Oh, come on, who the fuck am I kidding? I couldn't even type that with a straight face.
No, seriously. I want you to take a look at something with me. We're going to take a look at a favorite Evangelical/Fundamentalist chapter of the Bible, kind of in chunks. Please bear with me.
Romans 1King James Version (KJV)
1 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,
2 (Which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,)
3 Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh;
4 And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead:
5 By whom we have received grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations, for his name:
6 Among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ:
7 To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.
8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world.
9 For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers;
10 Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you.
11 For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established;
12 That is, that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me.
13 Now I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that oftentimes I purposed to come unto you, (but was let hitherto,) that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among other Gentiles.
14 I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise.
15 So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also.
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.
See that last bit? Multiculturalism, it's in the Bible, folks.
But seriously, this section right here lays out the Pauline framework that overlays much of modern Christianity, meaning that it's a religion about Jesus rather than an effort to emulate the conduct or teachings of Jesus. Still, this section has to be fired for effect, as it's basically the kind of framework and requirements I was brought up with in terms of doctrine.
We'll come back to this later, it's important.
17 For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;
19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.
20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
OK, as the last section laid out the case for Paul's missionary journey to Rome (Sorry, can't help it, most of the Biblical exegesis I've been taught sets Romans up like Paul is a lawyer making his case in court. Like I said, bear with me for a moment) this section lays out the spiritual requirements for what he is trying to accomplish with said journey. In shorter, non-Elizabethan English, what Paul is basically saying here is ya'll have seen the evidence. Now you're supposed to act. (That the 'Evidence' Paul provides basically boils down to "Because I said so" is also important and indicative of the authoritarian nature of the Pauline framework, but that's another article for another time.)
Now, where was I, ah yes...
21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
Consequences. Can't have the Pauline, nor the Evangelical nor Fundamentalist interpretations without consequences...which is funny in a way. We'll shortly get to why.
22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
This is kind of self-explanatory but:
'Why Do I Have to Repent or Ask for Forgiveness If I Am Not Making Mistakes?' ~Donald Trump
This is just one example. The traditional Christian doctrine of Original Sin states that all human beings inherit the sins of Adam and Eve. Effectively making Sin a part of the human condition, and as Trump should know from his own actions, we all have the capacity to commit evil to do wrong. That is what Sin is. If Trump has the vast depth of experience with mainline Christianity going all the way back to Reformed (Presbyterian) minister Norman Vincent Peale, that he claims, he shouldn't need to be told this and as Reformed theology is the modern incarnation of Puritan Calvinist theology then the concepts of Sin and Repentance should not be foreign to him. Yes, yes I know, Norman Vincent Peale is more known for "The Power of Positive Thinking" than his ministry but the point remains. If you fail to communicate the theology you're attempting to teach properly, from a spiritual standpoint the Bible says you get to own it when the people you taught miss the mark.
I didn't make the rules, but effectively it's a spiritual version of Command Responsibility. You are responsible, therefore it is important to teach the Truth.
23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
I have literally seen several articles with my own eyes where people said that Trump was a god. I imagine he'd fail at the "Make your own Earth" test if God put him to it, though, just sayin.'
(Make your own Earth test: An example my friend Tim Wong came up with for a theological argument we were having with somebody, wherein a person claimed to be divine by large numbers of people or their self is at the moment of crossing over into the Afterlife transported to a place of nothingness by God and given six days to conjure a world from it.)
24 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;
29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,
30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
32 Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.
Funny thing but several of these last verses read like an alt-right Nazi manifesto. Which brings me to the subject of my smart-ass title, Milo Yiannopoulos or as I prefer to call him (simply because I detest the man) Milo the Fag. See, here's my thing, if you're a gay person who doesn't believe gay people should have rights...well then, I'll do you a favor and treat you the way you want other people like you treated. Fuck you. Milo said some dumb shit about Pedophilia and in defense of pedophiles and that perhaps sounded more like something an unusually candid member of the Taliban might say (that is, that it's perfectly fine to use boys sexually for pleasure, which it is in Afghanistan...but we ain't in Afghanistan.) Then he followed that up by saying that he sucked dick better because of a Catholic priest.
Ironically, before this he was scheduled to speak at CPAC 2017 (CPAC = Conservative Political Action Conference) before all this got out. Now as I've said a dozen times this week all the old Republicans I used to know would have had some words for Milo and "Conservative" wouldn't have been one of them. They'd have called him a faggot and told him to get the fuck out. Why? Because there was a time when most Republicans understood that small-"c" conservatism was never going to be an edgy or popular philosophy, and even when they did have popular (more Movement Conservative for example) leaders like Ronald Reagan, they also understood that some things were not done in the better places. They understood that sometimes the price one might pay for popularity could be too high. Fascists, Misogynists, Nazis, racists and reality-show freaks usually fell into the category of "too high." I was taught to treat gay people the same as everybody else, but a lot of people weren't.
Anybody here read the Left Behind Series? For the record, they're some truly awful books, although they have their moments in a few spots. One thing that always bothered me about those books was the author's bad stereotyping and shitty treatment of gay people, minorities, non-Christians and women. The last of those books that I read (a good portion of it in Borders books in Traverse City, MI during several hours in the book store on my first date with my ex-wife) was called The Indwelling. One of the characters in that book was this dude, Guy Blod, who was a bad stereotype of a flaming gay artist. That's when I gave up on reading those books because I thought LaHaye and Jenkins were just mailing it in. Honestly, Milo the Fag meets Robert Mappelthorpe would probably describe the character better than this but I'll still link to it to describe the situation. The difference of course being that Robert Mappelthorpe had issues but probably wasn't that bad of a guy, and while I thought his art sucked, conservatives still occasionally bring him up like it was the worst thing ever. A lot of their animus against the National Endowment for the Arts comes from his work appearing at an NEA funded event back in the 1980's.
...And now an online equivalent who's also basically a Nazi is a conservative darling??
Fuck you, conservatives, this shit is indefensible.
No comments:
Post a Comment