Talk To Action co-founder Frederick Clarkson and I had the opportunity to watch Dutch Sheets in action last Friday, October 27, at the "Sound of Arising!" conference held in the Old First Church in Springfield, MA, and we were both deeply impressed.
Sheets' low-key public demeanor doesn't seem to attract the sort of attention of some of his colleagues but his performance suggested to me that I've seriously neglected Sheets as a player in Peter Wagner's New Apostolic Reformation leadership cadre, and Sheets' connection to Katherine Harris (which I'll be covering soon) only strengthens my estimation of his political significance.
Delving into Dutch Sheets material, I was struck to find Sheets claiming, in typically understated fashion, that President Barack Obama is a Muslim.
You can hear Welton Gaddy and I discuss the role of Talk to Action -- as well as the oddness of media pooh poohery about dominionism -- on State of Belief on the weekend of October 22nd and 23rd on several stations around the country, and via streaming audio and podcast. (There is even an app for that!) Click here to find out how to hear the show.
I don't know if readers or posters have seen this yet, but I was startled to see this article, Election Year Goals of Christian Group Questioned, in my AP feed last night. I see this morning that it has made it to several outlets, including CBS news.
Talk2Action and Rachel Tabachnik's NAR series are cited in the article.
Maybe a front page contributor will write more about this but this is probably the most widely distributed "mainstream" NAR story I've seen so far.
This article was a cover story in the weekly newspaper, The Valley Advocate, before the days of the online edition. The Valley Advocate covers the towns and cities of the Connecticut River valley in Massachusetts.
I am cross-posting this very interesting article from Religion Dispatches (http://www.religiondispatches.org/). LOUIS A. RUPRECHT noticed parallels between early Christian history and the current power struggles in the GOP. I strongly recommend heading over there and reading it.
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This summer, as the race for the Republican presidential nomination began to gain steam, RD Director Gary Laderman wrote a pair of essays, coining the term "Republicanity" and offering an analysis of the current political landscape that made religion an explicit and overarching theoretical concern. The extensive discussion they've generated has been fascinating to read and instructive to ponder.
In the first, he described the ways in which "Republicanity" now seems to operate as a religion, with its own myths, rituals, theologies, and ethics. In the second, he identified an important "teaching moment" that this discussion and debate have created.
What this summer's debate over the debt ceiling and the straw polls have made clear is that the Republican Party is now involved in a difficult battle over its own orthodoxy. Strange as the comparison may seem, what we're seeing today is highly reminiscent of the shifting landscape of the Christian world in the second and third centuries, and concerns a truism of Christian history: orthodoxy does not appear at the beginning of a movement, it's the result of a long, and painful, and drawn-out argument that was, as often as not, a violent one.
In this video clip, from the November 2-4, 2006 "Freedom, Freedom, Freedom!" deliverance conference held at the Sonrise Chapel in Everett, WA (near Seattle), C. Peter Wagner expressed his strong dislike for anti-war movements which, he suggests, may be under satanic influence.
What's even more notable in the speech, to me, is the complete blurring of lines between "spiritual warfare" and actual warfare. In his speech, Wagner moved seamlessly between the two realms as if they were one and the same. And, perhaps for the New Apostolic Reformation, spiritual warfare and warfare, as carried out with bullets and bombs, are indeed the same.
I've decided that it is time to start a list of examples demonstrating the ideological extremity of the New Apostolic Reformation.
This will be an evolving resource page, as Talk To Action researchers compile and chronicle material concerning the activities, speech, and writing of NAR apostles and prophets.
Note: these items are in no particular order, and this version (which will be updated frequently) currently contains only a small fraction of the available evidence. - Bruce Wilson, October 11, 2011.
-- Apostles C. Peter Wagner, Cindy Jacobs, Ed Silvoso, and Chuck Pierce. These four ICA apostles (Wagner, Jacobs, and Pierce also serve in ACPE) describe, in their books, the need for believers in their movement to burn or otherwise destroy objects associated with non-Christian beliefs, and world religious traditions:
"Top NAR leaders, including C. Peter Wagner, Cindy Jacobs, Ed Silvoso and, Chuck Pierce, have repeatedly emphasized in their writings the need for believers to destroy or neutralize, by burning, smashing, or flushing down toilets, objects deemed to be unholy, including profane books and "idolatrous" religious texts (such as Books of Mormon), religious relics (such as statues of Catholic saints, the Buddha, or Hindu gods), and native art (such as African masks, Hopi Indian Kachina dolls, and totem poles.)
According to New Apostolic Reformation doctrine, objects to be destroyed include those associated with Mormonism, Islam, Jehovah's Witnesses, Hinduism, eastern religions, Christian Science, native religions, and Baha'i."
-- Apostle Lou Engle. Apostolic Council of Prophetic Elders members Lou Engle is co-founder, along with ICA apostle and Wagner Leadership Institute Chancellor Che Ahn, of The Call. As major ideological elements, The Call's stadium-size rallies feature strident antigay and antiabortion rhetoric which bears resemblance to extreme rhetoric from the 1980's and 1990's terrorist group The Army of God. The Call events have featured calls, from onstage, for acts of Christian martyrdom to stop gay marriage and legalized abortion. The Call cofounder Engle posted, on his personal website, two months prior to the assassination of late-term abortion doctor George Tiller, a characterization of Tiller as similar to an Auschwitz death camp worker.
In May 2010, Lou Engle took The Call to Kampala, Uganda, for a controversial rally that featured onstage calls for speedy passage of Uganda's notorious, so-called "kill the gays" bill. Some Ugandan leaders such as apostle Julius Oyet (also tied to Peter Wagner's ICA, and who claims to have played a major role in Uganda's Anti Homosexuality Bill) interpreted Lou Engle's The Call Uganda event as support for the "kill the gays" bill.
-- Apostle Willie Wooten. ICA Apostle Willie Wooten attacked Martin Luther King, Jr., in book which claims King was responsible for a 40-year curse on African Americans incurred by the immoral acts of top Civil Rights movement leaders, especially King. Wooten cites writing from a white supremacist, Holocaust denial website, as evidence. Wooten's book has been endorsed and promoted by ICA apostle Alice Patterson, who (according to C. Peter Wagner) organized Rick Perry's The Response prayer event See - New Apostolic Reformation Reconciliation Expert Promotes Book Demonizing MLK.
-- Apostle Jim Ammerman (see 1, 2, 3.) Recently deceased ICA apostle Jim Ammerman, whose chaplain endorsing agency presided over a significant percentage of active duty chaplains in the United States military, printed in 2008, in his official chaplain endorsing agency newsletter, a letter from a retired military officer which stated that US Democratic senators Hillary Clinton, James Dodd, Joe Biden, and Barack Obama should be executed for voting against a senate bill to establish English as the official language of the United States.
-- Apostle Kim Daniels (see: 1, 2, 3, 4.) ICA Apostle Kimberly Daniels, who in the 2010 election won a seat on the Jacksonville, FL. city council, teaches a core course for the Wagner Leadership Institute. Daniels has claimed "the Jews own everything!", has played a national role (along with apostle and Bishop Harry Jackson) in fighting hate crimes legislation. Daniels' numerous demonology-centered books feature, among other things, a claim that Africans are especially prone to sex with demon spirits and asserts that homosexuality involves a covenant with the devil
We all know that the liberal blogosphere, as well as the mainstream media, has turned the hot lights on the fascist brand of Christianity known as the New Apostolic Reformation. Well, several Christian conservatives aren't too keen on it either. Among them is Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend, who has spoken out at least twice about his concerns that the NAR is promoting false teaching. Now, Warren Throckmorton of Religion Dispatches reports that the American Family Association has issued an ultimatum--if you partner with Howse, you'll lose your slot on American Family Radio.
Earlier this week, Jim Stanley, program director of AFA’s radio network, American Family Radio, sent notices to two talk show hosts who are associated with Howse, informing them that continued presence on the AFA’s radio network was conditioned on severing ties with Howse.
The talk show hosts, John Loeffler and Todd Friel, have shows aired by American Family Radio and also speak at Howse sponsored events. According to Tim Wildmon, president of the AFA, “we identified two people with programs on our networks and told them, ’you have to make a choice.’” In defense of the move, Wildmon said “AFR is under no obligation to run programs of individuals who are going to help Brannon when he is attacking our friends. We make programming decisions all the time.”
Howse has been very critical of the AFA and several other "mainstream" fundie leaders such as Tony Perkins and James Dobson for sponsoring Rick Perry's Response rally, which included several prominent NAR/dominionist leaders as either speakers or endorsers. According to Wildmon, AFR was hit with a blizzard of calls from listeners, and it had become too much of a headache.
If ever you needed more convincing that the religious right and its bastard child, the New Apostolic Reformation, is full of hot air when it says all it wants is influence, look no further than a statement Bryan Fischer made on Focal Point on Monday. He says, straight up, that the First Amendment doesn't apply to anyone else except Christians. Watch for yourself.
Fischer even goes as far to say that the states still have the right to set up an established church if they so choose, since the First Amendment only says Congress can't make a law setting up one. Never mind that it has been well-established that the 14th Amendment's liberty clause is binding on the states.
Fischer claims that it was "a good thing" that no state has an established church anymore. However, it sounds like he's perfectly OK with the state constitutional provisions that bar people who don't believe in God from holding office, even though the Supreme Court made it pretty clear that those provisions can't be enforced.
Well, you can't say Fischer didn't warn us of what was in store in the Christian America they'd like to create.
We all know that "America, the Christian nation" is pretty much an article of faith on the religious right. Yesterday, Rick Joyner took it one step further--he claims that the Founding Fathers were dominionists. I'm not kidding--PFAW got the whole thing.
I have to wonder if Joyner slept through history class. After all, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin were both deists. Moreover, Jefferson wrote Virginia's law establishing complete religious freedom--hardly the act of a dominionist.
Here's another hoot--he claims he isn't one because dominion can't really come until Jesus comes back. Uh huh. Then how come you've so heavily advocated for Christians to gain footholds in the "seven mountains" of society? Or made plans to form an army called "300" to help take back the nation from evil? It's amazing Joyner said this with a straight face.
Florida Governor Rick Scott's craziness since taking office has been well documented. But if possible, his lieutenant governor, Jennifer Carroll, may be even crazier. Carroll spoke at a rally sponsored by Ralph Reed's Faith and Freedom Coalition, in which she claimed that Christians are under siege.
Just in case Carroll thinks about walking her remarks back, the AP got the whole thing here. For those who want the Reader's Digest version, PFAW has it here.
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