Magical Thinking and the Army of God

When I saw that 16 people died when riots erupted in the Islamic world after a news item describing the desecration of the Quran in American military prisons was published, I got a really sick feeling in my stomach. It's not the idea that some uniformed interrogator would trash a supposed holy book that bothers me so much as the notion that there are people who would kill one another over the treatment of paper and ink. Even more, I fear that the corrosive mentality and pathological culture that would give supernatural powers to bound wood pulp, and kill over it, is now growing here in America.

I value the widsom, ideas and insuppressible love of life found in books as much as anyone. The words of another human, written centuries ago or yesterday, can carry truth to isolated souls and inspire dreams in weary minds. But something happens when we ascribe magic to man-made items, whether it's a volume bound in fine leather or a string of beads with a cross on the end. Sooner or later, the divine power we give to those items starts to talk to a part of us that's deep in our psyche, a primitive part that tells us that more recent human developments like compassion, tolerance and mercy just won't cut it in a world where we think we have to kill or be killed, convert or be converted.

The ideas in books, and beliefs, are critical to being human. Without the ability to believe in the ephemeral, in the unseen, we revert to dull creatures, lacking the spark that makes us special among what lives on Earth. Under stress, though, the behaviours we know as "faith in God" or "belief in the supernatural" take on the properties of obsessive compulsive disorder. Thus, a believer in the unseen unity in the Universe becomes a crackpot. This is where the Religious Right in this country are going.

It's no accident that the fear-causing events of the last decade or so have been followed by surging numbers of people calling themselves "born again" or Evangelical Christians. The old saw about "no athiests in foxholes" was never so true as in a time when people are faced with terrors and decline that are outside of our control.

Let me be clear: I am not saying that all religion is pathological in nature. It's only when artifacts start to become "holy" and beliefs are not only outside the realm of observable, scientific phenomenon but actually opposite to what we can see and hear, that believers become fanatics. So, not only did God create the universe, but he did it in six days, and only six thousand years ago, despite the geological record and fossils that we can hold in our hands. Prayer become incantation, ceremony becomes ritual.

The 20th century was hard on us little creatures. Diseases seem to represent God's wrath, wars, disasters both ecological and social seem to take on supernatural origins. Stressed-out believers want to protect themselves any way they can, which opens them up to magical thinking. Talismans, hex signs, crossing themselves when passing through a doorway. My grandmother, only a boat ride away from being a Sicilian peasant, was a devout Catholic who kept a bottle of holy water behind her bedstead, and buried a statue of St. Joseph upside-down in the front yard. You can talk to immigrants from anywhere in Christian Europe and find the same stories. Superstition is part of human history and every ethnic group. How does it differ from sacred Qurans being kept off the ground or rubbing rosary beads? Religious beliefs, like all belief in the supernatural, is a rich part of human experience. At its best, it can open up our minds and hearts to understanding beyond what we can see and touch. It can connect us to each other and important mysteries within and without. It is not diminished by being related to all superstitious beliefs. The medieval fanaticism that is exploding in the Islamic world toward which the Religious Right in America is hurtling shows what it can become at its worst.

Religious Extremists Fight Vaccinations

According to some religious extremists, the greatest threat to the souls of their children is not drugs or television or even rap music. The most dangerous element of the modern world to getting their children into heaven is, um, vaccination against disease.

[Warning to educated people: The following could make you crazy.]

The latest battlefront in the religious Right's war on common sense is the assertion that many childhood vaccinations, lifesaving though they may be, were originally developed on fetal tissue and thus desecrate their children's bodies in ways that Big Macs, Coca-Cola and heroin can never do. The polio vaccine known as Poliovax, manufactured by Aventis-Pasteur, is derived, they say, from the MRC-5 fetal cell line, which comes from a 1970 abortion. Vaccines for measles, mumps, rubella, rabies, hepatitis-A and chicken pox are also "abortion-tainted" according to Debbie Vinnedge of Children of God for Life.

Sometime this year, according to the World Health Organization, we may see the world's last cases of polio. The horrible disease smallpox, once the killer of hundreds of thousands, has been eradicated since 1980 (except in bio-weapons labs, that is). When I was a kid, I remember the polio cases, those crippled or living in iron lungs, and my mother's warnings to stay away from public swimming pools due to her terrible fear of polio. Today, we are free or nearly-free of these terrors thanks to the efforts of science, medicine and education, and the effectiveness of childhood vaccinations. But the emergent class of hysterical science-phobic maniacs now threatens these advances thanks to superstition.

A friend of mine who's a mathematician, who grew up in a developing country and is not very tolerant of nonsense, reminds me that "primitive cultures always find reasons to shun vaccines." I explain to her that this is happening here, in Kansas, in Florida, in Texas. "Oh," she says quietly.

Salem Radio Declares War on America

As I've written before in these pages, Salem Radio Network, the extremist Right-Wing/ultra-conservative Christian mouthpiece, carefully synchronizes the message delivered by it's national hosts throughout the day. Here are a few of the most alarming themes they have been pushing the last few days:

• It's war between the Red and Blue states. When I first heard it on Bill Bennett's "Morning in America" show, I thought it was just a weak joke, but throughout the day, the intensity of the message increased. "It's time to jettison the Blue States" a carefully screened caller said. "We've got all the important stuff in the Red States, anyway." With a chuckle, Bennett (failed Secretary of Education and degenerate gambler) started a list, which subsequent callers appended. "They can keep Hollywood and Harvard, we've got Disneyworld and the Alamo." OK, funny, right? But then it got serious. "What would our immigration laws be? Would we allow guest workers from the Blue States? Since we are the states that grow all the food, we could just starve the Blue States out," the former drug czar went on. "And the Red States have all the guns, of course." One caller crossed Salem Radio's dotted line: "All the black people and Jews are in the Blue States, so we'll just have to get rid of the Mexicans." Bennett quickly mentioned that racism was a bad thing, but he let the comment ride.
• Democrats must be thrown out of churches. In every SRN show and even a few editorial segments called "Behind the News" support was shown for the Waynesville, NC pastor, Rev. Chan Chandler of the East Waynesville Baptist Church who expelled nine members of his congregation for supporting Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry. "They need to either repent or resign," he said of the non-Republicans from the pulpit. He later resigned when it turned out that the North Carolina Baptist Church worried that his actions might endanger their tax-exempt status. Naturally, to the Salem Radio extremists, he's a hero and a martyr. "If it's in the Bible, it should be preached," said one supporter. I forgot which verse of the Bible says that Democrats should be thrown out of the Church, so if anyone can enlighten me, please leave a comment.
• Congressmen who don't support Bush are guilty of treason. Again, this theme started during the morning show. "Democrats who are holding up the Bolton nomination are giving succor to the enemy," ex-Secretary of Education Bill Bennett cried. "All along, the Hillary's, the Kennedy's, the Bidens are making it look like our country is divided, and this just puts ammunition in the guns of our enemies." "How do you think the Iranians, the Koreans feel when they hear all the criticism of Bush?" Laura Ingraham shrieked. "They must just celebrate. If there's another terrorist attack in this country, we'll have the Democrats to thank." By 6:00 pm, Democrats were guilty of a capital offense according to Michael Savage. "It's just treason, pure and simple," Savage cited. "And you know what we do to traitors, right?... It's time to bring back the firing squad." Let's hope the many gun nuts who listen to Salem Radio were eating dinner when he said this.

New Pope Begins Reign of (T)Error

It didn't take long. This week Pope Benedict XVI struck the first blow in his promised war on open debate, or even discussion, of important Catholic issues. The first casualty: Father Thomas J. Reese, an American Jesuit who is a frequent television commentator on Roman Catholic issues, who resigned Friday under direct orders from the Vatican as editor of the Catholic magazine America because he had published articles critical of church positions, according to several Catholic officials in the United States. Father Reese's great sin was to be "off-message" on the issue of condoms, his "heresy" was that he believed lives might be saved in third world countries if sexually transmitted diseases could be prevented.

That the new pope would come down so quickly and so heavily with the jackboots on one of the most evenly balanced Catholic journals, America, which is known for it's careful discussion of issues and for presenting conservative and liberal sides of debates, is an ugly sign. It's a warning to those leaders of the Church who might be tempted to actually think about some of the most important issues of the day that they better think Right, or they may find themselves in hot water. Jesuits, one of the most respected religious orders in the world, who as the "Army of Jesus" have brought so much light to the worlds of both faith and science, are so stunned they can barely respond. "It can have a chilling effect," says one theologian. No kidding.

I called a Jesuit priest who was a teacher of mine when I was in high school. He was one of those teachers who can light a fire under the lazy brain of teenage boy, and he exposed me to the world of literature and ideas when all that mattered to me was rock music and girls. I asked him about America magazine and the ouster of Father Reese. He told me that the problem is an old one, and he called it "paternalism". It means that debates on Catholic dogma have gone on since The Council of Nicea but that Church leadership often assumes that ordinary Catholics would only be "distressed" by these discussions. So it's OK for scholars, theologians and church leaders to discuss these issues, but the rest of us would only be worried by such information. So really, by gagging a priest who edited a magazine that publishes open dialogue they're really just protecting us. So is it the Pope's concern for our inability to handle the truth, or his fear of open minds that leads him to keep questions out of Catholic life? It all comes to the same thing for Father Reese, who made the great mistake of respecting the ability of rank and file believers to think for themselves.

A few weeks ago, news outlets all over the world reminded us that Cardinal Ratsinger, the man who would soon be named Benedict, was the head of an organization called "The Congregation (for the Doctrine of the Faith)", that used to be known as "The Holy Inquisition". These were the bright boys who tortured and murdered thousands a few hundred years ago because they believed in outrageous things like the Earth revolving around the Sun. Of course, we were told, this is now a benign outfit that simply makes sure Catholic doctrine is authentic, and that what Catholics believe is correctly represented. "There's no more Inquisition," they said. They lied, and the new masthead of the once-respected magazine America is the proof.


I wonder if there are European craftsmen who still remember how to build an Iron Maiden.

[If you're curious about what Pope Benedict thinks is unacceptable, please go to your library and pick up a back issue of America. You will be surprised]

Hate Radio: The Salem Radio Network

If you've got a good job, or an education, or an FM radio, chances are you haven't heard the Salem Radio Network. So you probably don't realize just how ugly things have gotten in this country. Sure, you remember the ugly invectives from the "Religious Right" during the election, and you might remember Tom DeLay threatening to get even with the federal judges who decided that a person's right to make a decision with their spouse regarding the use of extraordinary means of life support in the event of irreversible catastrophic brain damage is not the business of Bill Frist, Rick Santorum and the irrepressible asinine Sam Brownbeck. You might even have heard Ann Coulter encouraging the murder of those she calls "liberal". But you haven't heard hate until you've heard The Salem Radio Network.

SRN, and their parent, Salem Communications is an upstart media conglomerate in the Clear Channel mode, but they play a low-down game, manipulating the religious fervor of the Evangelicals to push a neo-fascist agenda that makes the check-pants conservatives at Clear Channel or Fox News look like pikers by comparison.

Think of the ugliest stereotype of the phoney-baloney, cynical, TV preacher, sucking money from desperate folks while pumping it back into the political system, not to make the country better, but to fatten their wallets and to grab power. Picture the most foul Bill Maher joke about the neocon hypocrites with a cross in one hand and a flag in the other, greasing the way for rotten corporate thieves to take wealth beyond measure, while convincing the middle class that the lack of proper health care is the American Way. The reality of the Salem Radio Network has these exaggerations beat by a mile. They are the real deal. They are the Anti-Christian Christians, the Anti-American Americans. They are the worst of the worst. And they're slick liars, smooth on the outside, rotten on the inside. They've learned their business-school lessons well, with their synergistic marketing and disciplined message. And they're coming to your town.
I wish I had the literary and journalistic skills to convey the nastiness of this outfit, but nothing I could possibly write would do the job as well as a couple of hours of listening to SRN. Go to the website, find a station near you, or go to the individual hosts' websites and listen online. Then tell me if I'm wrong. It's time that that the decent people of America found out just how bad things have gotten, and just how serious the religious maniacs are about taking away our freedom, our way of life.

[Note to Chicagoans: Here, the Salem Radio Network can be found at AM 560, "Left on your dial, but Right on the issues."]

For Evangelicals, Culture War is Civil War

Today, I became convinced that the fanatic Religious Right have declared a civil war in our nation. Just as the Confederate States declared that they could not obey the laws of America, that the country they wanted to live in was so substantially different from the USA of the 1860's that they could no longer abide by it's laws, customs, and culture, the numerically small but highly disciplined group of anti-American revolutionaries known as "The Religious Right" have now put the rest of us on notice: We are their Enemy. They want to destroy the way of life, the culture, the unity of principles that for 230 years has been known as the United States of America. Their very religion, known as Evangelicalism requires them to do it. They are in fact, the spiritual brothers of fanatical Islamists that our military has been fighting overseas. Their "God" is telling them that we must be destroyed.

Our first Civil War started small. A constitutional crisis in this state legislature, or a violent outcry over that federal court decision, and the men who believed they could own other men reached for their guns. Today, a Republican Senator tells his people that the Democrats in congress are against their religion, and a Republican leader of the House of Representatives warns judges that disagree with him that they should be looking over their shoulders, and another Eric Rudolph starts assembling a bomb, another Tim McVeigh's hatred boils over. Of course, the Far Right Republicans disavow any connection to the violent men who would bring home-grown terror, but where did Rudolph get the idea to bomb an abortion clinic? What made Tim McVeigh pick a building of federal agents to destroy?

Now we are told, by the James Dobsons, the Sam Brownbecks, that we are fighting a "Culture War". As usual, the men of the right believe war is the solution to all problems. A drug problem? We need a "War on Drugs". Forget using the combined international police agencies to fight the criminals we call terrorists. We need a "War on Terror". If George W. Bush had been in office instead of John F. Kennedy, the national effort of manned space flights would have been called the "War on the Moon".

When you use the "war model" to fight a problem, it makes it a lot easier to accept real bloodshed, real death. As we've heard time and time again, "We're at war" so a little torture, a little less liberty, more Americans in prison, that's all to be expected. How long do you think it will take before we start seeing casualties in "The Culture War"? Maybe we already have.

I happen to belong to the same religious denomination as most of the founding fathers of this nation. It's a religion that believes that human reason should be given equal weight to scripture or tradition. The Evangelicals have no such notion about human reason. If God says it's so, or more accurately, if the televangelist says that God says it's so, then it's for sure. I hate abortion, but I absolutely believe in a woman's right to choose whether or not to bear a child. I think committed, loving relationships are always better than promiscuity, so allowing marriage or civil unions between homosexuals can only be a good thing. I believe that in a prosperous nation like ours, that health care is a right for all people, as is education, whether or not that person happens to have a high-paying job. That Social Security guarantees that old folks who've played by the rules and worked hard all their lives can live with just a tiny bit of dignity is a good thing, I believe. I believe that if someone who pays for a subscription media service wants to see a little indecent entertainment, that's their choice. In fact, I like a little indecency myself once in a while. I believe in "Live and Let Live". I believe in the liberty that our Constitution guarantees is the right of everyone in this country, not just the ones who have found Jesus. These beliefs make me the sworn Enemy of the Religious Right.

Evangelicals believe that theirs is the One True Faith, and that if you haven't been born again, according to their rules, you are going to burn in Hell for eternity. This is not a secret, they trumpet this belief from their pulpits, from their blogs, and from their seats in Congress. As we've learned from other societies who've had such beliefs, this notion leaves room for a lot of horror if you don't happen to share it. For example, at an Evangelical church in the small Missouri town where I live part of the year, friends tell me that they are told that if they have any Jewish or Catholic friends, and they care about them, it's their bound duty to make sure that these non-Evangelicals are born again, or they'll burn in Hell for Eternity. If they have any friends who are not raising their children to believe the way the Evangelicals do, then that's the same thing as child abuse, worse in fact, because an Eternity in Hell is far worse than any earthly abuse. You can see where this is going. When it comes to saving souls, how far are you willing to go for Jesus? If that Democrat state rep or federal judge is standing in the way of more Americans finding Jesus, well, if it was 1935 and you had a chance to kill Hitler...

As Bill Bennett (famous moralist and degenerate gambler) is known to say, on his SRN Radio talk show, "Truth is Truth. Wrong is Wrong and Right is Right. There are no grey areas in morality." When James Dobson says that Democrats are the enemies of the faithful, then he's painting a target on all Democrats. And the people who are listening are mostly in states with quite liberal gun laws. When Tom DeLay warns federal judges to be looking over their shoulders because of the way they voted on the Terri Schiavo matter, who does he think is listening?

It's about the saddest thing in the world to me, but this I believe: When suicide bombers start their evil work in this country, they are as likely to be waving a cross as a crescent.

I Didn't Want to Write This

It wasn't my intention to write a political blog. I didn't want to make fighting the rise of the right-wing quasi-Christians my reason for being.

I wanted to write about the beauty in the world. The poetry in great art, the music in architecture, the drama in sculpture. I wanted to talk about the way a song or a great novel can lift a human heart above the basic struggles of living and give us wings. I wanted to write about ideas and the value in play.

It didn't work out that way. I've never cared that much about politics. Despite my own faith and beliefs, I never really worried much about the religious beliefs of others. I was brought up to believe that there was room for everyone in this country, that as long as you didn't step on someone else's toes, you could go your own way. I always thought that was really the idea of our nation. But I've learned in the last decade or so that there's a movement that doesn't believe in freedom for anyone but their own; that believes their way is the only way, and they're ready and willing to enforce this belief no matter who gets hurt. This movement is extremely disciplined, they're all on the same page, they march in step. They use the most private insecurities of a vulnerable population to expand their power, increase their wealth by manipulating their very need for meaning in life - their need to believe. They work in concert with a nascent political philosophy inaccurately known as "neoconservativism" that seeks a society where the weak disappear and power is God. They've convinced the fearful, the less educated, the middle class and poor whites that there are enemies all around, and to vote against their own best interest using a fantasy of security, of "values" but not morals. They are not tolerant of dissent.

This movement, which I believe is set on the very destruction of the best of our society is called by many names, but none of these names is really accurate. "Religious Right" misses the mark and "Christian Conservatives" is way off, since they are neither Christian or conservative. "Evangelicals" is closer, but I'm not willing to cede the concept of evangelism to this vicious crowd. I guess "fanatics" is probably closest to the mark but it just doesn't get across the way this movement is willing to dress itself in the clothes of reasonable people, with titles like "Reverend" and "Senator" and "Chairman of a conservative think tank". Scratch the surface on these folks and you get the mirror image of the wild-eyed terrorist, willing to meet his maker in cleansing blast of righteousness.

A movement so bent on destruction needs an enemy, and that's me, and if you're reading this, probably you, too. We were brought up to believe that religious beliefs were a personal matter. A very personal matter. Decent people didn't go around putting pressure on friends, co-workers, neighbors or children put into our care, such as students or Cub Scouts or the kids next door. If you were the type who went around asking people if they were "saved" it meant that you were a little bit looney, and you probably weren't going to get invited to the next barbecue. But today, if you're NOT saved, for a lot of people and institutions, including some of our government institutions, you don't exist. Think about this: If a presidential candidate were to admit that even though he believes in God, he's not much on going to church on Sunday, could he become President? He couldn't even get a nomination. In fact, if a candidate doesn't claim to be born again chances are good that he won't get a chance to run. So we've already got a RELIGIOUS LITMUS TEST for presidential candidates. Joe Lieberman only got by because he's a devout orthodox Jew. If he'd been a secular Jew, no way.

The ironic part of all this is that it's only the generous tolerance of the vast majority of open-minded Americans that made this theocracy happen. We always knew a few nuts who believed that evolution never happened (it's only a theory after all, they say, showing a misunderstanding of both the science of evolution and the word "theory") or neighborhood cranks who used to warn that we were all going to burn in Hell and sometimes shouted it from streetcorners. But we used to simply walk around them and shrug: "It's a free country, after all." But it took the politics of terror to put so much fear into us that we actually voted those wackos into power. Now we have to pay the price for a few more years, but have we learned the lesson? Do we now understand that the folks who believe God is whispering in their ears are always going to be more dedicated, more fervent, more willing to go to their neighbors with petitions, more willing to strap on bombs? To the Evangelicals, the Jihadists, this is an end-game. They're willing to accept nuclear options, mutual assured destruction, final solutions. It doesn't bother them to throw the baby out with the bath water (as long as it's not unborn), because their shallow interpretations of scripture tell them Armageddon is coming, there will be no tomorrow. The scary part is that they are now in a position to make Armageddon happen.

If we're going to insure a future for our children and grandchildren, one that's free of abortion-bombers and burkahs, we're going to have to shore up the separation between church and state that our founders so presciently made. We're going to have to make sure that people seeking to govern our country are able to put love of their country and their countrymen before the mandates of their own faiths. The evangelicals tell us that they cannot do this. There's our answer.

Companies that Sponsor Hate-Speech

I thought you'd want to know. Below is a partial list of sponsors of the Salem Radio Network, the good people who bring us Michael Savage, Laura Ingraham, Hugh Hewitt, failed movie reviewer Michael Medved and the famous degenerate gambler Bill Bennett, a lineup from 5am to after midnight filled with some of the most disturbing hate-mongering ever on the air in America.

Forget Rush, Hannity, and company, Clear Channel and Sinclair. These are the real haters. Just today you could have heard an hour-long segment on why Islam should be made illegal, why no Muslim should ever be allowed to become a federal judge, that all homosexuals are guilty of treason and why any Democrat who claims to be a Christian is a "rotten liar". On SRN, the holocaust wasn't quite so bad as some would whine. Liberals all suffer from mental disorders and Bill Clinton was our first Socialist president. I'll try to post a few transcripts here, but first I'll have to replace the radio that I flung against the wall in disgust. Even my Republican friends squirm in embarassment over the viscious and often violent diatribes on this network.

Interestingly, the hosts on the Salem Radio Network synchronize their message each day, so topics carry over from program to program. Today and yesterday, was anti-Muslim day on SRN. Bill Bennet (famous degenerate gambler, in case I forgot to mention it) kicked it off with a discussion of a moral comparison between Christianity and Islam. His take on it: The Christians are more moral. Laura Ingraham took up the cause with a guest who explained why Islam is a religion based on deception, violence and terror. Dennis Prager came on at 11, talking to a columnist for the Weekly Standard who made the alarming statement that Christian lives are worth more than Muslim lives. In the afternoon drivetime, here come Michael Medved (heavily closeted failed movie critic with the big mustache) who explains that anyone who is against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are no better than terrorists, and "Not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslim". Apparently, he's forgotten about Tim McVeigh and Olympic/abortion bomber Eric Rudolph. "They are the dregs of humanity, Medved says about Muslims. Michael Savage come on at 5 with a careful discussion of "Islamofascism" (this Michael Savage guy, the same one who was so foul that Fox News through him off the air, is so bad that the other Salem Radio Network announcers disavow his existence. "He's on Salem Radio, but he's not a Salem Radio host" Dennis Prager says on his show.). Hugh Hewitt rounds out the day with a guest who has written a book titled "Prophet of Doom" that reveals that Mohammed was a liar, rapist and terrorist, and that all good Muslims must by definition be terrorists. Mike Gallagher takes the late shift and tells us that Islam is bad, Christianity, good. This group of radio bigmouths know how to stay on topic, that's for sure.

Here in Chicago the "SRN" is on a station that's waaaay on the end of the dial, in the radio ghetto usually reserved for Department of Transportation roadway bulletins and hokum prayer-lines, but in some small to medium markets in America, this is the only radio that comes in good and strong. This is what the people who live in the heartland listen to in between the farm reports and weather. It's just about all they've got, and the big right-wing conglomerates like Clear Channel and Salem are seemingly willing to lose money to get out their message of hate and support of the Christian Republican agenda.

You'll notice a distinct lack of prestigious national advertisers on this network. No McDonald's, no Coca Cola or Chevrolet. The ads here are primarily for hair-growth potions, get-rich-quick pyramid outfits and people who would sell you a book on how to buy gold. One big advertiser is a seller of the Phazer III radar detector which, as the commercial boasts, "..is illegal in eleven states!". But a few of the companies who, perhaps unknowingly, sponsor this filth might surprise you. All of them could benefit from a few phone calls letting them know the sort of rotten eggs they support.

Here is a list of the companies who are paying to spread hate and fear in the United States of America. I'll try to get phone numbers and email addresses and pass them along. Give 'em a call and let them know what you think.

Farmers' Auto Insurance

Pinnacle Home Mortgage

proflowers.com

Lear Financial

Comcast Sportsnet

4airfix.com

tweeter

eharmony.com (dating service)

expedia.com