so i didn't get a chance to write about this last night, which i guess is good because last night would have been a tirade of curses and insults and melodramatic pronouncements. having had some time to calm down, i'll try to keep this...oh, fuck it. last night i saw the scariest movie i have ever seen. it is called jesus camp, and it's about a camp in north dakota for evangelical kids and their families. these people are so blind, so deluded that i spent most of the movie with my head buried in my hands. in turns, i wanted to cry, scream, hit someone and run out of the theater. this is the future of our fucking country? THESE DELUDED MANIACS?!?!?! i would feel sorry for them, for the blindness and intolerance that they have brought into their lives, but they are too strong for my sympathy. 80 million americans describe themselves as evangelicals. merciful god. no, they don't need someone to try and open their eyes, they need to be fought. they're normal fucking people, except they've convinced themselves that the end time is near, that creationism is the only way, that george w. bush represents their interests (which, by the way, he really doesnt...cynical fuck), that everyone but them is wrong, and that they are the true spirit of america. WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO THE ENLIGHTENMENT? what happened to kant's "dare to know"? these people are doing the opposite of daring, they are cowering under the veil of a gory, oppressive, judgmental god and convincing themselves that they are the only our nation was not founded to be a christian nation. it was founded on the ideals of secular intellectual and social advancement by a bunch of deists who despised the orthodox church as totalitarian. scarier still, i could see the appeal of their ideas. it's so easy, to just say that jesus is coming back soon, so fuck everyone else. no need to help people in real ways, just convince them that jesus is lord and abortion is wrong. no need to protect the earth, god gave us dominion and we're not going to need it for much longer, so who gives a shit? i'm telling you, and myself, i guess, that the number two priority for all liberals in this country (after MAKE A FUCKING PLAN FOR THE FUTURE, YOU DUMBASSES) is to fight these people tooth and nail, to raise the same kind of passion for democracy and truth as these people feel for their angry, demented god and his "plan". how they know what that is is beyond me altogether. i could, obviously, keep going. but it's probably best that i stop before this turns into a 300-page scream. i don't really know what i'm talking about, but i know that these people are wrong and they are powerful and they are growing in numbers, and i KNOW that they must be stopped if this country isn't going completely to hell. it's almost enough to make ME believe in god, just so that these people can be worshipping satan in disguise. because their god looks a lot more like a great deceiver to me than like jesus the teacher, the reformer, the social worker.
i'm still in a bit of a daze from the movie last night. in other news, i'm starving, have to pee into a god damn container again because the first god damn sample wasn't right or something and have to wait for the fucking insurance company to say they'll pay for my mri before we can even schedule it. ugh. i just hope i don't have renal failure, too. that would be cute.
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5 comments:
Why do Christians make you so angry?
Have you attempted to understand what we believe, and why?
I used to be like you - I HATED evangelicals. But, sparing you the details, I became saved, found Christ, and now believe the Bible - most importantly, that Christ is my saviour, and the he died for my sins - and yours.
My faith is based upon several things, including that the Bible prophesied many things that have come true, and that once I accepted Christ, I immediately had a framework within which I understood the world (many will tell you that this is the Holy Spirit). I.e: I'm not always right, and I still screw up, but now I KNOW I screwed up, and sinned. I am convicted in my heart when I do wrong, vs., feeling that I can try to reason my way out of it.
And yes, I believe that Christ will return. That said, I think that any Christian that truly thinks that they have it pegged as to when (or even soon), is a fool, since Christ himself said that we'll have no idea, and that he'll come when we least expect it......
christians do not make me angry, it's as ridiculous to say that as to say, "french people make me angry" or "people who like classical music make me angry." being a christian is simply part of a person's identity, like frenchness or an affinity for classical music. what drives me to distraction is when people allow a particularly blind, judgmental form of the faith to create, as you say, the framework within which they understand the world. to just sit back and say, "god will take care of everything, jesus is coming back, we are right and everyone else is wrong," is a violation of the most basic values of this country, which i believe are great: creativity, far-sightedness and liberalism. your attack of reason is most telling. i don't need--nobody needs--a centuries-old book, which, by the way, is filled with contradictions and conflicting stories and messages that many evangelicals apparently ignore, to tell me when i have done something that's wrong. morality is not the exclusive domain of the christian bible. the evangelical church, at least from what i have observed of it through reading the news and various books and seeing movies like this one, would like to do away with those things. i can't stand by and watch my great country be torn apart at the roots by a group of people who have a demented idea that this country is somehow "god's country". (by the way, my father is studying to be a minister, so it's not as if i'm on the lunatic anti-christian fringe.) extremism of any kind is ALWAYS dangerous, and evangelicalism is extremism of the most oppressive sort. pluralism forever.
"creativity, far-sightedness and liberalism."
You're right, they ARE the foundation of this country - they're right there in the Declaration of Independence and The Constitution!
...documents that, apparently, many evangelicals and certainly prince bush would love to do away with. stupid rule of law...
No, we are trying to return the country to actually using and referring to them, rather than re-inventing them to fit whatever we want at the time.
Examples?
-Right to privacy - tell me where that one is.
-"Separation of Church and State" - neither document contains any such phrase.
Just a taste, my friend, just a taste.
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