THE RADICAL CHRISTIAN RIGHT: THEY SHALL BEAT THEIR CROSSES INTO SWASTIKAS AND THEIR PLOUGHSHARES INTO SCIMIATARS

THE RADICAL CHRISTIAN NIGHT:
AND THEY HAVE BEATEN THEIR CROSSES INTO SWASTIKAS AND THEIR PLOUGHSHARES INTO SCIMITARS

By Brandon



"For such are false apostles, decietful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light." 2 Corinthians 11: 13-14 (King James Edition)


What will it take for the spineless left in this country to recognize the fact that it isn't only allowable, but necessary to speak out against hate, bigotry, and fanaticism? Why do so-called liberal Democrats not understand that being intolerant of intolerance itself is a good thing, an honrable American value, not something to be ashamed of or frightened by? When will the American people stop deceiving themselves and recognize the present wave of right-wing fundamentalism for the traitorous fifth column that it actually is?

After watching Justice Sunday, (a travesty of decency which, in the name of honesty, should have been called “Fascist Sinday”), I am again perplexed by the attitudes of my fellow liberals, Democrats and other wise. For some baffling reason or reasons, there are actually people on the left who believe that they can extend a compromising hand to the Radical Christian Right in the hope that they might be able to extract a few votes from what, for all intents and purposes, is a neo-fascist movement with the name of Jesus Christ attached to it for the sake of public consumption. John Edwards talks about the meaning of and importance of his church in his personal life; Hilary Clinton delivers political speeches which sound as if they were lifted from a Sunday morning sermon; John Kerry, at the end of the 2004 election, informed is that he had morals and that he often prayed. It’s almost as if these normally astute politicians genuinely believe that the Radical Christian Right is actually interested in, or is somehow capable of compromise.

It seems to me that liberals, Democrats in particular, simply do not understand the nature of the beast with which they are dealing. They either cannot or will not accept the fact the Radical Christian Right is the greatest threat to American Democracy since the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in the 1920s and 1930s. In the past the evangelical community was content to warn us about the dangers of secularism, and their rhetoric, while occasionally bucolic, tended to center itself around the joys and benefits of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and the bliss that could be found in salvation. But the type of fundamentalism that we see today is nothing like the fundamentalism that we saw prior to the late 1970s.

Beginning in the early 1980’s we saw a new breed of fundamentalism, and wasn’t the conservative, Bible-based faith of our fathers and grandfathers. Unlike previous generations, the new and improved fundamentalists were no longer content to wait for the Second Coming. They actually believed that they could create the Kingdom of God here on earth before Christ made his reappearance. In other words, we are dealing with a group of people who truly believe that they have been selected by God, and who consequently believe that anyone and everyone who refuses to accept their very narrow interpretation of the King James Bible is a part of a Satanic plot.

And if you think that’s bad, just hold on, because it’s about to get a hell of a lot worse.

These people quite literally believe that they have been chosen to prepare the way for Christ. In their warped theology, they have a sacred duty to transform America into, a Christian Republic, a Global American Empire which will spread their decadent, hate-filled Gospel across the face of the earth. This became all too aparent in the days after George W. Bush was elected as President in the year 2000, when Pat Robertson resigned as the head of the Christian Coalition and changed the name of his university to the Regent University.

By now you may well be asking, “So what has that got to do with anything? How does this affect my every day life?" The answers are both complicated and yet obvious.

Radical Right Wing Christians genuinely believe that they should be training a Christian cadre that will eventually rule a Christian Republic here at home, and quite possibly, an American Christian Empire abroad. They truly believe that we are approaching the End of Days and that America will be dominated by a series of twelve Regents who will rule the earth (or at least the United States) until such time as Christ decides to make his last and most impressive appearance.

And now for the weird part: Some poor, deluded souls actually believe that George W. Bush is the first of these so called Regents.

So what’s the problem? Why does this movement represent such a threat?

Think about it.

This wild-eyed pack of self-appointed moralists has come to believe that they have been selected by God and that everyone else is a servant of the Anti-Christ. When you strip away the religious rhetoric you find an intensely paranoid and hate-filled movement which is essentially fascist in its world view and overall attitude towards dissidents in general. In many ways the present group of Millenialists or Dominionists or whatever else you choose to call them, are a direct outgrowth of right wing extremist groups such as the old Anti-Communist League, the John Birch Society, and the Ku Klux Klan, the last of which had chaplains for each of its local chapters. Not surprisingly, the ultimate goal is to create a parallel government which will gradually strangle out the government that was established by the Founding Fathers in 1787. To that end we see "Faith-Based Initiatives," which, for all intents and purposes, are designed to replace everything from state and federal social services, to public education, to the very legal system which protects the rights of both the religious majority and the religious minority. Often touted as a sincere effort to “help people,” faith –based initiatives are, in fact, designed first and foremost to weaken the power of the federal and state governments. Indeed, we already have an alternate media in the form of Christian Broadcasting which effectively issolates the every day "Christian" follower from the debate that is taking place within the corporate-owned mainstream press. In other words, they can see and listen to what ever lies and propaganda the Spin Masters on the (Radical Christian) Right want to spread as the truth and they won't ever know the difference.

It is no accident that Pat Robertson’s Regent University is operating both, law and journalism schools for future Christian leaders in a proverbial Christian Reich. Moreover, the intense effort by Carl Rove and his merry band of Bible-thumping fanatics to dismantle church-state separation and to smear any and all nonbelivers as unpatriotic, antichristian, or unamerican, is not an accident either, The Domionists, really do have a chilling overall objective, which, as I stated earlier, is to overtthrow the present government and to replace the Constitution with a Creationism, Social Dawrwinism, and a literal interpretation of the King James Bible.

In short, when you peal away the phony religious rhetoric, you end up with nothing less than good old fashioned totalitarianism; the same kind that this country went to war against in World War II. The only difference, is that American Fascists, instead of wearing swastikas and SS uniforms, are now wearing crosses and every day street clothing. And the "good" news is that their only enemies are: Jews; Muslims; human secularists; gays, lesbians, agnostics, atheists; “nominal,” mainstream Christians, and just about anyone else who is either brave or foolish enough to cross their theocratic path. And when you're dealing with a totalitarian mindset like that, discussion, debate, and compromise become the theo-political equivalents of heresey. That's an awefully dangerous belief in a representative Republic such as the United States, because American government was founded on compromise and continues to function on compromise.

In many ways the idea that we need to establish a Reich-Wing Regency while we wait for Christ to return, is a disturbing blend of both, fascism and communism. As some of you may recall, certain Marxist theories actually maintained that a given nation would have to go through a period of dictatorship before the proverbial workers paradise could be achieved here on earth. Now flash forward to the year 2005. Today we have the Radical Christian Right telling us that we'll have to go through a divinely-inspired, dictatorship before Christ will come back to establish his Kingdom. You have to give the Radical Christian Right credit--only they could embrace the worst aspects of both, fascism and communism. Which makes me wonder: Doesn't their delusional dream for the future sound more like the reign of The Anti-Christ than the reign of anything even remotely divine?

I didn’t think it was possible, but on Fascist Sinday, every loose nut, pseudo patriot, and Apostate from Hell was given the freedom to rant and rave (often hysterically) about individuals or groups that he or she had chosen to single out for unsrestrained hatred. Historically speaking this is how fascist mvements operate. They exploit our fears; play on our emotions through pageantry and symbolism. Their time-tested tactics worked for The Duce, Paul Josef Goebbels, and his beloved Fuhrer, and they seem to be working just as well for Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Tony Perkins, and James Dobson as well.

And the thing that "amuses" me to no end, is the fact that these people really do believe that they are Christians. They really do believe that they are doing God's will. Despite the fact that Christ never harmed another living being during his time here and earth; despite his pleas for peace, love, and forgiveness, and turning the other cheek, they really do believe Christ was a warrior. Despite the fact that Jesus Christ refused the temptation of political and temporal power while he walked on earth, the Radical Christian Right craves political, temporal power in the same disgusting manner in which a heroin addict craves the next fix. Despite the fact that Christ himself never hoarded material wealth and often consorted with the poor and repressed the Radical Christian Right truly believes that if you are poor you are somehow not right with God--a belief which stems less from The Bible than from the often bizarre rantings of John Calvin.

It seems to me that the Radical Christian Right, or the Fundamentalists, or the Millenialists, or the Dominionists--or whatever to hell you want to call them--have only succeeded in bastardizing the Deity that they so shallowly claim to love and adore. Through a delusional process of historical revision they have transformed our secular Constitution into a Theocratic blue print. Through outright prevarication they have distorted the King James Bible into a Gospel of Hate. Or to be glib they have beaten their crosses into swastikas and their ploughshares into scimiatars.

And it's about time that we took their demented world view a little more seriously.

"For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect."Mark 13:22 (King James Edition)