Category Archives: religiosity

Dear Rick…

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Thanks to JB, for this one.

The Encyclodpedia of

Check out a thorough collection of articles about 9/11 via NYMAG‘s Encyclopedia of 9/11.

What Dinh didn’t anticipate was a profound shift in liberalism and, therefore, in the politics of the country. Even with a Democrat now in the White House, the liberalism that protects the right of the individual against the majority—the politics of civil rights and abortion and gay marriage—has diminished, in favor of one that aims to improve the lot of the median man. Obama’s liberalism is for the majority, not against it. This spirit, and the unlikely endurance of the Patriot Act, owes something to the central psychological events of the decade: the vitality and threat of new economic competitors, the social violence initiated by the authors of obscure financial instruments, but first and most of all September 11—each of which evoked a particular feeling, that we were all together, under attack. .::Patriot Act

HUSSSSSEEEEEIIINNN

The following is an excerpt of an Op-Ed Reposted from Buzzflash. The views expressed herein do not represent those of MNP as a network.  PSYCH! My ninja, please!

WALTER BRASCH FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT

The latest garbage spewing hate as it circles the Internet in a viral state of panic continues a three year smear against Barack Obama.

The attacks had begun with the extreme right wing spitting out Obama’s full name-Barack HUSSEIN Obama, as if somehow he wasn’t an American but connected to the Iraqi dictator who, despite the Bush Administration’s best efforts, had no connections to 9/11.

When the right-wingers and Tea Party Pack get tired of their “cutesy” attempts to link Obama to militant Muslims, they launch half-truths and lies to claim he wasn’t born in the United States. Like Jaws, Jason, or Freddy Krueger, “birther” propaganda keeps returning, even when independent state officials and analysts proved the claims false.

The issue simmered on Fox TV and talk radio until Donald Trump, the man with the planet-sized ego and the bacteria-sized brain, inserted his persona into the issue, while pontificating about becoming the next president. The media, exhausted from having to cover the antics of Lindsay Lohan and Charlie Sheen, turned their news columns over to the man who would be God-if only it paid better.

The Wing Nut Cotillion, with Trump getting the headlines, then demanded Obama produce a long-form birth certificate-which he did while leading a combined White House-CIA-Pentagon effort to find and destroy Osama bin Laden. The truth still hasn’t quieted the conspiracy nuts.

Not willing to accept truth and logic, the extreme right wing, grasping for anything they could find, have attacked the raid that killed bin Laden. Among their screeches are that bin Laden isn’t dead . . . that he was killed a week earlier or even years earlier . . . that Obama had hidden the death until there was a more political time to reveal it . . . that it was George W. Bush (who publicly said six months after 9/11 that he didn’t care about bin Laden) who deserves all the credit . . . and that while Navy SEALS should get credit, Obama is too weak to have overseen any part of the mission.

And now from the caves of ignorance and hatred comes a much-forwarded letter, which the anonymous author says “shouldn’t surprise anyone.” Written as fact, the letter informs us Barack Obama: “never held a ‘real’ job, never owned a business and as far as we know, never really attended Harvard or Columbia since those transcripts have never been released and no one remembers him from their time at either school.”

The email of hate further “enlightens” us that “Being a community activist only gives someone insite [sic] on how to assist the less fortunate and dregs of society on how to acquire government housing and government benefits without ever contributing one penny in taxes.”

That’s right. The Whackadoodles Wearing Tinfoil Caps crowd has escaped again… Read The Rest

Anti-Socialism (Except in terms of Masturbation)

BTW… if Delaware elects this woman, I’m sending my best ninjas.

O’Donnell’s version of this critique is more explicitly socialist: If he already knows what pleases him, and he can please himself, then why am I in the picture? The guy is taking care of his own business, and O’Donnell is upset because this makes him less dependent on others.

Is O’Donnell going to outlaw masturbation? Of course not. No government could enforce such a law. But that doesn’t lessen her antipathy to non-procreative sexuality, even when it’s protected by private industry. In 1995, when Coors offered health benefits to partners of its gay employees, O’Donnell said that her organization, Concerned Women for America, opposed the company’s policy because “it legitimizes the homosexual lifestyle.” In Catholic doctrine, masturbation and homosexuality are wrong for the same reason: They don’t serve the kind of conjugal union that can lead to procreation.

The next time you hear O’Donnell decry socialism, remember how little she respects the individual in the most private of matters. Your wallet doesn’t belong to society. Neither does what’s under it. ##Read the full story from Slate##

The God Project: Hinduism as Open-Source Faith

With over 330 million gods worshipped over Hinduism’s evolution in the past 5,000 years on the Indian sub-continent, Josh Schrei of HP considers this religion the only “open-source” religion.

At the heart of the Indic source code are the Vedas, which immediately establish the primacy of inquiry in Indic thought. In the Rig Veda, the oldest of all Hindu texts (and possibly the oldest of all spiritual texts on the planet), God, or Prajapati, is summarized as one big mysterious question and we the people are basically invited to answer it.

“Who really knows?
Who will here proclaim it?
Whence was it produced?
Whence is this creation?
The gods came afterwards, with the creation of this universe.
Who then knows whence it has arisen?”

On the God Project:

In Indic thought, there is no trade secret. The foundation of yoga is that the key to god, or the macrocosm, or the absolute … lies within the individual and can be accessed through a certain set of practices. It’s a beautifully simple but ultimately profound concept that has been allowed to flourish unchecked for millennia. The process of discovering and re-imagining the divine is in your hands. The God Project.

.:huffingtonpost.com->

Massaging the Curriculum: A Texas Guide to Rewriting History

I haven’t much to say about this besides that you should read the article.  Part of me thinks it’s scary, another part of me thinks that it’s always scary when you see sausage being made.

I mean… I remember that in school we colored in pictures of happy “Pilgrims” and “Indians. “  Sometimes feeling like you were lied to can be more dramatic than not.

McLeroy moved that Margaret Sanger, the birth-control pioneer, be included because she “and her followers promoted eugenics,” that language be inserted about Ronald Reagan’s “leadership in restoring national confidence” following Jimmy Carter’s presidency and that students be instructed to “describe the causes and key organizations and individuals of the conservative resurgence of the 1980s and 1990s, including Phyllis Schlafly, the Contract With America, the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority and the National Rifle Association.” The injection of partisan politics into education went so far that at one point another Republican board member burst out in seemingly embarrassed exasperation, “Guys, you’re rewriting history now!” Nevertheless, most of McLeroy’s proposed amendments passed by a show of hands.

Finally, the board considered an amendment to require students to evaluate the contributions of significant Americans. The names proposed included Thurgood Marshall, Billy Graham, Newt Gingrich, William F. Buckley Jr., Hillary Rodham Clinton and Edward Kennedy. All passed muster except Kennedy, who was voted down.

This is how history is made — or rather, how the hue and cry of the present and near past gets lodged into the long-term cultural memory or else is allowed to quietly fade into an inaudible whisper. Public education has always been a battleground between cultural forces; one reason that Texas’ school-board members find themselves at the very center of the battlefield is, not surprisingly, money. The state’s $22 billion education fund is among the largest educational endowments in the country. LINK

They say history is written by the victors.  Given how frequently we accuse our politicians of attempting to rewrite history, nay, how frequently they do, maybe we should begin to say that the victors are also written by history.

Vatican Hates Avatar

“3 words… 3rd word starts with O… Giant Owls… C’mon sons…!”

I never thought I’d say it, but thank you to Dan Brown for blowing these gates wide open.

VATICAN CITY The Vatican newspaper and radio station have called the film “Avatar” simplistic, and criticized it for flirting with modern doctrines that promote the worship of nature as a substitute for religion.

L’Osservatore Romano and Vatican Radio dedicated ample coverage to James Cameron’s big-grossing, 3-D spectacle. But the reviews were lukewarm, calling the movie superficial in its eco-message, despite groundbreaking visual effects.

L’Osservatore said the film “gets bogged down by a spiritualism linked to the worship of nature.” Similarly, Vatican Radio said it “cleverly winks at all those pseudo-doctrines that turn ecology into the religion of the millennium.”

“Nature is no longer a creation to defend, but a divinity to worship,” the radio said.

Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi said that while the movie reviews are just that film criticism, with no theological weight they do reflect Pope Benedict XVI’s views on the dangers of turning nature into a “new divinity.”

Benedict has often spoken about the need to protect the environment, earning the nickname of “green pope.” But he has sometimes balanced that call with a warning against neo-paganism.

In a recent World Day of Peace message, the pontiff warned against any notions that equate human person and other living things. He said such notions “open the way to a new pantheism tinged with neo-paganism, which would see the source of man’s salvation in nature alone.”

The Vatican newspaper occasionally likes to comment in its cultural pages on movies or pop culture icons, as it did recently about “The Simpsons” or U2. In one famous instance, several Vatican officials spoke out against “The Da Vinci Code.”

In this case, the reviews came out after a red carpet preview held in Rome just a stone’s throw from St. Peter’s Square. The movie will be released Friday in Italy.

The story of the tall blue creatures who inhabit Pandora and contend with humans intent on grabbing the resources of their planet has made over $1.1 billion at box offices worldwide. Partly boosted by higher 3-D ticket prices, “Avatar” looks well on its way to becoming the biggest grossing movie of all time.

“So much stupefying, enchanting technology, but few genuine emotions,” said L’Osservatore Romano, which devoted three articles to “Avatar” in its Sunday editions.

L’Osservatore Romano said the movie’s plot is unoriginal and its message not new. It faulted Cameron for taking a “bland approach.”

“He tells the story without going deep into it, and ends up falling into sappiness,” it said.

Vatican Radio did say, however, that “really never before have such surprising images been seen,” while L’Osservatore said the movie’s worth lies in its “extraordinary visual impact.”

From Yahoo

Sarah Palin’s Weird-ass Church

OK, ninjas. I have an announcement to make. It’s not cool to be making fun of peoples’ religions and stuff. It’s not because I respect religion, or some high-falutin’ nonsense, but rather because they’re basically all the same, for one. Moreover, you know people get extra sensitive when you talk about their chosen deity, so it’s just best to let sleeping dogs lie. So, as you read forward into this next article let me also remind you that while this is weird… it’s less weird than some of ya’lls crochety-ass churches. And that’s my word, as a ninja AND as a scholar.

Ok now read this complete strange-ness and try not to fall out of your chair:

Mike Rose is the senior pastor of Juneau Christian Church, where Governor Sarah Palin attends when in residence in Juneau. The Alaska Update of the Alaska Assemblies of God featured a story on Palin’s attendance at the 2008 Alaska District Council and stated that “Superintendent Ted Boatsman, who was Palin’s junior high pastor at Wasilla Assembly of God, along with Pastor Mike Rose of Juneau Christian Center, where Palin presently attends church when in Juneau, laid hands on the Governor and led the Council in Prayer.”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_CkZWTvKBc[/youtube]

Rose is well known as far away as Australia for his participation in the “new wave” of the Holy Spirit. Former General Superintendent of the Assemblies of God in Australia, Dr. Andrew Evans, has also been a supporter of the “new wave” and its manifestations which he lists as falling, shaking and drunkenness (in the Spirit),and uncontrollable weeping and laughing. (He has been a controversial figure for his belief that these manifestations would aid in church growth in his denomination in Australia although these activities have been repeatedly denounced as Deviant Behavior by the U.S. General Council.) Evans writes about Rose’s ability to manage these manifestations in his church without excessive disruption of services. He also notes that Rose had been an advisor to Rodney Howard-Browne’s Revival Ministries committee and had “sat in over 110 of Rodney’s meetings.” Andrew Evans went on to found the Family First Party of Australia.

Rodney Howard-Browne is one of the most controversial and publicized figures of the Third Wave movement. While many of the leaders have been almost invisible in the mainstream media, Howard-Browne and his Holy Laughter anointing have been covered by CNN , Time, Newsweek, PBS, and numerous British media outlets. Howard-Browne refers to himself in many of these articles as the “Holy Ghost bartender.”

He is also one of the most controversial figures in the Evangelical world and is the subject of many hundreds of internet pages from other Evangelical and Fundamentalists discernment groups who view his unusual revival manifestations such as uncontrollable laughter, weeping, shrieking, and animal noises, as cultic. Other conservative Christians also find fault with Howard-Browne’s end time belief that a unified and purified church is currently being restored through a “great awakening” that is manifesting itself through these “signs and wonders.” Howard-Browne, like the other leaders of the Third Wave, believe that they are raising a great end time army that will take control of the world through spiritual warfare, and triumph over Satan before the millennial reign of Jesus. Many in the movement, such as C. Peter Wagner believe that the Apostolic age began in 2001. John Bevere, author of curriculum for the Master’s Commission of Wasilla Assembly of God, believes that he is teaching the final generation before the Millennial which he calculates will begin in 2028 or 2029.

Rodney Howard-Browne and his family moved from South Africa to the United States in 1987, and settled in the Lakeland/Tampa area after having a successful revival at the church of Karl Strader, Lakeland’s first Assemblies of God, Karl is father of Stephen Strader of Ignited Church and the current Lakeland Revival fame. Howard-Browne and his wife continued to lead revivals around the world and often worked closely with the late John Wimber of the Vineyard movement and the the Kansas City Prophets. They introduced hyper-charismatic activities in widely publicized revivals in both the United States and Great Britain including the Toronto Airport Blessing which began in 1994, and drew people worldwide to experience the phenomenon. Howard-Brown is also credited with a role in the Brownsville Revival, 1995, and more recently, the 2008 Lakeland Healing Revival with Todd Bentley.

Additionally Howard-Browne has been instrumental in the introduction of these “signs and wonders” all over the world including Brompton Holy Trinity, a high-profile charismatic Anglican church in May, 1994. The resulting Holy Laughter and other unusual manifestations at this prominent church and others in London shocked the British press and was the biggest story covered by British Christian media in 1995 and 1996. Brompton Holy Trinity is now primarily known as the source of the ALPHA course.

.::Read the rest of this article (p. 2) at -> alternet

Al Qaeda Claims Cucumbers Un-Ladylike

Besides the terrible killings inflicted by the fanatics on those who refuse to pledge allegiance to them, Al-Qa’eda has lost credibility for enforcing a series of rules imposing their way of thought on the most mundane aspects of everyday life.

They include a ban on women buying suggestively-shaped vegetables, according to one tribal leader in the western province of Anbar.

Sheikh Hameed al-Hayyes, a Sunni elder, told Reuters: “They even killed female goats because their private parts were not covered and their tails were pointed upward, which they said was haram.

.::Read the rest at –> telegraph.co.uk

I kinda feel them, though. I mean… I’ve seen a few of the wrong girls pick up a few of the wrong vegetables and thought about implementing my own fundamentalist beliefs. Seriously though, I’m not sure how to take this report. If it’s serious then it ranks among the top ten goofiest reasons why the global Jihad will fail. If it’s not serious… then it’s in extremely poor taste… and puts a whole new spin on gazpacho.