This demonstrates why I am proud to serve on MRFF’s Board of Directors and work alongside Mikey Weinstein. He is not one to mince words or meanings! This isn’t JUST a freedom of speech issue. It is also a responsibility issue. We all have a responsibility as citizens of the United States to actually THINK about how our actions may effect others. In this case, as Mikey would tell you, this act directly will cause death and injury to our troops stationed abroad who will be targeted as retribution to this careless and juvenile act. All those who defend this burning had best go buy decal remover and get rid of those “we support our troops” ribbons that they so proudly display.

The reckless acts by this madman masquerading as a man of the cloth is being supported by the very people who have railed so loudly against the Muslim Community Center proposed in New York City recently. And yes…these are the same “Christian Patriots” who routinely threaten our lives at MRFF for the work we do to support religious freedoms in our armed forces. The very same that disseminate falsehoods about American Muslims secretly preparing to launch Shariah Law in the United States. The same ones that scream and war-cry in defense of freedom of religion in America – but ONLY if it is their branding of Christianity…not all the rest of those who are “not the right kind of Christian”. You know the ones…those pesky Catholics, the non-born again lost souls, those Mormons and their wacky under garments, the denominations that dare to critically think the Bible and so on.

Anderson Cooper of CNN tries to talk sense to the ignorant Pastor Terry Jones…

This is what I mean when I talk about zealots. They are so completely wrapped up in their delusions that there is no talking to them…hence my tag line on my emails…”It’s easier to write on water than to argue with a religious zealot”. Oh so TRUE!

Here is a new post just in from Sarah Jones who writes brilliantly over at www.politicusUSA…

The Sleazy German Past of Qur’an Hating Pastor Terry Jones

Posted on September 8, 2010 by Sarah Jones

Pastor Jones - Obsessed and Dangerous

The Fanatical and Illegal Past of Qur’an Hating Pastor Terry Jones, The Pastor of the church in Florida that is planning to burn the Quran has a sleazy past in Germany involving both allegations of financial wrong-doing and being convicted for using a false PhD. A German news paper, Zeit Online, is reporting that the Pastor at the center of the proposed Quran burning in Florida this September 11, was convicted in Germany for holding a false PhD.

Stephen Baar, deputy chairman of the Christian Congregation of Cologne, which was co-founded with Pastor Jones, also says Jones was “prone to violence and fanaticism” and “Baar remembers Jones as a pastor who had “not the biblical standards and values” worn on the outside, but rather “self as personality.” [read entire story here]…

The following is Bruce’s latest article posted at the Daily Kos:

“Pray For Newark” Is a Model For Christian Theocratic Rule

by Bruce Wilson

Sat Jul 31, 2010 at 05:22:52 AM PDT

Consider this following 10 minute video documentary, which presents what it calls the “transformation” of Newark. Initiated by New Jersey residents Lloyd and Joanna Turner in early 2008, the Pray For Newark effort involves a consortium of church volunteers who are working closely with Newark’s police and the mayoral administration of Corey Booker. The effort claims to be able to field an entire army of volunteers, one for each street in the city, organized by city ward – almost like a neighborhood watch. Neighborhood watches have been shown to be effective at reducing crime. So what’s not to like?

Well, as I documented in my story Movement Behind Uganda’s “Kill the Gays” Bill Organizing in Newark, Pray For Newark is closely tied to a an international evangelical ministry whose leaders are in the forefront of opposing gay rights in Hawaii and are closely allied with Ugandan leaders who are leading the push in Uganda for the so-called “kill the gays” bill that would in effect legislate an entire segment of Ugandan society out of existence. As a simple point of fact, the Uganda Anti Homosexuality Bill is harsher than any comparable anti-gay legislation passed, prior to World War Two, in Nazi Germany. The movement can’t currently aim so high in the United States but in Hawaii, where it is highly influential in the executive branch of government, gay rights activists are being treated as second-class citizens whose civil rights can be determined by majority vote.

Another slight problem with Pray For Newark is that it is being led by a Newark minister, the Rev. Bernard Wilks, whose literature for the effort lists the goal of “enemy identification,” (see my Newark story, above) and the Pray For Newark website cites the “Seven Mountains” program which encourages Christians to achieve dominance in all sectors of society. In the video, Pray For Newark founder Lloyd Turner notes that Newark was founded as an overtly Christian city, which is correct. Turner says he wants to return the city to those roots but omits to note that Newark was set up as a theocracy.

The Rev. Bernard Wilks is an apostle in the International Coalition of Apostles (ICA), one of the major organizational bodies of a new reorganization of charismatic Christianity known as the New Apostolic Reformation – whose leaders practice exorcism, burn “witchcraft items,” and have become the new de-facto prayer leaders of the Republican Party.

In this article ICA head C. Peter Wagner explains what’s distinctive about the New Apostolic Reformation. Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is extremely closely tied to Wagner’s movement. Talk To Action features a resource directory on the major known entities in the New Apostolic Reformation, here.

Pray For Newark has become so closely tied to Newark’s police department that early in 2010 Newark leader of the effort, the Rev. Bernard Wilks presided over the graduation of 54 new Newark police officers. The graduation was held in a church Wilks preaches at, with Newark’s mayor Corey Booker and other top Newark city officials in attendance.

So where is this headed ? It’s impossible to say, but given that the apostles of the New Apostolic Reformation say they’re working to implement Christian theocratic rule, the indications are not promising. In all likelihood, Newark, NJ is a developing template for the implementation of Christian theocratic government.

Thank you, Bruce!

Police War?

Holy War?

If this doesn’t scare you as much as it does me then we need paint this picture even more clearly. There is nothing innocent about the infiltration of law enforcement agencies. It is as serious as the Dominionism infiltration in the military that we battle over at the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. These are the issues that should be grabbing our attention…not what the latest shift is or isn’t in the poster family for dysfunction form Wasilla.

Remember what I have been saying about the 7 Mountains Mandate? If you have missed any of it, please search my blog for the articles that I have written here…and absolutely check out the video I have on my sidebar to the right of this post that is their own marketing video on the 7 Mountains Mandate.

Eyes open people!

by dogemperor

My story of how I walked away from Joel’s Army–and joined the survivor community–started, quite ironically enough, with (of all things) Christian heavy metal…because, interestingly enough, it was my first major experience in how coercive groups operate by telling their members a thousand little lies to create a culture of fear.

To make a long story short, when I was eleven both the Sunday school I attended (at an Assemblies of God megachurch which I would eventually discover some 24 years later was one of the fifteen most influential churches in the United States of what was then known as “Joel’s Army” and which has since rebranded as “Elijah’s Army” and the “New Apostolic Reformation”–and which was at the center of a poorly-documented pre-Brownsville “Toronto Outpouring”-style Third Wave event in the 70s and 80s) and televangelists we’d watch in the household before and after church started condemning Christian rock–and they made the mistake of condemning the band Stryper in their missives as “satanic”.

For those who remember the 80s, yes, this is the same Stryper that literally named itself after Isaiah 53:5 (“By his stripes we are healed”), the same one that wrote of Jesus as “The Rock That Makes Me Roll”, the same one that held altar calls at their concerts and tossed out Bibles to the crowd. The very Stryper that was the very EPITOME of Christian metal at the time (and the best-known by far, because they actually got airplay on secular metal stations and MTV’s Headbangers Ball among other things–probably the very reason they were condemned, in retrospect).

Yeah. THAT Stryper.

The claim was that they were Satanists, that all Christian metal was “Satanic” because it used a “rock beat” (in which case I was incorrigibly doomed; I hated and STILL cannot stand the majority of the pap that passes for “Christian contemporary”, and have a similar allergy to “new country” because a great deal of THAT is “Christian contemporary” with slide guitar). And being levied against bands that I knew DAMN WELL weren’t Satanic even according to their claims–they were doing the same stuff but in a far more listenable (IMHO) manner!

That, right there, was the first little crack in the wall for me–my first loss of innocence in finding that supposed men of God could be manipulative and even lie to their members.

And little did they know that–ironically–perhaps I’d either learned or developed a bit much of a sense of personal morality in that even I could tell that such things weren’t right.

. . .

The next crack–and the one that really started tumbling things down–was two years later, after I’d literally ended up on an adolescent psych ward as the direct result of trying to be a good little “God Warrior” as a kid (resulting in alienating myself from pretty much the entire public school body, eventually spending my time in the principal’s office the majority of the time, ultimately being referred to a psychiatrist, and ultimately (post-monthlong-vacation for depression at the age of 12) seeing more psychs and attending a special school for kids with emotional disturbances; I was FINALLY diagnosed nearly 20 years later correctly with complex PTSD resulting from religiously motivated child abuse).

At aforementioned school, I had a rather unusual teacher–among other things, she’d take Amnesty International literature to class, she’d listen to heavy metal (Iron Maiden, as I’d find out eventually, was a personal favourite of hers), she’d tell bits of stories about international goings-on that weren’t heavily covered even in international media (I first learned who Mangosuthu Buthelezi of the Inkatha Freedom Party in South Africa was from her–most people have never heard of him outside of SA), was a card-carrying member of Americans United, and generally did her best to make her kids think.

In other words, the very sort of teacher that would have the average “Christian Homeschooling” and Joel’s Army “Joshua Generation” circles requiring entire truckloads of adult diapers if they contemplated said teacher getting near their kids. (I consider myself very lucky in that regard that correspondence-schooling of the sort now common in NAR circles was not yet the “new hotness” in 1986. I know all too well how things could have ended differently.)

Anyways, shortly after I got her as a teacher, the PMRC (which, as it turned out, pretty much had Tipper Gore as the sole non-dominionist on the board; it promoted abusive “behavior modification” facilities run by Bob Larson Ministries that claimed to “de-metal” and “de-rap” kids, which claimed the Nike symbol and the peace sign were “satanic symbols”, and which are now themselves seen as abusive cult-like groups by experts) got a spot on a national news show essentially claiming the whole modern music industry–especially metal–was out to corrupt kids, and the old dominionist claim that Ozzy Osbourne’s “Suicide Solution” was in fact telling kids to off themselves was trotted out.

Teacher–and much of the student body–were LIVID about this. Teacher, bless her soul, decided to make this into a civics lesson and organised a letter-writing campaign to the creators of the news program (ABC’s “20/20″)…and brought along her own copy of “Blizzard of Ozz” to the school, with the lyrics on it.

I argued this with the teacher…and she noted that the lyrics said NOTHING about kids killing themselves, and she’d offer to show them to me.

I accepted (I really didn’t want to create a scene and possibly get demerits)…and what I read can be best described as Impromptu Clue-By-Four Therapy By Brummie.

I discovered that “Suicide Solution”, of note, not only did NOT state a darned thing about telling people to kill themselves, but (of all things), was actually giving a message that my teetotaler church would wholeheartedly endorse if they weren’t so busy condemning Ozzy Osbourne as a devil worshipper:

Wine is fine, but whiskey’s quicker
Suicide is slow with liqueur
Take a bottle, drown your sorrows
Then it floods away tomorrows

I was shocked to find that–of all things–the song was stating alcoholism was a “suicide solution” to life’s problems.

That–and the later discovery, offered by the same teacher, that the Equal Rights Amendment said not a thing about lesbians or merging the Scouts but only mandated equal treatment on the basis of sex–was the thing that first REALLY breached the wall for me, let me see that Outside was not such a horrid place–and that the wall had been maintained by a series of little lies.

It was this that originally inspired me to go into anti-censorship activism.

. . .

The third link that finally knocked it all down came in stages.

The first knock was finding a book by the Simon Wiesenthal League which talked about historical and modern anti-Semitism–including that which was promoted by televangelists my mom still listened to, and groups I knew had close links to the church I ultimately left. (Ironically, the church’s very theology made me quite amenable to arguments by groups like the ADL and Simon Wiesenthal League; the church was heavily Christian Zionist, even stating to never disagree with the Israelis even if they genocided the entire Palestinian population. This eventually led to an exception of “Except when they want to block out Joel’s Army missionaries who want to convert them to “Messianic Jews”; then they got accused of having Satan “Harden their hearts”. In all other ways, though, there was a weird near-idolatry of “God’s Chosen People”.)

I attempted to argue this with my mother at age 16, when a televangelist she watched pulled up stuff about the “Bildebergers” and “Trilateral Commission” secretly controlling the world economy (racialist groups often use these as codewords for “Jews”), and ended up with an impromptu neopentecostal “exorcism” and being harangued about how I was going to hell for two hours–especially when I noted my sense that not all televangelists were really men of God when the “Thou shalt not mock a man of God” line was trotted out.

This was my first experience with “cult mentality”, but would not be the last.

The thing that honestly brought it home to me that I HAD been raised in a coercive group came in the early 1990s, when I was involved in communities trying to reduce network abuse on Usenet (a largely-dead predecessor to web-based chat forums that ended up being wrecked largely by spammers in the same way email is being wrecked nowadays). There was quite a controversy about abuse occuring on alt.religion.scientology in particular; Scientologists were engaging in some fairly massive network abuse (including fake cancel messages, flooding the group with garbage posts, and even attempts to sue web hosts and services that allowed anonymous posting to Usenet to shut them down) and ex-Scientologist walkaways (who were using the group as a support forum before the Scientologists started attacking it) posting informational material like the super-secret scriptures they charged for, warning signs that a groupmwas coercive (showing how Scientology met the criteria), etc.

I decided to look to see what was going on (my anti-censorship curiosity was piqued)–and went through several of the “warning signs” checklists.

And was utterly and completely shocked to find that not only did the church I was still forced to attend match each and every criteria that Scientology hit, but even a few warning signs the Scientologists didn’t. (Keep in mind that at this time, outside of possibly Australia and the abuses going on at International Church of Christ and Maranatha, there was very little documentation of “Bible-based” coercive groups outside of a very few exit counseling groups–including, ironically, one that the Scientologists eventually sued into bankruptcy for the purpose of a hostile takeover.)

Revivals

Shortly after this, the same program that fell for the “Satanic Panic” hokum in 1986 put on a program about documented coercive activity at the “Brownsville Revival” in Pensacola, FL (a very well known “Third Wave” Joel’s Army revival that actually sparked the formation of several new NAR denominations and paradenominations). The church I escaped from was livid; I saw this as confirmation I was onto something.

Later on, more info came out from the now-defunct Institute for First Amendment Studies–including the first walkaway forum for ex-dominionists. On most other walkaway communities, though (and this would remain the case until the early 2000s, when much more info would start coming out about abusive practices within the Australian A/G in particular) there was still the bias of “Oh, it’s just an oddball”, or “Oh, it’s just one bad apple”.

This shut me up for a while…until 2004.

. . .

During this period of walking away, I’d been forced to confront some uncomfortable (at the time) facts about myself–this came to a head at a friend’s house, when a good friend (who I consider adopted family, to be honest) worried about how they were going to come out to their rather Catholic parents as bisexual.

I told them I envied them that they’d ever have that chance–that to do such a thing would be, literally, taking my life into my hands.

They asked why.

This led to a two-hour talk (complete with some breakdowns into tears) of what I’d experienced growing up–including kids being outed, “exorcised”, and then forced into “Christian mental hospitals” where they were held prisoner until they converted.

I was told by all assembled that I Needed To Write About This; an acquaintance of one of those attending (who now is a very good friend and Adopted Family) had started a new forum on Livejournal to talk about what was called then the “religious right”–one of what would turn out to be multiple successors to the old IFAS, including not only Dark Christianity but talk2action.org, the Association of Former Pentecostals, and–ultimately–this forum itself as well.

I haven’t stopped writing…only now, it’s not just because of myself.

It’s because of someone I know whom, in a sense, Bill Gothard–one of the major promoters of “Quiverfull” stuff within the circles I grew up in back at the church I walked away from–murdered by killing his soul.

. . .

I am lucky I grew up when I did; it’s much worse for kids growing up in that now.

You all might have heard of one of those kids about two years ago–Matthew Murray, who shot up a Youth With A Mission post and a portion of New Life Church in Colorado Springs (and killed several people) before he committed suicide by gunshot to his head.

What was never publicised well–outside of forums like Dark Christianity and Talk to Action, at least, until a chapter on the story appeared in Max Blumenthal’s recent book “Republican Gomorrah”–was that the Youth With A Mission post was in the Assemblies church he grew up in, which was a hardcore Joel’s Army church of the sort portrayed in the movie “Jesus Camp” (which I still cannot watch without the hooboo-jeebies–in part because I was “Jesus Camped” as a kid).

What was never publicised is that his mom was a hardcore believer in Bill Gothard’s system of coercing kids and families, as was his pastor–and when he showed the first signs of questioning, he was literally isolated from everything save the Internet and referred to “Christian counselors” rather than legitimate psychiatric professionals.

What was never publicised is that this isolation meant his only chances for “escape” were essentially from the frying pan into the fire–particularly Youth With A Mission, which is a Joel’s Army group that is almost universally considered a “Bible-based cult” by experts in abusive groups.

What was never publicised is that, for months before he went on his rampage, people on the Ex-Pentecostals forums begged him to seek help–and he refused, in part because he was convinced he’d just end up with another “Christian counselor” who would throw him right back into the pit of abuse. (He was so spooked at this, in fact, that he even refused the help of an exit counselor. I can relate–after a lot of failed psychotherapy in my teens, including a family therapy session with my folks after I’d told the psychiatrist I was afraid if I told him about the abuse I was suffering in front of my parents that I’d be abused worse, I pretty much refused to see therapists until early 2004 when I had a near-crippling PTSD flare that scared me enough to seek mental help. Fortunately, THIS time I knew what to say to the GP to get an appropriate referral.)

He tried–but ultimately he was never able to escape the Culture of Fear, which now has built a very high wall indeed for walkaways to surmount.

Much of why I write is because I know that–had I been born a few years later, right when “Christian homeschooling” was catching on and the trend was accelerating to isolate kids almost entirely from the non-dominionist community–I’d have likely been in a very similar situation, and I can’t say I wouldn’t have snapped either.

I also know Matthew Murray isn’t the only one that this movement has destroyed like this. Most of the time, the suicides and the destroyed lives don’t take others out with them.

But that’s why I write and why I fight. I don’t want to see anyone destroyed like that again. 

. . .

And it’s precisely this why this community [No Longer Qivering] in particular gives me hope–even with the entire parallel society that these groups have set up to isolate their members and keep them in a Culture of Fear, there ARE still people who escape. Sometimes alone, sometimes with their families, but they’re escaping and not going completely mad in the process.

And–just as important, probably a bit more important IMHO–they know they aren’t alone in this. Others have gotten out and survived and are going through culture-shock of their own as they learn to adjust–or re-learn–to Outside.

The more that people speak out, the more people know they aren’t alone–and the more likely it is they can realise something is Broken and can begin the process of finding the cracks in the wall.

I can say that–in my own case–the discovery I grew up in a coercive group and the later exposes of abusive treatment in the group I escaped from did make me realise I wasn’t alone and that this was a pattern; that this was something that was not normal and not right.

The more we tell our stories, the more the evidence gets out and truth is spoken to power.

It’s people like you–the survivors, the ones who vaulted the wall and are escaping the Culture of Fear that all coercive patriarchial groups set up–it’s you folks who are honestly my heroes.

You prove it’s possible.

Congratulations to you all–you’ve earned it. :3

-dogemperor

*****************************************************************************************************************************************

It is a brave step for Alex and others like her to tell their stories of how the extricated themselves from this very harmful incarnation of Christianity. I applaud all of you who have been given the gift of clarity and escaped the indoctrination that holds millions of Americans captive to the manipulations sweeping our country in the blasphemous name of God.

Island Chapel’s Purpose:

The purpose of this church is to fulfill the Great Commission (Matt. 28:19-20) and Great Commandment (Matt. 22:37-40) of Jesus Christ. It shall do so through the worship of God, the sharing of the gospel with all peoples, the instruction and edification of Christians, the expression of the Christian faith through varied means and the expression of biblical social concern for those in need.

Ah yes…”The Great Commission”. We have covered that in discussions about Palin’s zealous devotion and those like her that have been taught that it is their responsibility to go forth and shove their version of Christianity down the throats of humans worldwide. And they do – without regard, consideration or respect of ANY other faith. They are obsessed and possessed!

Why do I bring this up? This annoying little Chapel outpost on an island with less than a thousand residents is here to “harvest souls”. This is the graphic and unsettling term that they use in their code speak.

The Island Chapel is part of the the Village Missions sect. They intentionally seek out rural areas; preferably in close proximity to “First Nations” populations; and sidle up snuggly near elementary schools.

Island Chapel’s Statement of Faith:

In essentials unity, in non essentials charity, and in all things Jesus Christ.

The Church affirms the following as its essential beliefs:

The Immers

1. We believe the Bible is the Word of God, fully inspired and without error in the original manuscripts, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and that it has the supreme authority in all matters of faith and conduct.

2. We believe that there is one God, eternally existent in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

3. We believe in the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ, in His virgin birth, in his sinless life, in His miracles, in vicarious and atoning death through His shed blood, in His bodily resurrection, in His ascension to the right hand of the Father, and in His personal return in power and glory.

4. We believe for the salvation of lost and sinful people, “That if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead you will be saved.” (Romans 10:9)

5. We believe the Holy Spirit indwells Christians and enables them to live a godly life.

6. We believe in the resurrection of the saved into eternal life and the resurrection of the lost to eternal separation from God.

7. We believe in the spiritual unity of believers in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Affiliation

Village Missions

Go to this site and type in your own zip code to see just how infested your own areas are with these NARasitic Dominionists. It is a real eye opener!

They are parasites. That is why we have coined the phrase NARisites for them. NAR stands for New Apostolic Reformation. The NARasites are just one of a multitude of non-denominational sects organized under the Christian Dominionist umbrella. They may not all agree, and some vehemently lash out against each other as we heard from Shirley Phelps-Roper from the Westboro Baptist Church during our Blog Talk Radio program this past Thursday evening. (For those of you who did not hear it, Deborah always makes certain that they are available on podcast). Shirley made it abundantly clear that she thinks the Dominionists are “freaks”. Yes, she actually called them that.

What makes all of this so confusing for the rest of us is that, for example, Westboro Baptists are not the same as Southern Baptist Convention denomination who are not the same as the Mainline Baptists along the lines of Pastor Bess whose writings I post here on Sundays. Here we have three completely oppositional theologies all using “Baptist”. Is it any wonder that we can’t keep up with who believes what?

But, getting back to the Village Missionaries. These people move into communities, ingratiate themselves with the locals and insidiously cause a rift resulting in a fracture of local congregations. This allows them to siphon off a potential congregation so that they can establish their own “church”. It is deception of the wolf in sheep’s clothing at it’s finest. It is a practice that is becoming widely used known as “Steeplejacking”. This very same practice is used by the Dominionists in politics as well.

This is how the GOP was “Steeplejacked” in the early 1990s, and now the Religious Right non-secular Republican Party is no longer conservative enough by today’s Christian Dominionists’ standards, we see the same tactic of divide, fracture and recruit ocurring again. Out with that old guard liberal Religious Right! In with the neocon/Dominionist/plutocratic/Dixiebelt patriot/gun totin’/Bible thumpin’/low-information Amurikan!

Don’t tread on WHO?

I will keep you posted about this new gathering of predators on our little island…this just illustrates that they are in our own back yards and spreading…look around.

On that note…tonight Deborah is hosting Shirley Phelps-Roper of the Westboro Baptist Church. She has asked me to join her as a co-host in the latter part of the discussion.

WBC is known for their extreme intolerance and overt hate speech. Their unyielding call for the eradication of homosexuals. Their heartless and insensitive picketing at the funerals of fallen soldiers while the grave side ceremonies are actually taking place. It is an extremism that most cannot fathom. But without dialogue, without listening, we never learn. So we are looking forward to hearing what Mrs. Roper has to share with us tonight, even though we are prepared to be repulsed by their hate in the name of Christianity. Deborah announces tonight’s show…

If you cannot join us live, Deborah always posts the archived podcast, and this one will most definitely be posted as a YouTube as well. I know that for most it is hard to listen to this type of rhetoric. But remember, as extreme and obsessive as these folks are in demonstrating their ideology, there is a frightening parallel to the Christian Dominionists who present themselves as more palatable (dare I say) than the Westboro congregation, but who share more of their viewpoints than makes me rest comfortably.

Anti-homosexual is at the top of their shared heap. Anti-government. Anti-public education. Pursuit of a theocratic dominance.

You see where I am going. The similarities are shocking. WBC is simply more animated…