David Barton Doesn't Know His Bible

Recently, on his WallBuilders Radio Show, David Barton made some remarks about how Christians should think while casting their vote.  Barton framed his position the way that all politicians do - as a dichotomous argument, where there is only one right and everything else is wrong.

As usual, this framing doesn't work.  Barton was decrying the fact that there was a Religious Right and a Religious Left.  He said that there shouldn't be a Religious Right OR Left but only a religious biblicist contingency.  He goes on to state that, if the Bible doesn't speak of it, Christians shouldn't worry themselves about it (climate change, health care, etc.). What he says next reveals his complete lack of knowledge (or, more than likely, his blind acceptance of right wing principles, simply because it increases ratings) of his Bible.

Where does the Bible line up on education? Alright, that's where I am.  Where does the Bible line up on taxation?  Okay, that's where I am.  Where does the Bible line up on social programs? Alright, that's where I am.

If you're at all familiar with theology, you immediately see the problem here.  The reason why there are over 30,000 different denominations of Christianity is because the interpretations of life issues contained in the Bible can be concluded in many different ways.  Couple that with stories that are considered to be prescriptive, rather than descriptive and parables that have many meanings, and you find yourself completely confused as to where you should take a stand.

This is why many religious people boil their faith down to simple truthisms like The Golden Rule or "Love God, Love People".  It's so much easier than trying to navigate all the pretzelified logic.

But let's take a look at Barton's comments a bit more closely.

Where does the Bible line up on education? Alright, that's where I am.

David, David, David.  You are there, but so many other Christians are not.  The Bible says nothing about education.  In the Psalms, it does talk about teaching children the statutes of the god of the Bible, something that many wouldn't really want to do, being that that god wasn't all that nice.  In Proverbs, it says to beat your children with a rod and they'll turn out fine.  On the other hand, Jesus says to not hurt the children.  You see, David?  It isn't really all that cut and dry.

But the Bible doesn't talk about how to teach your kids math and reading.  It doesn't say to teach them at home rather than regular school.  It doesn't say to only allow education funding to be at the local or state level, rather than the federal level.  It doesn't say whether or not to teach a child to a test, rather than teaching them for knowledge.  It doesn't say whether or not to allow a district to increase a tax levy or not. It doesn't speak of whether or not to have strict statutes against bullying.  There is much about education that the Bible does not speak of and thus leads to many differing positions within the Christian community.

Where does the Bible line up on taxation?  Okay, that's where I am.

Really, David?  Are you?  Maybe you think you are.  But, in reality, your position only encompasses one interpretation of taxation in the Bible.

Jesus says to "give unto Caesar what is Caesar's" after his disciples find money in fish.  That can be interpreted in several ways.  First, we are to pay all taxes without question.  That positions wouldn't line up with yours, Mr. Barton.  Or, maybe it means that we are to go fishing and find money in order to pay our taxes.  Jesus also told the rich ruler to sell everything and follow him.  David, have you sold everything and followed Him?  There is also the parable of the ten talents where the one man saves his money and is ridiculed.  Then, another man invests it and makes more money and is warmly treated.  Some people make taxation arguments from that story.

But the Bible doesn't speak about cutting or increasing taxes.  It doesn't speak about whether to give more in order to reduce your tax bill.  It doesn't speak about whether we should remove the home interest deduction from our tax loopholes.  It doesn't speak about the marriage penalty or whether one should claim 18 exemptions or 3.  It doesn't speak of whether it is alright to harbor your money overseas or whether we should file taxes in another state if we only made a few dollars there.  There is much about taxation it does not speak to.

Which leads into Barton's final point:

Where does the Bible line up on social programs? Alright, that's where I am.

The early church owned everything commonly.  In fact, if we wanted to see how important it was to Peter that the early church owned everything commonly, all one has to do is look at how he treated Ananias and Sapphira.  He cursed them and they died when they held back a bit of the money they made from the sale of their personal property, rather than giving it all to the Christian commune.  Yeah.  It was that important, David.  You can also use the story of the ten talents to further the Republican position of keeping all your money and not giving it away but it really doesn't speak to that.  After all, the guy who just kept the money was excoriated.

So, Mr. Barton.  To your point about not voting on issues that aren't in the Bible, my recommendation is to just sit out every single election from President to local dog catcher (the Bible god says nothing about animal control although he says a lot about butchering them and burning them on altars, wasting the meat).  But, more importantly, David Barton, it is time to stop pretending that there is exactly one position for everything in the Bible.  There isn't.  Many issues are not even addressed, let alone addressed in twenty different ways.

Tea Party Nation Blames Teachers for Sandy Hook Tragedy

This post continues my views on the "article", written by Timothy Birdnow of The Tea Party Nation.

Birdnow makes a tragic mistake here - willingly.

There is the key to our whole cultural disintegration; we refuse to recognize Evil as a transcendent thing. Good and Evil presuppose a God and a Devil...You see it in the schools where children may no longer be corrected. There was a time when teachers actually spanked children; now a teacher is in peril if he verbally chastises a bad kid.

Good and evil does not presuppose a god and a devil.  My children are the children of practicing atheists and completely understood the evil in what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary.  My children do not get spanked and know exactly what is right and wrong in many situations.  

My little five year old daughter wept for half the night last night for the children of Sandy Hook.  She worried about the shooter coming to her school.  Kristine, my wife, slept with her ALL NIGHT, consoling her at intervals.  She has a brilliant mind and deeply understands what is good and what is not.  

Why?  Because I taught her from the Bible?  Not remotely.  The Bible is full of murder and genocide, SANCTIONED BY THE VERY GOD THESE PEOPLE PRETEND TO KNOW.  God didn't order men and women to go and shoot little pieces of metal into children.  No, he ordered them slashed and spliced by sharp metal objects.  He ordered pregnant women to have their bellies split open to prevent people who didn't give his band of nomads their land from successfully reproducing.  He gloried in children being smashed against rocks.  He ordered the death of adulterers, gay people.  The stoning of rebellious children.  He created the idea of an eternal death, being burned forever, for simply not acknowledging his existence.  All this is only scratching the surface of the very book that Birdnow, et al, say they get their absolute morals from.

My children know that the Bible god was an evil being.  How?  Because they know that killing people is very wrong.  Especially if it is just because they disagree with you.  Or...for revenge - like the Bible god.

Teachers understand bullying.  Teachers understand right from wrong.  Teachers understand the value of teaching children to think, rather than telling them to just accept.  To just accept is to roboticly do whatever you have been told, setting up the sorts of scenes like the Salem Witch Trials, the murderous acts of John Calvin, the Inquisition of the Catholic Church, the massacre of millions of Jews during Hitler's reign, the obliteration of millions of Russians during the years of Stalin and beyond, the Civil War in America, the hundreds of foreign actions we do across the globe, the killing of innocents with drones from the air-conditioned, plush seats of a lab in Nevada.

All of these deaths were done by people who followed orders.  Had human beings been taught to question authority and think for themselves and act on that thinking, might some of these epic tragedies been thwarted?  I suspect so.  Only the future can tell.

Tea Party Nation's Despicable Sandy Hook Article

I am livid over this article. 

First, the author, Timothy Birdnow, nonchalantly makes a joke about the elementary school being named "Sandy Hook":

...the ironically named Sandy Hook - it’s been a bad year for anything named Sandy...

Then, he starts in on a diatribe against Barack Obama and Eric Holder by connecting the deaths of Mexican citizens (not that Tea Party Nation gives one small crap about the citizens of Mexico) and the precious students and teachers of Sandy Hook Elementary.

It appears no tragedy, no matter how horrendous, is to be allowed to “go to waste” as Rahm Emmanuel would say. And, given the hundreds of dead Mexican citizens as a direct result of one such anti-gun scheme (known as Fast and Furious) one wonders if Misters Obama and Holder are really that broken up by the carnage

Did you catch that?  Barack Obama cried on the public stage and uttered some beautiful words that millions upon millions of Americans were thinking, looking at the tragedy through the eyes of our own children.  Birdnow forgets that, as much as he disagrees with the president, Obama is still a man, a husband, and a father - just like me.  And the fact that I disagree with the ease that killers can get a gun does not make me indifferent to the suffering of the families and the friends of the precious victims of Sandy Hook Elementary.  This is beyond the pale.

After excoriating human beings by erroneously amalgamating their deeply held emotions and beliefs as a human being with their political positions, Timothy goes on to try and connect a lack of belief in good and evil with the tragedy.  He states that we have become a nation of "criers and weepers" instead of "angry and hot as hell".

I actually cried when I read that part.  He's right.  We do cry.  And we do weep.  We cry and weep for those lives that are meaninglessly and tragically snuffed out by a horrible human being - that every one of us can become if we do not FEEL!!!!!!!!!!!  And by "feeling", I am referring to empathy, love, and mutual respect for our fellow human beings.  Anger is definitely part of it, as is the case here.  We get angry when we see humans wronged.  But, Timothy, you miss the point.  I'll put it in all caps for you because you need it.

THERE IS NO DICHOTOMY BETWEEN CRYING AND WEEPING  VS. BEING ANGRY.
None.  It doesn't exist.  All of those emotions are part of the human condition and definitely part of the grieving process, as is the case here.  I grieve one moment for the victims and become angry for them the next.

But Timothy misses the real issue here.  He is so wrapped up in his support for unadulterated and unfettered gun rights that he thinks people who make comments about the shooter's mental state are simply post-modernistic relativists, thinking that all victims of this tragedy, including the shooter, are to be viewed as equally suffering.  This is NOT the case at all.  And the actuality of the position of pragmatists define the very problem that we continue to face when people like Timothy Birdnow frame the argument in this manner.

That position is simple.  We don't do enough to help people with mental health issues.  We simply don't.  A large faction of the United States denies that mental health even exists.  I grew up in Christian fundamentalism where the answer was always the same - you need Jesus.  If you were depressed or had autism or Asperger's or anything that wasn't a festering sore on your right eyelid, it was all in your mind (ironically) and of the devil.

So, yes, Mr. Birdnow, we do give a rat's rear end about the mental condition of the shooter.  But we don't care about HIM anymore.  We are angry that he killed himself and got off easy.  But, the reality is, we care about his mental condition because we want to understand HOW TO PREVENT THIS FROM HAPPENING AGAIN!!!!!