More Pictures of Religious Hatred

As an atheist, I LOOOVVVVVVE those cretins. They turn more people away from religion than I ever could.

I guess the "swindlers" and "thieves" part pretty much determines where Jack Abramoff and Ralph Reed are going to go.

This reminds me of the post on this blog the other day saying that Bush is not a theocrat. He may not be, but do you think he disagrees with these people on anything? I don't.

Ed - don't you think they've got a point? I mean to say that those verses they're quoting are in the Bible, and the Bible is quite unequivocal in its condemnation of homosexuality. So they are just being consistant Christians. Their views are abhorrent, but they are the views of the Bible, which is their holy book. Isn't hard for a Christian who tolerates homosexuality to be consistent with the word of the Bible?

Ian -- I for one don't think so. Just try to picture Jesus on the street corner holding an "AIDS is the cure" sign.

Ian -- Whether the Bible condemns homosexuality depends on who is reading it,so I do not agree that it unequivocably condemns it. The Old Testament is rife with laws prohibiting homosexuality, but the Gospels say nothing about it. Jesus had bigger issues on his mind, I believe. As a Christian who accepts (not just tolerates) homosexuality, I don't find it inconsistent with the Word at all. Then again, I'm a Quaker, and not representative of these fundie pharisees in SF.

These are times when I am reluctant to say I'm a Christian.

wheatdogg,

I am writhing in anguish at your last statement, "These are times when I am reluctant to say I'm a Christian."

No. In all truth, there is no writhing, nor is there joy in their anguish, I find no disagreement in what you were saying, there is only sadness in knowing that people can place so much Faith in believing that they know what is Right and what is Wrong when encountering their Religion.

The first Epiphany I discovered in my Bible is that Jesus did not write a single word of it. His disciples observed Him and then told His story. While guided by their Faith, they were not Jesus, nor were they God. How could anyone expect them to write that story perfectly, without any errors, without any contradictions, even with a Divine finger guiding the placement their words?

People place their fears into things. That is the truth. That is reality.

Poor Ian was just trying to apply a (misguided) Scientific Argument to explain why any person would ever use the image of God to justify the destruction of one "Thing" or another.

Science is a blessing. It seeks to understand empirical reality. It seeks to explain the nature of things that we all must share, because we are alive, because we are all human, because we can understand each other if we choose to.

I would never choose to force a person?s head underneath the waters of a baptismal font just to prove that they would struggle against me. As my victim sputters up to the surface of those waters to declare "I was wrong. You were right!" could I ever claim that my hand was the hand of God?

Science is about proving things. Religion is not.

That is an important distinction. Both sides can be abused.

Never be reluctant to declare yourself a Christian. Scream it. You can explain yourself afterwards. You are never required to prove it. You are only required to live it.

For Ian, the Bible is equally as unequivocal in condemning homosexuality as it is for eating SHELLFISH. Yes, the old testament prohibits eating any fish that do not have fins and gills, including shrimp, crab, lobster, squid, etc. One of the other passages in the Bible that has been construed to be against homosexuality at the same time condones treating women as sexual property. Note that Jesus pretty unequivocally said nothing about homosexuality and lots about loving each other.

You know, in looking at that sign about not inheriting gOD's Kingdom, I couldn't help but chuckle, if they are a window into who I'll hang out with in this kingdom, then fine by me. What I find strange is that, okay, they believe that AIDS is gOD's punishment, on top of already going to hell for eternity, so why do they need to do anything else about it?
And is it just me, or do these groups have a strange undercurrent of sexism? Why, for example, is being "effeminate" going to keep you out of this kingdumb?
Here in Davis, we have crazy preachers with signs that come to the university campus regularly. One of their signs, however, is a list of things that make them sick, and "women" is one of them. Granted, they say "rebellious women", but in every case except for that one the adjective and the noun are in the same font, which says something.
http://www.daviswiki.org/Preachers_with_Signs
The LGBT center sends out a couple rainbow flags to bug them.

The other day here in town, groups of what appeared to be men from the "shelters" were carrying similar signs in a slow walk and corner posting (one on each corner along a few intersections). I was curious, so i walked by the main shelter just up the street and was not surprised to find that the signs and men were coming from there. It is one of those "faith based charities" that receives some of the block grant monies from the Fed to provide meals and lodging for the homeless and destitute. As one of the all too many provisions of their access to this shelter (this one is new, rather luxurious in some sense with better food, etc.), rather than to some of the other nearby shelters downtown, these men were "asked" to fulfill this part of the mission. Interesting how evangelical/fundamentalist sects support hate of others as part of their creed. I am not very appreciative of my Federal funds being used that way to say the least.

The Old Testament is rife with laws prohibiting homosexuality, but the Gospels say nothing about it.

*sigh* No, that's not true--the latter part, that is. What the Bible "says" is always completely up to the person reading it. So, for instance, Jack Chick can determine that Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed because of homosexuality by reading Jude. People will quote Romans 1:27. And they can read homosexuality into several other verses as well, such as I Corinthians and I Timothy.

Then again, other people can read the Bible and say Jesus did talk about gays, but didn't condemn them.

I never understood why the chapters that are letters from St. Paul, who did nto convert to Christianity until Jesus was alreayd dead, and never heard him in person, are considered "gospel" like the 4 Gospels are. But what do I know, I am a Muslim. If people would ignore both the old testament and St. Paul and get their Christianity only from the New Testament, there would be nothing to say at all about homosexuality, as far as my limited knowledge tells me.

Similarly, in Islam, the only passages that seem to condemn homosexuality are uttered by Lot, not directly by God-as-narrator of the Quran, which seems to me to make it a relatively weak condemnation - surely if God felt that strongly about it He would ahve taken the time to discuss it directly as He did so many other issues. Which is why I never understood why religious fundies in my religion get so incensed about gayness.

Then again, I may just be weird.

Ian Gibson wrote:

Ed - don't you think they've got a point? I mean to say that those verses they're quoting are in the Bible, and the Bible is quite unequivocal in its condemnation of homosexuality. So they are just being consistant Christians. Their views are abhorrent, but they are the views of the Bible, which is their holy book. Isn't hard for a Christian who tolerates homosexuality to be consistent with the word of the Bible?

I actually agree that the Bible really does condemn homosexuality and frankly, I've never found the attempts to explain away such condemnation or reinterpret it (a la Bishop Spong) to be convincing. I have no doubt that the ancient Hebrews believed homosexuality to be an abomination. Now, for me personally, I just don't care what the Bible says about it because I don't think the Bible is any more the "word of God" than any other book that claims to be. So yes, I agree that they are being consistent with their literalist theology, but that doesn't really affect the point of this post - it's hateful, regardless of whether they think God agrees with them or not.

I agree with Ed's last comment here. Many, if not most topics in the bible can bedebated due to it's unclear nature on virtually everything but not homosexuality.

I also agree that giving the bible deference because of an 'assumed' belief makes little sense. I also agree that the fundies pictured are reading the book accurately on this topic.

But the bigger issue I think is the number of people who believe in a loving God and the belief in 'hell'. It is perhaps the single most horrid belief in mankinds history I for one find it increasingly impossible to reconcile with a loving God.

The sad thing about religion in the US has been the seeming dominance of the noisy right-wing element in politics and the media. They subscribe to a very narrow interpretation of Scripture, usually literal (although selectively literal -- many probably eat shellfish, for example), and apocalyptic. We have had a secretary of interior, James Watt, for example, who believed that the world will eventually come to an end in the Rapture, so there was no need to preserve natural resources for later generations. No doubt there are similar beliefs in this current administration.
As Anna_in_Cairo points out, the letters of Paul feature heavily in the NT, and it is Paul's interpretation of Jesus' words that the fundies rely so much on. My wife suggests they should be called Paulists, and not Christians, but I doubt the tag will catch on. Their vision of the divine is a strange mix of the OT version of a loving, yet occasionally violent, vengeful, and jealous parent with the NT version of God-on-Earth preaching the ultimate patience and loving-kindness of the Divine. At times they deify Jesus to the point of his replacing the Father, and invoke the Holy Spirit as if it were as easy as calling up the Ghostbusters. I have visited pentacostal church services and I find the experience very uncomfortable. The noise (for me anyway) tends to make any sort of thoughtful worship impossible, and the sermons at times have been particularly weird. I have heard preachers suggest that Catholics are not really Christian, poke fun at the muezzins' call to prayer, and preach politics instead of faith.
Worse yet, for me, is that they have co-opted the word Christian to mean only their narrow version of Christianity. So, thalidomideglow, I tend not to identify myself initially as a Christian in conversation, since the very word nowadays carries so much emotional, theological and political baggage. Better to say I am a Friend or a Quaker, and then explain we are Christians (well, for the most part -- some Friends would more identify with Buddhists or Jews).
Hell, as it turns out, was a latecomer to Christian theology. It features prominently in Revelations, and may have resulted from associationwith manichean theology, Greek thought, and Zoroastrianism. Jesus himself did not seem too concerned with it. His remark of, "Get thee behind me, Satan," may have been added long after Jesus' death. The fundies, though, believe in a literal Heaven and Hell, so anyone who does not subscribe to their theology is headed downstairs, or at the very least, not caught up in the Rapture. (I refer of course to the hack novels of the Left Behind series).