How you take the rotten carcass of religion to even a more repugnant level? Mix in the sham-psychology of positive affirmations and the greedy notions of robber baron capitalism. Mix this these foul artifacts together and you have what is known as the Prosperity Gospel. We are not here today to get into what the PG is all about and how frakked-up it is and the damage it is doing to the US.
Nope.
We are here to observe a christian who understood the ways of the world and let his faith (partially)inform, but not force his decisions. Here’s the quote.
“[..] the first truth is that the liberty of democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is Fascism – ownership of Government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. The second truth of liberty is that the liberty of a democracy is not safe if its business system does not provide employment and produce and distribute goods in such a way to sustain an acceptable standard of living. “
Wow. I’m sure this individual would be quickly branded a communist traitor or a godless socialist by the standards of what passes for ‘debate’ in the US. Care to guess who said the above?
Yeah, so there was a time when you could be christain and rational, all at the same time. I pine for those times.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
9 comments
August 11, 2013 at 7:04 am
john zande
“financial blessing is the will of God for Christians….”
Whoa!
Reminds me of this Onion piece from a few years ago:
Jesus Christ Files Lawsuit Against GOP For Slander
When asked about the lawsuit, House Speaker John Boehner made the following remarks:
“Mr. Christ is entitled to his opinion, however the GOP believes that the underlying message in the Bible is that giving tax cuts to the wealthy is the true path to happiness. I don’t know where Mr. Christ thinks the Bible says to help the poor and the sick, but that sounds awfully socialistic to me, and we are not a socialist country.”
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August 11, 2013 at 7:29 am
Notes To Ponder
Holy crap! Do we laugh or cry?
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August 11, 2013 at 11:41 am
The Arbourist
@NtP
I’m not sure. I am certainly not an ardent defender of Christianity, but I think I can hold the idea that it was a touch less stupid back then. One needs to calibrate the stupid metre quite finely, but I’m thinking the possible rise of the fascist christian right (in the US) is much more likely now that it was 50-70 years ago.
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August 11, 2013 at 11:43 am
The Arbourist
@JZ
The problem is that as soon as you embrace one illusion, that is you turn off your critical faculties, the next fallacy is that much easier to accept. The tide of stupid has been growing for quite awhile in the US and the consequences, frankly, scare the bejeezuz out me.
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August 11, 2013 at 11:59 am
john zande
You think it’s been growing, or is it more the case that the stupid are just getting more airtime than they previously enjoyed?
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August 11, 2013 at 12:10 pm
The Arbourist
I’m not sure John to be honest. But from what I can remember about media and popular discussions from my childhood (the 70’s/80’s) there was much less of the vapid, peurile crap that we are subjected to now.
This is all goes back to the elites fraking with the systems set up to keep nations on a egalitarian footing. Bretton Woods, Glass Steaghal act etc.
Once those systems, a barrier to speculative capital and the bubble inducing wealth it creates, were gone the need for distraction and infotainment to keep the masses consuming became much more of a necessity.
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August 11, 2013 at 12:29 pm
syrbal
Critical faculties? Oh, come now…..the first thing the Christianists will tell you is that you can’t be “judgmental” ….tho’ I note THEY do an awful lot of that themselves. So you can’t be engaging in critical thinking cause it might lead to a rush to judgement that they are all full of it, and I ain’t just talking Communion wine and wafers.
That tide of stupid is a regular recurring tsunami…..which is why my signature line used to be, “Sounds like undulant rhetoric to me!”…a reference to a brilliant Doris Lessing novel examining the lack of critical thinking and embrace of emotive, bombastic nonsense as a psychological illness!
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August 11, 2013 at 12:33 pm
The Arbourist
@Syrbal
One of a myriad of problems with organized religion. The ability to admit that you are wrong isn’t in the playbook.
Where can argument go when one side “knows” its right?
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August 12, 2013 at 1:23 am
bleatmop
“Though he accepts giving as “praiseworthy”,[61] he questions the motives of prosperity theology and criticizes the “Law of Compensation”,[61] which teaches that when Christians give generously, God will give back more in return. Rather, Jones cites Jesus’ teaching to “give, hoping for nothing in return.” – From the wiki
Wow, I just realized that I was taught the prosperity gospel, or at least part of it, in my Mennonite church growing up. Things I learned today…
Irrespective, I still find this prosperity gospel to be one of the most vile things I’ve ever heard of. Since wealth is seen as a reward for being holy and devout, it means that being poor is a curse from god for being evil or whatever. It shames and humiliates anyone who is poor and tell them that they are bad people for being poor. It’s just such an evil doctrine that I don’t know what more to say about it.
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