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    Entries in Faith (11)

    Monday
    14Dec2009

    Break Out Your Hoseas and your Hallelujahs

    Someone finally does something nice for the President, and Mel Gibson, and Tiger Woods:

    The greatest golfer in the world has fallen from the grace of humans, but not from the grace of God who still loves him dearly. About 100 members of the Miracle Temple Seventh-day Adventist Church, located at 100 South Rock Glen Road, Baltimore, Maryland and the Pray at the Pump Movement (PAPM) will drive this point home on this Wednesday evening, December 16 from 7:30 to 9:00 PM as they hold an Emergency Chirstmas Prayer Vigil for this true sports icon. These members want him to know that even though the entire world seems against him, that they care about him as he desperately tries to hold his family together in accordance with God’s word. Those gathered say that we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God and urge the critical public to show compassion for Tiger as well as other celebrities who fall from grace. Dr. Errol Stoddart, who is pastor of the progressive congregation and an avid golf fan, will preach about the need for the public to wrap their arms around Tiger during this moment of disgrace. He points to a number of individuals in the Bible such as Abraham, David and Solomon who became victims of worldly lust, but whom God forgave. If God can forgive us, we should be able to forgive others. Stoddart hopes to use his years of marriage counseling to deal with this horrific situation.

    The Pray at the Pump Movement will circulate a Book of Hope and Deliverance for those present to sign. The good wishes will be sent directly to the Tiger Woods Foundation and hopefully Tiger will read them. The group is working on an online petition of support for the golf star. PAPM has constantly emphasized that the public should show compassion for stars who are nothing more than human beings that the public has placed on lofty pedestals. They organized vigils of hope when Michael Jackson, the King Of Pop died. Twyman stated that people almost totally forgot that he gave more money to charity than any other star including Oprah. Tiger’s Foundation has been a pivotal force in helping and inspiring children in low income neighborhoods. Twyman suggest that Woods use the time off with his family to contemplate how he can better use the wealth that God has blessed him with to help Americans who are losing their homes and jobs at an alarming rate. PAPM calls upon the country to pray for these celebrities who have lost their way such as Michael Vick; Governors Sanford and Spitzer; DC’s Marion Barry; Hollywood star Mel Gibson: Senator Craig and a host of other political and entertainment celebrities. PAPM thinks that the higher a person goes, the more they must depend upon God for their stability. With his economic policies failing and unemployment at staggering high levels, Twyman is calling on Obama to turn more to God and prayer and less to the wisdom of his human council of economic advisers. The group is lobbying to urge Obama to hold an ecumenical prayer vigil/Summit for this battered economy at The White House similar to the recent jobs summit. “Obama is just a man, like Tiger Woods, that God has richly blessed, says Twyman. At some point, both must come to the realization that God and not man is Supreme. It was God that arranged events so that Obama could win the Nobel Peace Prize after being in office for only 11 days. We saw the power of prayer as the gas prices started coming down when we organized pray circles at gas pumps all over the country. Both Tiger and Obama who is also vulnerable to womanizing will only be able to succeed as they focus on prayer and fasting just like the prophets of old did when things got rough. Our prayers are with Tiger during this hour of trial.”

    Somewhere in there is a complete and total misunderstanding of what religion is supposed to be about, but who cares? It’s a great blog post! It writes itself! I don’t even have to be here.

    Twyman made news over a year ago with his “Prayer at the Pump” movement:

    On the first day of the movement, April 23, the national average price of a gallon of unleaded was $3.53, according to AAA. As of yesterday, it was $3.96.

    But Twyman said true faith does not demand instant gratification, and he plans to keep his pump-side prayers going “until God tells us to stop.”

    “This whole thing is a wake-up call from God to Americans, because we idolize men so much,” said Twyman, 59, a public relations consultant and Seventh-day Adventist who believes that high gas prices are a sign of the apocalypse drawing nigh. “I think through this crisis, God is trying to call us back to depend on Him more.”

    For the past several weeks, Twyman has assembled a group at a soup kitchen in the Petworth neighborhood of Northwest Washington where he volunteers. They have driven to a gas station, locked hands, said a prayer, purchased gas and sung the civil rights anthem “We Shall Overcome,” with an added verse: “We’ll have lower gas prices.”

    Reactions, and results, have been mixed.

    After he gave an interview to a Tampa radio station, the station received calls from listeners saying the price at their pumps had dropped. (According to AAA’s Fuel Price Finder, regular gas at Tampa area stations averaged $3.89 a gallon yesterday, up from $3.59 a month ago).

    Hey, whatever trips your trigger.

    Friday
    11Dec2009

    Radicalization Knows No Religion

    In light of the previous post, reflecting how the Reverend Franklin Graham sees Islam as it is practiced in the Middle East, it’s important to note that Islam, as it is practiced in this country, does conform to U.S. law and does, in most cases, assimilate into American culture. The freedom to practice religion is an integral part of American life. I do note where certain tenets of Islam come into conflict with American law—no, you cannot beat your wife or daughter in this country—but I have to point out that we have also had legal and moral struggles with certain tenets of Mormonism and Scientology and a host of other religions. This is where you have to cowboy up, and balance everything as best you can. You may not like Islam, but it is anti-American to tell someone they can’t practice their religion. You may wonder what your neighbors are up to, but you can’t invade their privacy. You may disagree with what your government is doing, but you can’t organize an effort to overthrow it.

    The vast majority of people who practice Islam are law-abiding Americans. We should welcome anyone who wants to come to this country and live in freedom and contribute to our society. Xenophobia has no place at the American table. But we’re faced with the difficult question of what to do when practitioners of Islam become radicalized. In the news, recently, is the story of five young men who went to Pakistan to try to join al Qaeda. What was it about this country that caused them to do that? The answer is, nothing. There’s nothing about this country that would cause them to do that. There’s something appealing about radicalized Wahhabism, and jihad, and all of that other nonsense that caused them to try to join an international terrorist movement. What do you do when this happens?

    Simple. You treat them like everyone else who radicalizes themselves in the name of religion or faith. Throw the politically correct to the wind. If we apply a little common sense and tolerance to the issue, we can fight radicalized practitioners of Islam like we fight radical Mormons or radical whoevers. We can apply the rule of law and try to be fair when we deal with people who want to cross the line and break our laws. Anyone who cannot embrace what America has to offer, and who chooses to try to bring down this country, forget it. I don’t think we can stand for that. I think we need to defend ourselves. And, I think, we need to have a frank and honest discussion about what to do in cases like this:

    According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the five men do not fit the typical profile of other Americans arrested on terrorist-related charges. These men came from middle-class homes and were educated and assimilated – unlike suspects such as David Coleman Headley, who was arraigned in Chicago this week for conspiracy in the 2008 Mumbai attacks and in a plot to attack a Danish newspaper. The five are also unlike a number of Somali men who left Minnesota over the past two years and are believed to have joined a terror group in Somalia.

    One man in the latest case, Ramy Zamzam, attended the dental program at Howard University in Washington.

    “This might be most clear wake-up call for the American Muslim community,” says Ihsan Bagby, professor of Islamic studies at the University of Kentucky in Lexington. “These were the kids who should have been clear about what Islam says, but somehow they got a radical message. I’m not sure they got it from their parents or the mosque they attended – so where did they get it from? That’s the question the American Muslim community wants an answer to.”

    He adds, “This may be a real slap in the face…. They thought they were immune to this type of thing.”

    The five men, ages 19 to 25, traveled to Pakistan in November from their homes in the northern Virginia and Washington, D.C., area, according to federal investigators. Their travels did not initially create commotion, but their parents discovered a video featuring the men expressing extremist sympathies, and they alerted the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR. According to CAIR, its officials then alerted the FBI, which worked with Pakistani authorities.

    The case is already being treated differently from the cases in Chicago and Minnesota – not just because of the men’s more affluent background, but also because of the proactive measures taken by the Muslim community that led to their capture.

    Ever since the 9/11 attacks, Muslims have often felt a need to defend their religion against perceptions that it was somehow fostering terrorist behavior or that certain mosques or organizations were linked to international terrorist organizations. “Muslims had no other choice: They had to go out and talk about their own faith; they had to condemn violence,” says Malika Zeghal, who specializes in religion and Islamic studies at the University of Chicago.

    Making matters more complicated, relationships between law enforcement and Muslim organizations have worsened in recent years. Relations between the FBI and CAIR, one of the largest Muslim US civil rights organizations, have been particularly strained for about a year.

    The discussion we have to have is how to stop radicalized practitioners of Islam from attacking this country. We cannot stop every attack, nor can we stop someone who is willing to give their live for their cause, however misguided. We have to try, but we can’t have absolute security. 

    Muslims don’t need to defend their religion. As it is practiced in this country, they’re fine. What they need to do is nothing. They’re not to blame for the radicals in their midst. That’s like blaming the Baptist church because someone shot an abortion doctor.

    If you can apply equal parts tolerance, common sense, and the rule of law to cases like this, I don’t see how you can go wrong. I really don’t. There’s an opportunity for all areas of the political spectrum to realize their prejudices, and that has no place in the debate over how to defend this country. If you’re right with the law, you’re on the path to getting right with America. If the central organizing principle of your life is to hate people who are different, you’re well on your way to abandoning everything that America has to offer, and I don’t care who you are or how white your skin is.

    Friday
    11Dec2009

    Franklin Graham's Grasp of Religion

    You simply cannot speak the truth on the American airwaves these days.

    Is Graham wrong? He’s wrong in that what he’s saying is politically incorrect, but he’s right when he talks about Sharia law as it is practiced in the Middle East. I give him some credibility to competently speak about what he has seen, simply because he actually goes to these countries. He’s actually seen it with his own eyes. Has the media? Does the media tell the truth about Islam? Or is Franklin Graham demonstrating, through personal experience, that he has a better grasp on it than they do? Does he have a better sense as to how Islam is interpreted and practiced in the Middle East? In the clip, you can see the catnip that Campbell Brown is trying to chase. She senses the gotcha moment, but Graham is above the gotcha moment. He knows what he has seen. He knows that women are beaten to death, and that Islam, in some forms, cannot be practiced in this country.

    Graham’s interpretation doesn’t necessarily define what the religion is, but it does highlight how we fail to speak clearly as to how this religion is used to enforce a Medieval mindset about women, and women’s rights, all throughout the parts of the world where Islam is practiced.

    Wednesday
    02Dec2009

    Spare Me the Maudlin Drama

    Never go for a boat ride with a shifty, disloyal hack

    I hate to make fun of a Republican who is down, but this is just too rich to pass up:

    As I mentioned this morning, I resigned my position as Arkansas coordinator for HuckPAC today where I served in a volunteer capacity. My departure was with a heavy heart but was done after serious prayer and consideration. Some have asked about the timing. As most could imagine, the recent news of the last two days along with the response did play a role in this decision but was not the sole factor.

    I may say more in the coming days but for now I will leave it at this. I still firmly believe in the ideals and principles championed by Gov. Mike Huckabee.

    The resignation of Mr. Tolbert means what, exactly? That he cannot be counted upon to stand with someone who had taken a hit?

    The God that I pray to often tells me to stick with friends who are being buffeted by the storm, sir. The God that I pray to often tells me to stick with my principles and never turn a friend away. They call them principles for a reason. They help us stick with what’s right. Where’d yours go? Do you think Mike Huckabee needs some people to stand with him right now? Don’t you think Mike Huckabee is worth a plug nickel? Given all that has been said and done, don’t you think old Huck is feeling pretty low right now?

    Do you think that the idea of Christian compassion is now dead? You seem to be answering that question with your feet. Where we you when it was a well known fact that:

    …Huckabee “granted 1,033 pardons and commutations, including 12 convicted murderers. Huckabee granted more clemencies than the previous three governors combined. Even reduced penalties for manufacturing methamphetamine.”

    Were you pinching your cheeks, hoping that someone wouldn’t do what that animal in Washington State did? Where are the other eleven killers Huckabee pardoned? Hopefully, they’ve accepted their fate and have turned their lives around. If not, it really doesn’t do you any good to abandon Huckabee now. His lack of judgement was already well established. It took you this long to sort that out? Or was it the timing of the tragedy and your own lack of intestinal fortitude?

    I guess you have to run screaming away from Mike Huckabee with your hands on both butt cheeks, terrified of the fallout of being associated with a man who pardoned a man who went out and killed four police officers. Did Mike Huckabee kill anyone? No. He used his Christian compassion to let a man go free and to give him a second chance. That turned out to be a nightmarishly bad decision. If everyone who ever received a pardon acted the way that disgusting man in Washington State acted, there would be no pardons. And yet, the act of pardon has helped untold citizens feel like a part of this democracy again, and it has helped inspire them to lead exemplary lives. Granted, many are pardoned because their father made a timely campaign contribution. This doesn’t seem to be the case here.

    I’m glad you prayed about it. It makes taking the opportunity to go personal and mock your curious grasp on religion that much easier for me. I was sweating bullets there for a minute. You’re running from trouble, thinking that will save you. The God that I pray to keeps tabs on this sort of thing, I believe.

    Who is Jason Tolbert?

    Jason Tolbert – Editor, Publisher, Blogger – Tolbert has been involved with social conservative issues for the past decade.  He also is heavily involved with the Republican Party serving as an alternate delegate to the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul.  He began working with the new media first through the grassroots website called Huck’s Armyand now through the Tolbert Report.  He is a Certified Public Accountant practicing in Central Arkansas.

    A CPA who won’t stand by someone who takes a fall? Well, that will drive up your business and make your professional reputation really valuable, won’t it? Good move, sport. Hey, who’s that running away behind that slamming door? Oh, that’s Jason Tolbert. When a man who he supported, organized for, raised money for, and expressed devotion and love for had a hiccup in his political career, Jason Tolbert tore off his clothes and went streaking out of the room as fast as humanly possible in order to preserve his political viability. He’s a natural born leader and a loyal friend. Just don’t go through a bad patch, and he’ll stick with you, good Christian that he is.

    Pardon me for being opinionated, but, as a Northeastern Rockefeller Republican, I’m a little tired of convenient Christianity being mixed in with my party. You and your God Boy ilk have brought so much shame to the Republican Party that I sometimes can’t even stand the idea that you call yourselves Republicans. Barry Goldwater would have laughed in your face if you had told him you were a Republican. We don’t break bread with fools, and we certainly don’t run from a fight. We stick with people. If everyone who had hung with Dick Nixon had abandoned him—wait. If everyone who had hung with Jerry Ford—hold on. If everyone who had stayed a part of the Ronald Reagan phenomenon had walked away from him in 1976, our greatest President would have been Walter Mondale.

    Pick something to believe in and stick with it. You born agains don’t mix with us Episcopalians, I gather. Sorry—I got it right the first time and stuck with my religion. I don’t claim to be a holy roller or a saint, but many of you certainly do. Just don’t rub my face in it when you can’t reconcile God and Mammon, okay? Sticking with Huckabee meant the possibility the Mammon in your coin sack would take a hit, right? Did I get that right? Is my theology squared away, there?

    You know, a bunch of people had this same thing happen to them when John Edwards went tits up. Liberals, you don’t get a pass here. You’re opportunistic hacks as well.

    From the comments, though, there is this chestnut. This is a priceless example of delusional thinking:

    I would recommend thinking about this a little more strategically. From a rational perspective, there really isn’t much to blame Huckabee for. He granted clemency within the bounds of the law and within the bounds of a system designed to help correct perceived errors in the justice system (or at least account for changed conditions). Not knowing what was in Clemmons’ clemency file, one can presume — for the sake of argument — that there was nothing indicating any sort of propensity to commit such a heinous crime. So, yes, you can’t really rationally blame Huckabee, at least not on the facts we have.

    But … Dukakis was effectively trashed up one side and down the other for the Willie Horton fiasco, which had strikingly similar facts. He was billed as “soft on crime,” and we all know how his candidacy fared. Because the GOP used this tactic on Dukakis, it’s fair game for Huckabee. That means a Huckabee candidacy would be plagued with allegations of being soft on crime, replete with pictures of the deceased officers, the children left behind, and so on.

    And I can’t understand why you would possibly think the brazen slaughter of four on-duty police officers is only worth a “30-second soundbite.” I think this is a hard news story about a horrific crime, and I bet uniformed police officers across the country think it’s worth a lot more than a “30-second soundbite.”

    Good God, do you think with that brain, sir? In public?

    “Isn’t much to blame Huckabee for?”Other than the fact that the killer was behind bars, and Huckabee let him go, sure. There isn’t much to blame old Huck for, that’s, wow. That’s a really, really asinine thing to say. 

    And, in case you forgot, the ads run against Huckabee would trash his judgement, and they would be damning and effective in that regard. Oh, wait a minute—they already ran those ads and made those points. Pardon me. Few elected officials ever make this kind of mistake and survive. This is what you call a career-killer. Professionals know it, and professionals act accordingly. Amateurs make blog comments.

    Godspeed, Jason Tolbert. Your word means nothing and your loyalty is conditional, temporary, and fleeting, and subject to the blowing of the wind. Whoever you support is going to keep one eye on your twitchy hands and watch for any sign of faltering from now on, sir. You might as well go be a liberal. They’ll give you that touchy-feely stuff you need.

    Wednesday
    18Nov2009

    A Funny Thing Happens When You Work For the Moonies

     

    I guess some people have to be clued into the obvious:

    The former opinion editor of The Washington Times has filed a religious discrimination complaint against the paper.

    Richard Miniter says the company president “coerced” him into attending a Unification Church event in 2008 that included a mass wedding. He says the company launched a background investigation into him earlier this year after he made a joke about the church to a co-worker.

    The Times was founded by the leader of the Unification Church, the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, in 1982.

    The 42-year-old Miniter says in July he was told to work from home. He says he stopped getting paychecks in September and was fired in October.

    Is Richard Miniter the only person in America who doesn’t understand that the Moonies are a cult? Is he such a babe in the woods that he figured he could go to work for them and not be pressured into becoming one of them?

    Can he can be believed when he says that he didn’t know that the Moonies expected him to join their church? Or is he a fool trying to use the legal system to hand him a payout?

    Wednesday
    11Nov2009

    Know Your Orthodox Priests Before You Experience Roid Rage

    Greek Orthodox Priest

    As much as I want to try to help people understand that, yes, there is a Greek Orthodox Church, and, yes, it is a Christian religion that has been around since forever, there’s a part of me that realizes that many people are simply too stupid to understand anything at all about the world in which we live:

    Marine reservist Jasen Bruce was getting clothes out of the trunk of his car Monday evening when a bearded man in a robe approached him.

    That man, a Greek Orthodox priest named Father Alexios Marakis, speaks little English and was lost, police said. He wanted directions.

    What the priest got instead, police say, was a tire iron to the head. Then he was chased for three blocks and pinned to the ground — as the Marine kept a 911 operator on the phone, saying he had captured a terrorist.

    Police say Bruce offered several reasons to explain his actions:

    The man tried to rob him.

    The man grabbed Bruce’s crotch and made an overt sexual advance in perfect English.

    The man yelled “Allahu Akbar,” Arabic for “God is great,” the same words some witnesses said the Fort Hood shooting suspect uttered last week.

    “That’s what they tell you right before they blow you up,” police say Bruce told them.

    Greek Orthodox Priests generally don’t shout “Allahu Akbar” because of the fact that they don’t speak Arabic, they don’t believe in Allah, and because they believe wholeheartedly in Jesus Christ. There there’s the fact that this happened on Monday, not long after the Fort Hood shooting rampage, which is probably where the young man got the idea, in a panic, no doubt, to try to glom onto what happened there and earn a little sympathy. I believe that we can perhaps think about forgiving the young man for lying through a human growth hormone and steroid-laced chemical fog that has warped his brain, probably similar to the one that drove Roger Clemens throughout much of his later years in baseball. Clearly, his ‘roid rage (he’s into that stuff and has blogged about it) and his inability to deal with the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder that he most emphatically does not have because he has never deployed as a Marine indicate that he’s just a violent, reactionary young man with no judgement or impulse control.

    Know your Greek Orthodox priests, my friends. Oh, and Sikhs aren’t Muslims, sir. I know you’re looking at what’s on their head, and I know you’re flushed with anger and you’re confused, but they’re not Muslims, so calm down.