Ecumenical Insanity

Saturday, June 26th

Ridiculous arguments on Federal Marriage Amendment

A collection of religious leaders, orchestrated by church-state separation extremist Barry Lynn, recently wrote to members of Congress expressing their opposition to the Federal Marriage Amendment, which would limit civil marriage to one man and one woman. Here's their effort in full:

As leaders representing many of the diverse perspectives on religion in our nation, we are writing to urge you to oppose passage of H. J. Res. 56/S. J. Res. 26, the "Federal Marriage Amendment." Although we have differing opinions on rights for same-sex couples, we believe the Federal Marriage Amendment reflects a fundamental disregard for individual civil rights and ignores differences among our nation’s many religious traditions. It should be rejected.

Perusal of the list of signatories indicates that, in fact, they are almost all essentially in lockstep on gay rights. The differences to which they allude are largely the differences they represent within their own religious traditions (Sikhism being a possible exception).

Few decisions by religious bodies are more central than who can take part in important religious rituals or services, including marriage. Fortunately, the Constitution bars any court or legislature from requiring any religious institution or person to perform marriage ceremonies for anyone. Indeed, the Constitution protects houses of worship in their freedom to limit marriages on whatever theological grounds they choose. The First Amendment already protects religious organizations from governmental interference in such matters, and constitutional definitions of marriage therefore are unnecessary.

The totalitarian demand of gay activists for not just tolerance but acceptance aside, it is probably true that religious bodies in the US won't be forced to conduct gay marriages, regardless of whether the FMA is passed or not. But this is leading up to a red herring of monumental proportions.

Regardless of judicial and legislative decisions defining the legal rights of gay couples, religious marriage will justly remain the prerogative of individual faith traditions in accordance with their doctrinal beliefs. And this is as it should be. It is not the task of our government and elected representatives to enshrine in our laws the religious point of view of any one faith. Rather, our government should dedicate itself to protecting the rights of all citizens and all faiths.

See it coming yet?

For over two hundred years, the Constitution has had no provision on marriage, the matter being left to the states and the teachings of various religious groups. Our nation’s founders adopted the First Amendment precisely because they foresaw the dangers posed by allowing government to have control over religious decisions. The religious freedom protected by the First Amendment has allowed religious practice and pluralism to flourish. Respecting the rights of those in the faith community who deem sacred text consistent with the blessing of same-sex relationships protects and ensures that freedom.

GOTCHA! The claim here is that if one religious belief (heterosexual marriage only) is protected, then the other (same-sex marriage is ok) must be as well. This is the red herring. The FMA has nothing to do with what religious bodies do. If Gene Robinson wants to pronounce an episcopal blessing on the conjugal union of three men and an Irish setter, he's welcome to do so, FMA or no FMA. The amendment has to do with civil marriage, what the state will recognize and extend benefits to.

We are particularly concerned that this proposal to amend the Constitution would, for the first time, restrict the civil rights of millions of Americans. That concern alone merits rejection of the Federal Marriage Amendment. We strongly believe that Congress must continue to protect the nation’s fundamental religious freedoms and continue to protect our nation’s bedrock principle of respecting religious pluralism. Congress should soundly reject any attempt to enshrine into the Constitution a particular religious viewpoint on a matter of such fundamental religious importance.

This is the most asinine thing in the letter. Gay marriage is not a civil right. Marriage is a human right, but that doesn't mean absolutely any form of it must therefore be recognized as such. The logic here of this sentence means that all prohibitions on polygamous marriage, incestous marriage, or communitarian marriage would by definition be swept away. If the signatories aren't willing to grant the legitimacy of a marriage between a father and daughter, or between three men and one woman, or between four women and three men, or between two women and their son by artifical insemination (make up your own variation), then they grant the state and society's right to limit marriage by gender, number, and consaguinuity. Ergo, gay marriage is not a civil right.

This also suggests that the idea of marriage as one man, one woman is some kind of peculiar and exclusively religious idea. In fact, this view of marriage has been universal in the US (19th century Mormonism excepted, which brings us back to my previous argument) until a few years ago. Muslims have never demanded the legalization of polygamy, secularists didn't claim that marriage was of infinite variety, until gay activists conceived of same-sex marriage as a way of furthering their agenda of public acceptance for their lifestyle.That hardly makes the idea a "particular religious viewpoint."

One other point needs to be made about this letter. According to Americans United for Separation of Church and States, "over two dozen major denominations and other religious groups" signed on to their effort. Really? The signatories included:

*Seven activist organizations (Anti-Defamation League, American Jewish Committee, Christians for Justice Action, Disciples Justice Action Network, National Conference for Community and Justice, Protestant Justice Action, and The Interfaith Alliance) accountable to virtually no one.

*Five denominational "justice ministry" offices that may or may not speak for anyone other than themselves (American Friends Service Committee, Friends Committee on National Legislation, Lutheran Office for Governmental Affairs (ELCA), Presbyterian Church (USA) Washington Office, and United Church of Christ Justice & Witness Ministries).

*Three Sikh organizations of unknown influence, standing, or authority within the Sikh community (Guru Gobind Singh Foundation, National Sikh Center, Sikh Council on Religion and Education–if anyone who can enlighten me on these, please do).

*Five Jewish organizations, none of which represent either Conservative or Orthodox Judaism (Central Conference of American Rabbis (Reform Judaism], Jewish Reconstructionist Federation, National Council of Jewish Women, Union for Reform Judaism, Women of Reform Judaism).

*A "Catholic order" (Loretto Women's Network) that is actually the political arm of an order, and which actively works against official Catholic positions on abortion, homosexuality, etc.

*A quasi-denomination (Alliance of Baptists) of 118 churches and indeterminate membership.

*Four actual denominations (Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Episcopal Church, USA, Metropolitan Community Churches, Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations), two of which are in steep decline, two of which can hardly be classified as "major."

They would no doubt claim to speak for "tens of millions of religious people."

Athanasius on 06.26.04 @ 04:51 PM EST [link]

Friday, June 25th

Imposition of a new standard of "family"

Maggie Gallagher of the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy nails it on NRO:

The transformation of mother and father into "Parent A" and "Parent B" is the model of the paradigm shift now underway in Massachusetts. The distinctive features of the union of male and female are going to have to be removed from our notions of marriage and family. The experience of same-sex couples will become the new norm for family life, because the "unisex" idea that gender has no public significance is the only model that can be construed as "inclusive" of both opposite-sex and same-sex unions. The result is not neutrality but the active promotion of a new unisex ideal, in which the distinctive features of opposite-sex relations will be submerged, marginalized, cast to one side, and redefined as discrimination in order to protect the new court-ordered public moral standard of the equality of same-sex and opposite-sex couples....

The change has begun: The needs and desires of a tiny fraction of adults in alternative families are becoming the basis of a new moral norm. Anyone who departs from it risks thundering denunciation from self-righteous elites who are no longer satisfied with tolerance and civility–living with our deepest differences–but wish to impose their vision of morality on the majority.

Read the whole piece.
Athanasius on 06.25.04 @ 06:12 PM EST [">link]

Thursday, June 24th

Any questions?

If there was ever any doubt that Yasser Arafat is the head of a terrorist-criminal gang bent on the murder of Israeli civilians, the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority blew it away yesterday. According to the Jerusalem Post:

The Palestinian Authority has no plans to dismantle the Aksa Martyrs Brigades, the armed wing of Fatah, Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei announced on Sunday. He acknowledged that the group is part of Fatah and said its gunmen are entitled to play a political role in the future.

"We have clearly declared that the Aksa Martyrs Brigades are part of Fatah," Qurei said in an interview with the London-based Asharq al-Awsat newspaper. "We are committed to them and Fatah bears full responsibility for the group."

Qurei said his top priority now is to safeguard the security of the Fatah gunmen who are wanted by Israel. He said they would be integrated into Fatah's institutions and would be paid salaries.

"We are working toward ensuring three issues for them on the basis of their adherence to the PLO's political program," Qurei said. "First, they have the right to play a political role within the framework of Fatah, and this is guaranteed for each member. Second, we are seeking to ensure their personal safety, because they are on the run and are wanted and threatened. We will achieve this with the help of the Quartet and the international community. Third, we will guarantee their living conditions economically and socially.

The Aksa Martyrs Brigades will not be dismantled."

Fatah, of course, is the Palestinian political movement headed by, you guessed it, Yasser Arafat. So what we've known all along has been confirmed: that far from being rogue operators, the suicide bombers of the Aksa Martyrs are part and parcel of Arafat's modus operandi. Hamas and Islamic Jihad may or may not take orders from the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize winner. But the Brigades do, and they're responsible for hundreds of Israeli civilians killed and wounded over the last three years.

So can anyone think of a good reason why Arafat should be treated as anything other than a murderous gangster by Israel, the US, or indeed any other civilized nation?
Athanasius on 06.24.04 @ 05:27 PM EST [link]

New guy on the block

I don't usually puff for folks, but I have to make an exception. Serge at Imago Dei is a new blogger (started in May) who's off to an exceptionally fine start. He's a Renaissance man: an oral and maxillofacial surgeon who's interested in bioethics and pursuing a degree in apologetics. Give him a look. You won't be disappointed.
Athanasius on 06.24.04 @ 04:06 PM EST [link]

Wednesday, June 23rd

Film at 11

From Scottish TV comes this disturbing headline:

Ronald McDonald charged following nuclear bunker armed siege.

I couldn't quite make out the sub-head, but I think it said, "Crusty and Chuckles charged as accomplices."

Don't blame me–'twas Kathy Shaidle dug this gem up.
Athanasius on 06.23.04 @ 09:14 PM EST [link]

On another Bible front...

While some are changing Scripture to suit their politics (see next post), others are warning against a toxic Bible. Specifically, Union Theological Seminary (NY) professor Hyun Kyung:

"I want to put a warning sign on a Bible just like tobacco companies put them on their cigarette packs," she jokes to a crowd of students. "The label should say that without guidance, this book can lead to various side effects, such as mental illness, cancer, rape, genocide, murder and a slavery system. And that it's especially dangerous to the mental health of pregnant women."

And from whom should delicate and unformed minds get their guidance while using such dangerous material? Why, the professor herself:

Hyun Kyung says the church hasn't provided that to its followers, especially women, but instead used its biblical authority to subjugate women. She goes so far as to challenge the accuracy of biblical texts, suggesting that there might have been a possible conspiracy among Jesus's disciples, like the one mentioned in popular novels such as "The Da Vinci Code."

"Contemporary theories reflect that Mary Magdalene was performing a funerary rite when she poured oil on Jesus's feet," she says. "Some feminist scholars argue that she was a priestess, because the funerary rite was conducted only among the priests at the time of Jesus. Gnosticism, which supports those ideas more clearly, was excluded from the Gospels.

"There are also supporting facts about the writing of Genesis, in which God supposedly created the living in order of perfection. It could mean that the Bible was written by the ones who triumphed and advocated their views, just like many other history books. We just don't know."

Well, some of us don't, that's for sure.

Athanasius on 06.23.04 @ 08:38 PM EST [link]

Mutilating the Bible

Not content with ever more bizarre interpretations of Scripture, a British group of self-styled "radical Christians" have decided to insert some of their ideas into the text itself. A new "translation" called Good as New from One doesn't like what Paul says about sex, for instance, so presto:

A passage from the standard version of his "Letters to the Corinthians" reads: "It is well for a man not to touch a woman.

"But because of the temptation to immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband."

In the "Good As New" version the same passage reads: "Some of you think the best way to cope with sex is for men and women to keep right away from each other.

"That is more likely to lead to sexual offences. My advice is for everyone to have a regular partner."

But that's not all:

The translation is pioneering in its accessibility, and changes the original Greek and Hebrew nomenclature into modern nicknames. St. Peter becomes "Rocky", Mary Magdalen becomes "Maggie" [someone should tell the "translator" that "Magdalen" isn't her name, but a reference to the town she's from-A.], Aaron becomes "Ron", Andronicus becomes "Andy" and Barabbas becomes "Barry".

In other passages the translator John Henson, a retired Baptist minister, renders “demon possession” as "mental illness" and "Son of Man", the phrase used frequently to refer to Jesus, as "the Complete Person" [I'd have preferred "the Total Package" myself–A.].

Parables become "riddles" and to baptise, to "dip" in water. Salvation becomes "healing" or "completeness" and Heaven becomes "the world beyond time and space."

Oh, and it should also be mentioned that, in the interest of inclusivity, the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas is included in the New Testament. If there's any doubt about what this project is about (namely, the subversion of orthodox Christianity), that should dispel it. Amazingly enough, among the enthusiastic supporters of the new "translation" is the Archbishop of Canterbury:

In his foreword...Dr. Williams describes it as a work of "extraordinary power" because it is “so close to the prose and poetry of ordinary life". He writes: "Instead of being taken into a specialised religious frame of reference–as happens even with the most conscientious of formal modern translations–and being given a gospel addressed to specialised concerns...we have here a vehicle for thinking and worshipping that is fully earthed, recognisably about our humanity."

The Archbishop praises Mr. Henson’s translation for screening out "the stale, the technical, the unconsciously exclusive words and policies".

There's a technical term for what this is all about: apostasy.
Athanasius on 06.23.04 @ 08:17 PM EST [link]

Tuesday, June 22nd

Turning up the heat on Michael Moore

If you have any plans to see Michael Moore's fake-umentary Fahrenheit 9/11, all I can say is, well, it's your nickel. But you should do yourself a favor and first read Christopher Hitchens' piece in Slate called "Unfairenheit 9/11: The lies of Michael Moore. Here are a few exceprts:

Fahrenheit 9/11 makes the following points about Bin Laden and about Afghanistan, and makes them in this order:

1) The Bin Laden family (if not exactly Osama himself) had a close if convoluted business relationship with the Bush family, through the Carlyle Group.

2) Saudi capital in general is a very large element of foreign investment in the United States.

3) The Unocal company in Texas had been willing to discuss a gas pipeline across Afghanistan with the Taliban, as had other vested interests.

4) The Bush administration sent far too few ground troops to Afghanistan and thus allowed far too many Taliban and al-Qaida members to escape.

5) The Afghan government, in supporting the coalition in Iraq, was purely risible in that its non-army was purely American.

6) The American lives lost in Afghanistan have been wasted. (This I divine from the fact that this supposedly "antiwar" film is dedicated ruefully to all those killed there, as well as in Iraq.)

It must be evident to anyone, despite the rapid-fire way in which Moore's direction eases the audience hastily past the contradictions, that these discrepant scatter shots do not cohere at any point. Either the Saudis run U.S. policy (through family ties or overwhelming economic interest), or they do not. As allies and patrons of the Taliban regime, they either opposed Bush's removal of it, or they did not. (They opposed the removal, all right: They wouldn't even let Tony Blair land his own plane on their soil at the time of the operation.) Either we sent too many troops, or were wrong to send any at all—the latter was Moore's view as late as 2002—or we sent too few. If we were going to make sure no Taliban or al-Qaida forces survived or escaped, we would have had to be more ruthless than I suspect that Mr. Moore is really recommending. And these are simply observations on what is "in" the film. If we turn to the facts that are deliberately left out, we discover that there is an emerging Afghan army, that the country is now a joint NATO responsibility and thus under the protection of the broadest military alliance in history, that it has a new constitution and is preparing against hellish odds to hold a general election, and that at least a million and a half of its former refugees have opted to return. I don't think a pipeline is being constructed yet, not that Afghanistan couldn't do with a pipeline. But a highway from Kabul to Kandahar—an insurance against warlordism and a condition of nation-building—is nearing completion with infinite labor and risk. We also discover that the parties of the Afghan secular left—like the parties of the Iraqi secular left—are strongly in favor of the regime change. But this is not the sort of irony in which Moore chooses to deal....

Moore asserts that Iraq under Saddam had never attacked or killed or even threatened (his words) any American. I never quite know whether Moore is as ignorant as he looks, or even if that would be humanly possible. Baghdad was for years the official, undisguised home address of Abu Nidal, then the most-wanted gangster in the world, who had been sentenced to death even by the PLO and had blown up airports in Vienna* and Rome. Baghdad was the safe house for the man whose "operation" murdered Leon Klinghoffer. Saddam boasted publicly of his financial sponsorship of suicide bombers in Israel. (Quite a few Americans of all denominations walk the streets of Jerusalem.) In 1991, a large number of Western hostages were taken by the hideous Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and held in terrible conditions for a long time. After that same invasion was repelled—Saddam having killed quite a few Americans and Egyptians and Syrians and Brits in the meantime and having threatened to kill many more—the Iraqi secret police were caught trying to murder former President Bush during his visit to Kuwait. Never mind whether his son should take that personally. (Though why should he not?) Should you and I not resent any foreign dictatorship that attempts to kill one of our retired chief executives? (President Clinton certainly took it that way: He ordered the destruction by cruise missiles of the Baathist "security" headquarters.) Iraqi forces fired, every day, for 10 years, on the aircraft that patrolled the no-fly zones and staved off further genocide in the north and south of the country. In 1993, a certain Mr. Yasin helped mix the chemicals for the bomb at the World Trade Center and then skipped to Iraq, where he remained a guest of the state until the overthrow of Saddam. In 2001, Saddam's regime was the only one in the region that openly celebrated the attacks on New York and Washington and described them as just the beginning of a larger revenge. Its official media regularly spewed out a stream of anti-Semitic incitement. I think one might describe that as "threatening," even if one was narrow enough to think that anti-Semitism only menaces Jews. And it was after, and not before, the 9/11 attacks that Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi moved from Afghanistan to Baghdad and began to plan his now very open and lethal design for a holy and ethnic civil war. On Dec. 1, 2003, the New York Times reported—and the David Kay report had established—that Saddam had been secretly negotiating with the "Dear Leader" Kim Jong-il in a series of secret meetings in Syria, as late as the spring of 2003, to buy a North Korean missile system, and missile-production system, right off the shelf. (This attempt was not uncovered until after the fall of Baghdad, the coalition's presence having meanwhile put an end to the negotiations.)

Thus, in spite of the film's loaded bias against the work of the mind, you can grasp even while watching it that Michael Moore has just said, in so many words, the one thing that no reflective or informed person can possibly believe: that Saddam Hussein was no problem. No problem at all. Now look again at the facts I have cited above. If these things had been allowed to happen under any other administration, you can be sure that Moore and others would now glibly be accusing the president of ignoring, or of having ignored, some fairly unmistakable "warnings."

The whole piece is as thorough an evisceration of one liberal by another as I've ever seen. Ignore the critics falling over themselves to fawn on Moore. Read Hitchens instead.

UPDATE: This just in from the friends of Michael Moore:

The company distributing filmmaker Michael Moore's Bush-bashing movie Fahrenheit 9/11 says it won't reject an offer of help from Middle East terrorist organization Hezbollah.

As WorldNetDaily reported, terrorists affiliated with the Iran-backed network last week offered to help promote the film in the United Arab Emirates.

The movie industry publication Screen Daily reported, "In terms of marketing the film, [distributor] Front Row is getting a boost from organizations related to Hezbollah which have rung up from Lebanon to ask if there’s anything they can do to support the film."

The story then quotes Front Row Managing Director Gianluca Chacra: "We can’t go against these organizations as they could strongly boycott the film in Lebanon and Syria."
Athanasius on 06.22.04 @ 04:25 PM EST [link]

Monday, June 21st

Heart of the issue: power

According to the St. Paul Pioneer-Press, Gene Robinson knows exactly why his elevation to bishop caused such an uproar:

He said the battle is about the end of patriarchy in the church.

"For a lot of centuries, at least in western civilization, straight white men have gotten to make all the decisions.''

Over 200 years, people of color and women became decision-makers in many churches.

"Now, we're welcoming gays and lesbians into those same places,'' Robinson said. "Nobody likes to share power. It's scary. Folks are demanding to be in places where decisions are made; that is a seismic shift. No wonder the resistance is so great."

It's not about Scripture, theology, right and wrong, or any of that other trivia. It's about power. And that, of course, is a large part of the reason why Gene Robinson accepted the elevation, despite the earthquake it was bound to cause, and why he remains in office, having seen what his ambition has caused. It is all about power–his power, and that of his fellow ideologues.
Athanasius on 06.21.04 @ 09:40 PM EST [link]

Sunday, June 20th

Guess the movie

I thought this wonderfully silly. It's one of those one-line synopses of movies you find in the newspaper, in this case a paper in California's Marin County:

Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first woman she meets and then teams up with three complete strangers to kill again.

Whether this was meant as a gag or seriously (Marin County being what it is, anything's possible), I don't know. I'm taking it as the former.

(Thanks to Pejman for the info. Follow the link for the correct answer.)
Athanasius on 06.20.04 @ 08:06 PM EST [link]