Would you care to attend Fred Phelps' Westboro Baptist Church for a morning? Philip Bloom has a short documentary in which he used a hidden camera in the Phelps compound. It's as you might expect: raging howls of a sermon, condemnations and hatred, people hoping that millions of others die and go to hell. Phelps has 13 children (11 of whom are lawyers!) and 54 grandchildren, and looking around the pews there can't be many more attendees than that.
The end is particularly disturbing when two of Phelps' teenaged granddaughters come up to regurgitate the very same hate speech at the reporter. It's also kind of creepy because they look so alike, and like Shirley Phelps Roper, and Fred Phelps … just how inbred are these people?
I'm afraid, though, that there's a little interlude in the middle with a liberal minister in Topeka, and she's saying with such certainty the usual platitudes about how god is love and he wouldn't countenance Phelps' activities, etc., and I found that just as offensive as Phelps' screeching about god's nature and desires. They're both ignorant, and they're both saying what they think their congregation wants to hear.
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Crashes under Firefox (with Quicktime) and IE (with Quicktime). I'm sure it's scary though.
Have you seen Louis Theroux's documentary-ish thing on them? ('The Most Hated Family In America': http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4413388146858417528 ) He didn't have to use a hidden camera, and it's really quite interesting/disturbing.
God is love... OF SMITING!
NB: That video seems kind of slow to load, but it's the only copy I can find. It really is worth watching, though... You get to see a somewhat different side to some of them. I, at least, ended up feeling great pity for the granddaughter Louis spends the most time talking to, rather than hating her.
Every time I see that family I think there must be some inbreeding going on. I think Daddy Phelps has been a very bad boy. Some of his daughters have left the church, I hear, and no longer speak to him. I wonder why.
If you can take any more of the hating here's another 'God Hates' documentary about the Phelps clan by the British actor Keith Allen (father of Lilly). http://tinyurl.com/2qh2kz
It's scary how people can be so brainwashed once their petty fears and hatreds are justified. I think the mind-boggling thing is that I didn't realize Phelps used to be a civil rights lawyer.
How the hell does one person become that unhinged? I'd like to just chalk it up to simple self-loathing, but he seems to be suffering some pretty severe mental illness(es).
Crazy, evil bastards all.
Raise your hand if you think Fred Phelps is gay.
It seems that every time you hear some religious zealot ranting about homosexuality it turns out they are gay or involved in other "sinful" sexual or illegal activities and were just engaging in what I call smoke screen piety.
I'd like to know what the apologists say about phelps. not much you can put a spin on to say that christianity is good and worth while.
"How the hell does one person become that unhinged?"
He read the Bible.
It says:
1) You must kill all homosexuals.
2) Nations that do not do this displease God.
3) God collectively punishes nations that displease him.
On a non-related note the BBC have Richard Dawkins on live (well, live a few minutes ago) answering listeners questions on God and religion. It should still be there - click the 'watch' link.
http://tinyurl.com/3xbotz
"You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do."
---Anne Lamott, writer. (See her non-fiction "Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith")
Sigh, it's really disappointing when people put up an equivalence between liberal christians and pseudo-nazi asshole dirtbags like Phelps. (Especially with the probably false insinuation that neither believe what they are saying.)
There's a measurable difference between the ones who you might have a reasonable argument with over coffee, and the ones who want to kill us all.
The bible doesn't say you must kill all homosexuals.
I found that just as offensive as Phelps' screeching about god's nature and desires.
No, PZ, hatred is always more offensive than love and tolerance. Come on. I grasp and sympathize with what you're trying to get across, but this is self-parody.
That's right. It only says we must kill the male homosexuals who act on it. That's a BIG difference, isn't it?
Phelps is so scary because, unlike the liberal Christians, he really does get his morality from the Bible.
FhnuZoag
You are, of course, absolutely correct, FZ, and the measurable difference is how much time they spend alternately ignoring or interpreting the bible.
Case in point:
Leviticus 20:13If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.
Pwned.
Watched Louis Theroux's special a few months ago... it's really sad actually. The one girl he spent most of the time talking to clearly was very conflicted. You could tell that she must have wanted to leave at one time but just couldn't bring herself to lose her entire family and the whole world she'd grown up with. Not uncommon for victims of abuse, which all of the Phelps kids certainly are.
"Leviticus 20:13If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable."
What if he does it differently?
Speaking of hate-sermons:
"They're both ignorant, and they're both saying what they think their congregation wants to hear."
whoa, project much?
The Bible most certainly does advocate violence against gay people.
I hate to trot out Leviticus again but here we go:
20:13 If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
The italicization of the last part is from the The Skeptic's Annotated Bible.
Which makes us wonder, why haven't they put Ted Haggard to death yet? Perhaps their Bible contains more contradictions than they're willing to admit.
Sigh, it's really disappointing when people put up an equivalence between liberal christians and pseudo-nazi asshole dirtbags like Phelps. (Especially with the probably false insinuation that neither believe what they are saying.)
1) Funny how the outrage by other christians against Phelps didn't move from the "tsk-tsk" stage until he stopped limiting his vile spew to "teh gai". Then he was just an extremeist, but as soon as he starts picking on people christians like, THEN he's evil and MUST BE STOPPED.
2) When Christians stop using Stalin to represent athiests, I'll give a fuck about their protests about Phelps being used to represent them.
As said, Phelps has 13 children and 54 grandchildren. That puts his Simple Darwinian Fitness higher than most humans. Indeed there is no justice.
One side says God is Love.
Another side says God is Hate.
Couldn't we split the difference?
Why not say: God is Apathy.
Religious activism would be a contradiction in terms.
"As said, Phelps has 13 children and 54 grandchildren. That puts his Simple Darwinian Fitness higher than most humans. Indeed there is no justice."
Fitnes higher for now. What happens when his ignorant hatred-soaked type (because of their natural tendencies) decide to have an all-out killing war with others of the same ilk? Short term fitness...whatever.
Tony P and others,
Wrong. The bible most definitely does not say to kill homosexuals, any more than it teaches that to kill blasphemers. The bible teaches that in pre-Christian-era Israel, practicing homosexuals (and blasphemers) were to be executed. It also gives about 600 other laws, none of which are in effect today--they were the civil laws for a nation that no longer exists, and they died with that nation. Of course, this is an inconvenient fact for many readers here, because it is much easier for bigots and the weak-minded to have a caricature for a villain. So people with no knowledge whatsoever of the relationship between the OT law and NT grace will insist that the levitical death sentences are still in effect. It is so easy to say that the Christians who (correctly) insist that there is no biblically-mandated executable offense are wrong and they just choose to ignore their own bible--because if they are right (which they are) you'd have to do more homework. But some people here are lazy, or just not up to the task, or both--so they the lazy route. No surprise there.
And please don't come back with Jesus' "jot and tittle" verse, unless you actually know what you are talking about.
John C. Welch
Huh? Christians have been condemning Phelps, who is not a Christian by the way, from day one.
On the other hand, Dahan, Evolution does not care one whit about long term fitness, if anything at all.
"Phelps has now been given two chances to show that he is capable of conducting himself in a manner that is expected of an attorney. On both occasions he had flagrantly violated the oath he swore to uphold. He should not be given a third opportunity to harm the public or the judicial system. Fred W. Phelps Sr. should be disbarred."
The Kansas Supreme Court agreed.
The justices wrote: "The seriousness of the present case coupled with his previous record leads this court to the conclusion that respondent has little regard for the ethics of his profession."
The justices concluded: "The practice of law is a privilege rather than a right and by his conduct, respondent (Phelps) has forfeited his privilege. We find he should be disciplined by disbarment and assessed the costs of this action." The date was July 20, 1979.
Everything one would ever want to know about these weasels can be found at the Topeka Capital-Journal website http://cjonline.com/webindepth/phelps/
Stanton #27,
Gota give ya that one.
heddle #26,
You make a common mistake in assuming the ignorance of those who post here to the bible, OT NT etc. Many of us here are quite well versed. I mayself have somewhere around 14 years of education in these matters.
You come off as a shrill apologist, and an abrasive one at that. Looking to troll a bit are we?
When different sects of Christians argue over what God (or the Bible) really says and means, it's similar to when different schools of astrology argue over what the stars and planets really advise or portend.
You can pick out which groups are making sense anyway. You can examine which groups are closer to "classic" methods. You can distinguish between groups that have come up with astrological charts which only inspire benign or even positive actions when seen from a non-astrological perspective -- verses the groups which routinely advocate violence, or inspire their followers to see dangers and benefits which differ greatly from the non-astrological perspective.
But when push comes to shove, astrology is pseudoscience, and it should be thrown out. Heaping praise or compliments on the nice, normal astrologers who have managed to hook astrology up with basic psychology, history, or common sense is counterproductive. "Today is a good day to get to those projects you have been putting off, help someone else, and thank someone else who helped you, because Leo is on the cusp." No, they are not "doing astrology the correct way."
One might argue that they are doing it a better way than the yahoos who are claiming that the planet Mars in Capricorn means it's time to go to war -- but in a sense there is still a dangerous equivalence. The results are different, sure, but the methods are the same. And there is no objective, neutral ground where it becomes clear that the methods of some astrologers are right because non-astrologers like the results -- but the other ones are wrong, because non-astrologers don't like the results.
Since when do either the stars or the gods care what skeptics think?
Heddle, the ChristoFascists pick and choose whatever they want from either the Old Testament (Book of Dreck) or the New Testament (Book of Nonsense) to support whatever vision of God they choose for themselves in the context of whatever moral high horse they happen to be riding at the time of their choosing. It is an excuse for virtually anything and everything depending upon what one picks and chooses. Religion is an excuse for not having any morality based upon one's own thoughts, considerations and knowledgeable awareness, as well as an open door for authoritarian manipulation of the ignorant.
Oops. Change "methods are" to "system is."
PZ, you rightly and frequently say that religion doesn't cause people to be good or bad, but in can enable their worst instincts. The point is that people are going to be good or bad anyway, and their evil deeds are often done in the name of a god, which provides some cover from criticism.
Anyway, my point is that some people are good and some are bad, religion aside, and Fred Phelps is very, very bad. And to compare his fathomless hatred to a liberal preacher's message of love and tolerance is itself incredibly offensive and stupid. Come on. You know better than that.
And yes, I am an atheist and I think both preachers are wrong about the existance of a god...but Fred is most certainly infinitely more dangerous and despicable than some anodyne milquetoast liberal preacher.
Didn't Calvinist Geneva execute some people for sodomy? I guess they weren't Christians, either.
Yes, I know that Christians do both good and evil, and that atheists do both good and evil. I equate Phelps and that liberal preacher because the real difference between us isn't our potential for good and evil, but how we resolve our choice: both that preacher and Phelps, rather than using reason and human values, make an authoritarian appeal to an unknowable entity, and both claim to know the motivations of that supernatural being.
They're both lying, one for love and one for hate. I don't care what their goals are, they're both doing the same thing...lying.
Phelps is blatantly contemptible, and I don't think the majority of Americans are likely to succumb to his particular evil delusions. That preacher? More dangerous. Many will see her message as attractive, and will not question her methods at all.
Heddle:
'The bible teaches that in pre-Christian-era Israel, practicing homosexuals (and blasphemers) were to be executed'.
A perfect example of how moral relativism lies at the heart of Christianity. We atheists supposedly are dangerous because we don't believe in some objective, transcendent set of moral laws. However, according to the Bible, things were mandated in ancient Israelite society (e.g. executing gays) that would now be considered morally wrong if they were carried out today. Either homosexual behaviour is an 'abomination' worthy of death or it is not. According to Heddle and his ilk it all depends where and when in history it took place. Absurd.
That aside, what kind of a 'God' EVER mandates execution for gay sex or for 'blasphemy'? Well, the kind of God that also has no problem with slavery, stoning, burning, hand chopping, genocide, and war crimes, and who sends disease, wild animals, famine, and armies against his own 'chosen people', a God who dashes babies to the ground and rips open pregnant women (Hosea 13:16).
Windy
You point is precisely why, despite what the John-Birch-like black-helicopter types 'round here would have us believe (that there is a reconstructionist under every bed) the majority of Christians are not theonomists. A theocracy, such as Calvin's Geneva, can certainly enact death sentences for things like blasphemy--but what they cannot do is make a biblical case that it was the right thing to do.
Edmund,
No you are not dangerous. You like to think that we think you are dangerous, but we don't. We have this verse that teaches us that he who is within us is stronger than he who is in the world--so why would there be any reason to consider atheists dangerous? They are impotent when it comes to posing any risk to Christianity.
The bible is chock-full of situational ethics, and civil laws are a prime example.
Deuteronomy orders that disobedient children be taken to the city gate and stoned to death.
Sounds pretty drastic and these days that would get you a long jail sentence.
What struck me as odd, no one has ever found piles of tiny bones at the gates of ancient Jewish cities. Nor AFAIK, has anyone ever done anything like this.
My best guess. When whoever was writing Deuteronomy was frothing at the mouth and ranting and raving, the average Israeli just shrugged their shoulders, said what a nutcase, and ignored him. Maybe he was the Fred Phelps of 1000 BC.
i think we should be a little more careful about lumping the whole of the bible in with the "wrathful god" idea. presuming that the bible is all one thing is the same basic mistake that the fundamentalists make, and it is utterly untrue.
in particular, with the homosexuality issue, there are two very diverse sides presented in the bible. the bit that commands the execution of "men who lay with men" is, frankly, taken a little bit out of context by everyone. it's in a section of sexual commandments, in a book of ritual purity laws directed at the priestly class (leviticus), and is meant to be in strict contrast to the canaanite fertility cults. in those cults, it was common practice for the priests to engage in sexual relations with the people, as a form of worship. bodily fluids considered offerings. it's something the authors of bible generally despised (sodom is probably a mangling of this practice, and ham's rape of noah is probably regarding the same thing). so leviticus commands the priests to engage in no such activities -- no temple prostitution.
are consentual homosexual relationships out? well, look at david and jonathan. the greatest king israel ever had had a gay lover. so while mixing sex (any kind of sex) with religion = abomination, it appears that the butt-sex itself isn't that big of an issue, even in the old testament.
heddle, you state that "A theocracy, such as Calvin's Geneva, can certainly enact death sentences for things like blasphemy--but what they cannot do is make a biblical case that it was the right thing to do."
As you would say...wrong. They certainly could and did. It's just a case you, yourself, don't happen to believe or agree with. It certainly has as much merit as any other though. That's the problem. You can use the bible to justify just about damn near anything you want to believe. Since it's a fairy tale anyways, why not just leave it be and think for yourself?
"We have this verse that teaches us that He who is within us is stronger than he who is in the world -- so why would there be any reason to consider atheists equal citizens? They who are only of the world are impotent when it comes to justifying their worth, value, and rights."
"We have this verse that teaches us that he who is within us is stronger than he who is in the world -- so why would there be any reason to refrain from fighting the infidel? They are impotent when it comes to posing any risk to the dominion of Allah over the world."
Yes, I know. My point is not that these are all saying the same thing, or that they are equivalent. It's that when you start out believing that you have an Inner Strength within you that is not of this world -- that you are guided by a Supernatural Force which cannot be resisted -- tolerance for others does not necessarily follow as night follows day.
It can just as easily flip the other way -- and then they will also point sincerely and confidently and with the utmost humility to the Word of God or their own Undeniable Personal Revelation -- and shake their heads ruefully over those who misinterpret, distort, ignore, and fail to understand.
"Proper scholarship" is not going to resolve disputes among sects and religions. If it could there wouldn't be all the sects and religions. The only way to resolve different appeals to God is for GOD ITSELF to make it completely clear who really got everything right. And not by "working through men." No. Not by natural disasters and portents in the heavens. No. Directly.
Don't settle for a substitute, I say.
I get the impression from Heddle that many Christians consider the Old Testament "mythology" while the New Testament is "truth." The concept of Salvation by Grace is a true path from the mythological punishments of the stone-your-kids God to eternal bliss in heaven, right? Wait, wait, I think I feel a verse coming on from the New Testament:
It may just be me, but it seems as though God is leading apostates to homosexuality, "harding their hearts," or something like it.
God is Love, Sailor.
In my book, that raises even more theological problems than if solves.
As a homosexual, ex-jesuit, I love it when people tell me that the Bible clearly condems homosexuality. They always refer to Leviticus.
I calmly remind them that :
The original hebrew Mosaic code :
"V'et zachar lo tishkav mishk'vey eeshah toeyvah hee."
First part describes what one shall not do :
"V'et zachar lo tishkav mishk'vey eeshah",
literally means :
"And with a male you shall not lay lyings of a woman"
now, this clearly does not refer to what we modern consider as homosexual acts nor relationships.
Nobody knows what it means. Does it mean you should not go in the bed of a woman with another man ? Does make sense as those days, the bed of a woman was sacred.
Second part "toeyvah hee" is an even bigger problem :
"toeyvah" got translated into "abomination" (ie moral sin) but the correct word for that should have been "zimah". Moreover, in the greek Septuagint (the OT of the earliest Christian bibles), it got translated into "bdelygma" which means "ritual impurity".
(on the same level as, for example;
getting a tattoo, planting a grass seed mixture in one's front lawn, wearing a cotton-polyester shirt, eating shellfish, munching on some barbequed pork ribs, or eating supper with a person who follows another religion.)
Conclusion, what the writer(s) of Leviticus meant was for sure very different from what we consider as homosexuality, and how strongly it was condemned is unclear in the hebrew version, and just an impurity (not a sin) in the greek version.
Of course, I am not even talking about the basic assumption as to whether the writer(s) of Leviticus were truly "inspired" by God, that's just a waste of time with a Christian.
Believe me, I do convert quite a number of Christians to accepting homosexuality with this. It might be a long way to getting them to understand a more important idea that the only "God inspiritation" is that of "thinking in one's head", but that's a different issue alltogether.
"Wrong. The bible most definitely does not say to kill homosexuals, any more than it teaches that to kill blasphemers."
God's hatred for homosexuality and his desire that its practitioners be killed is spelled out in stark language in multiple places in both OT and NT. In Romans, Paul himself concludes that homosexuals and other perverts are "worthy of death"
"The bible teaches that in pre-Christian-era Israel, practicing homosexuals (and blasphemers) were to be executed."
For well over 1000 years, Christians have construed the Bible as calling for the death of homosexuals, and acted upon that interpretation. Christian violence towards homosexuals is so pervasive and so well-documented that you just can't escape from it with a simple "well that was only Leviticus."
Phelps' is adhering to the traditional interpretation of the Bible. Everyone disagreeing with him is going with a modern, cherry-picked version.
It clearly means "no gangbangs".
"I love it when people tell me that the Bible clearly condems homosexuality. They always refer to Leviticus."
Sorry, but:
1) It's not just Leviticus that condemns homosexuality, nor is it a single passage in Leviticus.
2) It's condemned in Greek, in the New Testament.
3) The multiple references taken as a whole make a pretty airtight case that they are indeed talking about homosexuality.
4) Dozens of major, extremely influential Christian writers throughout the centuries have upheld this view.
5) It's really only in the modern world that you get revisionists trying to argue that it doesn't.
I did enjoy the Keith Allen piece, thanks for the link Sigmund.
I loved when he caught her out that her son was illegitimate, and that she was being a hypocrite (not that the rest of us didn't already figure that out) for letting herself off the hook. It was just a moment of deer-in-headlights. I laughed so hard I nearly dropped my computer.
Now, as interesting as it is watching Mr Allen pick apart their arguments, I wonder if we should all just start ignoring them.
Bullies love attention, so perhaps we should just start ignoring these folks as best we can. You know, just do the bare minimum to make sure their noise doesn't hurt anyone; my guess is they would likely be the ones who will end up on the receiving end of any hurt.
Perhaps I am rosy-eyed here, but I would think that if we ignored them, eventually they would fade out; both in terms of psychological impact and in terms of the continuation of their group.
Just my two bits.
negentropyeater
Conclusion, what the writer(s) of Leviticus meant was for sure very different from what we consider as homosexuality, and how strongly it was condemned is unclear in the hebrew version, and just an impurity (not a sin) in the greek version.
Neg, are you still a christian? I assume you are, because you seem to be grasping at straws. I noticed you didn't translate, "They shall both be put to death and their blood shall be upon them." I think in the context of executing two people, it's not a stretch to imagine what the sin could be.
Secondly, if a Christian buys your argument, then the logical thing to do is not to accept homosexuality, but to reject Christianity. Imagine that God wanted to give you his Word, and he was so sloppy that he accidentally left something in there that could be misinterpreted to mean that you should KILL PEOPLE for no good reason. If anyone's serious about the bible, then they should learn Greek & Hebrew and spend a life time studying it. And then they shouldn't believe anything at all, because everything has 3 interpretations, and there's a lot of different shit in there, and it only seems that these different interpretations come to light when society shifts.
Conclusion: The Bible is a rorschach blot.
Also -- Here's a question -- If it's so accepted, and so obvious that Leviticus is a load of historical crap, why is it still in the bible? I haven't heard of any modern church that is willing to expunge anything out of the bible. Why not? Leviticus obviously causes more harm than good -- which is, by their own argument is not what God wanted. So why not just chuck it? Hm?
Heddle is lying for Jesus. In Matthew 19:16-19, Jesus says:
Notice that these are, in fact, a reiteration of some of the commandments. Which Heddle says don't count. Only, out of the mouth of Jesus, they seem to count.
Later in Matthew when one the Pharsisee's asked him which commandment (there are 613) was most important, Jesus out-smarted him by saying :
For those of us who actually understand this passage, (and aren't trying to bullshit their way around it) Jesus is summarizing the "worship God" commandments (the first five commandments) and the "be a good citizen" commandments (the second five commandments).
Anyway, this blog isn't the place, nor is now the time. I would suggest that if you're interested in understanding what Jesus said about following the commandments, you read elsewhere. And ignore Heddle.
Gerber,
your points 2) and 3) are factually incorrect. Please substantiate. Provide the greek text, and the literal translation(s). Not the interpretations which were made in the modern translations from the middle ages onwards.
Moreover, there are numerous other historical evidences that the populations of the east mediteranean bassin (from Israel to Greece) were at that time very tolerant of homosexual behaviours.
It all changed in the early middle ages, and got perpetuated until recently, as you say, in your point 4).
Hm. Since our apologist mentions Calvin, I thought I would look him up.
It seems that Calvin didn't get the memo about Leviticus. Almost the entire foundation of his Hamrony of the Law (note: Law) is based on Leviticus.
Christian liberals are fish in a barrel compared to fundamentalist. They not only have to believe in God, but they have to deny 90% of everything ever written 'by' or about him.
Inkadu,
I've received a Jesuit education, but always been skeptical of the validity of the claims. I reject all supernatural aspects of Christianity. I'm interested with the Bible from purely a historical perspective.
It has been demonstrated by numerous theologians that the "They shall both be put to death and their blood shall be upon them." was added in Leviticus 20:13 much later on.
That the folks from the early middle ages onwards (of which this Mr Phelps is a vestige) hated homosexuals and used bad interpretations (not translations, interpretations) of old documents to justify their hate is also clear to me.
The absolute saddest part was his interview with Phelps' teenage granddaughters. Those girls have been brainwashed all their lives by him, and now it will continue for at least another generation. I hope somebody breaks the spell.
Negen --
Thanks for your reply.
I have no idea to validate what you say is true or not, but assuming it is true, assuming that we know how the tools to uncover what the bible REALLY meant, or to confess that verses are hopelessly ambigious, why don't the religious, to whom an accurate bible would be most imporant, issue a thoroughly revised edition? And from a strictly Christian perspective, why is so much of the Old Testament included? I understand the need to have your savior prophesied, but of what use Leviticus?
(there -- I think there's one "graduate level" sentence in that paragraph)
I'm also not sure than acceptance of homosexuality makes a defining case for interepretation. We don't allow slavery anymore, but in a thousand years, scholars can point to our translations and say, "They still translated the passages in ways that support slavery."
Inkadu,
check "The Pagan Christ". Some are trying to change things.
It was all meant to be alegorical. Obscurantism in the middle age changed that.
The US Evangelicals are trying to make sure we revert to the middle ages because they are thinking Enlightenment = Communism.
These are people find joy in hating people, and they love being hated by every outsider.
Why hatred? Because the 'fire' of hatred completely masks feelings of uncertainty, sadness, apprehension, dread, and depression. Hatred is free, and lacks the health and legal complications of amphetamine use. They can feel they're doing good by being bad. Cf. The Klan.
"When Christians stop using Stalin to represent athiests, I'll give a fuck about their protests about Phelps being used to represent them."
Somewhere along the line, I thought we were supposed to be *better* than them. Well, if we sink to the same dirty tactics, remember - at the end of the day, there's more of them than there are of us.
"I equate Phelps and that liberal preacher because the real difference between us isn't our potential for good and evil, but how we resolve our choice: both that preacher and Phelps, rather than using reason and human values, make an authoritarian appeal to an unknowable entity, and both claim to know the motivations of that supernatural being."
I think being good, and specifically not being a jerk trumps ideological correctness. Heck, what does it matter that the liberal christian is appealing to an unknowable entity, and not to a similarly unknowable 'human values'? (What, indeed, are atheist human values? Can a proposal that someone take up a value system be anything other than authoritarian? Why the heck is everyone ignoring this?)
If we follow the atheist paradigm, we have no fear that this 'God' is going to change its mind, since it would be purely a psychological construct, a method of reinforcing beliefs and values the believer already holds. How can it be authoritarian, when there is no actual authority, and a key part of the belief system is that people should be allowed to make religious attachments freely? And besides, empirically speaking, what does it matter at all, so long as good is done or not done?
But it seems the other commenters on this blog seem content to play into the hands of the biblical literalists, and to construct strawmen instead. What a pointless, masturbatory, waste of time.
Phelps should go and see a Psychiatrist, I'm sure he'll get prescribed synthetic Oxytocin. Then his God will tell him not to hate homosexuals anymore
inkadu:
Apparently I missed the part where this thread was renamed 'Competition To Tar With Biggest Brush'. The liberal Christian may be the proverbial fish in a barrel, but that doesn't make Phelps' version of religion less obviously toxic than other variants. It clearly is quite a bit more toxic, and it is also quite clearly both pathological and isolated. Even extremely conservative ministers like Jerry Falwell made it their business to distance themselves from Phelps' teachings, after all.
One could have a meaningful debate about differences in degree and differences in kind, I suppose, but that's not happening here.
On the other side, inkadu asks a good question about the failure of all Christians to get rid of things like the above-cited passages in Leviticus. But at some level, I think, this is like asking why The Merchant of Venice , with its obvious anti-semitism, is still acknowledged as part of the Shakespearean canon, much less performed. Apparently, in dealing with the Bard, the quality of mercy is not strained. We will forgive this as a product of his time, and yet some of us will strain mightily against the unpleasant asides embedded in old religious texts---which, old Will might well have remarked, can be quoted by the Devil for his purpose.
Yet, I hear atheists routinely cite with approbation H.L. Mencken's stinging barbs at the expense of Christianity. Does that mean that they endorse Mencken's unsavory personal views on Jews and blacks? Of course not, and Christians of various theological persuasions can look to the Bible for guidance without tackling the project of completely reediting, much less passing judgement upon, every aspect of the canon.
But people will object: after all, Menken's essays and Shakespeare's plays have not sponsored a death cult like Christianity, so the objection doesn't speak to power. But of course, the Epic of Gilgamesh was a Sumerian religious text, right? Would inkadu like to see translation of Gilgamesh stripped of their sexual content? If not, does he endorse the tyrant Gilgamesh's practice of personally deflowering all the maidens within his domain?
Well, these are all absurd questions of course, but no more so than the presumption that Fred Phelps represents Christianity, or that Christians are somehow obligated to delete or deny every passage of scripture that grates against our modern sensibilities. Ironically, such an argument deprives the believer of the context that so many of them desperately need in evaluating not just the claims of others, but of their own traditions.
Who is correct about God, Phelps or the liberal minister? At the most concrete level of analysis that's like arguing about whether Adam West's Batusi-dancing Caped Crusader or the grim vigilantism of Frank Miller's Dark Knight more faithly captures the true essence of Batman. Since that approach cannot produce conclusions absent arbitrary criteria, we could instead focus on practice and ask which set of beliefs results in more salutary behaviors. Alternatively, we could refuse to play ball altogether and reject any basis for action that appeals to extra-empirical and illogical concepts.
The problem is the last option is unlikely to be widely embraced. Don't like militant Christianity/Islam/Sikhism etc.? Chances of mass conversion to non-theism, on any timescale, are slim to none. So I will go along with commending the notion of a nice-guy (or gal) God for those unwilling to take the step to unbelief.
Colugo -- What you say would make sense if the bible were largely considered literature. Unforunately the Bible is considered law. And, as a "law book," I don't know why any Christians would object, or on what grounds they would object, to removing laws that are no longer valid (or never were valid) in order to make God's meaning more clear.
And I'd rather have people believe in a nice God than the Phelps God, certainly. And by claiming there is no God, I think I'm helping to do that. See, people will see the Old Testament God on one side of the argument, and these frothing-at-the-mouth atheists on the other, and conclude the reasonable conclusion must be that God is a decent liberal guy, like them. It's worked for Republicans.
OK, so focus on practice. What you will find is that there is nothing in the method that either one applies that will necessarily lead to rational behaviors—they're both village idiots, twirling about vacantly in the town square, and that one has been caught facing the school while the other is facing the prison does not tell you anything about where they will end up. Come back a little later and they may well each be facing the opposite way.
I commend neither. Both are practicing the same arbitrary nonsense. Encouraging one on the basis of short term good fortune gives you no reassurance for the future.
...Christians of various theological persuasions can look to the Bible for guidance without tackling the project of completely reediting, much less passing judgement upon, every aspect of the canon.
Then what is the value of that guidance?
But people will object: after all, Menken's essays and Shakespeare's plays have not sponsored a death cult like Christianity, so the objection doesn't speak to power. But of course, the Epic of Gilgamesh was a Sumerian religious text, right? Would inkadu like to see translation of Gilgamesh stripped of their sexual content? If not, does he endorse the tyrant Gilgamesh's practice of personally deflowering all the maidens within his domain?
Nonsense, it doesn't matter if the text in question used to be a religious text, only if it's proponents claim that it provides "guidance" beyond a normal fictional story.
Well, these are all absurd questions of course, but no more so than the presumption that Fred Phelps represents Christianity, or that Christians are somehow obligated to delete or deny every passage of scripture that grates against our modern sensibilities.
How about adding some footnotes?
Scott Hatfield: "Yet, I hear atheists routinely cite with approbation H.L. Mencken's stinging barbs at the expense of Christianity. Does that mean that they endorse Mencken's unsavory personal views on Jews and blacks?"
Scott Hatfield is absolutely correct; we atheists want it both ways. We want to castigate theists for the sins of their ancestors - Hebrew patriarchs, medieval popes, Muslim conquerors, Protestant fanatics, Mormon polygamists. Rub their noses in it like a dog that soiled on the rug. At the same time we want to honor our freethinker and progressive intellectual ancestors. Yet if anyone reminds us of our ancestors' sins we cry foul. Do we really want to dwell on what some of our ideological and philosophical forebears - of whom we are proud - thought of race, class and/or "good breeding"?
I know, the theists are supposedly external authority-seeking sheep who revere their worthless sacred texts while we, using our powers of reason, are capable of rationally rejecting the bad and keeping the good. But maybe all of us, theist and nontheist alike, have the gift of selective compartmentalization, rationalization, and interpretation. Otherwise, none of us would claim any heroes, ancestors, or traditions.
Gerber,
your points 2) and 3) are factually incorrect."
Romans, Corinthians, Jude are all pretty stark on the topic. Only by taking statements out of context, re-parsing them, and interpreting them in a manner contradictory to how they've always been interpreted can you argue otherwise.
"Please substantiate."
Well, let's see, every single major Christian denomination both historical and modern has taken the Bible as condemning homosexuality. Yours is unarguably a minority view.
"Provide the greek text, and the literal translation(s)."
With the Hebrew version, you took sentences out of context and then re-parsed them to make it seem they were saying things they weren't saying. I've read a few pages now that tried to make the same argument that you are about to make about the Greek and I'm not buying it, and neither is any major Christian organization in the world.
It's pretty darn clear, when you put all of the Bible's statements even potentially referring to homosexuality, that's its pretty negative to the idea.
"Not the interpretations which were made in the modern translations from the middle ages onwards."
Biblical and Christian writing condemning homosexuality predates the early Middle Ages, proceeds through the Middle Ages, and continues on in a straight line to the modern era.
"Moreover, there are numerous other historical evidences that the populations of the east mediteranean bassin (from Israel to Greece) were at that time very tolerant of homosexual behaviours."
Paul apparently didn't agree with them.
"It all changed in the early middle ages, and got perpetuated until recently, as you say, in your point 4)."
No, it started thousands of years before that in the Old Testament and runs in a straight line to the early church fathers, pre-Middle Ages.
PZ Myers, you're a douchebag.
You say that a despicable cult leader like Fred Phelps, who ceaselessly promotes hatred and violence, is no less offensive than a nice woman (however misguided) who is preaching love and peace? And your bellicose justification for this half-baked reasoning is that neither of them are using rational arguments? Come on!
Oops. First paragraph for Scott Hatfield. Second for Colugo.
#69:
To an extent PZ is right, both Phelps and the "nice old lady" are on the exact same road. Phelps is simply much further down it.
PZ's point is that endorsing either of those,for any reason, immediately puts you on that same road, and once you start down it it becomes very difficult to stop.
Now, I don't agree that they are both as despicable, but I do think that, in the long run, they're both as potentially dangerous.
Although the Old Testament (Jewish) God seems the more temperamental one compared to the New Testament (Christian) God, he is actually the more humane one (if you can call a deity that...)
Before the Common Era, there was no threat of eternal pain/punishment. The OT God had no eternal torture chamber - no everlasting fire. His hatred seemed to end at the grave, his revenge satisfied when his enemy was dead.
Not so with the NT God. Death is not the end, but the beginning of ever-lasting punishment. In the Common Era, the anger of the NT God is infinite and the hunger of his revenge eternal.
It is befuddling that this NT God, when incarnated in humble human flesh, told his disciples not to resist evil, to love their enemies, and when stricken in one cheek to turn the other. And yet this same "loving" NT God, upon his second coming, promised to send his mortal enemies into everlasting fire prepared for his immortal enemies (the devil and his angels.) No wonder most of his followers practice this same "Do as I say, not as I do" creed...
#71
I understand what PZ is saying, but arguing that both "are on the exact same road" is just ridiculous. They're both guilty of believing in fairy tales, but beyond that their roads don't converge at all.
Colugo:
This is in effect an ad hom attack on Mencken. Even if Mencken espoused the views on jews and blacks it wouldn't make his statements about religion less accurate.
Likewise if one wants to pick and choose from the bible and ignore the parts that bother you, feel free to do so. But don't pretend to know which parts are inspired or not.
This has part of it correct. The part that everyone needs to evaluate each others claims and their traditions. Unfortunately I have to say Phelps while clearly despicable in his actions can present as good a case as to why he should be preaching his way as the liberal preacher can themselves. And if in fact Phelps is correct and homosexuals are going to hell than he is more than doing what he thinks is correct. The problem is with his premise and your tap dancing around it doesn't change the fact he is consistent within his premise.
That being said of course atheists have doneand sad some crappy things who would say otherwise.
I love how people use Leviticus to condemn homosexuals, yet they themselves don't even follow Leviticus, and they just treat their annoying Bibles as though they are nothing more than an ala-carte menu for justifying their own petty hatreds.
So, usually, whenever someone trots out that whole Leviticus gibberish, I tend to shut them out of the conversation simply because I have no desire to deal with such gleaming, empty-headed hypocrites. That is, of course, unless the chattering homophobe actually does follow all the Levitican Laws --in which case, he or she would be in jail.
Ah well... I'm just ranting. Sorry folks.
The absurdity of such a position makes the mind reel. It is ideological masturbation--a fundamentalism that rivals any other variant in its demand for absolute purity. Repulsive, is what it is.
Well said, heddle.
I've always been annoyed when I hear folks talk about "atheist fundamentalists" but I think these few posts by PZ have earned the label.
It's interesting what happens to a thread if PZ doesn't update the website for a few hours, ennit?
As to the whole "same road" business, I think it's just a touch of over-simplification to say they are on the same road. Well, they might be on the same road, but there is a huge frickin' road block on it that keeps most christians from becoming phelps fantatics.
The argument made by Dawkins is that the nice-preacher lady can say Phelps is wrong, but that's all she can do. Phelps has the weight of scripture on his side. So, in the long run, that nice-preacher lady teaching that the Bible God is love is implicitly supporting Phelps. The bible is a time anchor, keeping some people forever in the past.
Comparing the effects of these preachers on society is like saying "whats worse, ebola or influenza?"
It's kind of funny when people complain that moderates in Islam need to more diligently voice their condemnation of extremists, and meanwhile you have this Christian woman doing exactly that for Christianity and the same people turn around to complain that she's the problem.
Here's a logical exercise for you all: you've got 1) a good-hearted progressive preacher who supports social justice because "god is love, and he wants it so". You've got 2) a deranged nitwit who wants a theocracy because "god is love, and he wants it so".
How do you justify accepting the argument of 1 while rejecting the argument of 2? Accept one's premise, you've got no grounds for rejecting the other's. They're the same argument. They're equally unjustified and untestable.
At best, you can probably convince #1 to shift her argument to humanitarian grounds, that we should aspire to equality and fairness because it is the right thing for human beings to do. Until she does, though, she's babbling out of her ass and giving ammunition to anyone who wants to make claims for whatever they want, on the basis of biblical authority and personal revelation.
Don't fall for the trap.
I pray to god that all this shit wasn't actually planned.
++++
But that's not what the Phelpsians say, is it? Their god hates.
PZ,
where did you hear Phelps saying "god is love, and he wants it so" ?
His message is "God hates men who don't follow (my) rules".
heddle is a goof who pretends to know something more then others about something that it is clearly impossible to do. I actually agree with him on some items but more from a fideist perspective than anything else. I don't think the majority of Christians are reconstructionists but enough of them are to warrant attention.
And Phelps is most certainly a Christian. You may not agree with him but he thinks he is following what Christ and the bible compels him to do. He is ill but is a Christian.
Yeah or you know some slick apologetic to get around it.
Who is this we? Do you speak for the Christians of this nation because I assure you as even the Golden Compass upheaval shows Christians are very afraid of atheist anything. More accurately anything pertaining to thinking outside the given parameters of their particular faith.
If you get a chance to see the louis theroux's "most hated family in america" documentary, you'll quickly realize that natural selection is going to put an end to fred phelps church soon. All the young girls are dedicated to the church and seem quite content with the idea that they will never marry and have families. It seems that there are not very many young men that wish to join the church, so there are no suitable suitors available for these girls who are all coming of age now.
The mental and physical abuse that the kids put up with is heartbreaking though.
HAHAHAHHAHA that has got to be one of the most ironic posts ever. heddle as a religious person buys all kinds of strange superstitious ideas THEN...
Then as a person whose ENTIRE blog is essentially mental masturbation of a particular ideology he makes the next statement THEN...
complains of a demand for purity when his very blog talks about the ONE way you can get to heaven- talk about irony THEN..
Calls it repulsive while going on his daily life making excuses for his accpetance of genocide and hell.
That is almost a perfect trifecta of hypocrisy in action. He wouldn't know repulsive if it hit him in the face and has no intellectual creditibility on anything in any event simply because of the blindness of the above.
PZ, I think you know you're being dishonest here.
The woman in the video doesn't claim that the only valid argument for treating each other with respect comes from her religious views. Stop tarring everybody with the same brush.
Oh and by the way while I do see PZ's point I think the nice liberal Christian lady is not in the same league perhaps because I favor that side myself. That being said her position is equally squalid when compared to Phelps if not for a modern mindset.
Perhaps looking at the two different ministers and their seemingly opposite messages can be looked at with an evolutionary paradigm[I know - paradigm : ugh]. One could look at their messages as branches of the same limb, but with Phelps phenotype being much more fixed and the "liberal" preacher being far more malleable in terms of future growth.
"How do you justify accepting the argument of 1 while rejecting the argument of 2? Accept one's premise, you've got no grounds for rejecting the other's. They're the same argument. They're equally unjustified and untestable."
I don't accept either's argument. But I do find one more offensive than the other. It is possible to disagree, perhaps disagree entirely, with someone, but still maintain respect. Both people's arguments are equally meaningless to me as an atheist, but I can accept the liberal lady as my neighbour, while Phelps I would consider a dangerous lunatic who might murder me in my sleep.
I'm not at all offended if our political leaders might believe in certain things privately, but I am offended by real manifestations of those beliefs in ways that interfere with my values. In this, there is a real and clear difference between those liberal Christians who believe in religious freedom and separation of church and state, and those extremists who oppose science, oppose freedom, and oppose peace.
Yes, I myself always prefer the bland but pleasant Sun Sign astrologers over those intense followers of the Vedic systems.
Exactly, FhnuZoag. PZ's false dichotomy is a little too obvious.
JImC, I don't like the term "atheist fundamentalist" either, but how can you read this analysis by PZ and call it anything else? I think that, although his own hypocrisy shows through, heddle got it right.
"beyond that their roads don't converge at all."
Yet.
I like to think of Phelps as a two wetsuit kind of guy.
PZ Myers: "...she's babbling out of her ass and giving ammunition to anyone who wants to make claims for whatever they want, on the basis of biblical authority and personal revelation."
A question for us rationalists: From whence come our views on ideology and ethics? Do we arrive at them from empiricism and reason alone, given some initial axioms (e.g. "Do unto others...")? We probably like to think so.
If that were the case, why do non-theistic rationalists largely agree on physical reality (yes, I know, there are active paradigmatic debates at the frontiers of many sciences) but have so much disagreement on ideology and ethics? (No, it's not just a rearguard of Randians. I'm talking about ethical and policy debates from transhumanism to animal rights.) And where there is relative consensus, what is the real source of that agreement?
Alternatively, perhaps the prescriptive beliefs of even non-theistic rationalists are more like the gnosis, revelation, and scripture of theists than we like to think. Maybe we arrive at those positions that fulfill psychological needs based on our idiosyncratic biases due to individual life histories, informed by culturally resonant stories and symbols, and reinforced by differential social approval. And once these positions are hardened, we provide them with post-hoc intellectual justifications.
I also find one's conclusions more offensive than the other's. But the way they come to those conclusions is equivalent and equally offensive.
And the liberal preacher is not excusable, nor am I putting words in her mouth. Her argument was that her god is a god of love. That is no argument at all.
PZ, all she said was that she thinks it "makes god sad" to see people mistreating eachother. So friggin' what? You are way too easily offended if her little comment fires you up as much as the "god hates fags" mob.
And you are way too unprincipled and mush-headed if you don't see that how we make decisions matters. Shall we just accept dogma as long as it currently returns the same answer as reason?
Context, context, context...
The translations of Romans 1 may not actually tell what Paul really meant. In describing any negative connotations of homosexual acts, two terms are used in the original text. The first is para physin( or physis) which is usually translated as "unnatural". However, unnatural has multiple meanings. The Stoics used the term to roughly mean "against natural law", but from the use of used elsewhere by Paul, it may mean "against one's personal nature", which would mean not being true to what you are. In the context of the Greco-Roman society and its sexual practices, it would mean a married man or woman using a prostitute in any and all possible combinations and also mean a heterosexual person committing a homosexual act [or vece versa]. The other term that Paul used was atemia which was translated to mean "degrading passions". The other meanings of atemia might be more applicable: something "not highly valued", "not held in honor", "not respected" or "socially unaccepable". This would change a homosexual act from "horrible" to something more like "icky". To emphasize the differnce in the use of atemia, Paul refers himself as atemia in 2 Corinthians 6 & 11 for being a Christian.
As additional information to muddy the waters about what was really meant in Romans 1, in Romans 2 Paul writes appears to contradict himself by condemning those who would pass judgement on others. In other passages in the Epistles that many interpretations have been used to assail homosexuality [1 Cor 6 & 1 Tim 1], the term that is used is malakos, which literally means "soft". As such it is ambiguous and could again refer to anyone who goes to a prostitute of either gender.
And one thing that Phelps and others who are so enamored with Leviticus is Paul's "get out of jail free" statement in Rom 7 that negates Mosaic Law - a notion especially popular for males (wink, nod) and a putdown to those in the Jerusalem church.
So, God should at least do some smiting to show what He/She/It/They really mean, but I won't hold my breath waiting.
She wasn't spewing dogma. She was commenting on Phelps' despicable church and opining that it "made god sad"
Sure PZ, her opinion wasn't logic-tight. Bravo, for pointing that out. But you're being completely disingenuous by refusing to acknowledge the real qualitative differences between her and Phelps--and not just the obvious ones.
By the way, I appreciate a rational approach as much as you do, PZ. I'm just not so eager to condemn those who've yet to discover that appreciation...at least not all equally.
merkin-
My reading of PZ isn't that he doesn't see the qualitative differences between the two people in questions actions but that neither are any different in claiming God to be on their side for whatever cause they are speaking about today.
I think you are mistaking the stance to fit another agenda.
Uber, I don't know what you mean when you say that I'm "mistaking the stance to fit another agenda"
If PZ said, "they both think god is on their side, how silly" then I'd have no comment. But that's not what PZ said. He said that the statements made by the liberal preacher were equally offensive to those made by Phelps and his stooges, and furthermore, that she was "more dangerous" than the Westboro mob because her message that "god is love" will have greater appeal!
Uber, that's exactly what I got out of the initial post, which I fully agree with.
PZ clearly appreciates to difference in *degree* of both unsound, unsupported viewpoints that both Phelps and the other minister share - that gawd is on their side.
Seeing as there's no evidence for any god, let alone one that supports either's side, PZ is right - they're both dangerous. Perhaps the liberal minister moreso, due to the attractiveness of her positions she claims are supported by her unproven god.
It's like mental seduction - sure, the liberal minister is a decent human being, but the poison she pushes (unwarranted certainty based on beliefs with no corroborating evidence whatsoever) kills just as surely as Phelps'. It just takes longer.
Um - Merkin, both the liberal preacher and the Westboro Baptists claim to know the mind of God and are using unverifiable precepts to back their claims. And why is her position offensive?
It comes from the position that people need to have a faith to know right from wrong. God isn't love - God isn't. Period. People don't need to believe in God to be nice to each other; but the next point is that there is enough in the Bible that teaches people to be judgmental, rude and obnoxious about their faith to offset the stuff that is intended to teach us to be "excellent to each other."
It is offensive because it gives credit to God for that which we are very well capable of doing on our own and don't need supernatural forces to help us do. We do good, God gets the credit. We do bad, we get the blame, even if we use the texts to justify our actions.
I am sure that I would rather spend time with the liberal preacher than with the Phelps gang; but I will tell you this. At my mother's funeral, the pastor's sermon emphasized that my mother was a sweet woman who did all the good things that she did because that was how she showed God's love.
Nonsense. She was a good person because that was how her parents raised her, religion was just a trapping. She raised me to be good, and that hasn't changed since I abandoned religion.
Mom was good, and God got the credit. It was bullshit and it was offensive to me.
PZ Myers: "the real difference between us isn't our potential for good and evil, but how we resolve our choice"
Perhaps.
But consider changes in state of different kinds of entities: a cell, an organ, an organism, a society. These entities undergo internal change in response to a change in external conditions in order to maintain function, which in turn influences those conditions. Both stochastic and deterministic processes are involved, in some cases involving selection or at least competition. The entity "chooses" between an ensemble of possible future states. But we know that in each case the word "choose" is loaded and misleading.
Which is more important: a) the properties of the new functional state, or b) the precise steps, including stochastic variation in lower-order components of the larger system, involved in achieving the new state?
Some might argue that the organism is different - or at least we are - since we have self-awareness and free will. Actually, we are only aware of a portion of our mental operations and free will is probably illusory. When we arrive at a position, make a decision, change our minds, we are undergoing a change in state in a higher order cognitive construct. We can attempt to backtrack and reverse engineer how we arrived at the new state. But unless we wholly understand all of the variables, including our own minds, our neuroendocrinology, our social and physical environment, we really do not know precisely how we arrived at those positions.
Luzid, you're nuts. How do people who believe that god is love "kill"? (Even slowly?)
Your point, as I see it, is that people need to ground their arguments on evidence-based reality in order to most assuredly make good decisions. Well that sounds nice, and generally speaking I agree. But as Colugo pointed out in one of the above posts, not many of us tend to arrive at our moral positions for scientific reasons. We use "post-hoc intellectual justifications" to reaffirm our intuitive sense of what is right or wrong. So your fear that people are going to adopt this liberal preacher's flawed logic and then innocently spread their own hatred and intolerance is completely unfounded. It's a shallow, self-righteous game you're playing.
Mike Haubrich, I too have been offended by well meaning pastors at my relatives' funerals. But I think it's only fair to judge the woman in the video for what she actually said in the video...unless you know her personally, which I don't.
Wow, I can't believe you even asked that question. Maybe because they feel they have special insight into what this God thinks. One need not kill to see that one can do great harm in this regard. I'm pretty sure abortion clinic bombers think their version of God is love as well.
I think you miss the point again. Mnay have already adopted it through childhood indoctrination. She facilitates it's continous nature by giving credit to actions based on superstition. Do I think she is a bad person- of course not-but for the purposes of this discussion her position isn't more defensible as an intellectual exercise.
Of course she is more pleasant than Phelps but then again who isn't?
Merkin:
Please explain how the act of accepting "I feel it in my heart" or "I take it on faith" as the principal justification for a sane position does not weaken one's ability to criticize those who "feel in their hearts" or "take on faith" a completely insane position?
Merkin,
You could understand PZ's point if you tried. Use, for example, the speech made by Romney. Do you see how far our country has moved from separation of church and state since Kennedy's speech in the early 60's? It's like watching a sun dial. Can't see it move but come back in an hour and notice the difference.
PZ's point is that when you have the same justification for a belief or action as the nutjob Phelps then over time the seemingly benign behavior can morph into a more detrimental form, slowly and most surely since they are both based on dogma.
PZ's logic is impeccable even if it may sound harsh to you. Proof that he is correct can be seen all around the USA from the White House to the class room and from our treatment of the poor to the enrichment of the elite class.
If we remove the bible as a justification for beliefs then a reasonable case must be made for a policy instead of an appeal to authority.
JimC, the woman in the video said something like, "god is love and hate makes god sad." So what?? What do abortion clinic bombings have to do with that? For all you know, the woman is pro-choice...
I'm not trying to defend religion...I know as well as anybody about the dangers of faith. I was brought up in an evangelical cult (a private elementary school) that really wasn't too far removed from the Westboro Baptists. Believe me when I say that I've got beef with religion. But as a "survivor" of that experience, I'm offended to see a nice woman preaching peace and love being thrown in with these ghouls. When PZ says that the liberal preacher is more insidious than the fundamentalist creeps, it makes me wish he could have grown up at Santa Rosa Christian School.
Heddle that's some really poor logic. The New Testament does not support this idea that the old laws are no more. And by the same reasoning, the NT would no longer apply as it was directed at a people and a nation that no longer exist. That's not even getting into Paul's ideas that Jews who come to Christ should continue following Jewish law, whereas converted Gentiles were exempt. And it completely denies that the laws themselves are understood to be God's laws, not the mere laws of mere mortal men, leaving you with the undeniable assertion by God himself, as we are told to believe, that Gays, Homosexuals, and Shellfish ought to be put to death upon discovery.
Gorging on cake and then vomiting it back into a pan don't count. Your god is an asshole. And his rules: kind of bloodthirsty.
Gerber Baby (#49):
paul vehemently condemns temple prostitutes (pornos) and pederasts (arsenokoites), yes. keep in mind that jesus also says that he who calls his brother names (such as "raca," the "fag" of its day) is in danger of hell-fire.
actually, it's only in the modern world that you get openly gay couples of roughly similar age. such relationships are unheard of in ancient times. except, of course, in the book of samuel where it goes completely un-condemned.
@inkadu (#51):
this is quite the case. the more one studies the bible, the more skeptically they tend to view it. the radical christian viewpoints just do not hold up against the text itself. i'm always amused by the people who hold these views and claim to have studied the bible for their entire lives. the only response is "then you haven't learned much of anything, have you?"
well, no. it's a vastly diverse set of texts, written by many different authors who had many different opinions. some were in favour of genocide. others would have been quite against it. more interestingly, it's a (partial) record of the changing ideology of a society over time. it's not that people see what they want in it -- it's that they don't see anything else. but it's all really there in the first place, all the good and all the evil.
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD. - leviticus 19:18.
leviticus is one of the worst cases, as it's extreme ritual purity laws are taken so far out of context. but in some respects, it's a microcosm of the bible as a whole. lots of bad, little bits of good. your question is really "why do we bother reading any of it?" and the answer is a complicated one about cultural identity, the human condition, and the history of philosophy.
@inkadu (#74):
err... no. go back and study it some more. this is the same basic lie the fundamentalists get away with. they treat the bible as one comprehensive block of text, and then when it fails to make sense, they go off on their little interpretation of how to make sense of it. that's quite the wrong way to approach it. one does not walk into the library of congress, declare "it makes no damn coherent sense!" and then go on to say it can be argued any one of million ways. it can't -- certainly, for instance, the science section will present a pretty unified view of evolution. when you begin to cut it up into different disciplines, sections, books, etc, and catalog it properly, sense can be made. yes, you might find the odd holocaust-denial book, but the library of congress is not "arguing" that position.
the same should really be said of the bible. it's a library of texts. some texts have certain points of view and opinions. others don't. but it certainly starts making a lot more sense when you treat it like a library, and not the rantings of some crazy old jews who lived for over 1,000 years and couldn't stick to any particular style, language, or ideology.
@PZ (#82):
what about the good-hearted progressive preacher who says, "wow, that jesus guy had a point, and his argument that we should treat others how we'd like to be treated is a very convincing one." or must everything in religion ultimately break down into an appeal to authority? frankly, i myself have argued for the humanitarian view with "jesus says so" on numerous occasions. why? because it works. it gets through to many fundamentalists (not the phelpsian hate-cult, but). it is damned convincing if you can beat someone in their own terms, showing them their own contradiction. frankly, for lots of people, authority is all that works and all they'll understand. that's PROBABLY the social function of religion in the first place -- but that's not to say that every position argued in a religious context is "because god says so."
how can the same argument yield two different conclusions? clearly, there must be something else at play here.
PZ's impeccable logic sounds like this to me, Rick T:
Both preachers have derived their opposite conclusions, (A) love one another, and (B) hate one another, from unsound arguments. Therefore those preaching (A) are more dangerous because their conclusions will have greater appeal, and we don't want people loving each other for bad reasons.
Beyond that, any argument against the liberal preacher is speculative at best. She makes no claim other than that, in her view, god is love. There are a lot of things to get upset over, and this just isn't one of them.
As far as the difference between Phelps and that charming preacher go, I find that she is the more dishonest of the two. Phelps's sermons come closer to the spittle-flecked sermonizing, and bat-shit crazy behavior of the patriarchs, whose actions and teachings are the best examples of pure Christianity we have - Phelps channels best what lays at the heart of the religion, when it is not mediated by important concerns, such as forming a stable society. The moment Christianity steps away from rabid denunciations of evil and panders to such trivialities as living harmoniously with the people next door, it betrays its essence, it denies itself, and falls away into mere social control. Christianity at the beginning was an eschatological movement. It said: the end is now. It said: Most of you are going to hell. It said: You shall not pass away before the end of the world is nigh, referring to a time 2,000 years ago.
These are the facts. That it mutated into all these various flavors, and politically attractive watered-down versions is another story all together. What this woman believes in is a historically inaccurate depiction of a fictitious deity. That she feels very strongly about it, and it gives her some comfort is nice, I suppose, but it doesn't change the fact that the god of her fervent desiring, this god of love, is unrecognizable in his own autobiography, but very much corresponds to Phelps's conception and preaching of a megalomaniacal patriarch with a penchant for mass murder and gay-bashing. One of these things is not like the other.
But I've not come to praise Phelps or lend him any more credence then any other hair-shirted wildman atop a pole requires. I just find it incredibly dishonest that you would defend someone's utterances regarding god that are on their face counterfactual to even the most loose readings of the bible, yet refuse to defend the person, Phelps, whose own preaching perhaps comes closest to what Christianity actually requires of its adherents.
Is this a politically expedient line of reasoning on your part? Does your ignorance of Christianity prevade your understanding so much that you are incapable of discriminating false-doctine from the tenets of holy writ? Or are you just in the habit of siding with the socially acceptable "interpretation" mouthed by the nice clean lady in the modern church, when the authentic reading is espoused by such an unsavory character?
@brandon (#114):
same basic logical problem. whether or not god exists is not a function how nice or how much of an asshole he or she or it may be. the ancient greek gods were kind of assholes too, but that's not why we don't believe in them, is it?
in any case, that's sort of an anachronistic argument to begin with.
now, maybe i'm just crazy here, but shouldn't jesus have something to do with christianity?
the patriarchs, frankly, weren't all that bad. you're thinking moses onwards, especially joshua, but the david and the kings of judah, and the prophets near the time of exile in babylon. now, i agree, phelps may be a good example of the major prophets. but i'm not sure i would call that christianity, what with them living before christ.
Jesus Christ, brandon.
No, No, and No.
It has nothing to do with political correctness or ignorance of scripture. This woman says no more than that she believes god is love. You're assuming that she accepts the Bible as divine authority, though she said nothing of the kind. Maybe she does. But it's kind of ironic how you complain that she's professing to know things that she doesn't--that god is love--and in the same breath you talk about her as though you knew the details of her private beliefs.
I'm sorry I should have been more precise. There are the patriarchs of the O.T., and then there are the Christian patriarchs, I'm bending the term a little, it has a very specific meaning, I'm using it in the sense of "founders of the church" the old Church Fathers, mystics like St. John the Divine, writers like Tertullian and Augustine, and, early monastic precursors and founders like St. Anthony of the Desert, smeared across three centuries C.E. These people practiced a Christianity that is, to me at least, unrecognizable in the ecumenical, wishy-washy, mishmash of modern, Western religion. It was visceral, it was real, it was immediate, it had people that were definitely "out" of the salvation story, it saw holy scripture as very specifically detailing events that were happening in that day. Revelations for, example half of it is him castigating other street preachers for not preaching enough hellfire and brimstone, condemning them as whores and sexual perverts. The rest of it is a first or second century conspiracy theory screed that's more or less identical to whatever to a Phelps sermon, only its more likely to blame the SPQR and not the CFR. That's pure, unadulterated Christianity - mindless, bizarre screams about the end of the world, sexual purity, and sorting out the good people from the bad. This woman preacher, whatever she's talking about, it's a Christianity that's been distorted through centuries and centuries of revision and adjustment to make Christianity amenable and even useful for social control and compatibility for evolving, diverse social realities. Both, are bullshit, as far as addressing actual reality.
But I just find it curious that these self-appointed Christian apologists cropping up here are so quick to deny the real Christian nature of Phelps's messages, and side with the more unscriptural teachings of the nice, approachable, groomed collared lady, simply because the person mouthing the more authentic Christian position just happens to be one of the most hate men in America. Seems, I don't know, hypocritical, opportunistic, and entirely cynical to me. But what do I know;)
I'm a Christian apologist now? Thanks for cluing me in.
Shit, that's a lot of typos. But it's late, and I'm tired. My point is, to reiterate the last paragraph. The Fred Phelps message is closer to the authentic Christian messsage. It is textually closer. It is historically closer. I don't think that I need to remind anyone that even in this country, it was the accepted practice only a few hundred years ago to kill and immolate the men and the animals caught in bestiality. It was acceptable to kill people accused of witchcraft. It was acceptable to kill homosexuals. And these precepts were lifted directly from the bible, in NT and OT language.
It seems, then, highly artificial to me, for those who would seek to defend the Christian tradition that they should deny its more authentic presentation, i.e., the Westboro thugs, since it is attached to a social pariah, and endorse highly questionable formulations of a "God of Love" merely because it expedient for them to advance a charge of "anti-Christian bigotry" against a third party.
When in fact the point-of-view that is being endorsed is itself an anti-Christian message so far as it runs counter to the accepted authority of Christianity, holy-writ.
Christianity is not a sweet-as lollipops religion. It's mean, it's nasty, it's filled with themes of extremely hard punishment, damnation, and unconditional obediance to a very angry deity. Mammals don't really respond to that well. So I can see why those who enjoy the minty-fresh taste of daily subjugations of the flesh might tend to repackage it for the public - and that's their perogative. But on the other hand, I find it distasteful and disingenuous that the same people would make a defense of false doctrines just to support outlandish assertions about bigotry - seems wholly dishonest to me.
brandon: "But I just find it curious that these self-appointed Christian apologists cropping up here are so quick to deny the real Christian nature of Phelps's messages, and side with the more unscriptural teachings"
Who made you the arbitrator of what is "real" Christianity? Is there such a thing? This essentialized, intentionalist, literalist interpretation of Christianity is staggeringly inadequate from the standpoint of sociology, anthropology, history, or hermeneutics. This simplistic kind of analysis of the role and significance of religious institutions and beliefs cannot aid our understanding of these phenomena. A religion is what its adherents believe about it and how they act on it, not a reconstruction of the beliefs and practices of a group in a particular era deemed the "real" faith. Nor is a religion reducible to purported fidelity to a certain interpretation to sacred texts. True, the primal "pure" faithful become the models of religious revitalization movements, but even then these groups are reinterpreted in the interests of the revitalization movement within its contemporary social context.
@arachnophilia (#151)
"how can the same argument yield two different conclusions?"
Because it's an unsound argument. That was easy! Although calling religious statements arguments is really stretching in the first place.
I'm sure the various posters you replied to can speak for themselves, but in case they're busy:
I can't speak to issues of translation but you failed to refute anything Inkadu said, if that was your intention. E.g.- Inkadu describes the Bible as a Rorschach blot, you contend that people selectively see the parts they want to see. He(she?) says the Bible is an incoherent mess if taken as a whole and hence no basis for an argument. You inform us that a library is exactly the same. Kudos.
As for PZ's comments and yours, the good hearted preacher who parrots Jesus's arguments is not being a preacher per se, and they're not really Jesus's to begin with. That is, the argument can stand or fall on its own regardless of whether Jesus makes it. Of course, most of Jesus's arguments are themselves appeals to authority or, worse yet, parable.
Pointing out contradictions within the Bible is certainly a valid way of getting people to stop believing the Bible,(although if it's such a magic bullet I'm surprised we don't see the fundamentalists dropping in droves). However, trying to show them the "true" interpretation relies on your being able to convincingly argue that the book agrees with your own principles. This is unlikely, unprincipled, and it transforms the argument into a rhetorical tug of war between you and the next conservative bombast who comes along. There are lots of people with an authoritarian mindset. Maybe we shouldn't encourage them.
Maybe our Christian commenters could answer this question that has been bugging me forever:
if the NT is the only thing that counts in Christianity, why does every Christian sermon I've ever been to (and I've been to quite a few, both Catholic and Protestant) quote the OT? Why is it even in the Bibles that Christians pass around, if it doeesn't matter? As a historical footnote? Awfully long for that, don't you think? If all that counts is what Jesus said, why the waste of paper? Why keep sticking to the 10 commandments, when the Sermon of the Mount delivers all the ethics and morals you need?
Brandon,
Oh really? I guess I misinterpreted Paul's dressing down of Peter and the Jerusalem council. So he was really telling Peter to continue following the law--to continue, for example, sacrificing animals? Who'd a thunk it? And the writer of Hebrews--he was actually telling his audience to follow Levitical law? Man, not sure how I never noticed that. And Jesus, what a naughty Jew he was, disobeying those OT laws on proper dealing with lepers, blasphemers, the Sabbath, etc.
Darwin's minion,
Huh? Who said the OT doesn't count? Of course it is essential. The OT is part of God's redemptive plan. The OT, using types, foreshadows much of the NT. We cannot appreciate grace fully without understanding what grace has freed us from. The OT contains messianic prophecy, and through the law and the special privileges given to the Jews it demonstrates the need for a savior--for even the Jews, with God's special blessings, with the law to guide them, were unable to save themselves. No Christian should say the OT doesn't count. I'm sorry something based on such a manifestly incorrect premise has been buggin you for so long.
Heddle: I find it disturbing that you think massive human suffering on the scale of the Old Testament is somehow acceptable as a form of allegory or moral demonstration. It's as if the suffering of other people is not real to you, and indicates a really disturbing lack of empathy. Possibly the belief that you don't die when you die is distorting your moral compass.
Among other things, you're describing a deity who's essentially pulling a massive bait-and-switch on the entire world, both gentiles (Sorry! you're not the Chosen People!) and Jews (I choose you, Pikachu! But you're still not saved!).
Brandon @123
Hear hear! I really don't understand how people that read The Bible are able to think in such circles and not get confused.
Many thanks for clearing that up, Heddle.
Now, could you go out and clear up that mistake for your fellow Christians, too? A lot of them seem to think that they have to take the OT (or select parts of it) as the literal word of god that has to be obeyed at all times, instead of the cautionary history it is (according to you).
David Heddle @127,
it's not quite fair, I think, to scold atheists for being unclear on the question whether or to what extent the Mosaic law applies to Christians (esp. to those who are not also Jews) when so many Christians themselves are unclear on the concept.
I am no longer a churchgoer, but the church I no longer go to had a whacking great tablet of the decalogue up front (quite common in that tradition, actually) where many church buildings have a cross or crucifix. Now, ten commandaments written on a plaque is a big step up from an idol of a man tortured to death. Still, I thought even then that it was pretty funny to decorate a church with the symbol of a Law that was not the ostensible source of our salvation and had never applied to most of us in any case. (To be fair, the building and hence the decoration were quite old, and in my day the minister was much more interested in grace than in law.)
More generally, I don't think you argue validly (at least, not in this forum) in universalising your interpretation or version of Christianity. You think that true Christianity consists of X, Y and Z (and that's your good right). Most if not all other Christians think the same; but they will often have other values of X, Y and Z than you have. These differences are no doubt important in theological debates between Christians. But non-Christians are pardonably impatient when a Christian tells them that what some other Christian says isn't really Christianity. I am not as impressed by the "No True Scotsman" objection as many people around here are, but surely it applies in this case.
I really can't decide what to do with my free time tonight, so I've decided to leave it up to chance. I'll write down as many options as I can think of, toss them into a hat, and pick one at random. If it says 'volunteer at a soup kitchen,' I'll volunteer at a soup kitchen. And if it says 'go on a killing spree,' I'll go on a killing spree. I could end up doing just about anything, really.
Should I end up doing something good, I should be commended for my actions, even though my motivation was idiotic. And if I end up doing something bad, you shouldn't blame my methodology; after all, it leads to so many good outcomes as well. Surely that's what matters.
Above all, be sure to remember that every position should be judged not on its intellectual merits, but rather on how much you like it. Rigour and coherence pale into insignificance when a position is warm and fuzzy.
I don't like the term "atheist fundamentalist" either, but how can you read this analysis by PZ and call it anything else?
Get back to me when you uncover the grand revelatory text of Atheism.
Until then, you either 1) don't understand the meaning of "fundamentalist" in the context of belief systems or 2) are trying to set up a false equivalency.
Haven't gotten around to watching the video yet, but I grew up in KC and went to KU, so the Phelps clan was a regular appearance on campus and around town. Now I live in Omaha, and I just heard that he is going to be picketing the funerals of the shooting victims from the incident at Westroads mall last weekend. I'm sure that's gonna go over really well.
Mrs. Tilton,
I don't apply doctrinal tests to judge those who claim to be Christians. I apply, as described in Matthew 7, behavioral tests. In that chapter we are told to judge those who claim to be Christians, and how to judge them--it is by their fruits they will be known. Furthermore we have the practice of excommunication--again based on a person's behavior, such as the case of the man of whom Paul demanded excommunication because the man continued sleeping with his own stepmother. The fact that the NT condones excommunication is proof that we are supposed to judge who is not a Christian by their deeds. It is on that basis that I would argue that Phelps is not a Christian regardless of what he claims. He bears no fruit remotely resembling that which was taught and exemplified by Christ.
We know the no true scotsman arguement well.
Only the best, brightest, nicest, richest and prettiest are real christians...
Are all of the homophobic in the closet christians not true christians too???
There's alot of "not true" christians out there then.
Who decides what deeds make someone a Christian heddle? You?
Your interpretation is no better or worse than Phelp's.
Hey, I got some kumquats for ya, right heah!
What about the, you know, in my name they shall cast out demons, and no venomous thing shall hurt them- what about that test?
spurge,
You missed the boat. I told you how we are to judge, but I never said it was bulletproof. Phelps, of course, is free to declare that I am not a Christian.
It is funny how I read although these complaints about the obvious flaw in biblical interpretation--namely that everyone interprets scripture how they like. That is a legitimate concern, but is not as simple as represented here. As spurge does, it is common to argue on here using absurd examples.
My question is that on this site, blessedly frequented by highly intellectual uber- rationalists, how is it that your vaunted reason often splits you right down the middle? I have seen heated debates on here about things like animal research and gun control. Is one side rational and the other side not, or does properly exercised rational thought nevertheless lead to contradictory conclusions? May it never be! Surely by the pure power of rational thought you all should reach similar conclusions? Otherwise--you are in the same boat as Christians who argue over what is correct exegesis. And we can't have that.
David Heddle @135,
[Phelps] bears no fruit remotely resembling that which was taught and exemplified by Christ
Rather than making the obvious joke that, if what you say is true, Christianity's excommunicators are asleep on the job with respect to many more reverends than just Phelps, I will note instead that your response simply underscores the basic problem. Phelps would certainly argue, and with unquestionable sincerity, that you are wrong about what Jesus taught and he is right; and who am I to gainsay him?
Wherever two or more are gathered in his name, there are usually three or more opinions about what Jesus taught and exemplified. Who decides which are right, and which Christians bear them as "fruit"? Even the catholics, with the benefit of an infallible pope to give them the skinny, aren't really ever in 100% agreement. And, whether one appeal to a pope, or to "tradition", or to direct enlightenment by the spirit, or even to "the plain language of scripture itself", at the end of the day what you unavoidably have is two (or more) humans offering their differing interpretations of X, Y or Z.
As I said before, among Christians and on their own terms, arguments over these differences might be legitimate and interesting. To non-Christians (unless perhaps they have some special academic interest in, say, comparative religion or church history), they are boring and, indeed, in many important ways quite meaningless. When you assert that such-and-such is "true" Christianity, my response to you is the same as it would be to Ratzinger: who made you pope anyway?
Don't take that as a personal insult, BTW. I've gone so far as to visit your website and, though I think you are as wrong about many things as it is possible to be, I also think you lack the appalling character of so many committed American practitioners of Christianity (which might better be described as Red State Shinto). For example, you have made clear your feelings about the monster Phelps, and you detest the "prosperity gospel". For all that, though, non-Christians trying to puzzle out what Christianity is have no recourse but to use an analogue to the same method you use to determine who is a Christian. One must look at what people who claim the label "Christian" do. I am perfectly happy to accept your claim that you do not view Leviticus as an instruction manual. (And of course, I know a great many Christians who do not.) Thing is, though, there are also many who call themselves Christians who do (though they'd be a lot more entertaining if they were consistent about observing pentateuchal commands). You might claim that they have got Christianity wrong, and they might claim that you do. All that non-Christians can (or should) do is tell both of you to sort it out amongst yourselves if you can. You can't expect us to arbitrate your competing claims.
Here's a clue... no one here claims someone isn't a true atheist if they don't agree on a topic...
The only thing that makes you not a true atheist is if you believe in a god of some sort.
I think Hitchens is pretty much an ass, but he's still an atheist. Bill Maher is an atheist with wooish anti-traditional medicine tendencies, but still an atheist.
Phelps, Haggard, Robertson, Huckabee, Romney, Bush... not true christians???
Mrs Titlon,
On some things we agree. Let's grant something I doubt--that Phelps actually believes he is a Christian--and he is not just in it for the power and notoriety. He then would some sense be duty bound to judge my deeds and if he found them lacking to deem me an apostate. However, as far as atheists judging who is a Christian, in as much as they care about it, I would suggest that they don't apply the simple standard of just accepting any claim at face value. Atheists too can read Matthew 7. They can read Jesus' commands. They can read how Jesus behaved. They can apply the WWJD test. Then they can observe Phelps's behavior and that of a less notorious Christian that they might know. Then can they judge--is one much closer to behaving the way Jesus commanded than the other? In that sense I believe they can recognize that when Christians such as myself claim that Phelps is not a Christian, the true-Scotsman fallacy is too trivial of a response.
As for excommunication, you may be right. Matthew 18 teaches how the discipline should be carried out in the case of someone who refuses to disavow a blatantly sinful lifestyle. Following that if someone, including a church leader, refuses to try to change his behavior, he should be excommunicated.
Stevie_C,
Here is another clue, nobody claims that about Christians, either. I know hundreds of Christains. I don't know any with which I have no disagreements, but as far as I am concerned they are true Christians because, unlike Phelps, they bear some resemblence to Christ.
Then by this logic you clearly can't be a Christian and neither can just about anyone be since it appears every human being on this planet 'sins' and at the same time does a majority of good actions. You by your arrogance and dishonesty in the realm of Christiandom are no better then Phelps and maybe worse.
You guide as a whose who is clearly faulty and frankly stupid. It encompasses everyone and no one.
Then yours are dishonesty, advocation of genocide, and arrogance. I guess that leaves you out. But you do many good things as well. Bottom line as above peoples 'fruits' even out whether Christian, muslim, atheist, or buddhist. It's no criteria at all.
You mean love and forgiveness? One could easily argue he is showing love in a different way than others from a different perspective. Just because the message is ugly doesn't make him less Christian. He is preaching what to him is the core.
Nor do rationalists pretend that they have to make a book make sense as a premise. A rationalist would conclude that the premise is faulty if after 1000's of years of conflicting opinion on virtually every issue the founding document may not be what it initially was thought to be.
It is not at all the same thing but I think you know that already.
No they can't. He preaches hellfire and damnation. He is trying to get what he perceives as sinners to repent. If he believes what he is preaching he is showing love and adhereing to the gospels.
He would be faulted for not doing it if he truly believes it. That he is aggressive is more a fault of style than content.
Outside of picketing and screaming at people to repent is there any other day to day thing this man does that would seem different than anyone else?
JimC,
As I said, people like to argue the absurd. Whatever.
Sorry, there is no forgiveness of sins on the basis of sincerity. Not taught anywhere. There is no lesson that teaches that if someone sincerely believes that violence towards gays is justified, or slavery is justified, or bombing abortion clinics is justified, then they are give a get out of jail free pass. There is no gospel of salvation by sincerity. You seem just to make stuff up.
heddle it wasn't long ago you argued genocide is ok if God orders it. How can you be so blind to your own inanity and then pretend to take a 'high' ground?
Yo, person who cannot read. I never said anything about his 'sins' being forgiven. I said he could not be faulted if he believes his actions will keep people from eternal hell. He thinks he is doing a greater good in service of God. He is as likely correct as you and whatever tripe you selling most days.
The rest of your post above is just silly.
No rational person thinks he is doing a good thing but in the irrational world of religion one can make a case he is which is not a problem for the rational side of things.
You disagree with Phelps and claim he's not a true christian.
Heddle face it, the bible can be used to justify all sorts of hateful behaviour.
And many many many christians do. Including their attitudes towards atheists.
We're the worst, we're godless blapshemers, the bible gives them a free pass to hate us.
Heddle, is there a gospel of justification by faith? Do you think that Phelps has faith in Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior? (And, if not, who are you to judge?) So even if what he's doing is a sin in the eyes of God, isn't he forgiven anyway?
Further: don't you suppose it's required for justifaction that one's faith be sincere (i.e., that it be real faith, not faith shammed in order to reap the considerable benefits of justification)? How is this different from "salvation by sincerity"?
Just thought I'd point out that Westboro Baptist and Fred Phelps and two of his daughters, Shirley and Rebecca, were hit with a $10.9 million judgment by a jury in a federal court in Massachusetts in late October 2007. (For some reason, the story hasn't gotten much circulation.)
The lawsuit was brought by the family of a soldier killed in Iraq after the Phelpses and other Westboro members picketed the funeral, saying all kinds of nasty things about the dead soldier there and on the Westboro website.
The Wikipedia entry on Westboro Baptist has a brief description of the case, although it needs to be updated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westboro_baptist#Other_legal_responses
(For example, the article does not note that Defendants filed an appeal with the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this month.)
Intelligence Report, Southern Poverty Law Center, on the Phelps-Gore connection.
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?sid=184
"1988
Phelps provides rooms for Democrat Al Gore's presidential campaign workers. Though the Phelps-Gore connection will grow increasingly distant, Phelps' oldest son, Fred Jr., is invited to the first Clinton-Gore inauguration in 1993.
By 1998, Gore will be seen as such an enemy by WBC that its members picket the funeral of Gore's father."
'The man who loves to hate' by Kerry Lauerman, Mother Jones, March/April 1999:
"Phelps remained prominent in state and local politics, working for years as a major organizer for the state's Democratic Party. (He still calls himself a Democrat, refusing to change just because his party has.) In 1988, Phelps housed campaign workers for Al Gore's first presidential run; in 1989, his eldest son, Fred Jr., hosted a fundraiser for Gore's Senate campaign at his home."
Fred Phelps was a lawyer who took civil rights cases (even later winning an award from the NAACP), filed nuisance suits, and was disbarred by the Kansas Supreme Court for misconduct in 1979. In 1984 Phelps sued Ronald Reagan for appointing an ambassador to the Vatican. The Phelps did not begin their funeral protests until 1991.
Al Gore to the Nashville Tennessean in 1984, on homosexuality: "I do not believe it is simply an acceptable alternative that society should affirm." Gore also said that he would not accept campaign contributions from gay groups.
While Romney and Giuliani are under scrutiny by the GOP base because of the socially liberal record as Northeastern governors on abortion and gay rights, Gore was once the exemplar of a Southern Democratic politician - anti-abortion, pro-tobacco, anti-gay, very hawkish. Of course, people change.
Colugo @153
Of course, people change
Not least Phelps himself. On the basis of the (admittedly scant) evidence I've seen, Phelps might have been a half-decent man earlier in his life. And then at some point, in a shower of sparks and screech of protesting steel, he went dramatically off the rails.
Wonder what happened to him.
Thats a rich comment from an individual whose ENTIRE blog is about absurdities. Whoever said it above is correct, there is just so much irony in the above sentence.
well, yes and no. "god is love, therefor we should hate" doesn't quite compute, does it? i'm just saying that there are other inputs that are not being addressed.
i was not necessarily trying to refute anything. more like clarify. people really approach the text in completely the wrong way, and that's mostly the fault of the judeo-christian tradition so prevalent in western society. even the atheists can't totally escape it, and often argue from the basic set of erroneous assumptions about the bible:
of course the bible has contradictions. for a text that was written in two different countries, by about a hundred different people, in three different languages, and reflecting 1,000 years of history... it would be nothing short of a miracle if it all agreed. you can actually find wholesale ideological disputes. we shouldn't expect it to agree -- that's kind of the point.
and truthfully, we can learn more from the contradictions than anything else. they're what tell us about the structure of the text, the methodology of the collectors and the redactors, and the history of philosophy in this region.
this is probably a good point -- but how close have you ever come to convincing a religious homophobe to drop their hatred?
@brandon (#123):
and i think it's a mistake to conflate the actions of claimed christians, or even parts of the ideology itself, with christianity as a whole. surely, the teachings of christ have some bearing on what christianity is, do they not?
you're basically playing no-true-scotsman, just the other way around from your opponents who claim that phelps is not a true a christian. yes, there is a lot of hate in the bible, and i am not denying that. in fact, i'm reasonably confident that i could detail it in ways you were completely unaware of, and explain its social function in biblical society.
phelp's position is not more authentic than any other. the bible is a very large set of texts, with very many ideas present in it. phelps has only taken one set, and, to tell the truth, taken it a little out of context. though his style is very reminiscent of books like isaiah and jeremiah. but to presume that this somehow represents "the true christianity" is just as absurd as saying the same thing about any other position.
Evidently I should clarify my "same road" metaphor.
The problem is, it's a hard one to explain.
I do not think that the "nice old lady" will ever end up where Phelps is. However, she uses the exact same justification as Phelps does.
This means that it is not impossible that she will end up where Phelps is. (So long as she bases her morality solely on the Bible, that is, which was a point that I think people have missed.)
Of course, she doesn't have to go anywhere near as far as Phelps for an issue to arise.
She simply has to conclude that God does, after all, not like homosexuals. Suddenly we've got a problem. The thing is, so long as her morality is based solely on the Bible there is no reason that she shouldn't travel further down the road.
Her personality will likely keep her closer to the start, but faith is a very powerful thing, and when you've got a book that claims many, many hate crimes are God sanctioned (I honestly don't care if that's not what modern beliefs are based one, the acceptance is still there.) it does not seem inconceivable that the nice old lady would agree with some of them, simply because they are biblically sanctioned.
Alas, I only have anecdotes to back this up empirically, but I know a fair number of quite nice people who would see very little wrong with denying homosexuals legal rights, or with bombing abortion clinics. How can someone who seems perfectly nice most of the time be like that? Simple, they've concluded that they're biblically-based morality must allow that.
I should, of course, note that I do not feel that most (or, really, any save a handful) Christians will end up even remotely like the people in Phelps' cult, but my point is that a faith-based morality system not only allows such things to happen, in many cases it seems to encourage people to give up some of their morals to do what's "right."
neither group is, in fact, basing anything on the bible. (phelp's position certainly should never be called "morals") they are both starting a-priori with their own conclusions and justifying them with the bible, yes as an appeal to authority.
this would not be a result of "the bible." possibly a portion of it, but she would have to ignore other very prominent parts of it (as phelps does). phelps draws his conclusions from his own bigotry, and merely uses the bible to prop it up. yes, it's a shame that such things can be found in a supposedly holy text -- but take away the text, and you've still got a bigot.
to be totally fair, the biggest of these (genocide by the hands of joshua upon entering the promised land) seems to be a complete fiction. not a very NICE fiction, i will agree. but most of the people god supposedly sanctioned genocide against were wiped out by other causes long before the jewish priests who penned the book of joshua ever lived. to say that these are "hate crime" is rather putting the cart before the horse: they were more likely explaining where these civilizations that used to be in the area went. and if people are completely obliterated, well, god must not have liked them very much. welcome to etiologically driven religious history.
no. i talk to fundamentalists alot. most have never even read the bible, much less understood it and processed the information. they're going on hate-speech by the likes of phelps, and others like him in lesser degrees. their position is not biblically founded, it is biblically "proof-texted." for as much as they regard their holy book like an idol, under the surface, it seems to be only lip-service. in practice, they treat it with as much respect as they do scientific texts. they quote-mine the hell out of it.
this is perhaps the single greatest irony of the whole situation. the teachings of christ certainly seem to be driving at a system of true morality, directly opposed to a legalistic code of faith and ritual purity. and, in his name, people have carried on a legalistic code of ritual purity. 2,000 years ago, some poor carpenter from the ass-crack of the world said "wait a minute, guys, you're missing the point." in his honor, we treated him like a god and continued to miss the point.
I don't think it's inbreeding. I suspect drug abstinence and home cooking.
Oh, but you wanted to feel emotional rather than analytical. Oops.
Oh, I get it now: the bible, it's a series of tubes, it's a diverse text! How silly of me! I'm sorry to come back to this late, but other than the ad hominems, I still fail to see any serious attempts to refute the fact that Phelps's Christianity tracks closer to the original practice of Christianity as we understand it, than does that nice clean-cut Episcopal lady's denominational practices, and yet the apologists on this thread rejected Phelp's teaching as false because we find Phelps himself to be socially unacceptable.
As I see it, textual criticism is an not relevant to this discussion, except as a convenient bully pulpit from which to thunder against such an inconvenient question. Thus, I see your reverse no-true-scotsman, deduct for personal attacks, acknowledge and brush-off the intellectual bullying, and raise you still haven't fully explained, in the absence of a "true, authoritative text" and a "true Christianity" how it is morally and intellectually justifiable to prefer and validate one person's creed over another's because you find the second reprehensible and the former innocuous. No need to knee-cap me with your knowledge of koine and aramaic. No, really, I'm already impressed.
This thread is pretty stale, but:
Wait, what?
Seeing Dad drunk and naked, and telling your brothers ≠ rape. Not even a little. Where do you get this from?
Wait, what?
The "friendship" and "love" of D & J might have had a sexual component, assuming they even existed. You're allowed to read about their dedication to each other and infer a sexual relationship. But no such thing exists in the text. Certainly not "butt-sex", as you put it.
Revisionist nonsense.
The Hebrew word "(sh)(kh)v" (שכב) means "to lie down". Fine. But as an euphemism, when they wrote that a man and a woman lay down together, they clearly meant "coitus"¹, just as the euphemism "to sleep together" means "coitus" in English today (English-speakers did not invent squeamishness about sex).
The writers of Leviticus were sufficiently squeamish that they did not want to specify one man sticking his penis into another man, so they used a common euphemism, specifying "like lying down with a woman" to make it a little clearer what they meant.
And they clearly specified the death penalty for both participants.
Of course, they also specified the death penalty for ordinary adultery. But that's the bible for you.
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1: Speaking of euphemisms, I originally wrote a different word here. But I censored myself, so as not to trip any spam filters.