March 6, 2010 7:15 AM

Jesus loves you, but everyone else thinks you're a dick

When his life was ruined, his family killed, his farm destroyed, Job knelt down on the ground and yelled up to the heavens, “Why god? Why me?” and the thundering voice of God answered, “There’s just something about you that pisses me off.”

  • Stephen King

You have to know that your day is off to a flying start when the first headline you see is:

VATICAN HIT BY GAY SEX SCANDAL

I’m not certain if I should be feeling like a kid in a candy store…or if this is just piling on? I mean; Christianity has taken a whole lot of hits over the past few months, right? Perhaps I should just step back and let the jokes write and tell themselves? Do the zealots really need my help engaging in self-parody…or is reflexive, brain-dead zealotry it’s own reward?

Of course, there’s no way I’d pass this up. It’s like Cliff Lee throwing a 45 MPH fastball down the middle of the plate. Even I should be able to put that into play, no? Man, I’ve got to think that somewhere on a barstool in a tropical paradise, Jesus Christ is weeping into his Negro Modelo….

We could start with the Texas Taliban, a group calling itself Repent Amarillo that’s taken a few pages out of the Taliban’s playbook in attempting to enforce their narrow, ignorant Christian ideology upon innocent locals. This in a country founded by those fleeing religious oppression. Apparently, reports of the death of irony were WAY premature….

As I’ve grown older, I’ve come to realize that religion, while noble in concept, has devolved into little more than an method for wolves to dominate and control the sheep among us. It’s not about love, compassion, charity, or tolerance…in any shape, manner or form. It’s about people in positions of authority using and twisting theology to enforce their own ignorance and prejudice upon those insufficiently intellectually agile to think for themselves. Not that there aren’t good and decent adherents of any religion, of course, but their voices tend to be easily crowded out by those primarily interested in money, power, and control. Compassion? Yeah, right; try explaining this…and don’t get me started on the well-fed White hypocrites in charge of the Catholic Church….

I think Karl Marx was heading in the right direction when he referred to the “opiate of the masses”…except it’s not capitalism. It’s religion, which has done more damage and killed more people than capitalism could ever hope to.

And you wonder why I hold organized religion is such low esteem….

I understand that some of my readers may fancy themselves as committed to a religion, and I would never be one to denigrate an individual’s personal faith or spirituality. In a historical sense, though, it would be difficult to refute that religion can be divined as an underlying cause of and/or reason for most military conflicts since the Crusades. How many human beings have died because of arguments over theology writ large?

And it just becomes progressively sillier. When the American Family Association can seriously suggest that a killer whale be stoned to death for killing its trainer, you have to know that the crazy train has long since left the station. (Uh…isn’t it called a “Killer Whale” for a reason?) I’m assuming that the AFA will attempt to convert the whale to Christianity before it stones the poor, dumb animal? After all, you’d think they’d want to ensure that the whale would go to Heaven, no? This is what happens when you ignore Scripture, y’all….

What else could you reasonably expect from a collection of loons famous for it’s manufactured annual “War on Christmas”? The lengths to which these good, God-fearing Christians will go to take offense is truly breath-taking. And let’s not even consider the chutzpah involved in fashioned yourself as oppressed in a nation where Christianity is the majority religion….

I hadn’t realized this, but apparently God is a Republican. How else would you explain so many Right-wing Republicans claiming the imprimatur of the Almighty as they attempt to force their loony fear- and ignorance-based agenda down the throats of all Americans. SOCIALISM!! GOVERNMENT-CONTROLLED HEALTH CARE!! ATHEISTS IN THE WHITE HOUSE!!! Yada yada yada….

But despite its constant promotion of theological government and hate rhetoric, the AFA is not fringe in terms of influence. There are many powerful GOP lawmakers and leaders who regularly frequent the AFA radio program and AFA events, such as Reps. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), Steve King (R-IA), Trent Franks (R-AZ), Tom Price (R-GA), as well as Sens. Jim DeMint (R-SC), Mike Johanns (R-NE), and Sam Brownback (R-KS).

Despite the propaganda we’ve been fed to since we were old enough to understand that Islam is of Teh Devil, this is not a Christian nation. If you could be bothered to look around, you’d see that this is a secular nation ruled by a pronounced Christian minority…and that’s no small distinction. There’s this little thing I like to call the separation of Church and State that’s supposed to protect us from Christian mullahs who would stop at nothing to turn this Republic into a theocracy along the lines of Iran. Think I’m kidding? Inherent in the message of groups like Repent Amarillo is the belief that their Christian ideology is the One True Faith, and those who refuse to knuckle under will be deservedly crushed. Yes, these folks are a distinct minority, but they have the faith, the certainty, the arrogance, and the belief that they are destined to prevail.

I grew up Lutheran…and I can’t recognize ANY of this as being part and parcel of the religion I was taught. If what’s going on around us is representative of the teachings of Jesus Christ, then I’m the Queen of England. This has nothing to do with Christian love, charity, and tolerance. It has everything to do with power, control, and the ability to force your will and prejudice upon lesser mortals.

WE DESERVE BETTER.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on March 6, 2010 7:15 AM.

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