There seems to be much unnecessary animosity between Christian fundamentalists and secularists. Christian fundamentalists are notorious for their often unprovoked paranoia, but neither side is completely blameless as both sides feed off each other. One example of this is the recent dynamic developing between the followers of Brian Flemming with his DVD, The God Who Wasn't There and website, The War on Easter, and the followers of Gary DeMar and his upcoming DVD, The God Who Is There. Thank god and her godless brother that not all secularists are like Flemming and not all Christians are like DeMar. Perhaps one small way to reclaim our best democratic and pluralistic traditions of working together towards the common good is to create opportunities for real dialogue between people of different faiths and no faith.

Last weekend 25,000 youth descended on San Francisco to attend a BattleCry event. The purpose of BattleCry is to save today's youth from a "sinister enemy" that is "ravishing their hearts." From christianbooks.com:

A sinister enemy marches across our land leaving in its path the ravished hearts and minds of America's youth. Giant corporations, media conglomerates, and purveyors of popular culture have invested billions of dollars and endless hours of effort to seduce and enslave the souls of our youth. And so far, they have succeeded.

One of the key leaders of the Religious Right is often overlooked.  Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade, had a larger role than a lot of people realize.

In 1974 and 1975 Bill Bright convened a series of secret meetings with 20-25 key Christian Right leaders.  They formed Third Century Publishers to publish books and study guides to link their political agenda with conservative Christianity.  They needed a tax-exempt foundation to receive donations to help them with the for-profit Third Century Publishers.  Bright with the help of Richard DeVoss, president of Amway Corp., and Art DeMoss, board chairman of National Liberty Insurance Co.,  took over the financially troubled Christian Freedom Foundation to solicit funds for their publishing company.  They hired Ed McAteer to run it.  DeMoss later publicly stated that the purpose of CFF was to elect Christian conservatives to Congress in 1976:

"The vision is to rebuild the foundations of the Republic as it was when first founded--a 'Christian Republic.' We must return to the faith of our fathers." [John Saloma, Ominous Politics: The New Conservative Labyrinth(pp. 53-54).

On May 8, 2005 Rick Scarborough was profiled on the front page of the Washington Post.  He had just organized a conference in Washington D.C. on "Confronting the Judicial War on Faith" which launched the movement against the filibuster in congress and inspired three  "Justice Sundays."  Tom DeLay called Scarborough "one of my closest friends."  He was also credited with organizing a network of 2000 "Patriot Pastors" that led evangelicals to the polls in 2004.  He's still working his network of "Patriot Pastors" to get the vote out for the elections this year.

Who is Rick Scarborough?

The fundamentalist takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention began at a meeting in Houston, Texas in 1979.  From the beginning voting irregularities accompanied the takeover. (John Baugh, the Baptist layman who founded Sysco Corp., calls it "Voting Fraud" -- see his Battle for Baptist Integrity, p. 95)

The chief architect of the SBC takeover was Houston appellate court judge Paul Pressler who meticulously reviewed the Convention's Constitution and By-laws and crafted the strategy for the takeover.  Yet, in 1979, Pressler himself registered and voted at the Convention's annual meeting in violation of the SBC's Constitution.  Pressler registered as a messenger (delegate) from a church in which he was not a member (the ecclesial equivalent to the recent vote fraud felony Ann Coulter allegedly committed when she voted at a precinct in which she did not live).  

Searching Google News for David Gushee and torture (Gushee is the professor at a conservative Christian college who wrote a recent article criticizing Bush's torture policy) returns only three references. Searching for Rick Warren and global warming returns 260 references. Although it is disappointing that the media has ignored Gushee's work, it is encouraging that Rick Warren has made such a strong impression. Warren's Christian concern for global warming is driving the more hard core conservative Christians into a frenzy of hyperbolic prose that highlights how vulnerable the Christian Right is to division, fragmentation, and demonization. Some examples:

Sorry for 2 posts in a day, but I recently received an email from someone who felt I was unfairly criticizing Christians, especially Stuart Epperson, one of the many persons depicted in my painting "parade" and website celebrating the return of Christ and, by extension, the end of America as we know it. His brief question (the 4th in a thread) lends insight into one of the current arguments and criticisms of "secularists" developed and perpetuated by Christian Fundamentalists - that we hate Christians because they accept Jesus as the ONE WAY.

Actually, we don't - because that's totally beside the point.

Come see the painting and the artist in Buffalo and Detroit this weekend

Words alone are not enough - that's why I created my painting, American Fundamentalists (Christ's Entry into Washington in 2008). It's another way to get attention, then (perhaps) educate a bit about the far political and religious Right, supported by the creation of far-right media and "think tanks" funded by very deep far-right pockets. Depicted in the painting, and included in my discussion, is a particular Christian fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible and Revelations, one that seems to hold sway with many in this movement.

And one that, I believe, is SO horrible that no "compassionate" person could possibly celebrate it.

Somewhere over the rainbow and in a sealed tomb below the ground, Leo Strauss, the Wizard of the neo-conservative movement that has turned America into the land of Oz, is smiling.

Except for his disciples, few Americans know or understand the philosophy of the man that has influenced so many of the key leaders of the current administration.  If many did, they might be inclined wipe the smirks off Strauss' face and those of his followers.

I read Daniel Dreisbach's Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation between Church and State over the last few days.  The book is a storehouse of information related to Jefferson's metaphor in his letter to Danbury Baptists about the first amendment "building a wall of separation between church and state."  The author, however, has little regard for the metaphor as a principle of jurisprudence and he demonstrates an eagerness to offer strained interpretations of the material to discredit the principle.

There is one aspect of the rise of the religious right that, from where I sit, is grossly neglected. And it's not that many thoughtful, well-informed people don't understand the missing piece, at some level. But in the 16 years since the founding of Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition, I can't think of an instance in which it has ever been addressed by any signficant opposing institution. The Christian Right has gotten as far as it has for many reasons. But the most important and obvious aspect receives the least attention -- at least when it comes to discussing what to do about it.

Roger Williams fled the persecutions of Anglican Archbishop William Laud and landed in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1631. Shortly after his arrival he was banished from the colony for telling the authorities that they "cannot without a spiritual rape force the consciences of all to one worship."

More Talk To Action stories on Christian supremacy and religious discrimination in the USAF