Church of the Rebar Jesus

Our Heavenly Reward

2011-06-01T14:24:00.000+12:00

This is a video of a sermon delivered by the Reverend Reginald Barjesus at a Pecha Kucha event in Whangarei, New Zealand, in February 2011. The format for Pecha Kucha consists of 20 images displayed for 20 seconds each. You can find out more about it here: http://www.pecha-kucha.org/

The Great Ontological Circle Jerk: Michaelangelo, St. Anselm, and the Divine

2010-06-27T04:52:00.002+12:00

Separation of Light from Darkness,
by Michaelangelo

On this Sunday in New Zealand, the Rev. Reginald Barjesus is pleased yet humbled to have been chosen by the Lord to announce a theological development of some significance. By the grace of God, he has been given a deep insight into the character of the Trinity and has been allowed to share it with the world.

But before elucidating this insight more clearly, and indeed to underscore its significance, I wish briefly to treat the nature of theological study and progress. Unlike virtually every other form of human understanding, theological innovation is precious. And it is all the more rare to have a new insight into the nature of God. Indeed, the greatest theological innovations over many hundreds of years have pertained to Mary, who is merely a vessel -- unsoiled, to be sure, but still nothing more than a vessel.

In fact, the doctrinal developments regarding Mary are held up as "an example of the Church's growth in understanding of Christian doctrine." And by studying the case of Mary, we can learn the methods by which theological progress is achieved. We've pretty much always known, for instance, that Mary was a virgin when our Lord Jesus was conceived. But it was the Lateran Council in 649 that advanced our knowledge one step further, affirming that Mary conceived the baby Jesus "without any detriment to her virginity, which remains inviolate even after his birth." Mary's perpetual virginity was reaffirmed during Vatican II (1962-1965), which stated that the Lord's birth "did not diminish His mother's virginal integrity but sanctified it." I don't know exactly how this works, but my guess is that Jesus was born out the virgin's ass. My proposal for Vatican III is that we start referring to the virgin birth as the rectal birth, a term which might meet less resistance from skeptics. Given the Vatican's efforts to reach out to atheists, this may very well be the way to go. I don't believe it will violate any existing dogma, and in some ways it has clear advantages, for "rectal birth" tells us what happened: Mary squeezed Jesus out through her anus; she pinched a divine loaf. "Virgin birth" only tells us what did not happen: Jesus' birth did not diminish his mother's virginal integrity, which isn't saying much because his birth didn't diminish her eyesight either.

The Assumption of Mary,
by Peter Paul Rubens, ca. 1620
Not food for worms, this one!

Any doubts that arise due to misguided biblical literalism have also been banished. While the virgin birth mentioned in the Gospels is to be taken literally, we are not to be fooled by biblical references to Jesus as Mary's first-born (which might imply that there was at least a second-born). No, Jesus is the first-born of one; he was Mary's oldest son, but he was her youngest son, too. Neither are we to be misled by Gospel references to Jesus' brothers -- James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas (Matthew 13:55; Mark 6:3). We are told that they may have been step-brothers or cousins -- apparently, there is no specific Hebrew or Aramaic word for "cousin," so they might have used the term "brother" quite broadly. This may very well be true. Of course, we'll need to reconsider the nature of social life in ancient Palestine, for it would seem that Jewish men must have been fucking each other's wives left and right (from the Alpha to the Omega, so to speak) for them not to even have the words to express the difference between a brother and a cousin. But that is small price to pay for the integrity of the Bible.

Moreover, building on Mary's perpetual virginity (together with the dogma of Mary's own immaculate conception, which leaves her untainted with original sin), we proceed to the declaration in 1950 by Pope Pius XII of the infallible dogma regarding the Assumption of Mary:

By the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.

Pope Pius poses piously -- this the
last of XII pious Piuses was described
by the British Foreign Office as the
"greatest moral coward of our age" for
his flirtations with Ante Pavelić, the
fascist leader of Croatia during WWII.

Now, we don't know for certain whether or not Mary actually died (that knowledge will no doubt come with further theological study); but at the very least we know that she didn't stink.

Sadly, in contrast to the fruitful developments within the theological sub-discipline of Mariology, in other areas of the faith our theology has been impoverished over time rather than enriched. Limbo, for instance, while never an official dogma was exceptionally popular for many centuries. But since 2007 it has fallen out of favor. It seems likely at this point that dead unbaptized infants do not suffer the exquisite punishment of limbo. They may get to go straight to heaven. Of course, they're just as likely to go straight to hell -- we need more study to know for certain. By the way, please do not confuse limbo with purgatory, which is a different place and is a dogmatic certainty. Purgatory has served the Catholics very well in the past, underpinning a healthy revenue stream by making possible the sale of indulgences. Reviving that revenue stream may be crucial in light of recent sex-scandal lawsuits, so purgatory is not likely to be shut down any time soon. Meanwhile, the notion of hell is also under vicious assault by many liberal Churches, including the not-so-liberal Church of England. This is really going to disappoint many of those Christians who are denying themselves joy in this life for the pleasure of witnessing the torture of their enemies in the life to come. According to my calculations based on the most recent scientific data, allowing the traditionally damned to enter New Jerusalem will increase the population by 400% -- I pity the poor self-righteous Christian bastard who has to share a one-bedroom apartment with a smirking David Hume, who got so much pleasure out of tormenting Christians in this life and will no doubt have just as much pleasure tormenting them in the next.

Be that as it may. My purpose thus far has been to draw attention to the nature of theological innovation, to underscore how painfully it is won. Indeed, in many respects the richness of Christian theology has suffered over time -- in the hands of modern liberals, it is being reduced to an insipid broth. And sadly, the most exciting theological progress has been with respect to Mary. Let's face it, she's a sexually dissatisfied woman, a mere sidekick.

St. Anselm of Canterbury,
1033-1109.
Rumor has it that when St. Anselm
was hungry, he would use the
ontological argument to summon the
best of all possible meals.
He weighed 67 lbs. when
he died.

But now we will talk about real progress, for our new insights pertain to the nature of God Himself. And we achieved them by imagining God masturbating. Does God masturbate? Of course he does. It follows from the time-honored ontological proof of the existence of God, most commonly associated with St. Anselm:

1. The masturbating Greatest Being (God) exists in our minds.

2. Existence in reality is greater than non-existence in reality.

3. Suppose the masturbating Greatest Being exists only in our minds and not in reality.

4. This would mean that the masturbating Greatest Being is a Being that admits of a Greater masturbating Being, namely one that exists in reality -- which is a contradiction.

5. Therefore, in order for the masturbating Greatest Being to exist in our minds, it must also exist in reality.

Now, if we build upon this insight and take into consideration the Trinitarian nature of God, it follows that when God masturbates he is actually fucking himself in a threesome. Moreover, it is a homosexual threesome -- Father, Son, and Holy Ghost (we'll leave the incestuous nature of the relationship alone).

I must admit that out of a sinful sense of human pride I would like to take personal credit for this theological discovery. But in all honesty, I can at most lay claim to rediscovering this truth, for there is evidence that in certain exclusive circles this theological truth has or had been known for a very long time.

Recent observations by two neuroscientists who studied paintings in the Vatican have observed interesting outlines in the throat of God as depicted by Michaelangelo in the fresco "The Separation of Light and Darkness." Of course, with brainstems on their minds, what they see is a brainstem (even though the brainstem is located nowhere near the throat). But one the Reverand's learned associates -- a widely-read Renaissance woman with a husband and two adolescent sons, none of whom are circumcised (I'm establishing her credentials; hers are far better than the ever virgin Mary's) -- thinks about quite different things. And she immediately recognized the distinctive shape for what it actually is: the outline of an impressive incarnation of masculine sexual machinery. There is little doubt that Michaelangelo, who is an icon of the modern gay community, was thinking along those same lines too. It is truly wonderful when interdisciplinary efforts produce such fruitful results (though I should say some art historians have distanced themselves these interpretations for reasons I don't quite understand since they have an inclination to believe almost anything and issue bountiful opinions through the same orifice by which Mary delivered Jesus -- but that's merely an aside).

Clearly, what we have here is an image of God playing with himself, with the genitals of the Son rammed down the throat of the Father, who's being taken from behind by the Holy Ghost (whom we can't see because, naturally, he's invisible). Perhaps if the Vatican would allow us to scrape away some of the paint that makes up the white cloud in the background, we might get a glimpse of Jesus' face (we could compare it to Shroud of Turin for authenticity). But until then we'll have to speculate as to whether Jesus at this point in the history of the world was a man with a big prick or just a big prick. Theologically, however, it makes little difference.

What is significant, though, is that the painting is a depiction of the act of Creation (which explains why the Son isn't circumcised, for that ritual develops later) and it is a reaffirmation of the Gospel of John:

In the beginning the Word already existed. He was with God, and he was God. He was in the beginning with God. He created everything there is. Nothing exists that he didn't make. Life itself was in him, and this life gives life to everyone. (John 1:1-4)

Creation was a fecund orgy of male sexual energy. The scientists are wrong -- there wasn't one big bang, but series of bangs in close succession, orgasmic eruptions of divinely masculine solids, liquids, and gases that issued forth from within God and spewed into the void. God fucked and sucked himself for six days straight -- no wonder he was so tired on the seventh, no wonder he needed a rest. In Genesis we read that "God looked over all he had made, and he saw that it was excellent in every way." But those us who have flipped ahead know that he was deceiving himself; it was merely a case of post-orgasmic bliss. It wouldn't take him very long to figure out that he'd created an incredible mess, something that needed to be washed away in a Flood. But the disillusionment would come later in the story. For the time being we should be celebrating with God his homosexual joy, perhaps to the tune of Beethovan's Ninth.

Of course, the recognition of God's homosexuality not only helps us better understand the process of Creation, it also sheds light on the biblical condemnation of homosexuals: "Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is an abomination." (Lev. 18:22) It helps us understand why God was so eager to "rain down fire and burning sulfur" upon Sodom and Gomorrah. The sin is not homosexuality itself, but the aspiration to be like God. Nothing angers him more. Indeed, this is pretty much the same reason that God tossed Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden: "Then the Lord God said, 'The people have become as we are ... So the Lord banished Adam and his wife from the Garden." (Genesis 3:22-23)

Likewise, recognizing that God is a homosexual Being should help us understand the plight of the Catholic clergy. Dedicated as they are to serving the Lord, they take the spirit of the divine deep into their hearts. Is it any wonder that they wish to emulate in the flesh with their altar boys the divine relationship between the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost?

Please forgive me, Moroni, for I have sinned -- on Mormons and Sausages

2010-03-28T10:50:00.001+12:00

The LDS Temple on its launchpad
near Washington, D.C.
It's precise location:
39°0′50.68440″N 77°3′56.24639″W.
But that could change at
any moment.

On this Sunday in New Zealand, after studying Jimmy Swaggart's academy-award winning performance to learn how it is done, the Rev. Reginald Barjesus confesses his failings, sheds a few crocodile tears, and makes a public commitment before his entire congregation to broaden his mind. Earlier this week, someone pointed out to me (quite earnestly) that I have short-shrifted the Church of the Latter Day Saints and that I might find it worthwhile to study the Book of Mormon. And I confess, my personal acquaintance with things Mormon has been fleeting and can be summed up in a paragraph or two.

I've seen the Mormon Tabernacle Choir on television, narrowly averted a death-by-car-accident in Salt Lake City (the fault lies with my wife and not with Mormon suicide-assassins), and frequently admired the wonderful spacecraft known as the Washington D.C. Temple from the Capital Beltway. I recently enjoyed that sweet moral comedy, Baptists at Our Barbeque (“A witty, surprising, and delightful film!”) which takes on the perennial theme of religious conflict in a light-hearted way (that is to say, there is very little bloodshed, for the movie is meant for children, young and old). Though I'm slightly embarrassed to admit it, I also once read The Four O'Clock Murders, a somewhat trashy true-life crime drama about a murderous Mormon patriarch and his devoted family of killers, which unlike the aforementioned movie is soaked through with blood shed for religious reasons. It's not as bad as it sounds, though you should wash your hands after reading.

Sweetness, light and shining faces
at the Hill Cumorah Pageant.

Twice I've attended the Hill Cumorah Pageant in Palmyra, New York, where the blonde and blue-eyed dress up to play "Patriarchs and Indians" in a stunning presentation of the essential plot of the Book of Mormon. I recommend the experience to anyone, but also suggest leaving your cigarettes in the car, for once I went with a couple of Germans who insisted on smoking (the pageant is very long) and they were frowned upon, albeit politely.

The spectacle actually begins in the grassy parking lot, where the fleet of Winnebago motor homes with out-of-state tags testifies both to the breadth of the Mormon diaspora and the allure of this annual pilgrimage. The line of state troopers down the center of Route 21 is no mere fascist display; it serves an important peace-keeping function. On the west side of the highway are the sign-bearing Christian protesters (I understand that Mormons, too, consider themselves Christians; other Christians do not) who've taken time off from picketing abortion clinics to volunteer for the lighter duty of telling Mormons that they’re going to hell; on the east side of the highway, the Mormons are free to walk unmolested onto the pageant grounds. Standing between them, the state troopers in their spiffy uniforms embody the concept of the “separation of Church and State,” the real purpose of which is (and always has been) to separate Church from Church – though disparaged by religious zealots, it is what keeps them from slitting each other's throats.

The audio and visual extravaganza includes a re-enactment of the historical moment when the Angel Moroni reveals the “Golden Message” (the Book of Mormon) to Joseph Smith. Had my heart not been made of stone, I would have found this scene utterly convincing. I wondered momentarily why so much light and noise didn't draw the good citizens of Palmyra from their beds and compel them to investigate. But then I put on my thinking cap (you’ll have to bring your own, for they are not provided) and reasoned that this would have provided eye-witness support for Smith’s claims and thus reduced the significance of faith; so I concluded that, prior to his meeting with Smith, the Angel Moroni stuffed slave-picked cotton from Mississippi (my way of providing some historical context) in the ears of the sleeping Palmyrians in much the same way that the Lord hardened the hearts of the Egyptians prior to the Exodus.

Watch and sing along as the Mormon
faith spreads throughout the world.

While I have tasted from the Book of Mormon, I have not wholly imbibed its wisdom. Sure, I could point out that there are so many religions and there is so little time. But given the amazing presence of the LDS on the world stage (it is the fourth largest denomination in the USA, with 13 million members world-wide and an expected growth rate of 1 million per year), I have clearly been remiss. I have seen their missionaries, stalking their prey among the disillusioned communists of the former GDR, trying to foist upon them a different kind of faith (though I expect their resemblance to the Stasi, working in pairs to keep each other honest, did not much help their cause); and I have seen their Churches in the islands of the South Pacific, where the impoverished and semi-literate are already overburdened (and over taxed) by religious imperialists -- the Mormon Churches are clean, proud, and modern, reflecting a material wealth that attracts Islanders like flies to shit. Thus let me reiterate: I have been remiss.

A rare photo discovered buried in
Jerry Falwell's back yard of Joseph
Smith Jr. and the Three Witnesses
(from left to right: Oliver Cowdery,
Joseph Smith, Martin Harris, David
Whitmer) creating sausage while
discussing dogma in their workshop
in Palmyra, New York in preparation
for their journey to Ohio. The
Angel Moroni disappeared around the
time this photograph was made.
This, together with reports that the
sausages consumed on the trek were a
great source of spiritual sustenance,
has led scholars at Liberty University
to speculate that the substance in the
vats may very well be the Angel himself;
they suspect he was killed while he slept
and put through a grinder.
These were happy days for Joseph Smith
and the three Witnesses. Cowdery and
Whitmer were excommunicated in 1838;
Harris was among dissenters who
excommunicated Smith. Smith was
assassinated before the men could renew
their friendships, though reportedly they’ve
been reconciled in heaven.

One reason I have paid such little attention to the Church of Latter Day Saints is that the faith is so gosh-darned young and I don’t think it’s fair to pick on children. “Laws are like sausages,” the saying goes (attributed to Bismarck, a conservative who liked both sausage and politics): “it is better not to see them being made.” And for those who enjoy the comforts of their faith, the same applies to religion. Most flavors of Christianity have been hallowed by time (and, one might add, tempered by the skillful application of fire to human flesh) and their origins obscured and I find them worthy of archeological investigation. But the historical proximity of the birth of Mormonism is so very near that it is as if the abattoir was right next door and, even with the windows closed, one could smell the stink seeping through the walls of the kitchen while digging into one's Swift Premium Sizzle 'N Serve fully cooked breakfast meats (registered trade mark).

It is no doubt my stony heart that prevents me from fully appreciating the significance of the manner in which the Lord revealed the Mormon truth. Clearly, choosing a dissolute treasure-hunter and practitioner of religious magic named Joseph Smith Jr. to be his emissary of hope was no mistake; the Lord was merely underscoring the importance of subjugating reason to faith. He underscored that point again by allowing only a few of Smith’s closest associates to actually see the “Golden Plates” that were translated from the distance by looking at a magical stone in the bottom of a hat and transcribed as the Book of Mormon before said plates were whisked away forever (though gold is heavy, the arms of an angel are strong). And he underscored that point again by choosing a plot, style, and language that without the guiding light of faith might indicate the hand of a 19th-century plagiarist who cherry- picked passages and ideas from books by Ethan Smith and Josiah Priest, an unpublished manuscript by Solomon Spalding, the Apocrypha and the King James Bible. Yet again he underscored that point by including language (words of Greek etymology), fauna (horses, elephants, cows, domesticated goats, pigs), flora (barley and oats), and technologies (steel, chariots, compass) that have no place in America during the period (2500 BC to 400 AD) in which the divine message was etched in gold – something that without the guiding light of faith would indicate anachronism, ahistoricism and perhaps even duplicity. I myself have always wondered about the striking linguistic similarity between the Angel “Moroni” and the word “moron” -- I thought the latter might have been coined by strident Baptists as a way of slighting the new kids on the block. But the word “moron” actually comes from the Greek μωρός, meaning “foolish.” A mind unguided by the light of faith might speculate that Joseph Smith Jr. was playing a little joke, poking fun at his newly gathered flock while sharpening his shears. Of course, a more enlightened conclusion is that the Lord was simply encouraging the faithful (in the manner of St. Paul) to be “fools for Christ,” of which there are plenty.

One reason for Mormonism's astounding
success was the theological principle
that every man should have his own
sausage factory. Indeed, it was this
basic belief that led to the practice
of polygamy, as each man required his
own pool of labor. Once women started
touching the meat, however, sausages
lost their spiritual significance. After
1904, when the LDS renounced polygamy
for the second time, the Mormon sausage
industry went into a steep decline from
which it never recovered. Joseph Smith's
notion that there should be "a sausage
for every stew" which he proclaimed
loudly in his bid for the Presidency
in 1843, resurfaced later in a slightly
different form as "a chicken in every pot,"
a slogan put to good use by Herbert Hoover
in 1928, though by then all Moron connotations
had disappeared. Sausage making is no longer
part of the Mormon tradition. While some men
on the fundamentalist fringe still practice
polygamy, they do so to increase welfare
payments by farming children and to staff
vacuum cleaner repair shops. The practice
is looked upon with disapproval by mainstream
members of the Church of Latter Day Saints.

I confess that the candle light of faith glows but dimly in my shallow cranium (though if I hollowed out the cavity a little, allowing for a little more air flow, and perhaps lined the walls with reflective aluminum tape, things might improve. I wonder if the surgery required will be covered under the new healthcare reform bill in USA, or would I only be covered if I go to jail -- thank God I'm in New Zealand). Yet perhaps by pondering the Book of Mormon, I may discover the key to my salvation. For isn't it truly miraculous that human beings who can string together a sentence or, say, ride a bicycle can embrace the Book of Mormon as a source of religious truth? Indeed, Mormons do much more than that: they articulate elaborate apologetics to abolish doubt, make bids for the Presidency (as in the case of Joseph Smith Jr.in 1843 and, more, recently Mitt Romney), drive Winnebagos so successfully that their rate of accidents does not deviate from the national average, retroactively baptize dead Jews so that they might go to heaven, finally allow blacks to become priests (1978), and even secretly construct a spacecraft right under our noses that will lift them out of here when the world economy implodes (the count down starts -- wait for it -- NOW). There must be a God. What have I been thinking?

"If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him." Or maybe not.

2010-03-10T14:27:00.055+13:00

Voltaire as he appeared at
the end of the 18th century
On this Sunday in New Zealand, we savor the delicious irony (smothered in Béarnaise) that many Christian conservatives now find themselves siding with Voltaire. “If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him," insisted the notorious skeptic, advancing his utilitarian argument with a twinkle in his eye. Clearly, no self-respecting evangelicals would ever invite Francois-Marie to join them at Denny's after Church (or IHOP, Crackerbarrel, or Applebees -- take your pick). And none expect to see his face during the coming resurrection (for God truly hates the French and their peculiar eating habits). Yet the fact remains that many of today's conservative Christians are making much the same point as our feisty little philosophe, albeit with the glassy stare that marks the true believer.

Take the Discovery Institute, for instance, that non-profit think tank (one uses the term loosely) dedicated to the promotion of "Creative Design.” Since any outright pronouncement of religious truth would shatter its thin scientific disguise, the Institute won’t go so far as to make any religious pronouncements about God; it will only insist that a belief in God is good for us. In an essay published by the Institute entitled the “The Dehumanizing Impact of Modern Thought,” for example, an institute scribe traces a line from Darwin, Marx, and Nietzsche to the gas chambers of Auschwitz (I say traces because he hijacks the words of Victor Frankl). He condemns the “false conceptions of humanity” spawned by modern thought that "lead to destructive behavior and harmful policies” (like the Holocaust and, worse still, the disappearance of the author in literary analysis). And in conclusion he points out that:

people who believe humans are created in the image of God will have different values, practices, and institutions than those who view humans as merely the sum total of environmental and biological inputs.

Members of the Salem Community Church
(10 S. Walnut Lane, Schaumburg, IL 60193)
at the local Applebees, 'munching on the
delicious 2 for 20$ lunch meals'
and taking 'a 'nice break from the busy
flow of studying, working and serving at
church.' Note the conspicuous absence of
Francois-Marie Voltaire. And, no, he was
not the one taking the picture

Of course, one might also add that they practice a different kind of textual criticism and read far less interesting books. Perhaps it is also worth pointing out that far more Nazis went to Church than ever read Darwin, Marx, and Nietzsche. But that's not the bone I want to pick right now so we'll let it slide.

Likewise, the Family Research Council avoids making claims of religious truth and states only that:

...from the social science perspective the more an individual practices his religious beliefs the more he thrives in education, health and mental health, marriage and family and the less likely is he to be involved in crime, addiction, abuse or a host of other ills.

I certainly find curious the persistent use of the masculine pronoun -- the scribes are clearly bucking the trend, writing about "social science perspectives" and reinforcing biblical patriarchy at the same time. Very, very sneaky. But I digress.

Finally, my favorite piece, which looks like an add for a Tarantino flick, is a graphic by Answers in Genesis in which some young punk holds a revolver to your eye: If God doesn't matter to him, do you? The text continues:

As a society, we reap the consequences of the unquestioned acceptance of the belief in evolution every day. It diminishes your worth and reduces human beings from being 'made in the image of God' to being mere players in the game of survival of the fittest.

Faced with such horrific visions of a world without God, one might indeed be tempted to cauterize the brain so as to banish doubt and embrace the ridiculous.

But let us not so hastily concede the point to Voltaire (a man I've always admired, especially his fashion sense). Let us, instead, take him to the mountain and from lofty heights let him gaze upon the nations of the world. For one nice thing about utilitarian arguments (unlike religious ones) is that they can be measured.

Behold, the United States. Compared to all other first world democracies, the United States exhibits the greatest intensity of popular religious belief. Of these democracies, the United States is the only society where most people strongly believe in a Creator and most people reject evolution. It is the only country where most people pray at least several times a week. It has the highest percentage of biblical literalists and the second-lowest percentage of atheists and agnostics (just slightly more than Ireland).

Religion in
Prosperous Democracies (I)

Religion in
Prosperous Democracies (II)
Religiosity and
Societal Dysfunction (I)
Religiosity and
Societal Dysfunction (II)
Religiosity and
Societal Dysfunction (III)

Likewise, compared to all other first world democracies, the United States exhibits by far the greatest degree of social dysfunction. Homicide rates are more than 300% higher than in most secular democracies. The United States has the highest rate of mortality for children under five (something which diminishes in other secular democracies as religious belief wanes). Sexually transmitted diseases afflict American youth at rates many times those which are found in secular democracies. Among first world democracies, the United States has the highest rate of teenage abortion (almost twice that of Sweden) – as with infant mortality, abortion rates diminish as religious belief declines. Americans have the shortest marriages and second-highest rate of divorce (slightly less than Sweden). They have the second-shortest life spans (a little higher than Italy). The Americans imprison more of their citizens than any other country in the world (not just any other prosperous democracy): 400% more than New Zealand (which has the second highest rate of incarceration among prosperous democracies) and almost 1000% more than Sweden (which has the lowest rate of incarceration among prosperous democracies). America has the highest levels of poverty and greatest income inequality. And Americans work more days of the year than do the citizens of any other prosperous democracy.

Moreover, this societal dysfunction is a found in a country of extreme wealth. With less than 5% of the world’s population, America controls 25% of the world’s financial wealth and consumes 25% of the world’s energy. But whereas secular democracies have managed their resources to produce healthy societies and healthy individuals, this has clearly not happened in America.

Where does religion fit in all this? Among all other factors, religiosity stands out. Other first-world democracies (Canada, Australia, New Zealand) have a frontier heritage and are culturally diverse; all first-world countries have a media saturated with violence and sex. What distinguishes America from the other first-world democracies is fervor of its faithful. To a certain extent, religiosity in other democracies has waned as individuals in those societies have increasingly enjoyed the benefits and security that came with increasing prosperity; and to some degree, the high levels of religiosity in the USA are the result of material anxiety. But powerful religious lobbies in the United States have persistently resisted efforts to advance societal health in the United States and they continue to do so. Promoting abstinence-only sex education, impeding health care reform, denigrating social services provided by government while trying to secure public funds for faith-based social outreach, opposing progressive tax-reform, favoring retributive punishment rather than rehabilitation -- the list goes on. Religious conservatives identify any progressive agenda with socialism and the welfare state, which for them are tantamount to atheistic communism and a threat to Judeo-Christian values. They are, in fact, much more interested in creating a society that is pleasing to God than one which is good for human beings. And this, more than anything else, has poisoned American political discourse.

Voltaire as he appears today. The
longevity of the philosopher (who
has traded in his pen for a guitar)
has convinced many Christians that he
is actually demon-spawn. Others believe
that he's the wandering Jew. In fact,
he's a vampire -- the inspiration for
'Spike' in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

I doubt very much, however, that any of this matters to those who fill the mega-churches in Colorado and Alabama or take their families to Florida's "Holy Land Experience" to bathe in blood of an ersatz Christ, up close and personal. For them, the utilitarian argument is really just a ploy, a point of entry for political debate, a Trojan Horse. Voltaire himself, however, would have changed his mind -- inventing God may not have been so necessary after all.

[sources are papers published by Gregory Paul -- "The Chronic Dependence of Popular Religiosity upon Dysfunctional Psychosociological Conditions," Evolutionary Psychology, Volume 7 (3) 2009; and Cross-National Correlations of Quantifiable Social Health with Popular Religiosity and Secularism in the Prosperous Democracies," Journal of Religion & Society (Volume 7) 2005.]

A Public Service Message from the Society Against Theological and Anti-Humanistic Nastiness

2010-03-07T00:22:00.001+13:00

The Rev. Reginald Barjesus has recently become aware of serious disciplinary problems within the Society Against Theological and Anti-humanistic Nastiness. Last week, some low-level scribe at CBS's Crimesider posted a perfectly crap "news" story about conservative Christians: "Is Conservative Christian Group, No Greater Joy Ministries, Pushing Parents to Beat Kids to Death?" This "news" story begins with a question. Which it doesn't answer. And then it asks: "What do you think?" It's as if we're supposed to do the work of the idiot scribe ourselves. He should hang his head in shame; he should be drummed out the organization altogether and compelled to listen to the collected works of Stryper [definitely worth a look] while being molested by a gaggle of Irish Catholic priests (frocked, defrocked, or prufrocked -- doesn't matter). Side note: This use of music as an instrument of torture has the virtue of being both exceptionally painful and permissible under US law. Indeed, one suspects that a major reason for the remarkable success of artists like Stryper, Amy Grant, and MercyMe may be that since the first Gulf war the CIA and the Pentagon have been licensing the libraries of Christian record labels for use in the ongoing crusade against Muslims, something which has been kept secret for fear of irritating the ACLU and violating the disestablishment clause of the constitution. What do you think?

Of course, there is no doubt that conservative Christian "family values" are indeed pernicious and in many instances have caused life-long psychological trauma, maybe even death. We are more certain of that than we are about the reality of global warming. And that is precisely the point. In much the same way that the shoddy methods and discriminatory practices of a handful of overly zealous environmentalists/ climate scientists have lent credence to those who insist that global warming is a satanic conspiracy (once again, let me make it perfectly clear that the Society Against Theological and Anti-humanistic Nastiness has nothing to do with global warming), stories like the one discussed here undermine our well-intentioned efforts to save the world (and even Christians themselves) from the absurdities and harmful consequences of their ridiculous dogmas (for as they themselves might say: one loves the sinner yet hates the sin).

Consider, for instance, when our lowly CBS scribe writes:

...the ministry's website boasts that the Pearls' first book on how to properly beat children, "To Train Up a Child," has over 450,000 copies in print.

The key words here --"properly beat children"-- don't come from the book; they are the words of the scribe himself. Now, had he actually read the book, he would no doubt have been able to find some sentences that support his claims -- instructions, perhaps, on how to properly bless rubber hoses for use in a holy beating. But as it stands, his allegations are wholly unsubstantiated, the kind of thing one might expect from Christians when they talk about the Jews ritually murdering children and desecrating the Host. As for the low-level scribe himself, so great is the damage that he and his ilk might cause the good work of S.A.T.A.N. that one suspects him of acting as a double-agent -- perhaps he's a mole planted by the Discovery Institute or a journalist trained at Liberty University.

(The first photo was so much fun
that I had to post another)

Stories like these allow Christians to stand up and shout: Look at this!! We're being unfairly persecuted in the mainstream media!! And they would be right. The Society Against Theological and Anti-humanistic Nastiness doesn't want that; we want Christianity to be persecuted fairly (again, let's differentiate between the sinner and the sin). The absurdity of the Christian faith, the atrocities of its history, the bankruptcy of its ethics -- all of this is well-documented stuff. There's no need to make anything up, no need to be duplicitous.

Having said all this, it is perfectly fair to point our fingers at their rock & roll icons and laugh at their fancy clothes and hair.

February: This Month in the History of Christianity. Emperor Theodosius I Establishes Christianty as the State Religion of the Roman Empire

2010-02-28T18:39:00.025+13:00

Theodosius I (347-395)

On this last Sunday in February, we celebrate Christianity's glorious triumph as a totalitarian ideology. On February 27, 380, Emperor Theodosius I issued the Edict of Thessalonica, which established Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire as follows:

It is our desire that all the various nations which are subject to our clemency and moderation should continue to profess that religion which was delivered to the Romans by the divine Apostle Peter, as it has been preserved by faithful tradition, and which is now professed by the Pontiff Damasus and by Peter, Bishop of Alexandria, a man of apostolic holiness.

Now, Theodosius was not the first Christian Emperor -- that honor belongs to Constantine. Grateful to the Christian God for delivering to him the Empire (Constantine was no fool; he chose his god on the basis of results), Constantine issued the Edict of Milan in 313 which called for the toleration of Christianity. Just how much of a Christian he actually was remains the subject of debate, for he clearly retained a pagan frame of mind and evaded baptism until right before his death. Nonetheless, for services rendered, Catholics bestowed upon him the mantle of "greatness" and the Orthodox Church made him a saint. And if modern evangelicals had a better grasp of history, they too would honor Constantine, perhaps with the Dr. James Dobson Christian Family Values Award for recognizing the importance of Tough Love -- Saint Constantine was firm believer in familial discipline, compelling his father-in-law to commit suicide, mounting his brother-in-law's severed head on a lance, executing his first-born son, and strangling his wife.

Constantine at the decisive
Battle of Milvian Bridge (312)

No longer facing persecution, right-minded Christians could now fully concentrate on what they loved most, namely excoriating wrong-minded ones. Whereas there is but a single Christian truth, the errors of the damned are manifold. As Christian kids in the public schools of Kansas are wont to chant: "Big 'C', little 'c', what begins with 'C'? -- Carpocrations, Cerinthians, Colorbasians, Cainites, Cerdonians" -- these are only a few of the many heretics cataloged and condemned by Epiphanius (also a Saint) in the 370s. Unfortunately, the edict of toleration did not allow the orthodox to fully press their point. Worse still, under the brief reign of Julian the Apostate, it looked like traditional Roman tolerance for religious diversity would be restored as imperial policy. But a spear thrust through Julian's liver (delivered by someone who pagans and Christians alike were certain was a bright-eyed Christian soldier) set things right. The skewered Emperor's dying words -- "Thou has conquered, Galiliean" (stuffed into his mouth many years after his death by pious Churchmen) -- underscore the point that after Julian's demise, Christianity never looked back.

Still, it was not until the reign of Theodosius I that Christianity became the only religion sanctioned by the Empire. Theodosius brought traditional Roman religious tolerance to a definitive end.

'Leading Light of Christianity. Nero's Torches,'
Henryk Siemiradzki (1876)

Most Christians, recalling how Nero set their spiritual brethren ablaze to light his garden parties, would be surprised to learn that the Empire had been a religiously tolerant place. Far from extirpating local gods, the early Roman imperialists usually welcomed them into the fold. Religion for the Romans was a utilitarian matter, something that served the interests of state and society. They were much less interested in a religion's specific beliefs than with a religion's social and political consequences.

Of course, the Romans didn't welcome all religions -- only those that made life better. Hence, they wiped out the Celtic druids, for example -- lacking the politically correct insights of modern sophisticates, the Romans failed to appreciate the social value of druidic human sacrifice. Likewise, they cared little for Christianity. With their contempt for earthly existence and eager anticipation of the Empire's collapse and Christ's Second Coming, Christians played an entirely different game. Instead of strengthening the bonds of human society, their religion threatened to unravel the social and political fabric. So Tacitus, for instance, identified the Christian faith as a "destructive superstition" and condemned Christians for "their hatred of the human race.” To escape persecution, all Christians had to do was honor the Emperor with a token sacrifice (indeed, it wasn’t for the “nature of their creed" that Pliny had Christians executed, but for their "stubbornness and inflexible obstinacy"). And what would happen, asked Celus, if everyone behaved like the Christians and refused to honor a human king – “the affairs of the earth would fall into the hands of the wildest and most lawless barbarians.”

By the 380, however, with the Germanic barbarians already knocking at the Empire's gates, the Lord Jesus of Nazareth had captured the Emperor's heart. Good Christians needed no longer to fear persecution by the State; indeed, they could now use the State to do some heavy-duty persecuting of their own. And who were the good Christians? That was, indeed, carefully defined; for the Edict of Thessalonica only recognized that flavor of the faith cooked up in the theological kitchen known as the Council of Nicea in 325:

According to the apostolic teaching and the doctrine of the Gospel, let us believe in the one deity of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, in equal majesty and in a holy Trinity. We authorize the followers of this law to assume the title of Catholic Christians.

Critical in this respect was a belief in the holy Trinity (recently invented). Other forms of Christianity, most importantly Arianism and Manichaeism, which could not fathom the fuzzy math needed to understand the Trinity, did not receive Theodosius' blessing:

But as for the others, since, in our judgment they are foolish madmen, we decree that they shall be branded with the ignominious name of heretics, and shall not presume to give to their conventicles the name of churches. They will suffer in the first place the chastisement of the divine condemnation and in the second the punishment of our authority which in accordance with the will of Heaven we shall decide to inflict.

Thus Christian orthodoxy would be spread not merely by argument but with the sharp edge of the sword, which was far more persuasive. And in 385, a wayward Christian ascetic named Priscillian (together with six of his friends) was tried by a Roman magistrate for heresy, tortured to reveal his doctrinal impurity, and beheaded. He was not the first Christian killed by other Christians for the crime of false belief. Indeed, as Ammianus Marcellinus noted in the 4th century: "No wild beasts are so dangerous to man as Christians are to one another." But Priscillian was the first to be put to death by the dynamic duo of Church and State.

St. Ambrose teaches Emperor Theodosius
a little humility

At the same time, Theodosius embarked on the systematic destruction of pagan beliefs throughout the Empire. With good Christians like Saint Ambrose of Milan whispering in his ear, Theodosius passed a series of edicts that criminalized pagan belief and behavior. They prohibited any kind of sacrifices, public and private; forbade traditional (pagan) ceremonies of State; proscribed attendance of temples or worship of man-made images; forbade apostasy from Christianity. They prohibited torchlight processions, votive offerings, tying bands around trees, wafting incense, hanging garlands, and divination (and much, much more). And they threatened the recalcitrant who continued to worship pagan gods with death:

We command that all those proved to be devoting themselves to sacrificing or worshiping images be subject to the penalty death.

Not only were pagan practices criminalized; so, too, was the failure to enforce those laws that criminalized paganism. Even discussing religious matters became a punishable crime:

There shall be no opportunity for any man to go out to the public and to argue about religion or to discuss it or to give any counsel. If any person hereafter with flagrant and damnable audacity, should suppose that he may contravene any law of this kind or if he should dare to persist in his action of ruinous obstinacy, he shall be restrained with a due penalty and proper punishment.

And while Theodosius promulgated laws, the monks left the deserts and swept into the towns, plundering what they could. Throughout the empire, local bishops led their mobs to desecrate and destroy pagan temples, altars, and shrines.

Meanwhile, in Rome, the statesman Symmachus mounted a final defense of traditional Roman religious values:

What does it matter by which wisdom each of us arrives at the truth? It is not possible that only one road leads to so sublime a mystery.

To which St Ambrose responded:

What you are ignorant of, we know from the word of God. And what you try to infer, we have established as truth from the very wisdom of God.

St. Ambrose prevailed. The pagan Altar of Victory was banished from the Senate; the Vestal Fires that had burned since the early Roman Republic were extinguished. And poised on the edge of its own decline, the Roman Empire embraced the certainty of Christ -- which did not do the Empire much good but did wonders for the glory of God.

Into the Rabbit Hole. "The Sold their Souls for Rock & Roll" -- Exposés of the Damned and Dangerous at "Good Fight Ministries."

2010-02-11T00:13:00.004+13:00

Worried that demonic forces in the entertainment industry are leading you and your children straight to hell? Visit Good Fight Ministeries and confirm your suspicions. Because they are.

Tori Amos: "Tori is a very confused young lady who is leading her many fans into eternal perdition. Tori rejects Christ who shed his precious blood to redeem her from her filth. ... We need to stay away from Tori's music and pray for her soul and that God would grant her repentance."

Elton John: "Like so many artists who have sold their souls for rock and roll, Elton John has been immersed in Satanism. ... Many artists like Elton John and Bernie Taupin recognize the devils [sic] hand in their success and realize that their fans do not have a clue that much of their inspiration is the result of demonic beings that use them as puppets to deceive the public. ... Elton John has led millions of people into further accepting Satan’s plan to confuse human sexuality and do away with the Judeo Christian ethic. While he has enjoyed much worldly success as a result of his Satanism he has been left a miserable shell of a person spiritually."

Spice Girls: "The Spice Girls also promote a fair amount of feminist propaganda in some of their music. ... In their so-called quest for liberation, they have plunged themselves even deeper into bondage and slavery as they have identified with Eve in her rebellion against God and alliance with Satan … Parents who allow their children to listen to music which glorifies rebellion and stimulates the already racing hormones of adolescence are guilty of pouring gasoline on a destructive fire that is already raging within the bosom of many of our young people. ... We all have fallen short, and if you are reading this and have fallen short in allowing your children to swallow the candy coded poison of the Spice Girls or other ungodly music, you simply need to acknowledge this and seek God in prayer."

Fiona Apple: "Fiona Apple echoes the Satanic axiom of Aleister Crowley's New Satanic Age when she says that her philosophy on life is: 'Do what you want. You can't f--k it up.' ... Pray that the Lord would rescue Fiona Apple from the deep hopelessness and despair that accompanies her music, interviews, and her life in general and that she would find the Blessed Hope of Jesus Christ and the eternal joy that comes from knowing Him. Pray also that those who are under her influence would be rescued as well."

Kurt Cobain: "Cobain’s worship of Satan manifested itself in a multiplicity of ways. Cobain sported a statue of Mary, the mother of Jesus, 'with its head cut off'. Cobain, like other Satanists, also had a penchant for the desecration of churches. ... Cobain himself admitted, 'I’m definitely gay in spirit' , as well as 'I probably could be bisexual,' and admitted to a close friend that 'he’d had sex with three or four men'. ... Many would view it as a sad irony that the leader of a band called Nirvana would end his life with a horrific suicide. Nirvana is the Hindu name for heaven. It is a counterfeit heaven designed to bind people to the millions of Hindu demon gods which are worshipped in India to this very day. Cobain and his music had its share of eastern influences. From beguiling eastern melodies to Cobain’s references in interviews to karma, reincarnation, etc. Even as these illusionary concepts have cursed India and zapped the very life out of hundreds of millions of Hindus through the centuries, Cobain, like so many of the rock “stars” before him, continued to introduce these concepts to the Western world. Truly, there is no irony. Cobain’s concept of Nirvana from the get go was actually a hell. ... One of the reasons it seems that he committed suicide was that the devil was no longer delivering the goods in regard to musical inspiration. ... God, through his Holy Word, has demonstrated to us that demonic beings are often associated with the instigation of suicide."

The Good Fight Theater

Kick back in the "Good Fight Ministries" theater, enjoy a virtual Coca-Cola, and learn how the real purpose of much of your favorite music and many of your favorites movies is to lead you straight to hell. Watch videos about the following:

Musical Acts: NSYNC, Eminem, Ramstein, Korn, Backstreet Boys, Christina Aguilera, Snoop Dog, DMX, Tori Amos, 311, Nine Inch Nails, Sarah Mclachlan, ICP, Kurt Cobain, Easy E, Danzig, KMFDM, Madonna, Kid Rock, Slayer, MTV, Metallica, Prince, U2, Iron Maiden, Sting, AC/DC, Kiss, Van Halen, The Eagles, Led Zepplin, Black Sabbath, Michael Jackson, Hall & Oats [sic], Fleetwood Mac, Carlos Santana, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd, David Bowie, David Crosby, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, George Harrison, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley, Bill Haley, Little Richard, Robert Johnston

Other Satanic Threats (movies, etc.): Transformers, V for Vendetta, Rick Warren’s Forked Tongue, Matrix, Vanilla Sky, Fight Club, Eyes Wide Shut, Pleasantville, The Truman Show, Harry Potter, X-Men, Timothy Leary, Scientology, Aleister Crowley, Gnosticism

Of course, once you've watched all these videos, you'll want to cleanse your music and movie collection in a purifying fire. But please be patient and use your God-given resources carefully (remember the parable of the ten bridesmaids). By waiting until you've captured a witch or two and burning them together with those blasphemous CDs and DVDs, you'll save a match. Sometimes I long for the days of vinyl, when the fires burned brighter and hotter. Yet again, nowadays, the witches and heretics scream louder and longer -- and that "maketh a joyful noise unto the Lord."

"Good Fight Ministries" is endorsed by:

I almost forgot:

"If you feel that the Lord is leading you to make a contribution to Good Fight Ministries, you may make a tax deductible donation by credit card by choosing one of the amounts listed below, or you can send a check for any amount (payable to Good Fight Ministries) to the following address: Good Fight Ministries P.O. BOX 2202, SIMI VALLEY, CA 93062."

Into the Rabbit Hole. Keeping the Divine Tally at GodRev.com

2010-02-10T09:21:00.009+13:00

At GodRev.com, the Lord's statisticians are keeping the divine tally in REAL TIME!

Watch LIVE as sinners all over the world accept Christ as their Savior and help pray for them as they begin their new lives in Christ Jesus.

Get to know your new brothers & sisters in Christ and add them to your prayers! All while expanding your geographical knowledge!

Unfortunately, there are still many lost souls who don't know Jesus. The divine mathematicians at GodRev.com are watching in real-time not only as the world's population grows but also as Jesus separates the goats from the sheep -- the sadly departed are sorted according to whether they've been launched into a "Christian" or "Christ-less" Eternity. The statistics are heart-wrenching: the goats outnumber the sheep by about 4:1.

My friends, the matter is EXTREMELY URGENT. Help "God Revolution" realize its goal of "furthering the reach of the Gospel through the use of technology."

Our desire is to expand our ministry to the thirty-five most-used languages on the Internet in the next ten years, exposing 250 million people to the Gospel, and helping 25 million people come to Jesus as a result of this effort.

So please, donate now.

Reading from the Bible -- Matthew 19:14 & Genesis 11-24. Kids Groove on Abraham

2010-01-31T06:55:00.001+13:00

Abraham taking the knife to Isaac,
Laurent de LaHire (1650)

On this Sunday in New Zealand, I’m thinking about reaching people early. As Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these." (Matthew 19: 14) Indeed, nothing absorbs religious dogma more effectively than the uncritical, sponge-like gray matter of the very young. And nothing demonstrates the spine chilling implications of this fact better than the words of Becky Fisher.

Fisher is the Pentecostal children’s minister featured in Jesus Camp (2006), a documentary film that shows what happens when impressionable children are given over to devoted fundamentalists armed with smarmy metaphors and cheesy ‘educational’ toys and gearing up for deadly purposes. She’s worth quoting at length:

I can go into a playground of kids that don’t know anything about Christianity, lead them to the Lord in a matter of, just, no time at all, and -- and just moments later, they can be seeing visions and hearing the voice of God. Because they’re so open.

They are so usable in Christianity. If you look at the world’s population, one third of that 6.7 billion people are children under the age of 15. One third. Where should we be putting our efforts? Where should we be putting our focus? I’ll tell you where our enemies are putting it. They’re putting it on the kids. They’re going into the schools. You go into Palestine and I can take you to some websites that will absolutely shake you to your foundations and show you photographs of where they’re taking their kids, the camps like we take our kids, the bible camps, and they’re putting hand grenades in their hands, they’re teaching them how to put on bomb belts, they’re teaching them how to use rifles, they’re teaching them how to use machine guns. It’s no wonder, with that kind of intense training and discipling [sic], that those young people are ready to kill themselves for the cause of Islam. (Reflective pause)

I wanna see young people who are as committed to the cause of Jesus Christ as the young people are to the cause of Islam. I wanna see them as radically laying down their lives for the Gospel as they are over in Pakistan, in Israel, in Palestine and all those different places, you know, because we have – excuse me, but we have the Truth. (chuckle, smile).

The suggestion that we need to lead our children to the Lord so that they, like the children of Allah, will be prepared to lay down their lives for the Gospel should make all but the most cold-hearted fundamentalists shudder. Let’s see these children, for a moment, through Becky Fischer’s eyes: armed with grenades, strapped to bombs and raising rifles, prepared to kill and die for an absurd vision of the truth embedded into their psyche before they had a chance to think for themselves -- embedded so deeply that they never can escape. Considered in terms of their epistemology, the truths taught to the children of the Lord and to the children of Allah are exactly the same – they are products not of rational discourse but of revelation. If Becky Fisher’s dreams come true, these children will soon be staring each other down, armed to the teeth, mirror-image terrorists for the divine.

Fisher is not the only Christian leader who recognizes the stunning potential of children. In Tranforming Children into Spiritual Champions, George Barna, a renowned market researcher serving the evangelically inclined, demonstrates that the 'greatest probability of someone embracing Jesus as his or her Savior' occurs at the ages between five and twelve. Materials published by the Child Evangelism Fellowship identify children as a "harvest field … virtually untouched" and takes issue with "subtle worldly philosophies [that] have persuaded the majority of Christians that children cannot make a decision for Christ until they can reason." The Child Evangelism Fellowship is the largest child ministry in the world, and in a country that separates Church and State, announces boldly on its website:

Are you a strategist at children's ministry? Are you focused on the best location to reach the most children? Let me tell you about the triple-point-place for reaching children -- the public school!

Last year in South Carolina alone, the Child Evangelism Fellowship had 183 after-hours ‘Good News Clubs’ in public schools, reaching 13,524 children. The Fellowship also sends teams of missionaries into America’s playgrounds and housing projects in search of the very young, and last year claimed to have saved over 1 millions souls, world-wide. (other sources: Rachel Aviv, 'Like I was Jesus: How to bring a nine-year old to Christ,' Harper’s Magazine, August 2009)

The goal for us should not be simply to fill the minds of children with a different ideology, equally dogmatic, before the fundamentalists get their chance. Rather, we need to teach them to think critically about what they read and hear; they need to be encouraged to evaluate and judge for themselves. That itself is enough to inoculate them against many ideological diseases, religious and otherwise.

In the spirit of such an education, I offer here a modest didactic rhyme – something for the child in us all. It was written a few months ago in the shadow the evangelist’s tent in Savu Savu and grooves on the Old Testament tale of Abraham and Isaac. My editorial and interpretive voice in the poem is obvious; but at the same time, if anyone chooses to compare the poem with the original text, I’m confident that they’ll find I’ve treated the Bible fairly.

My hope now is that the esteemed Dr. Fishy will set the piece to music. And if not them, I’ll settle for the Great Big Sea.

Abraham the Patriarch (Genesis 11-24)

Abraham the Patriarch, the Bible does record
Had an evil voice inside his head that he thought was the Lord’s
The voice told Abraham that he would father a great Nation,
That he would a be famous man, a blessing to Creation
His descendants would be countless, as numerous as the stars
And they’d fill the land of Canaan as wide as it was far

Had Abraham the wherewithal to see a therapist,
He might have actually learned that he was clinically depressed
If he had gotten treatment and the pills that he required
His self-deluded grandeur might eventually have expired
But as it was he met the Priest Melchizedek instead
Who told him he was blessed and took a tenth of all he had

The voice inside his head no doubt filled Abraham with pride,
It made him strut and swagger; it made him glow inside
But all the same, he surely felt a cruel and nagging fear
For he was getting older and his end was drawing near
And yet had not a single son to bring his heart some cheer.

Still the voice kept telling him, his seed would spread and grow
Finally, Abraham spoke up: ‘How can I really know?!’
Now you and I would probably seek out answers in a book
And not the guts of animals, where Abraham did look
He got a heifer and a ram, a she-goat and a dove
And cut them into pieces to delight the Lord above
And then he saw a vision, which the voice of God explained
‘Your descendants will be many, but they’ll need to feel some pain
They’ll be oppressed and kept as slaves for some four hundred years
And then I’ll give them all that land I’ve promised for your heirs’

With such a change of plan what was a Patriarch to think?
I suspect that such malevolence would have driven me to drink
Yet Abraham was different, and he got all excited
He looked at his wife Sarah and his passion re-ignited
But no matter how he loved his wife, she wouldn’t be a mother
So he gave up and looked around and tried it with another
Then one day the servant-girl gave Abraham a son
Ishmael they called the boy, but he was not to be the one
‘Try again with Sarah,’ said the voice of the divine,
‘She will bear the special son that I have had in mind.

When Abraham was ninety-nine he once more heard the voice
That tortured him throughout his life by promising him boys
Again the voice told Abraham, his destiny was great
But then God added something weird for him to contemplate
‘You’ll be the father not of one but of great many nations,
‘But only if you honor me by your self-mutilation.’
So Abraham whipped out his knife and off his foreskin went
Then put that blade to all the men who shared his bloody tent.

So Sarah finally birthed a boy, and Abraham rejoiced
They cut the baby’s foreskin off without giving him a choice
They named the baby Isaac and had a giant celebration
And then got rid of Ishmael, expelled him from the nation

For many years it seems the voice left Abraham alone
And he was finally happy, with a son to call his own
But then one night the voice of God, so cruel and so malicious
Demanded an obedience most horrible and vicious
‘Abraham, sweet Abraham,’ said the voice inside his head
‘You know that son you love so much? I want to see him dead
‘Take him to the mountains and then slay him with your knife
‘And lay him on my altar as a burning sacrifice.’

Old Abraham he proved himself a solid man of faith
Not for a single moment did he doubt or hesitate
He had no words of protest, no need for understanding
He would do exactly what the madness was demanding
He gathered up his son and all the firewood he’d need
And went into the mountains to do the bloody deed
He trussed up little Isaac and laid him on the altar
Raised his knife up to the sky, and never once did falter
Suddenly an angel’s voice was carried on the breeze
‘Hey, I’m here to tell you, God likes what he sees.’
‘He loves your blind obedience, the way you’re always on your knees
‘So now he will reward you -- there’s no need to kill your son,
‘Kill him something else instead, and then we’ll call it done.’

I guess that you could say the story has a happy ending
But as far as Abraham’s concerned, there's no use in pretending
That he should be a hero and a man to emulate,
A person to look up to, someone to venerate

Abraham the Patriarch was a man afraid of doubt
A man who did not like to think or work his problems out
He surrendered moral judgment and any sense of shame
Denied responsibility and never took the blame
His faith and his obedience, his answer to God’s call
Enabled him to do things repugnant to us all
That’s what makes him scary -- a sociopath, a freak
A man who was as dangerous as he was spiritually weak.

As for God himself, he comes off as a nasty bloke,
A deity of fickle mind who likes the cruelest jokes
More likely still the voice of God’s an ailment of the brain
A pious inspiration for the criminally insane

O.K., fun's over -- let's all go down to the basement for tea and cookies.

Reading from the Bible: Matthew 13: 47-49 & Revelation 21 & 22. Our Heavenly Reward; or "Paradise is exactly like where you are right now, only much much worse."

2010-01-17T05:55:00.009+13:00

On this Sunday in New Zealand, I'm contemplating the horrors of the heavenly reward so eagerly anticipated by the Christian faithful. "I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus," announces Paul in Philippians 3:14. The passage is a favorite source of inspiration for Christians who are trying to rise above this mortal coil. Given their goal to wholly subjugate the flesh in order to claim their prize, it's worth trying to understand what the fuss is all about.

In this respect, the Islamic faith makes things easier. The vivid descriptions in the Koran give Muslim terrorists a remarkably clear picture of why they take flying lessons:

For them will be Gardens of eternity; beneath them rivers will flow; they will be adorned therein with bracelets of gold, and they will wear green garments of fine silk and heavy brocade. They will recline therein on raised thrones. How good [is] the recompense! How beautiful a couch [is there] to recline on! (Koran, verse 31)

This verse from the Koran and many others confirm for Muslim suicide-bombers what Laurie Anderson puts so succinctly: “Paradise is exactly like where you are right now, only much much better.”

Self-Crucifixion in the Philippines

In contrast, it is much more difficult to understand why many Christians in the Philippines, for example, crucify themselves (Tori Amos does so too but at least she wonders why) even though officials warn that crucifixion is bad for the health (officials also advise using sterilized nails, though sterilization is clearly not biblical and thus frowned upon). Or to understand why, even as I write, Roman Catholics, Mormons and Evangelicals (and orthodox Jews) are working together to amend the constitution of California (Proposition 8) to deny gays and lesbians the bliss of marriage, when they're generally much happier bickering amongst themselves. Indeed, what exactly about their expectations of the afterlife drives Christians to those heights of self-abuse, intolerance, and violent persecution for which they are so historically famous?

In truth, I'm not so sure that they even know themselves. I'm convinced that if Christians paid close attention to the biblical fine print, they'd be much less eager to forgo worldly pleasures for the dubious promise of God's reward. I can imagine the Muslim bomber doing a quick and cogent cost-benefit analysis (however misguided) right before pushing the button on his battery pack. But I can't do the same for the Warrior for Christ.

We'll begin our investigation into the nature of God's heavenly reward by parsing the words of Jesus himself.

Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like a fishing net that is thrown into the water and gathers fish of every kind. When the net is full, they drag it up onto the shore, sit down, sort the good fish into crates, and throw the bad ones away. That is the way it will be at the end of the world. (Matthew 13: 47-49)

There's nothing here of the lucidity one finds in the Koran. Instead, the idea that the heavenly kingdom is "like a fishing net that is thrown into the water" has the absurdist flavor of post-modern buillshit. It makes about as much sense as describing God's kingdom as a head of cabbage, cut in half. But these are the words of Jesus, and we'll work with what we get.

The only sense I manage to squeeze out of this parable has to do with the notions 'good' and 'bad' and the notion of purpose, which is not explicitly mentioned but informs the entire passage. Interestingly, they are seen exclusively from God's perspective. Whether the fish are 'good' or 'bad' has nothing to with the fish and everything to do with the fishermen. The fish themselves don't really matter (indeed, concern for the fish is cruelly absent). The only thing that matters is whether they serve the fisherman's purposes (which from the perspective of the fish can only be considered nefarious).

In their excitement to be counted among the ‘good’ fish, what Christians fail to grasp is that their reward looks grim. The ‘good’ will inevitably be gutted or filleted, then perhaps smoked, maybe grilled, or poached in a nice Chardonnay; they'll be masticated and digested, whereupon anything that’s left will explode out some heavenly backside. The ‘bad’ fish actually stand a better chance. If the fishermen sense at all the importance of husbanding their resources (though this is unlikely if they are evangelicals, for whom global warming and other environmental concerns are Satanic conspiracies), they will return the ‘bad’ fish to the sea instead of leaving them rotting on the beach and bringing down the value of waterfront properties.

So I must ask the Christian faithful--especially those who ridicule Muslims for looking forward to their harem of virgins--to do a cost-benefit analysis of their own. Consider an illicit pleasure that is dear to your heart--whether it's oral sex with a same-sex lover or curling up with Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (I would have included downloading porn, but evangelicals already do too much of that). And then ask yourself whether it is worth forgoing that pleasure for the heavenly reward of being turned to shit. Agnostics and atheists can look forward to becoming food for worms, which is pretty much the same as shit, but knowing this helps them recognize rather than deny the value of mortal life.

Perhaps you think I've taken the metaphor too far. I can only respond that if the good Lord had wanted us to understand his kingdom and the nature of our heavenly reward differently, he would have chosen a different metaphor. Besides, other biblical passages that offer insights into what Christians can expect in the afterlife only underscore God's narrow concern with his own needs and his indifference to those of others.

North Korea's Kim Jong-il is the
closest thing we have to God.

Consider, for example, some of the passages in the Book of Revelation. Written by St. John the Divine, the Book of Revelation provides the most reliable eye-witness account of what the afterlife is really like, and it isn't pretty. Here St. John describes what he saw when invited to gaze upon God's throne:

In the center, around the throne, were four living creatures, and they were covered with eyes, in front and in back. The first living creature was like a lion, the second was like an ox, the third had a face like a man, the fourth was like a flying eagle. Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes all around, even under his wings. Day and night they never stop saying: "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come."

Whenever the living creatures give glory, honor and thanks to him who sits on the throne and who lives for ever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who sits on the throne, and worship him who lives for ever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne and say:

"You are worthy, our Lord and God,
   to receive glory and honor and power,
   for you created all things,
   and by your will they were created
   and have their being." (Revelation 4: 7-11)

It is not clear to me whether every Christian is expected to don outlandish S&M gear and join in with God's answer to the Village People in the eternal wanking of the divine ego, but I find the words exceptionally tedious even upon first reading. The idea that I might be compelled to say them over and over, staring at a watch where the hands tick but never move, makes the Lake of Fire seem positively inviting. I suspect that God himself must be suffering a boredom so intense that it pains like an abscessed molar--this would go a long way in explaining his generally foul mood.

I can't begin to guess what was going through St. John's mind when he witnessed this scene, though I imagine he would have enjoyed Pyongyang. Indeed, I would encourage all Christians who want to understand what they might be getting into by placing their hand in the hand of the Man from Galilee to visit North Korea and seek an audience with Kim Jong-il, who right now is probably the closest thing we have to God on earth. But they should remember to bring their own food, for Kim Jong-il doesn't care much about his worshipers either.

This pornographic poster
of New Jerusalem (destined
for the place on a Christian
teenager's wall that might
otherwise be occupied by Sarah
Palin) shows the city with a
dome, and thus clearly violates
scripture. Concerned parents
should color over the naughty
bit with a blue marker.

Neither do I understand what's so exciting about New Jerusalem, which has the aesthetic appeal of a square box because it is ... well, a square box: 1400 miles high, wide, and long (Revelation 21: 16-17). It may be tarted up with fancy stones and pearls, but in the end it's just a box. You might think it was designed by some blind repentant architect from the GDR whom God never bothered to heal. Actually, God enlisted the talents of Rick Sternbach, who also designed the Borg cube for Star Trek.

Yet even if I set aside my aesthetic objections, a major problem with New Jerusalem is that this city is in fact the quintessential gated community:

[The blessed] have the right to the tree of life and may go through the gates into the city. Outside are the dogs, those who practice magic arts, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. (Revelation 22:14-15)

This depiction of New Jerusalem is
biblically accurate and won't lead
to impure thoughts.

As someone who values the notions of civil society, public interest, and public space, I don't think New Jerusalem is a place I'd like to live. As for the disparaging remarks about those who remain outside its walls, they can safely be dismissed as typical Christian hyperbole; like when Pat Robertson labeled thirty- to forty-thousand supposedly left-wing academics in the USA as ""racists, murderers, sexual deviants and supporters of Al-Qaeda," and as "termites that have worked into the woodwork of our academic society." He's talking about some of my best friends.

Sure, in New Jerusalem Christians will find themselves in the immediate presence of God, but this can only appeal to those who fancy the idea of eternal servitude:

The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. (Revelation 22:3-5)

This is not a depiction of New Jerusalem,
but rather of the evil Borg from Star Trek;
they were designed by the same architect.

Writing his name on everyone's forehead?! God is so obsessed with his possessions that he labels everything he owns -- spice rack, table cloth, bottle cap collection. Now, if there were other gods one might excuse such strange behavior (only barely), saying he doesn’t want to get his stuff mixed up with theirs. But since God is the only God around (having killed all others), we can only conclude that his obsession with stamping ‘Jehovah’ on every forehead derives from a preposterous need for self-glorification. That this will be standard operating procedure in New Jerusalem should come as no surprise – God is acting in a manner entirely consistent with the biblical record.

Pope Alexander VI (1431-1503), whose
actual behavior closely resembles
that which Pat Robertson imagines
of liberal academics.

Again, we get a clear sense of God's priorities. If God were actually interested in the needs of his ‘servants’, he would stamp their own names on their foreheads. I’m sure that the good people in New Jerusalem will all know that they belong to God, and God will know that they belong to him. But given the vast numbers of the resurrected and the raptured, what they probably won’t know is each other. How truly unfortunate, that when Pat Robertson finally gets to meet his true brother in Christ, the notorious Pope Alexander VI, they will recognize each other only as 'Property of God'; they will never get the chance to compare notes.

Reading from Bible: Gensis 6-9 -- Noah and the Flood

2010-01-03T22:01:00.002+13:00

Illustration from the
Nuremberg Chronicle, 1493On this Sunday in New Zealand, the Rev. Barjesus revisits the story of Noah's Ark. He doesn't know whether it's worth telling again, but decided to go ahead anyway. By the way, a new movie version of the story is now being produced, starring Michael Keaten as Noah and Elliot Gould as God. But the Rev. is pretty sure that his telling of the tale will be more firmly based in scripture.

Noah and the Flood (Genesis 6 – 9)

Long before the Lord became all-knowing and all-wise
He made a few mistakes and some things took him by surprise
About fifteen hundred years after he’d finished with Creation
He looked upon the world he’d made with growing consternation
God did not appreciate the way things had been going
Especially with humanity, which he found quite annoying
He said we were immoral and that we were depraved
He did not like our violence and the way we misbehaved
He figured that our thoughts were wicked and completely evil
And openly regretted that he ever made us people

God was broken hearted, so he came up with a plan
He would make himself feel better by destroying all of Man
He would send a massive flood that covered everything and all
He’d wipe out all the living things that walked or flew or crawled

But then he reconsidered, for it didn’t make much sense
For such a great performance not have an audience
If he killed everybody, then none would tell the tale
The glory would be fleeting, the vengeance would be stale

Now the only righteous person that the Lord said he could find
Was a quiet chap named Noah, who never spoke his mind
You’ll notice in the Bible, Noah never makes a sound
He just listens while the Lord complains and pushes him around
Keeping mum was probably the best thing he could do
For had he said a contrary word, God would have killed him, too

God walked up and said to him: Today’s your lucky day
I’ve got something big to tell you; I’ve got something big to say
I’ve had this genocidal urge to end life on this earth
But I need someone to watch me, to appreciate my worth
So you and your three boys – I’m keeping you alive
And so you won’t feel lonely, I’ll let you keep your wives
And you’ll need to gather pairs of every creature, great and small
And build a boat that’s big enough for you to float them all

And then I’m going to show what it means to be divine
I will demonstrate to you the glory that is mine
I will make the waters rise above the highest mountain peak
And you’ll behold the kind of mass destruction I can wreak

While Noah bobbed around and watched, God took center stage
Unleashed his flood of fury, unleashed his flood of rage
When everything was dead and gone and the earth was finally dry
God commanded Noah: go forth and multiply
The people and the animals, God sent them off to breed
And so the earth filled up again, slowly by degree

Noah learned his lesson well, he knew the Lord’s desire
God liked nothing better than a sacrificial pyre
So Noah made his sacrifices and the Lord was pleased,
He promised he would never again kill everything that breathes

But understand that even now, nothing much had changed
Before the Flood and after, life was pretty much the same
God still thought that people were all evil and deranged,
But perhaps he felt a little doubt, a little bit of shame
He put the rainbow in the sky to help himself remember
Not to kill when he was mad, but to control his temper
Yet his spirit is a weak one, and now he’s up in heaven
Grumbling to himself while he prepares for Armageddon

“Not the Sharpest Knives in the Drawer” – A Creationist Understanding of the Galileo Affair

2009-12-27T12:51:00.005+13:00

Galileo Facing the Roman Inquisition
Christiano Banti (1857)

In The Fundamental Mistake of Theistic Evolutionists (published by Christian Ministries International), Jason Carlson and Ron Carlson offer encouragement to Christians who feel that by adhering to Creationism “the church is in danger of looking like fools to the more enlightened ‘scientific’ community.” They’ve noticed that many Christians believe that by “holding onto a literal reading of the Genesis record … [Christians] are in danger of making the same mistake that they made with Galileo back in the 17th century.” The Carlsons, however, assuage their fears with an uplifting history lesson, one that places the blame for geocentrism on the seductions of nasty pagan philosophers rather than on biblical literalism. They write:

Unfortunately, theistic evolutionists have gotten their history of Galileo all wrong. The problem with the Church during the time of Galileo was not that they were using the Bible to help them interpret the scientific evidence of the day, but rather, the Church had allowed the dominant philosophies and science of the day to influence their reading of scripture. Prior to Galileo, the dominant scientific viewpoint regarding the universe was that the earth was the center of everything; and thus, the sun, planets, and stars all revolved around the earth. This theory was first developed by pagan philosophers like Aristotle (384-322 BC) and Ptolemy (AD 2nd century); and later was adopted as the most plausible scientific explanation throughout academia and the Church. Thus, the Church had allowed their reading and interpretation of scripture to be influenced by the false theories of pagan philosophers, which had been adopted by the scientists of the day.

The real point of the Galileo story is not that science made the Church look foolish, but rather, the Church looked foolish because they had given up a correct reading of scripture for the sake of accommodating the dominant pagan theories of the day. The Galileo story is actually an indictment against Christian evolutionists. Christian evolutionists have abandoned the literal history of God’s creation account in Genesis for the sake of accommodating the popular, man-made theories of today. In doing this, they are the ones who risk making the Church look foolish; for abandoning the biblical record of creation will never get one closer to true science.

For the record, Cardinal Bellarmine, who played a major role in the condemnation of Galileo and Copernican astronomy, knew his bible and ecclesiastical wisdom very well – quite unlike Jason and Ron Carlson. Bellarmine noted that placing the sun at the center of the universe “is a very dangerous thing, likely not only to irritate all scholastic philosophers and theologians, but also to harm the Holy Faith by rendering Holy Scripture false.” He continued:

[The] Council [of Trent] prohibits interpreting Scripture against the common consensus of the Holy Fathers; and if Your [Reverence] wants to read not only the Holy Fathers, but also the modern commentaries on genesis, the Psalms, Ecclesiastes, and Joshua, you will find all agreeing in the literal interpretation that the sun is in heaven and turns around the earth with great speed, and that the earth is very far from heaven and sits motionless at the center of the world.

Here are some of the pertinent biblical scriptures that the Inquisitors took quite literally indeed:

Psalm 93:1 -- “The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved.”

Psalm 96:10 – “The world is firmly established, it cannot be moved.”

Psalm 104:5 -- “He set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved.”

Ecclesiastes 1:5 – “The sun rises and the sun sets and hurries back to where it rises.”

1 Chronicles 16:30 -- “The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved.”

Joshua 10:13 -- “The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day. There has never been a day like it before or since ….”

Jason Carlson, by the way, happens to be the Vice-President of Christian Ministries International, and has advanced higher education throughout “28 countries on 6 continents, speaking and teaching in numerous churches, high schools, universities, and seminaries.” But if Creationists follow the advice he offers here, then they’ll not only look “like fools to the more enlightened ‘scientific’ community,” they’ll also look like complete idiots to anyone with an understanding of history. At the same time, they’ll reveal how little they actually read their Bibles.

Reading from the Bible -- Deuteronomy 7: 1-6 & 20: 10-18. Genocide & Providence

2009-12-13T14:04:00.002+13:00

Taking Jericho,
Jean Fouquet, ca. 1455

On this Sunday in New Zealand, I find myself in the desert, just moments after Moses has recited the Ten Commandments and reiterated God’s commitment to the sons of Abraham. He goes on, outlining what the Lord expects when Israel enters the promised land of Canaan -- and nothing captures better and with fewer words the charred flavor of the Old Testament, the carnivorous spirit of Jehovah, and the license of the chosen people to kill:

When the LORD your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations -- the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you -- and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods, and the LORD's anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you. This is what you are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Asherah poles and burn their idols in the fire. For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession. (Deuteronomy 7: 1-6)

This passage, which places divinely inspired genocide at the heart of Judeo-Christianity, should make the words “God is Love” stick in the craw of any self-respecting Believer.

Here’s another for added measure:

As you approach a town to attack it, first offer its people terms for peace. If they accept your terms … then all the people inside will serve you in forced labor. But if they refuse … you must attack the town. When the LORD your God hands it over to you, kill every man in the town. But you may keep for yourselves all the women, children, livestock, and other plunder. You may enjoy the spoils of your enemies that the LORD your God has given you. But these instructions apply only to distant towns, not to the towns of nations nearby. As for the towns of the nations the LORD your God is giving you as a special possession, destroy every living thing in them. …. This will keep the people from of the land from teaching you their detestable customs in the worship of their gods, which would cause you to sin deeply against the LORD your God. (Deuteronomy 20: 10-18)

These are not the kinds of texts that modern Christians are likely to slap onto billboards (for that they are far too long); nor will we expect to find anyone petitioning for their prominent display on the lawns of court houses. Although such sentiments saturate the Books of Moses, those Christians and Jews who insist that their nations honor traditional religious values prefer not to be reminded of God’s taste for genocide. Yet, all the same, these scriptures have had a powerful legacy. Indeed, we can easily draw a line from the tumbling walls of Jericho to the death camps in Auschwitz.

There is no doubt that Jehovah’s war in Canaan would have clearly violated the Geneva Conventions and perpetrated a crime against humanity as brutal as any one could possibly imagine. God has managed to enlist some of the best lawyers in history, but even they are hard pressed to mount a cogent defense of his lust for blood. Take John Calvin (1509-1564), for instance, the lawyer-cum-theologian whose schismatic efforts during the Reformation inform some of Christianity’s most important post-Catholic developments. Calvin understood that God desired to “purge the land of Canaan of the foul and loathsome defilements by which it had long been polluted.” But he had to concede that:

[The] indiscriminate and promiscuous slaughter [of the Canaanites], making no distinction of age or sex, but including alike women and children, the aged and decrepit, might seem an inhumane massacre....

Yet while we might imagine this "indiscriminate and promiscuous slaughter" to be quite horrendous, we would be wrong. Again, Calvin: €€

... [It might] seem an inhumane massacre had it not been executed by the command of God. But as he, in whose hands are life and death, had justly doomed those nations to destruction, this puts an end to all discussion.

Indeed, that which by any rational measure is monstrously “inhumane” is justified because it is divine; while this abhorrent genocide may look like an atrocity, the fact that God ordained it means that it was good. This is not much of a defense and would not have served Joshua (who led the Israelites during their biblical quest for Lebensraum) particularly well at, say, the Nuremberg Trials.

Perhaps there’s some comfort to be had from knowing that the genocide perpetrated by God’s chosen people in Canaan never actually occurred -- that it was, in fact, a political fiction. Yet there are many Faithful who would rather believe in a God with bloody hands and a voracious appetite for death than believe in no God at all. In defiance of modern archeology, they’re still desperately trying show that when the walls of Jericho came tumbling down, somebody named Joshua may have been in the vicinity -- give or take a few hundred years.

Puritans fighting the
Pequot Indians in the 17th century

But even though the story is a myth, those who nonetheless believe have found it incredibly motivating. Nowhere more so than in America. The Puritans in New England, who went to great lengths to determine their place in God’s grand historical narrative, were firmly convinced that they were His new chosen people and that America was given to them by God. They were also convinced that the vengeful natives were beyond redemption and worthy only of extermination. In the words of that eminent divine, Cotton Mather (who would also play a major role in the Salem witchcraft trials), the Indians were "nations of wretches" engaged in the "most explicit sort of devil-worship"; they sought "the extinction of a plantation so contrary to [Satan's] interest as that of New-England." Thus, he concluded, "the infant colonies of New-England, finding themselves necessitated unto the crushing of serpents, while they were but yet in the cradle, unanimously resolved, that with the assistance of Heaven they would root this ‘nest of serpents’ out of this world.” It is often suggested that the atrocities associated with the Christian faith were the result of human corruption and greed. But when one tries to understand the genocidal zeal of New England Puritans, all one needs to know is that they studied their Bibles and were sincere in their beliefs.

Corpse of Chief Spotted Elk,
killed in the Wounded Massacre, 1890

Thomas Jefferson, while hardly an orthodox Christian, nonetheless inherited the Puritan vision of America as the Promised Land. He suggested that the Seal of the United States show "the children of Israel in the wilderness, led by a cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night.” And in his second inaugural address, he called upon the “favor of the Being in whose hands we are, who led our fathers, as Israel of old, from their native land and planted them in a country flowing with all the necessities and comforts of life.” He had a special place in his heart for the biblical tale of God leading his chosen people into Canaan, mapping that tale onto the conquest of America. And he expressed his willingness to kill every Indian that stood in his way. Writing to General Henry Dearborn, who as Secretary of War also dealt with Indian affairs, Jefferson insisted that:

if we are constrained to lift the hatchet against any tribe, we will never lay it down until that tribe is exterminated, or driven beyond the Mississippi … [I]n war they will kill some of us; we will destroy all of them.

Looking across the Atlantic more than a century after Jefferson’s death from his prison cell in Bavaria, a diminutive corporal admired the fruits of his labor:

[I]n North America the Teutonic element, which has kept its racial stock pure and did not mix it with any other racial stock, has come to dominate the American Continent and will remain master of it as long as that element does not fall a victim to the habit of adulterating its blood.

Nothing testifies more strongly to the success with which Christians in the United States fulfilled their divine mandate than the approving words of Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf.

But America’s mission extended well beyond its Western shores, for the effort to annex the Philippines also drew its justification from heaven. In 1900, announcing in Congress that “the Philippines are ours forever,” Senator Albert Beveridge pledged not to “renounce our part in the mission of our race … of the civilization of the world.” God has made “the English-speaking and Teutonic peoples” the “master organizers of the world” destined to “administer government among savage and senile peoples.” Without such power “the world would relapse into barbarism and night.” He gave thanked “Almighty God that he has marked us as His chosen people … to lead in the regeneration of world.” In pursuit of God’s plan, American soldiers undertook scorched earth campaigns, destroyed entire villages, engaged in torture and set up concentration camps. “Our men have been relentless,” wrote an American war correspondent, “[They] have killed to exterminate men, women, children, prisoners and captives, active insurgents and suspected people from lads of ten up, the idea prevailing that the Filipino as such was little better than a dog ….” While the biblical genocide in Canaan was clearly a myth, it inspired exterminations that were bloody and real.

Reading the biblical account of the genocide perpetrated by God’s chosen people in the Land of Canaan should make us reconsider whether Hitler, too, was divinely inspired. Hitler says as much in Mein Kampf:

For me and for all genuine National-Socialists there is only one doctrine. PEOPLE AND FATHERLAND. What we have to fight for is the necessary security for the existence and increase of our race and people, the subsistence of its children and the maintenance of our racial stock unmixed, the freedom and independence of the Fatherland; so that our people may be enabled to fulfill the mission assigned to it by the Creator.

Entrance to Auschwitz-Birkenau, 1945

Once again, to make sense of Nazi atrocities and the horrors of Auschwitz, one doesn’t need to banish Hitler from humanity as an evil madman; one needs only to assume the sincerity of his beliefs -- his moral commitment, so to speak (on Hitler's religiosity see note below). Hitler stands in a long tradition of leaders in the Judeo-Christian West who were willing to exterminate for divine purposes. And we need to ask ourselves: why should we believe Hitler any less than we believe Joshua? The irony that Adolf Hitler and Joshua are soul brothers is, of course, palpable. And the many parallels between the biblical genocide in Canaan and the notorious accomplishments of the Nazis are deeply disturbing. But while nobody (not even a neo-Nazi) names their boys "Adolf" anymore and all who are civilized shun the Hitler mustache, Judeo-Christians continue to honor Joshua, a Founding Father in the Western tradition of war crimes and crimes against humanity, when they name their baby boys. “Joshua” is ranked as the third-most popular name given to baby boys in the USA; “Adolf” doesn’t warrant a ranking at all.

Perhaps, when we encounter someone like Zvi Yehuda, a gun-toting Israeli settler on the West Bank of the Jordan, we can dismiss him, however dangerous, as a delusional radical. “The creator if the universe gave us this land,” he says. “It is a commandment to live in it and settle it. Anyone who stands in our way – whether pharaoh or Obama – will be punished by God.” But what about a president, in this case George W. Bush, who stands before the American people in the wake of 9/11 and says: "Our nation is chosen by God and commissioned by history to be a model to the world of justice."

Certainly, countries like America have an obligation to the world. But are we to understand those obligations using the same arrogant religious language that has historically legitimated the abuse of power, wholesale destruction, and mass murder? Using a language that by its very nature precludes rational discussion? That by its very nature will inevitably lead to such atrocities again? While some traditions are well worth preserving, those which have us serving the purposes of a Judeo-Christian God rather than humanity should rightly be condemned. The Geneva Conventions, which by their very existence affirms humanity and repudiates the Judeo-Christian God, were a step in the right direction. But it’s time for more.

Note on Hitler's religiosity: Critics of Christianity often point out that Hitler was a Catholic, and, strictly speaking, that may very well be true. Unlike other Nazi leaders, Hitler never formally left the Church and the Papacy never saw fit to excommunicate him (nor did it ever put Mein Kampf on its list of forbidden books). Publicly Hitler spoke admiringly of Christianity; privately he had few nice things to say. But that doesn't mean he wasn't religious. Goebbels, the Third Reich's Minister of Propaganda, noted in his private diary: "The Fuehrer is deeply religious, but deeply anti-Christian. He regards Christianity as a symptom of decay." And in Mein Kampf he makes it very clear that he was on a Mission from God.

Reading from the Bible -- Deuteronomy 13, 21,22 & Matthew 10. Judeo-Christian 'Family Values' and the Promise of the Enlightenment

2009-11-15T06:37:00.000+12:00

Many are the things that
are against the the Word of God

On this Sunday in Fiji, I’m amazed at the sleight of hand by which conservative Christians have anointed themselves the great proponents of Family Values. We should be very much ashamed. For the importance of the family was one of the great insights of Enlightenment philosophers who worked so hard to free the West from religious tyranny. Yet not only have resurgent theocrats managed to usurp “family values” virtually unopposed, the greater irony is that the Holy Writ reflects “family values” that should rightly scare the Jesus out of anyone and repeatedly construes the “family” as a threat to religious loyalty.

Nose firmly pinched between thumb and forefinger, I recently wandered the websites of Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council, both of which are major political organizations dedicated to protecting their miserable understanding of “family” from, among other things, the horrors of homosexuality and unbridled feminism. Rejecting the “humanistic notions of today's theorists,” Focus on the Family draws instead on the “wisdom of the Bible and the Judeo-Christian ethic.” It sees itself as “nurturing and defending the God-ordained institution of the family and promoting biblical truths worldwide” and reflecting “the recommendations of the Creator Himself, who ordained the family and gave it His blessing.”

Brochure published
by the FRC, explaining why
the Defense of Marriage Act
is not enough The Family Research Council takes a more neutral tone but is actually more threatening. It endorses a very narrow notion of “family” which it seeks to impose on society as a whole:

Family Research Council champions marriage and family as the foundation of civilization, the seedbed of virtue, and the wellspring of society. Properly understood, "families" are formed only by ties of blood, marriage, or adoption, and "marriage" is a union of one man and one woman. We believe that the law should recognize only these traditional definitions of marriage and family and that public policy should encourage formation of such families and discourage alternative "family" forms.

Given the many different shapes and sizes of human families and civilizations past and present (including the polygamous extended families of the biblical patriarchs), the FRC’s claims are ludicrous from the outset. But setting that aside, one wonders what would happen if they decided that Birkenstock sandals were good for feet -- would they force everyone to wear them? Or if they determined that families thrived best in two-story Cape Cod cottages -- would they ask the Federal Government to raze Manhattan?

Although the Family Research Council avoids excessive religious language and even claims the support of “social science,” its agenda is based in religious belief. According to the FRC, “God is the author of life, liberty, and the family” and the FRC “promotes the Judeo-Christian worldview as the basis for a just, free, and stable society.” It claims further:

In the United States, the Judeo-Christian worldview has provided a sound basis for the flourishing of our national culture and our political system. FRC, in the tradition of our Founding Fathers, works to encourage the free worship of God as a great good for individuals, couples, families, communities and the nation.

Sympathy for the Devil

Supporting a wide slate of restrictive policies that include outlawing abortion, protecting society from (while offering a contemptuous “sympathy” to) homosexuals, and eliminating embryonic stem cell research, the FRC advances a social and political agenda that stinks like theocracy.

What I find especially interesting about both the FOC and FRC, however, is that their references to actual scripture are appallingly scarce. The reason for that is obvious to all who care enough to read the Bible for themselves. I wonder what kind of parents today would want to draw upon “biblical wisdom” when dealing with “a stubborn, rebellious son,” for the Bible demands the following:

In such cases, the father and mother must take the son before the town. They must declare: ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious and refuses to obey. He is a worthless drunkard.’ Then all the men of the town must stone him to death. (Deuteronomy 21:20-21)

Parents who suddenly find themselves transported back to biblical times would be advised to retain some proof that their daughter was a virgin when she married just in case their new son-in-law decides to accuse his bride of having slept with another man. If they have that proof, then the man faces a fine of 100 pieces of silver (a meager punishment, considering how often the punishment for even trivial offenses is death). If not, however, the results are dire:

[Suppose] … her virginity could not be proved. In such cases, the judges must take the girl to the door of her father’s home, and the men of the town will stone her death. (Deuteronomy 22: 20-21)

Meanwhile, for men unlucky in love, rape might be an appropriate path to marriage and a long lasting relationship – but such men need to make sure that they take their prize in public:

If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman … he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father. Then he must marry the woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her. (Deuteronomy 22:28-29)

Defending iron age
family values with stones

One can, of course, go on at length, identifying pernicious bits of “biblical wisdom” that bring comfort only to the cruel. Seeing the Bible as the source of family values would be utterly laughable were it not for the fact that powerful Christian organizations have been allowed to claim the moral high ground on the issue and exploit their defense of family values as a way to promote theocracy. Moreover, comparing the specific rules and laws of a violent iron age patriarchal society to our own would be totally unfair were it not for the fact that today’s conservative Judeo-Christians shamelessly look to that society for wisdom on how to shape our own. Keep in mind: we need search neither far nor long to find out what happens when such wisdom is set into action. Let us not avert our eyes: in countries where theocratic barbarity prevails (different name for God, same values) -- Iran, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Saudi Arabia -- women are still today being stoned to death.

An equally important point to consider is the place of the family in biblical Judeo-Christianity as a whole. Setting aside the many horrifying ways the Bible illustrates Judeo-Christian family values, we should understand that Jehovah’s primary focus is never on the family but on making sure his people worship him and him alone. He expects fathers to administer some rather tough love to maintain religious discipline:

Suppose your brother, son, daughter, beloved wife, or closest friend comes to you secretly and says, ‘Let us go worship other gods’ …. If they do this, do not give in or listen, and have no pity. Do not spare or protect them. You must put them to death! You must be the one to initiate the execution: then all the people must join in. Stone the guilty ones to death because they have tried to draw you away from the LORD your God. (Deuteronomy 13:6-9)

In the New Testament, Jesus doesn’t make the family a major priority either. He neither marries nor has children (except in the movies: as Jesus hangs on the cross in the Last Temptation of Christ, his dreams about familial bliss suggest that taking on the role of the Son of God may have resulted from a tragic misunderstanding of God’s own family values.) Jesus rejects his mother’s and brothers’ pleading requests to see him, pointing to his disciples instead and saying: “These are my mother and brothers. Anyone who does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” (Matthew 12:48); Clearly this is not the kind of family that the Family Research Council has in mind. Finally, if anyone has any doubt about Christ’s contempt for traditional “family values,” let’s listen to him declare that he came to earth in order to tear the family apart:

Don’t imagine that I came to bring peace to the earth! No, I came to bring a sword. I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. Your enemies will be right in your own household! If you love your father or mother more than you love me, you are not worthy of being mine; or if you love your son or daughter more than me, you are not worthy of being mine. (Matthew 10:34-38)

Children, how well do you
know the Fuehrer;
Better yet: "Let the little children
come to me ..." (Matthew 19:14)

Far from celebrating “family,” one of the most consistent themes running through both the Old Testament and the New is that “family values” threaten the undivided loyalty owed to God. From Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac to Jesus’ assault on natural familial bonds, the Bible repeatedly confronts the faithful with the choice between family and God -- and demands that they choose God or face annihilation. Indeed, the words of Jesus anticipate the notorious political messiahs of the 20th century who likewise came to tear families apart: Hitler, Stalin, and, most notably, Pol Pot, whose assault on family values enjoyed astounding success. The similarity between biblical theocracy and political religions like National Socialism and manifestations of Communism is striking: they all demand the sacrifice of familial love and affection for the preservation of their rigid ideologies.

Those truly interested in honoring family values should not be looking at biblical Judeo-Christianity. They should begin with the Enlightenment, considering writers like Francis Hutcheson, Adam Smith, and David Hume. Looking especially at the bonds of familial affection, these writers saw evidence of a human moral sense; this innate sense provides the basis for a morality not imposed by God but drawn from the hearts of human beings.

In response to those who reduced all of our “natural dispositions” to self-love, Hutcheson published An Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections (1728). Here he argued that alongside self-love, humans possessed -- "implanted in the human Breast" -- “affections” that included “an ultimate Desire of the Happiness of others.” He insisted that these affections “rise from the very frame of our Nature.” He pointed out that human "Offspring ... could not be preserved without perpetual Labour and Care” and that “Parents must often check and disappoint their own Appetites, to gratify those of their Children”; thus such affections are critical for our survival. Although Hutcheson was writing more than century before Darwin, he anticipates the case that these moral affections are crucial for the biological survival of the species.

In The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759), Adam Smith followed up on Hutcheson’s arguments (those who cite Smith’s Wealth of Nations in support of unfettered capitalism should also read Moral Sentiments, which Smith felt was the more important work). Nothing was more naturally pleasing, he insisted, than the vision of a harmonious family:

With what pleasure do we look upon a family, through the whole of which reign mutual love and esteem, where the parents and children are companions for one another, without any other difference than what is made by respectful affection on the one side, and kind indulgence on the other; where freedom and fondness, mutual raillery and mutual kindness, show that no opposition of interest divides the brothers, nor any rivalship of favour sets the sisters at variance, and where every thing presents us with the idea of peace, cheerfulness, harmony, and contentment?

According to Smith, our natural sympathy for the well-being of others is not limited to family; rather, it extends (with decreasing degrees of intensity) throughout our social relationships -- from family, to friends, and to the nation.

Finally, when we speak of family values, we should think of David Hume, whose cheerful and unabashed atheism was a thorn in the side of his Christian contemporaries. When the pious Family Research Council insists that the family is the “foundation of civilization and the seedbed of virtue” they might very well be citing Hume, who felt pretty much the same. But whereas the FRC feels the family is under attack and tries to keep it narrowly defined, Hume is both more generous and more optimistic. In An Enquiry Concerning the the Principles of Morals (1751), Hume imagines for a moment the following:

Suppose … the [human] mind is so enlarged, and so replete with friendship and generosity, that every man has the utmost tenderness for every man, and feels no more concern for his own interest than for that of his fellows. … And the whole human race would form only one family; where all would lie in common, and be used freely, without regard to property; but cautiously too, with as entire regard to the necessities of each individual, as if our own interests were most intimately concerned.

Clearly no such condition prevails, Hume says, “but still we may observe, that the case of families approaches towards it; and the stronger the mutual benevolence is among the individuals, the nearer it approaches.” Ultimately, Hume identifies a certain progress as families form societies, and as distinct societies develop mutually advantageous relations. “History, experience, reason,” he writes, “sufficiently instruct us in this natural progress of human sentiments, and in the gradual enlargement of our regards to justice, in proportion as we become acquainted with the extensive utility of that virtue.” While conservative Christians try to preserve family values that are musty, niggardly, and mean, the family values we see in Hume appear as promises of generosity, tenderness, and mutual benevolence, unfolding as our human sentiments evolve. His are far more worthwhile and far more useful.

Conservative Christians should not go unchallenged when they assume moral authority and champion "family values" based on the “wisdom of the Bible and the Judeo-Christian ethic." For this backward wisdom is hollow and this retrograde ethic will have us killing our loved ones with stones. The "family values" of the Enlightenment, however, look to the future. We should recognize the affection we feel for our families as a part of our human nature, and develop those affections to make the world a better place.

October: This Month in the History of Christianity. Luther posts his 95 theses and lives (thus making possible his substantial contribution to German anti-semitism).

2009-10-25T21:32:00.001+12:00

Martin Luther (1483-1546)
Don't be fooled by those
gentle bovine eyes

On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther posted his 95 theses and sparked the Protestant Reformation. The immediate cause of his discontent was the mercantile activity of a certain Johann Tetzel, a man whose intellectual heirs today manage the American banking system. Tetzel was hawking Indulgences to raise some desperately needed cash for the Church -- Renaissance popes were into home improvement in a very big way, transforming St. Peter’s into a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and fashionable designers like Bramante, Raphael, and, later, Michelangelo demanded a very high price. Fortunately, Indulgences were an especially effective form of pious alchemy by which the Catholic Church turned sin into gold. And there was never any shortage of sin.

Luther, however, cared little for fine art. What concerned him most was his own tortured soul and he was plagued by a profound sense of guilt brought upon by trying to please an abusive father. He could not abide the notion that the faithful could escape their punishment in purgatory by simply purchasing a certificate that they could present at the gates of heaven upon their death. Driven by despair and righteous anger, Luther developed a personal theology that promised salvation on the basis of faith alone, but which by any Catholic standards was clearly heretical.

Luther was ready to die for his beliefs, and indeed barely escaped the fiery death of heretics before him. By the grace of God and politics, however, he survived and over his long career demonstrated time and again that, just as he was prepared to die for his own beliefs, he was prepared that others should be killed for theirs. He certainly had no tears to shed for Ulrich Zwingli, a rival Protestant fanatic killed on the battlefield in 1531. Luther and Zwingli had engaged in a lengthy theological feud, described by Luther as a “war to the knife,” over whether the consumption of the Eucharist was real or merely symbolic cannibalism (Luther argued that the meat was real). And when Zwingli died, Luther noted:

If his error had prevailed, we would have perished, and our church with us. It was a judgment of God.

When the German peasants turned to the gospels to justify their struggle against an oppressive nobility and to guide their efforts to create a more equitable social order on this side of paradise, Luther responded to their misguided theology with a tract entitled: Against the Murderous, Thieving Hordes of Peasants (1525). The peasants, he said, had “sworn to be true and faithful, submissive and obedient, to their rulers” but now they had “deliberately and violently [broken] this oath … [and were] starting a rebellion” for which “they have doubly deserved death in body and soul.” He wrote:

let everyone who can, smite, slay, and stab, secretly or openly, remembering that nothing can be more poisonous, hurtful, or devilish than a rebel …. For baptism does not make men free in body and property, but in soul …

To encourage the authorities, he added: “anyone who is killed fighting on the side of the rulers may be a true martyr in the eyes of God.” (We hear similar sentiments today from Islamic zealots who strap bombs to teenagers and buy them bus tickets.) The conflict known as the Peasants’ War of 1524-1525, during which the peasants were defeated and brutally punished, resulted in an estimated 100 000 deaths.

On the Jews and Their Lies, 1543

Luther was irritated, too, by the Jews, who refused to accept the wisdom and truth of his Christian teachings. Angered by their recalcitrance, he wrote On Jews and Their Lies, (1543) in which he outlined plans to eradicate the Jewish faith in Germany by a combination of conversion, expulsion, and murder. Posing for himself the question: “What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people, the Jews,” Luther offered his “sincere advice” – set fire to their synagogues and schools, raze and destroy their homes, take away their Talmudic writings and prayer books, forbid their rabbis to teach on pain of loss of life and limb, abolish safe-conduct for Jews on the highways, prohibit usury and take their cash, silver and gold for “safe-keeping,” engage them in forced labor, eject them forever from the country as they’ve done in Spain, Bohemia and France. He wrote:

[The Jews are a] base, whoring people, that is, no people of God, and their boast of lineage, circumcision, and law must be accounted as filth. … [They are] full of the devil's feces ... which they wallow in like swine ….

We are even at fault in not avenging all this innocent blood of our Lord and of the Christians which they shed for three hundred years after the destruction of Jerusalem, and the blood of the children they have shed since then (which still shines forth from their eyes and their skin). We are at fault in not slaying them.

Luther graces a Nazi postcard;
he is 'searching for
the health and happiness
of all of Germany.'

This publication, written a few years before his death, secured Luther’s immortality in the pantheon of Nazi heroes – it was cited in virtually every Nazi anti-Semitic tract, praised by Heinrich Himmler, publicly displayed at the Nuremberg Rallies, and a first edition was presented by the city of Nuremberg to Julius Streicher, a leading Nazi propagandist who was executed after the war for crimes against humanity.

Luther died in 1546. One of his final sermons addressed the urgency of expelling the Jews as quickly as possible.

Apparently coming a little late to the conclusion that persecuting Jews counts as bad behavior, Lutheran Churches didn’t begin officially repudiating Luther’s anti-semitism until the 1980s.

Maps (USA): American Bible Belt and Sexually Transmitted Disease

2009-10-23T10:07:00.002+12:00

Chart sources: Bible Belt; Lust

The Mendacious World of Religious Scholarship -- "Peer Review" and the Discovery Institute

2009-10-17T14:57:00.004+12:00

Last night I spent some quality time at the website of the Discovery Institute Center for Science and Culture. The Discovery Institute is the Prime Mover behind the conservative Christian campaign to bring Intelligent Design (formerly known as Creationism) into American public schools. It is a non-profit public policy think tank with a budget of over $4,000,000. What caught my eye was the list of “Peer-Reviewed & Peer-Edited Scientific Publications Supporting the Theory of Intelligent Design” under the category “Scientific Research and Scholarship.” I was surprised to find this heading, for one of the criticisms often leveled against supporters of Intelligent Design is that they never publish anything in peer-reviewed journals (such journals are crucial to modern scientific discourse). For a moment I thought that maybe critics had been treating the proponents of Intelligent Design unfairly. But only for a moment, for a little research of my own quickly set me straight.

The point of this list of "Peer-Reviewed & Peer-Edited Scientific Publications" is to respond to “critics of intelligent design [who] often claim that design advocates don’t publish their work in appropriate scientific literature.” But the first clue that the Discovery Institute is more interested in obfuscation than clarity appears when it makes the following point:

Some of the most important and groundbreaking work in the history of science was first published not in scientific journals but in scientific books – including Copernicus' De Revolutionibus, Newton's Principia, and Darwin's Origin of Species (the latter of which was published in a prominent British trade press and was not peer-reviewed in the modern sense of the term).

Considering when these venerable tomes were published, this inane remark is no more meaningful than pointing out, too, that none of these works was written on a word processor. More important, the Institute ignores the extent to which these critical works were indeed of central importance in the scientific discourse of their times -- unlike those written by proponents of Intelligent Design. But perhaps, I thought, the Institute simply has a remarkably skewed sense of history.

But then I checked into the list of publications. The list is organized in two sections, with six articles of “higher interest to readers” at the top. The fact that these six articles are listed again in the second section is not an accident -- in the spirit of "longer is better," it appears like a pathetic attempt to pad a meager resume. I looked into the top six articles and here's what I found (please note that the creative deviations from standard bibligraphical notation are the product of the Institute's own intelligent design):

1) Meyer, S. C. DNA and the origin of life: Information, specification and explanation, in Darwinism, Design, & Public Education (Michigan State University Press, 2003). Pp. 223-285.[sic]

This article is not a peer-reviewed scientific article in any meaningful sense of term, whether we're talking about "modern" peer review or what might have passed as such when Copernicus wrote in the 16th century. A more detailed discussion of this issue can be found here, but I will outline the problems with the text in brief. The article is a review of literature, not a presentation of original scientific research. It is written by a philosopher of science, not a scientist. It appeared in a book edited by two proponents of Intelligent Design, neither of whom are scientists, and one of whom is the author of the article, who cannot possibly be expected to subject his own work to adequate peer review. The book itself is not a collection of scientific papers per se, but rather an inquiry as to whether the “controversies over biological origins” should be taught in public schools. Not surprisingly, given that 19 of the 27 essays are written by supporters of Intelligent Design (including the editors), the answer is "yes."

2) William A. Dembski and Robert J. Marks II, "Conservation of Information in Search: Measuring the Cost of Success," IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man and Cybernetics A, Systems & Humans, Vol. 39 (5):1051-1061 (September, 2009).

One author (Dembski) is a mathematician, philosopher, and theologian; the other (Marks) is a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering; neither are biologists. While the paper concerns a subject about which I am not qualified to comment (namely computer models that draw their inspiration from evolution), I can tell you this. The abstract included in the Discovery Institute’s introduction to the article says that the paper is supposed to be a critique of “Darwinian Evolution” and implies that some “intelligent programmer” would be necessary to make the evolutionary process work. But the paper itself is about computing – as in mathematical computer models of search algorithms. It is not about evolution. It is not about biology. It is not about Intelligent Design. The closest it gets to mentioning Intelligent Design is a reference to "active information." None of the following words make an appearance: “Darwin,” “Darwinism,” “Intelligent,” “Intelligence,” “Designer,” or ‘biology.” References to evolution only appear as “evolutionary search,” “evolutionary computing”, “evolution strategy,” and “evolutionary algorithms.”

As for the journal, it seems like a peculiar place to conduct a debate regarding biological origins. But since the article is not about biological origins -- it is about mathematical computer models of search algorithms -- this is not a problem. The interests of the Systems, Man, and Cybernetics Society are as follows:

Development of systems engineering technology including problem definition methods, modeling, and simulation, methods of system experimentation, human factors engineering, data and methods, systems design techniques and test and evaluation methods.

Integration of the theories of communication, control, cybernetics, stochastics, optimization, and system structure towards the formulation of a general theory of systems.

Application at hardware and software levels to the analysis and design of biological, ecological, socio-economic, social service, computer information, and operational man-machine systems.

An article on mathematical computer models may very well have a legitimate home here. I should mention that the authors' affiliations with Intelligent Design are mentioned in the biographical blurbs that append the article. This redounds to the credit of the journal, for it shows that nobody is persecuting the authors for their religious beliefs by preventing them from publishing an article about mathematical computer models. The journal does not hold against Dembski the fact that (in his own words spoken elsewhere) "what drives [him] in this [his support of Intelligent Design] is that [he] think[s] God's glory is being robbed by these naturalistic approaches to biological evolution." Or the fact that he sees himself in a "cultural war" and wants "to see God get the credit for what he’s done." Did I mention that the article is about mathematical computer models? A technical analysis about the paper can be found in the Metropolis Sampler, which concludes that "Dembski-Marks approach to evaluating model assumptions is both arbitrary and a poor reflection of scientific reasoning." Yet another critical evalution can be found here. But that's another story. The story here is that, given that the Dembski now claims the paper is a case for Intelligent Design suggests its publication as something about quite different was a deceptive maneuver to attain scientific credibility. This paper -- which the Institute showcases among its top six -- is, in fact, a Trojan horse in the service of God.

3) Stephen Meyer, "The Origin of Biological Information and the Higher Taxonomic Categories" [sic] Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington 117 (2004): 213-239.

Meyer is an executive officer and founding member of the Discovery Institute. He is a philosopher of science, not a scientist. He is also the author of the first article the Institute's list of featured publications, and here makes an appearance for the second time, thus exposing the shallow depth of Intelligent Design's scholarly support. His article is a review of literature and contains no new scholarship. Details concerning the dubious "peer review" in this case can be found here. But in short, the editor of the journal, Richard Sternberg, is a proponent of Intelligent Design, who resigned after the publication of this particular edition. Contrary to standard editorial practise, he "reviewed" the article entirely on his own. The “peer review” in this case became such an object of controversy and embarrassment that the journal’s publisher, the Council of the Biological Society of Washington, repudiated the article. It noted that the paper was published “contrary to typical editorial practices” and that it “would have deemed the paper inappropriate for the pages of the Proceedings because the subject matter represents such a significant departure from the nearly purely systematic content for which this journal has been known throughout its 122-year history.” While the Discovery Institute hails the appearance of the article in a legitimate scientific journal as a sign of Intelligent Design's scientific credibility, it is in fact evidence of the duplicitous manner in which proponents of Intelligent Design pursue credentials and of a shameful betrayal of trust.

4) Lönnig, W.-E. Dynamic genomes, morphological stasis and the origin of irreducible complexity, Dynamical Genetics [sic], Pp. 101-119.

This article is often cited by Intelligent Design proponents, most frequently by the Discovery Institute itself. But I couldn’t find anything regarding the "peer review" about this publication -- apart from the fact that it was removed from the Max Planck Institute's website because it didn't deal with "scientific issues." That speaks volumes.

5) Jonathan Wells, "Do Centrioles Generate a Polar Ejection Force?," Rivista di Biologia/Biology Forum 98 (2005): 37-62.

This is the only paper that appears legitimately in a peer reviewed journal and as such marks a major victory for Intelligent Design. As to what the paper contributes to science, that's another question -- though, according to one critic, the support of Intelligent Design is superficial. For a more in-depth critique of Well's approach to the subject more generally, check out the Panda's Thumb.

6) Scott Minnich and Stephen C. Meyer, "Genetic Analysis of Coordinate Flagellar and Type III Regulatory Circuits," Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Design & Nature, Rhodes Greece, edited by M.W. Collins and C.A. Brebbia (WIT Press, 2004).

With this fine piece of scholarship, Meyer makes his appearance for the third time in a list of six articles that, according to the Institute, merits special attention. And he is still not a scientist. More important, however, is that this is by far the most ridiculous publication of the bunch. I didn’t find anything about the paper, but I did find a few fellows from the Technical University of Vienna who, in relation to a different conference organized by the publisher (the Wessex Institute of Technology), denounced the publisher and warned that conferences organized by the WIT “will destroy confidence in scientific life.” Describing the nature of "peer review" conducted by WIT, they pointed out that the conference organizers "accept EVERYTHING"; their proceedings are "worth NOTHING AT ALL." Suspecting that the operation was a fraud, they prepared four nonsensical papers in response to a call for papers on engineering and architecture: 1) how to create footprints on walls in public rooms; 2) how to render interior rooms without light; 3) a copy of the conference organizer’s own introduction in its “call for papers”; 4) forty random phrases taken from a dictionary on information processing and linked together with technical sounding language. All four papers were “reviewed and provisionally accepted” and would be published upon payment of a “registration fee.” WIT seems to be operating what might be termed a cash-for-credibility scam.

And there we have it. With all of its non-profit lucre, the Discovery Institute will no doubt be paying for a many more mock International Conferences on Design & Nature in order to bolster the scientific credentials of its theocratic agenda. Or maybe they'll send their cultural warriors into the nation's libraries and slip pamphlets about Intelligent Design between the pages of scientific journals and thus proclaim that their theories are indeed in more peer-reviewed scientific journals than ever before. On the basis of their fraudulent scholarship, the charlattan "scientists" of the religious right seek access to the public schools. Instead, they should lose their license to operate all vehicles of scholarship, including pencils.

Reading from the Bible (Paul’s Letters) & Augustine: The “Foolishness of God” and the Infliction of Pain

2009-10-11T07:39:00.001+12:00

Protestant martyr, Cuthbert Simpson,
wracked by Queen Mary's Catholics in 1557

On this Sunday in Fiji, my mind turns to the relationship between Christian truths and the infliction of pain, for they have strolled hand-in-hand like lovers through history. They link their fingers neither in secret nor by accident. In fact, theirs is a marriage celebrated in heaven, rooted in the very nature of the "foolishness of God." The authority of the Church to determine and protect orthodox belief has always consisted of the power to make the faithful suffer in body and in soul.

The "foolishness of God" is the bedrock of religious faith; and the "wisdom of the world" stands in its way. The distinction is by no means modern -- it is a favorite metaphor of St. Paul, used while propagating his Christ. And it is a good one, for it captures the difference between religious truth and the quotidian beliefs we need to navigate through life. In every aspect of our lives, it is the "wisdom of the world" that really matters -- whether we’re shepherds in ancient Palestine or bank tellers in Manhattan, we are encouraged and required to think critically, assessing our experiences and evaluating the reports of others. In every aspect of life, that is, except religion, where foolishness brings us to the front of the class. "The message of the cross is foolishness," writes Paul (1 Corinthians 1:18). And who am I to argue? Consider Jesus’ response to Thomas, who had the audacity to check whether the fellow claiming to be the resurrected Christ bore the requisite nail marks on his hands: "You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who haven’t seen me and believe anyway." (John 20:29) In Christianity, the ability to believe the most outrageous truths on the basis of no evidence whatsoever is treated as a virtue. Elsewhere Jesus taught his disciples:

Let the children come to me … For the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I assure you, anyone who doesn’t have their kind of faith will never get into the Kingdom of God. (Mark 10:13-15)

What distinguishes religious beliefs from all others is that they depend entirely on preserving the innocent gullibility of children who believe everything they’re told. This is the same kind of belief that has children placing cookies and milk near chimneys on Christmas Eve, and slipping baby teeth under their pillows; unless disabused of such folly by their parents or their own good sense, this same kind of belief will have them as adults eating bread and drinking wine fully convinced that they are consuming the flesh and blood of Jesus. And that they will, therefore, live forever. Without childlike credulity, the sacred withers.

When Paul teaches the "Good News" it sounds like simple foolishness, for here is how he backs it up:

I solemnly assure you that the Good News of salvation which I preach is not based on mere human reasoning or logic. For my message came by a direct revelation from Jesus Christ himself. No one else taught me. … When all this happened to me, I did not rush out to consult with anyone else; nor did I go up to Jerusalem to consult with those who were apostles before I was. No, I went away into Arabia and later returned to the city of Damascus. It was not until three years later that I finally went to Jerusalem for a visit with Peter. … You must believe what I’m saying, for I declare before God that I am not lying. (Galatians 1:11-20)

Before we continue, it is worth pointing out that this account of Paul’s revelation and his early travels is at odds with the story as recounted in Acts – I dare say, the narratives contradict each other. I have no problem with such contradictions, since I don’t expect unerring consistency from the Bible. So I’ll defer to Biblical scholars who for compelling reasons have determined that Acts was written much later than Paul’s Letters, probably by the same fellow who wrote Luke, who, for the purposes of easing the tensions between Pauline Christians and those in Jerusalem, also took certain liberties with Paul’s message. In any event, if we want to hear the tale of Paul’s conversion in words that are the closest to his own, Galatians is the place to turn. Getting back to the "Good News," however, and down to brass tacks: what we have here is a guy who suggests that what he says probably won’t make sense, for it is not based on human reasoning or logic; who claims he had a revelation (Paul never met the historical Jesus); who says that he was influenced by no one else (Paul takes pains to distance himself from the other apostles); and tells us that we must believe him because he’s not lying.

Paul's revelation on the road to Damascus,
illuminated manuscript, ca. 1430
(Such experiences are rare indeed.)

Now, folks nowadays who virtually admit they’re mad, yet claim to have heard God’s voice (which is as good an indicator of madness as any, and better than most), and who proclaim the most outlandish things, and who say that they must be believed because they’re not lying – such strangers will occasionally find a few pathetic souls that will follow them to Utah or drink the Kool-Aid. But for the most part, they don’t enjoy a lot of credibility. Judging by how frequently Paul was chased by mobs, not a lot of people believed him either. Still, there were a few folks who hung upon his every word. (One gets the impression that they weren’t always the sharpest knives in the drawer – "Remember, dear brothers and sisters," Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2:26, "…that few of you were wise in the world’s eyes.") But, even so, the problem with people who will believe the most counter-realistic prattle on the basis of nothing more than a convincing smile, a pat on the back, and a rabbit pulled out of a hat, is that, more likely than not, they will find the next convincing smile that comes along with a fantastic tale to tell and a trick up his sleeve equally compelling. Indeed, on what basis can they distinguish the truths of one magician from the truths of the other?

This, in fact, becomes Paul’s biggest problem; and it is the reason we have a New Testament at all. Apart from the Gospels, most of the New Testament consists of letters intended to rescue Paul’s mutton from the maws of wolves who are leading his gullible flock astray. In 2 Corinthians these wolves are “false apostles” who are “disguising themselves as apostles of Christ”; in Galatians they are “so-called Christians – false ones, really”; in 2 Thessalonians it is the “evil man” who comes “to do the work of Satan with counterfeit power and signs and miracles”; in Philippians they are “dogs, those wicked men … those mutilators who say you must be circumcised.” My favorite example comes from 2 Corinthians 11: 4, where Paul writes:

You seem to believe whatever anyone tells you, even if they preach about a different Jesus … a different Spirit … or a different Gospel. (2 Corinthians 11: 4)

I imagine Paul in a fury, pulling his beard out at the roots, and I want to take him aside and say: so they believe whatever anyone tells them – what did you really expect?!

It is worth noting that Paul’s enemies are usually not outright pagans but explicitly or implicitly those who teach a version of Christianity different from his own – in the New Testament, much still depends on the foreskin of the penis: does God want it intact or does he require its removal? My heart goes out to those poor sods who, without the basis of any rational criteria (the model leaves no room for critical evaluation), need to decide which competing revelations they’re supposed to believe. Worse yet, the good guys and the bad guys can both perform miracles, so it’s impossible to tell them apart. It is like a high-stakes game show: everything hinges on whether you pick door number one, door number two, or door number three.

So, how do you shore up religious beliefs that by their very nature are "beyond human reasoning and logic?" Well, since discussion and argument are out of the question, one claims special authority, oozes charisma, and has an especially loud voice. Some might also argue: with miracles. But miracles are, in fact, a concession to the ‘wisdom of the world’ (though not a very good one). And, in any event, there are far too many miracles taking place and visions being had by prophets of all persuasions for such supernatural displays to be the touchstone of truth. Luckily, however, those concerned with preserving their foolish orthodoxy can always threaten pain.

Jesus himself found the threat of pain a useful tool. Christians like to emphasize the difference between the angry God of the Old Testament and the Prince of Peace we read about in the New Testament. But Jesus is far being all light and sunshine. He introduces Judeo-Christianity to that eternal fire where teeth gnash and eyes weep. Hell, of which there is only the merest whisper in the Old Testament, is one of Jesus’ favorite tunes, and he riffs on it like Thelonious Monk. The examples are so plentiful that one struggles to choose. For sheer drama, I enjoy Jesus’ promise to separate the sheep from the goats. To the sheep -- because they have cared for the hungry, homeless, naked, and sick -- Jesus says: "you are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world." But to the goats -- who failed to display the same philanthropic largesse -- he says: "Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels." (Matthew 25: 34-46)

There is indeed a major difference between Jehovah and Jesus. The former bestows blessings and, far more frequently, wreaks destruction in this world. The latter, apart from the ability to perform a few localized miracles – turning water into wine, walking on water, healing the blind (one wonders about the license taken by his biographers) – is virtually powerless; so, in contrast to Jehovah, he promises to distribute blessings and wreak destruction in the world beyond. It goes without saying, of course, that Jesus was really God made flesh, but it is striking that his emphasis on the afterlife is precisely the kind of thing one would expect from a vainglorious impotent lunatic. That is, if one were guided by the "wisdom of the world."

Naturally, what works for Jesus also works for Paul; he threatens pain well and often. He promises pain for the false apostles: "[Satan’s] servants" who are "pretending to be godly ministers" will "get every bit of punishment their wickedness deserves." (2 Corinthians 11: 13-15) And he promises pain for the recalcitrant: "We will punish those who remained disobedient after the rest of you became loyal and obedient." (2 Corinthians 10: 6) And he promises pain to those who do not believe because God has allowed them to be deceived: "So God will send a great deception upon them, and they will believe all these lies. Then they will be condemned for not believing the truth and for enjoying the evil they do." (2 Thessalonians 2: 11-12) And, finally, he promises that when Jesus returns, there will be pain forever:

He will come with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, bringing judgment on those who don’t know God and on those who refuse to obey the Good News of the our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction … (2 Thessalonians 1: 7-9)

In such manner are laid the foundations of a powerful religious orthodoxy.

Like Jesus, Paul was not in a position to distribute much pain himself. Christians did not yet grip the levers of earthly power, so they were still limited to promising pain rather than delivering it. Indeed, for a while, Christians were themselves subject to persecution by the Romans (though modern Christians make of more of that persecution than they should). But when Christians finally attained such power (Christianity became the state religion of the Roman Empire in 380), they quickly identified the value of persecution for returning those of wayward beliefs to the bosom of the ‘loving Mother.’

It was St. Augustine (354-430), that most eminent of Church Fathers who shaped so much of Western Christianity, who set persecution solidly on its scriptural feet, setting the stage for the sweet persuasions of the Inquisition. In his treatise Concerning the Correction of the Donatists he wrote:

[If] the power which the Church has received by divine appointment … through the religious character and the faith of kings, be the instrument by which those who are found in the highways and hedges — that is, in heresies and schisms — are compelled to come in, then let them not find fault with being compelled, but consider whether they be so compelled.

The question for Augustine was not whether the Church should "compel" using the power of the state (indeed, it should, according to Augustine) but whether those being compelled would actually allow themselves to succumb.

Augustine refuting a heretic,
13th century illuminated manuscript

Justifying his actions against the Donatists (whose heresy lay in being even more strict and unforgiving than the Catholic Church), Augustine distinguished between "unrighteous persecution," which is directed towards the Church; and "righteous persecution."The Church," he said, "persecutes in the spirit of love … that she may correct … that she may recall from error …. [She] persecutes her enemies and arrests them until they become weary in the vain opinions, so that they should make advance in the truth." Righteous persecution, Augustine insisted, under imperial laws shows "a great mercy" because:

[the wayward ] are in the first instance rescued against their will from that sect in which, through the teaching of lying devils, they learned those evil doctrines, so that afterwards they might be made whole in the Catholic Church, becoming accustomed to the good teaching.

Augustine makes it clear: pain works.

… [Many] have found advantage (as we have proved and are daily proving by actual experiment), in being first compelled by fear or pain, so that they might afterwards be influenced by teaching….

Thus Augustine established the basic principles by which the Church would shepherd the faithful and preserve the "foolishness of God" for the next 1500 years.

Reading from the Bible -- Genesis 2-3. My Heart Goes out to Eve

2009-10-11T06:57:00.003+12:00

Hans Baldung Grien -
Eve, Serpent & Death (1512)

On this Sunday in Fiji my heart goes out to Eve -- she made a hapless choice. Now, I’m not about to condemn her in the traditional manner, blaming her for the Fall of Man with the same misogynistic bloodlust that at the height of the Christian Era lit the fires beneath the feet of countless unfortunate women. Indeed, I honor Eve’s courage – it is only because she swallowed her fear of God and reached out her hand to pluck the fateful fruit from the Tree of Knowledge that we’re all not still as dumb as bricks. But there were two trees in the center of the Garden: the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life. (Genesis 2: 9) Eve’s mistake was that she did not eat from the Tree of Life first.

That, at any rate, is the conclusion I’ve drawn after studying the pertinent biblical texts. A careful reading of Genesis, Chapters 2-3, yields results that are surprisingly at odds with traditional Judeo-Christian teachings about the critical exchanges that took place so very long ago in the Garden of Eden, revealing among other things the honesty of the serpent and the mendacity of God.

Let’s start by considering the scene in which the Lord appoints Adam as the divine gardener:

Then the Lord placed the man in the center of the Garden of Eden to tend and care for it. But the Lord gave him this warning: ‘You may freely eat any fruit in the garden except fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If you eat of its fruit, you will surely die.’ (Genesis 2: 15-17)

Before going any further, it is worth pointing out that the formulation “knowledge of good and evil” is a merism – a figure of speech, common in the bible, that makes use of a pair of opposites to express the notion of "all" or “everything,” as in the creation of "heaven and earth", "searching high and low", and "creatures great and small." Thus the “Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil” concerns not only moral understanding, but understanding in general. Back to the main point, however: a reasonable assumption based on the Lord’s warning is that the fruit is poisonous. Moreover, since it is difficult to understand why a beneficent God would like to consign men and women to perpetual ignorance, one might even go so far as to believe that the fruit is unfortunately poisonous – that is, a God that really cared about Adam (Eve has not yet been created) might have meant: it would be nice if you could eat it, since it would enlighten you, but you can’t because it’s poisonous and will kill you (although then you’d have to inquire as to why God made the fruit poisonous in the first place, but Adam is still dumb as a brick and might not think to ask). It becomes clear a little later, that the last thing God wants is for people to know anything, but at this juncture in the narrative there is no reason for Adam to reach that conclusion. If God had been honest, he might have said: don’t eat that fruit or I will kill you, thus making it perfectly clear that the fruit isn’t poisonous and that the whole issue is really a question of obedience and tyrannical power. But had God revealed his true personality so early in the game, Adam might have balked at the idea of serving such a mean-spirited master and sought gainful employment elsewhere. God would then have been truly out of luck, because, as one might expect so early in the history of the world, labor was especially scarce.

In any event, when Eve chats with the serpent a few verses later, it is obvious that she believes the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge to be incredibly toxic:

Now the serpent was the shrewdest of all the creatures the Lord God had made. ‘Really?’ he asked the woman. ‘Did God really say you must not eat any of the fruit in the garden?’
‘Of course we may eat it,’ the woman told him. ‘It’s only the fruit from the tree at the center of the garden that we are not allowed to eat. God says we must not eat or even touch it, or we will die.”
‘You won’t die!’ the serpent hissed. ‘God knows that your eyes will be opened when you eat it. You will become just like God, knowing everything, both good and evil’ [the use of the word 'both' makes the merism more forceful]. (Genesis 3: 1)

Despite the fact that Judeo-Christians have roundly condemned the serpent as the Great Deceiver, he is actually telling the truth. Certainly, he has nothing to gain from misleading Eve, and in the end he even suffers for his efforts when God destroys his relationship with Eve and her decedents. I suspect that the reason the serpent is so shrewd is that he has already eaten some of the fruit without telling anyone, but that’s mere speculation. But we know this for sure: Eve eats the fruit, and she does not die but is enlightened; she brings the fruit for Adam to eat, who likewise does not die but is enlightened. And when God strolls back into the Garden (I imagine him in a crisp white shirt, argyle sweater-vest, cleats, plaid knickers and a matching cap, looking for Adam to caddy his clubs) , he knows that Adam and Eve have eaten the fruit not because he sees their bloated corpses lying on the manicured lawn, but because he discerns the light of understanding in their eyes.

It is at this point that God flies into a rage, unleashing curses left and right (this is a merism, too). He condemns the serpent first:

Because you have done this, you will be punished. You are singled out from all the domestic and wild animals of the whole earth to be cursed. You will grovel in the dust as long as you live, crawling along on your belly. (Genesis 3: 14)

Hugo van der Goes -
Original Sin (1467/8)

The odd thing about this particular curse is that the serpent (being a serpent) must have been groveling in the dust and crawling on his belly all along, whether cursed or not. Admittedly, I’ve come across a Christian commentator who insists that, prior to the curse, the serpent must have had legs, or else the curse makes little sense. But this commentator has never managed to convince me. Neither would he have convinced very many painters of the Renaissance and Baroque, most of whom were quite devout Christians, and whose depictions of the serpent for the most part don't show any sign of serpent legs, vestigial or otherwise. I say 'for the most part' because, in the interests of full disclosure, I have encountered a painting by Hugo van der Goes that depicts the serpent with legs and a human-like head (the creature looks a little like Steve Buscemi, who has played some nasty characters yet is by all accounts a very nice man). But Van der Goes' is an exception; the paintings by Duerer, Baldung, Michelangelo and others generally show the serpent in a manner that is more or less anatomically correct.

Next God directs his rage at Eve, telling her: ‘you will bear children with intense pain and suffering.’ (Genesis 3: 16) Eve is still a prepubescent at this point and has not yet borne any children, so she is in no position to argue with God, at least not on the basis of experience. But given that God curses the serpent to be what the serpent already is, I suspect that Eve would have suffered in childbirth anyway. Similarly, God tells Adam:

I have placed a curse on the ground. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it. … All your life you will sweat to produce food, until your dying day. Then you will return to ground from which you came. For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return. (Genesis 3:17-29)

Once again, I think Adam would have found himself scratching, sweating, and dying with or without the curse.

Now, the reader might object, insisting that I have no reason other than my own wishful thinking to believe that these divine curses are empty and that they merely reflect a reality already in place. But I base my conclusions largely on what happens after God has unleashed his curses, passed judgment, condemned Adam and Eve to death, and all is pretty much said and done. It is a candid moment when God is talking to himself, apparently unaware that his words are being recorded (one wonders how the omniscient being could be so oblivious):

Then the Lord God said, ‘The people have become as we are, knowing everything, both good and evil. What happens if they eat the fruit of the tree of life? Then they will live forever!’ So the Lord God banished Adam and his wife from the Garden of Eden. … [and] stationed mighty angelic beings to the east of Eden. And a flaming sword flashed back and forth, guarding the way to the tree of life. (Genesis 3: 22-24)

It suddenly becomes obvious that God has been lying all along. Clearly, eating the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge does not inevitably result in death. Even after the fruit has been consumed and the curses have been leveled, human immortality remains a distinct and threatening possibility. And, one might add, it seems that prior to the curses and to the consumption of the fruit, Adam and Eve would have died unless by chance they ate from the Tree of Life, which again reveals the emptiness of the curse. Only by banishing Adam and Eve does God mitigate the threat of human immortality. I say, ‘mitigate’ because there’s always the chance that they can sneak past that flaming sword.

Ultimately, what I see here is that God is very much afraid – afraid that people will become like him; afraid, perhaps, that having attained the knowledge of good and evil, they will identify the weakness and malignancy of his spirit.

And I wonder how different things might have been, had Eve reached not first for the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, but for the fruit of the Tree of Life. Of course, even without human immortality, many feel that there are far more people living on our planet than the environment can sustain, so I’m not suggesting that things would have been any better. But surely they would have been different.

Reading from the Bible -- John 3:16. A Ballot Proposition

2009-10-05T12:06:00.003+12:00

While I’m not a resident of California nor even a citizen of the United States, I would like to propose a ballot proposition that would require all representations of John 3:16 published for consumption within the State of California to include a fair and balanced synopsis of its biblical context. The point of the legislation is not to alter the meaning of the verse but simply to provide the information needed for the consumer to make an informed choice. For taken out of context, John 3:16 is like anti-freeze for cats.

The Golden State has already exhibited strong leadership in matters of public health and environmental protection. By passing appropriate legislation regarding John 3:16, California could take the lead in promoting greater spiritual and mental welfare as well. In the long run, such a measure would help the United States regain some of the moral credibility it squandered during the Bush presidency. And that, of course, would redound to the benefit of all of us who live beneath the American protective umbrella.

The text I propose in no way violates the verse’s original language – the original language is preserved in bold:

John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he [condemned humanity for seeking knowledge, wiped out virtually all life in a massive flood, ordered his chosen people to initiate genocidal wars, and severely punished said chosen people for not being genocidal enough; then, thoroughly disgusted with humanity but feeling a momentary pang of guilt, though unable to think of a plan that did not involve yet another extreme act of cruelty,] gave his only Son [which meant nailing his Son to a wooden cross and watching him die, demonstrating that God’s love really hurts] so that everyone who believes in him should not perish [keeping in mind that the precise theological content of this belief is critical though impossible to ascertain since the Son spoke in very convoluted metaphors, a fact which has precipitated vociferous debate and enough bloodshed to fill oceans while at the same time given God yet another way to renege on his promises] but have eternal life [the quality of which seems quite tedious, rendered only in pastels, while everyone else – those who don’t believe or believe wrongly – are consigned to eternal torment in Hell, something which God vividly describes, for therein lies the power of God’s imagination, and even though Hell is an idea God came up with rather late in his evolution, God delights in such a thing].

Spreading the Good News on
In-N-Out Burger's paper cups

The reason such legislation has become necessary is that the John 3:16 has been deliberately used by the Unscrupulous to mislead and exploit the Credulous. Having lost their legal sanction to seek conversions by the sword (how much easier life was under Charlemagne, who beheaded 4500 Saxons for practicing their pagan faith), today’s proselytizing Christians turn to hucksterism and advertising. And when they do, they rely on John 3:16 for the heavy lifting. John 3:16 is the evangelist’s foot in the door, the hook in the heart; it is that first vial of crack. Sometimes it is simply written “John 3:16” – in the eye-black of the Florida Gator’s all-star quarterback, for example, or on the bottom of In-N-Out Burger’s paper cups. As such, it is a code used by Believers to signal that they’re on the same page and to tantalize the uninitiated with a mystery. Other times it is written out in full – on billboards and greeting cards, t-shirts and bumper stickers. Today’s Christians on a Mission can stuff their luggage with "The Missionaries' Coloring Book: John 3:16 in 25 Languages, with Country Costumes, Flags and Maps" and thus share the (severely redacted) Good News everywhere they go. Or they can buy “witnessing coins” (no doubt made in communist China) stamped with John 3:16 at a discount in “evangelistic bulk packs” – coins which can be handed out like candy to children. “Now you can easily help anyone meet Jesus Christ personally,” says the purveyor of such coins . “Conversations can easily begin with, ‘Want to see an interesting coin?’ or ‘Have you ever seen this?’” These are the tactics of pedophiles trolling playgrounds. One such coin, stamped in Arabic with the question “Where will you spend Eternity?” on one side and John’s message “For God so Loved the World …” on the other, was being handed out to Iraqis by a U.S. Marine on his own personal crusade. Without the approval of the US Congress.

Not all Christians agree with the way the verse is so carelessly bandied about, for it leads many to misconstrue their faith. Wayne Jackson, for instance, in the "Golden Text: A Study of John 3:16" in the Christian Courier notes that John 3:16 is "one of the most misunderstood and misrepresented texts of the Word of God." As he explicates the verse, he emphasizes that "it is important to point out, of course, that only the elect will be saved." I can only hope that Wayne and other Christians sharing his concerns for clarity will support my efforts to pass legislation that makes the meaning of John 3:16 explicit. By passing the proposed resolution, California could lead the fight against spiritual abuse in the same way that it has led the fight against hazards in the work place and excessive vehicular fuel emissions. While persons should be free to practice the religion of their choice, they should know about the crippling psychological effects of organizing their lives around misanthropic fictions. Just like those who choose to smoke should know that cigarettes will kill them. And while the legislation may have a negative impact on the manufacturers of cheap tokens, these would be more than offset by the benefits accrued by the commemorative dinner plate industry. God knows, we need to climb out of this recession somehow.

Time Photos: John 3:16 in Pop Culture

Reading from the Bible – Matthew 16: 27-28 and the Wandering Jew

2009-10-04T06:23:00.001+12:00

The Wandering Jew,
Samuel Hirszenberg (1899)

On this Sunday in Fiji, my mind turns to the Wandering Jew, a contemporary of Jesus who by virtue of epistemological necessity was made to roam the earth. He owes his existence to a troublesome bit of scripture in which Jesus predicts his glorious return from the dead – I trust the epistemological problem will jump from the page:

For I, the Son of Man, will come in the glory of my Father with his angels and will judge all people according to their deeds. And I assure you that some of you standing here right now will not die before you see me, the Son of Man, coming in my Kingdom. (Matthew 16: 27-28)

This statement and others led early Christians to believe that the second coming was imminent; Jesus, they thought, would return to claim his kingdom in their lifetime. But years passed, and eventually all those Christians not fed to the lions, crucified, or set ablaze to light the streets of Rome succumbed to old age. It was then that the followers of Jesus surmised that perhaps he was enjoying a little joke at their expense. Satan may have whispered in their ears that Jesus’ failure to reappear as he predicted proved that the self-proclaimed Son of Man had made a tragic mistake in a moment of hubris. Yet, resisting temptation and faithful to dogma, medieval Christians knew that Jesus had indeed risen from the dead, that he will eventually return, and that he never makes mistakes. So they concluded that at least one of those men who so many years ago had listened to Jesus speak must still be very much alive. And from this marriage between revealed truth and logic was born the legend of Ahasver, the Wandering Jew, who, unable to die, still roams the earth today, waiting for the problems in the Middle East to get truly out of hand.

Now, most modern Christians, their faith corroded by secular science, balk at the idea that somewhere out there lives a Jew so old that he spends the week before his birthday putting candles on his cake. And they have engaged in all manners of sophistry to resolve the above conundrum by other means.

Most commonly, they try to identify the “coming” of Jesus into his “Kingdom” with an event known as the Transfiguration. The Transfiguration occurred when Jesus took Peter, James, and John onto a mountain and “as the men watched, Jesus’ appearance changed so that his face shone like the sun, and his clothing became dazzling white.” (Matthew 17: 2) I suspect Christians undertake this interpretive maneuver so they can place the second coming and the Apocalypse well into the future; thus they allow themselves the orthodox pleasure of reading their most inspirational fiction. I’m speaking, of course, about the Left Behind series by Timothy LaHaye and Jeremy B. Jenkins. Set during the End Times, LaHaye describes Left Behind as the “first fictional portrayal of events that is true to the literal interpretation of Bible prophecy.” And it has a serious didactic intent:

These books [says LaHaye] heighten readers’ awareness of the coming of the Lord and encourage them to live in that anticipation. The books make people aware of the dangers of being outside of grace when the Lord appears.

This series features a clutch of Christian heroes on an uplifting romp through an utterly devastated landscape while billions of people die. It has warmed the cockles of many faithful readers and led numerous souls to Christ. Thus far, the series consists of sixteen novels (seven of which reached #1 on American bestseller lists) with over 65 million copies sold. Yet, unfortunately for the premise of the series (and getting back to reality), identifying the Transfiguration with Jesus’ prediction in Matthew 16: 27-28 requires a Clintonesque understanding of the malleability of language. I ask you: in what way is “[coming] in the glory of my Father with his angels … [and judging] all people according to their deeds” the same as “face [shining] like the sun … and clothing [becoming] dazzling white?”!

But there are also many Christians who aren’t members of the LaHaye/ Jenkins fan club and they try to resolve the conundrum in another way. They label themselves Preterists and maintain that most or all (depending on whether they are partial or full Preterists) of the biblical prophesies occurred during the first century, during or around the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. (While preterism is orthodox, full preterism verges awfully close to heresy.) Preterists argue that Jesus himself predicted his imminent return, and that, based on passages like the following, this should be clear to all but the most clouded intellects:

[Jesus to his disciples as he sends them off to preach the Good News:] I assure you that I, the Son of Man, will return before you have reached all the towns of Israel. (Matthew 10: 23)

[Referring to prophesies he made about the end of the world had his return] … when you see the events I’ve described beginning to happen, you can know his [the Son of Man’s] return is very near, right at the door. I assure you, this generation will not pass from the scene before all these things appear. (Matthew 24: 33-34)

But the problem Preterists face is that many of the predictions associated with the second coming simply never happened: the Jews were not gathered from all the countries and brought back to Jerusalem (Matthew 24: 31) – they were scattered and killed; the kingdom of Israel was not restored (Acts 1: 6; Luke 1: 31-32) – Jerusalem was destroyed and there was no kingdom at all; Christ in his glorious return was not seen by everyone (Matthew 24: 25-30; Revelation 1: 7) – he wasn’t seen by anybody. These problems pertain only to prophesies in the New Testament; if one considers Old Testament prophesies associated with the second coming of Christ, the inconsistencies are even greater.

Still, there’s no reason for despair; we need only hearken to the past. For if we accept the existence of Ahasver, the Wandering Jew, we can eat our cake and have it too. Moreover, Ahasver’s existence is verified by numerous eye-witnesses in many different places and at many different times, starting around 1228 when an Armenian Bishop told the monks of St. Albans that he had seen the sorry bugger in Armenia. Others saw him in Italy, also during the 13th century. After the Reformation sightings were rather frequent: Hamburg (1547); Spain (1575); Vienna (1599); Luebeck (1601); Prague (1602); Luebeck (1603); Bavaria (1604); Ypres (1623); Brussels (1640) Leipzig (1642); Paris (1644); Sweden (1652); Stamford (1658); Astrakhan (1672); Zabkowice Slaskie (1676); Munich (1721); Altbach (1766); Brussels (1774); Newcastle (1790). There are indeed far more witnesses attesting to the reality of the Wandering Jew than that of the resurrected Christ. Not only has Ahasver never died, he may very well have been one of Christ’s disciples – “the disciple he loved.” Perhaps charged with the task of preaching to towns in western Judea, he might have been kidnapped by nefarious Pharisees and sold to a Greek fishmonger as a slave, which would explain why those towns have not yet heard the Good News and why Jesus has never been able to return.

Ahasver's last known sighting was in 1868, when he visited a Mormon in Salt Lake City, Utah. This means that at some point he must have crossed the Atlantic, maybe as a refugee during the Napoleonic Wars. There have been no sightings since, but I strongly suspect that he now calls himself Clyde Lott and lives Canton, Mississippi. Ahasver-cum-Lott is getting tired of wandering the earth. Recently he has been breeding red heifers for export to Israel in an effort to bring biblical prophesy back on track. No doubt he reads the Left Behind novels in his spare time.

P.S. My first meaningful encounter with Ahasver occurred when I read Stefan Heym's The Wandering Jew (1984). The novel alternates (chapter by chapter) between accounts of Ahasver's relationship with an ambitious Lutheran minister during the Reformation and his relationship with professor at the Institute for Scientific Atheism in the German Democratic Republic. It is a wonderful book -- well worth reading. I wish I still had it.