Religion
Bible cherry-picking at its most ludicrous . . . and lethal
By Mel Seesholtz, Ph.D.
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Aug 19, 2010, 00:11

Bryan Fischer is director of Issue Analysis for the American Family Association, a supposedly �Christian� organization infamous for its rabid homophobia.

Mr. Fischer gives voice to that homophobia in his AFA radio program and his Focal Point columns that have featured rants such as this:

Bryan Fischer-Focal Point
Homosexuality, Hitler and �Don�t Ask, Don�t Tell�
Date: 5/27/2010

The bottom line from what follows is this:

Homosexuality gave us Adolph Hitler, and homosexuals in the military gave us the Brown Shirts, the Nazi war machine and six million dead Jews. Gays in the military is an experiment that has been tried and found disastrously and tragically wanting. . . .

The next month he posted this nonsensical non sequitur . . .

Bryan Fischer-Focal Point
Gay sex = domestic terrorism
Date: 6/10/2010

Some of England�s leading newspapers - The Sun, the Telegraph, the Daily Mail - all had feature stories yesterday about the latest Taliban terror tactic: burying dirty needles with their bombs in an effort to infect troops with HIV. They are planting hypodermic syringes below the surface with the points facing upward in hopes that bomb squad experts will prick themselves and become contaminated with hepatitis and HIV. If the bomb goes off, then the needles become deadly flying shrapnel.

Said a member of Parliament, �Are there no depths to which these people will stoop? This is the definition of a dirty war.�

If we connect the dots here, the inescapable conclusion is that gay sex is a form of domestic terrorism. . . .

Mr. Fischer is particularly fond of quoting Old Testament passages to justify his homophobia and advocacy of killing animals and their owners (�Bible ignored, trainer dies�) -- and, in one of his more ludicrous pieces, to claim that �God� is sending bear attacks to kill Americans because we�re not following Old Testament edicts (�Bible ignored, grandfather mauled by grizzly�).

Mr. Fischer�s idol seems to be the hateful, vengeful �God� of the Old Testament. You know . . . the one who supposedly decreed that people who wear clothing made of two different threads should be killed, along with those who work on the Sabbath and, of course, all those nasty non-virgin brides; the Old Testament �God� who, in the first five books of the Bible, spends most of the time thinking up new and more maliciously cruel ways to torture and kill human beings, the �children He loves.�

AFA�s master of anti-gay Bible babble was at it again in his August 6, 2010 Focal Point column:

I have suggested on more than one occasion that a practicing homosexual should not serve in public office. . . .

Homosexual behavior is aberrant sexual behavior. It is clearly contrary to �the Laws of Nature and of Nature�s God� to which Thomas Jefferson so eloquently referred in the Declaration of Independence. Biblical passages such as Leviticus 18:22, Romans 1:26-27, 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, and 1 Timothy 1:8-11 make it abundantly clear what �Nature�s God� thinks of homosexual behavior. It is fundamentally immoral and pernicious, and puts homosexuals in the same category (according to 1 Timothy) as those who assault their parents, commit murder, are sexually promiscuous, engage in the slave trade, and lie under oath. 1 Corinthians adds adulterers, substance abusers, thieves and swindlers to the list to which homosexuals belong. . . .

Although Fischer does cite passages from the New Testament this time, what�s also obvious is that none of them are from the gospels. That�s not surprising since Jesus never said a thing about homosexuality, and Fischer�s cherry-picking of the Bible has been refuted by Rev. Patrick S. Cheng, Ph.D., theologian, seminary professor, and ordained minister.

Fischer�s irrational black-and-white, cherry-picked biblical view of things has, once again, as it always must, backfired. Fischer claims those Bible bumper stickers he quotes are the absolute words of �God,� and by using them, Mr. Fischer purports to be speaking for �God.�

Pat Robertson also claims to speak for �God� and know �God�s� will. Indeed, Robertson claims �God� speaks to him on a regular basis. Perhaps that�s what inspired his call to assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

Mental hospitals are home to more than a few people who claim to know �God�s� will and to speak for �Him.� Remember those two former pillars of �Christian morality,� Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker, �thieves and swindlers� and adulterers? More recently Swaggart said he�d be okay with killing a gay person. That must have warmed Fischer�s heart.

According to bible-thumper Fischer, gay men and women are in the same category as �those who . . . engage in the slave trade . . . [and] adulterers.� None of whom, according to Fischer, �should . . . serve in public office.�

Well, that eliminates most of the Founding Fathers. They participated in the slave trade by owning slaves. There goes George Washington, who had many slaves and may have fathered children with them, and Thomas Jefferson, another slave trade participant who fathered a child (Eston Hemings) with Sally Hemings, a slave at Monticello.

It also eliminates one of the hypocritical Christian Right�s favorite hypocritical politicians, Newt Gingrich:

Newt Gingrich - who left 1st wife stricken with cancer, cheated on 2nd wife, and now is on 3rd wife - does video in support of �traditional marriage�
Saturday, September 06, 2008

Newt dumped cancer-stricken 1st wife. When his pastor criticized him for not supporting his two kids, he left the church. Newt dumped 2nd wife after cheating on her with the Congressional aide who is now his 3rd wife. . . .

More about this political �Christian� crusader�s hypocrisy on behalf of �traditional marriage� is available here and here.

Predictably, when federal Judge Vaughn Walker rendered his decision -- that California�s Proposition 8 was unconstitutional -- leaders of the hate-for-profit Christian Right regurgitated their usual vile bile. Like spoiled brats throwing a temper tantrum, Tony Perkins and Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council and, of course, Fischer�s American Family Association stomped their collective feet and demanded the impeachment of Judge Walker. Their arguments were the same: because Judge Walker was �openly homosexual� and a �practicing homosexual� he could not render a fair, legally valid decision.

First of all, Judge Walker has never spoken of his sexuality, nor should he have to. So how the cretins of the Christian Right can assert so definitively that Judge Walker is �openly homosexual� and a �practicing homosexual� is quite a mystery, but it does underwrite one of the fallacious assumptions they constantly propagate: that a gay person is incapable of being professional. People like Bryan Fischer, Tony Perkins and Peter Sprigg don�t see gay men and women as real, whole people. They see them only as sex acts. That�s important to their strategy of encouraging fear and hatred of gays, but it�s failing. As more and more gay Americans �come out,� more and more Americans are realizing that straight or gay, we�re all the same. Same hopes, same dreams, and the same ability to be professional.

Just think about it. Using the Christian Right�s �logic,� a heterosexual judge hearing a marriage equality case would also be biased. A Christian judge hearing a marriage equality case would be biased. An atheist judge hearing a marriage equality case would be biased. A female judge hearing a case involving a woman would be biased. An African American judge hearing a case involving an African American would be biased. And a Muslim, Buddhist, or Hindu judge hearing a case involving a Christian would be biased. And on and on until no judge would be �qualified,� except for one who made decisions based on the perverted, bigoted, hate-filled view of Christianity propagated by the leaders of the Christian Right.

Indeed, bigot extraordinaire Fischer thinks America should ban any more building of mosques:

Permits should not be granted to build even one more mosque in the United States of America . . . This is for one simple reason: each Islamic mosque is dedicated to the overthrow of the American government. . . .

Can you think of any clearer statement of raw religious bigotry -- an outright call to discriminate against those of another faith -- than Mr. Fischer�s statements?

Fischer called the sexual relations of gay couples �pernicious.� He has company in using such a term:

Cardinal Norberto Rivera sharply criticized Mexico�s Supreme Court for upholding a law allowing homosexuals to marry in the capital, calling the ruling �aberrant� and �immoral.�

The Roman Catholic archbishop said it was wrong to go against Christian doctrine that recognizes only marriages between a man and a woman.

�The church cannot fail to call evil evil,� Rivera said in a statement.

�Evil�? Cardinal Rivera is part of the hierarchy of a corrupt, dysfunctional institution that -- for decades -- covered up child abuse and pedophilia by its predator priests; a �church� that to this day deems women second-class, unworthy to be priests; a �church� whose former leader -- Pope John Paul II -- preached against birth control in overpopulated, poverty-stricken Africa; a �church� whose current leader -- Pope Benedict XVI -- preached against condom use in AIDS ravaged Africa and has been directly implicated in the cover-up of child abuse and pedophilia by predator priests. And let�s not forget the Catholic Church�s long, blood-soaked history of evil, from the murderous �Holy Inquisition� through the wholesale murder of New World peoples to the Vatican�s silent complicity in the Holocaust.