Donald Trump's support from white evangelicals and other conservative Christians is as strong as ever.
We're not going to be able to fix these people. The only hope we have is to outlast them.
What an amazing display of privilege. It must be nice to live in a society where religious belief isn't being injected into the public and our government.
At one point in the deposition even Hecker became overwhelmed at the number of times with which he has been confronted with sex abuse allegations.
Just when you thought it was safe to back into the pew.
Johnson met evangelical leader of Ukraine’s National Prayer Breakfast before last week's press conference.
It should surprise no one that Dominionist Mike Johnson's change of heart on Ukraine was bought by suggesting to him that it could serve his religious agenda.
Well, this is unexpected, and details will be forthcoming. He was 82. I have lots of stories about Dan, and found him amiable and charitable, though sometimes he could be domineering, especially wh…
Daniel Dennett, philosopher, atheist, and one of the tongue-in-cheek "Horsemen" of atheism, died today. He was 82.
An Oklahoma man has been arrested after authorities accused him of throwing a pipe bomb at the headquarters of a group in Salem, Massachusetts, called The Satanic Temple.
Surveillance cameras showed a man walk up to the building soon after 4 a.m. on April 8 wearing a face covering, tactical vest and gloves, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the FBI. The man then ignited an improvised explosive device, threw it at the main entrance then ran away. The bomb partially detonated, resulting in some minor fire damage, authorities said.
I am a journalist who has covered the Christian right for two...
FTA:
> The bottom line is that Christian nationalism takes on different forms, and despite organizational or even ideological differences, ideas can penetrate the often porous borders between different camps. Someone who receives the daily email blast from the Family Research Council might also be drawn to Wolfe’s book, for example. On a more unnerving, macro level, major right-wing and GOP figures, including Marjorie Taylor Greene and the CEO of the Daily Wire, the podcast consortium run by conservative influencer Ben Shapiro, have embraced the rabidly antisemitic, Hitler-admiring antagonist Nick Fuentes, who is Catholic but also is accurately described as a Christian nationalist. The increasingly influential Catholic integralist movement, which seeks a Catholic-inflected replacement for the “liberal order,” is yet another unique form of Christian nationalism.
Over the past month, I’ve been speaking with people who describe themselves...
...In 2022, Stephen Wolfe (no relation to William) published a book called “The Case for Christian Nationalism.” The book was published by Canon Press, a publishing house that began as a ministry of Wilson’s church. Stephen K. Bannon, the Trump adviser, reportedly had a copy of the book stacked on his table.
In the book, Wolfe lays out a vision that veers very far into the fantastic — he rails against the advancement of women over the past several decades by using the term “gynocracy,” and describes both the Obergefell decision and the 1965 immigration reform which abolished quotas on national origin as an “imperial imposition.” One chapter, called “The Christian Prince,” advocates for a “measured and theocratic caesarism.” Wolfe has suggested that he’s playing a somewhat coy game here, using “prince” to refer not necessarily to a monarch, but possibly to the aggregate form of American governmental power. Whatever it is, in his version of Christian nationalism the prince would promote “national self-love and a manly, moral liberty.”
Trump’s efforts to conflate Christianity with his cause, and to mobilize both on behalf of transphobic hate, are offensive to both church and state.
Pity the poor unseen majority who shove their religion in our faces every day. Won't someone think of them?
Phony claims that Democrats “mock your faith” are a cynical excuse to strip Americans of religious freedom
> It's easy to roll one's eyes as the self-serving dramatics of MAGA voters using false claims of victimhood as cover for their ugly views. But, as the threatening language in Greene's tweet shows, this "woe is us" act is deeply dangerous. The hyperbolic conspiracy theories and dehumanizing language serve to convince Republican voters that religious liberty and democracy are simply values they can no longer afford to hold. The message is Christians are so "under siege" that the only way to fight back is by stripping everyone else of basic rights.
T.Rex Arms sells gun accessories. According to one expert, "The product is ideology, too.”
They have money, they have influence, they have charisma, and they have technical expertise. And they're using to pursue a theocratic America, even if they have to kill anyone who gets in their way.
Hosts of The View were gobsmacked at news that Donald Trump is now selling bibles, with Sunny Hostin declaring it "blasphemous."
Could Trump's attempt to pander to evangelicals backfire? We can only hope.
Posted to Truth Social while Trump is in court: Received this morning—Beautiful, thank you! “It’s ironic that Christ walked through His greatest persecution the very week they are trying to steal your property from you. But have you seen this verse…?” Psalm 109:3–8 (NKJV): They have also surrounded ...
One tweet illustrates the threat.
Minor nitpick: it was time to start worrying about Christian nationalism over twenty years ago. They've been trying to legitimize Christian nationalism since at least the founding of the "Moral Majority" when I was a boy. I've been trying to sound the alarm about Dominionism and Christian nationalism since the second Bush administration.
But if you're late to the game, fine. The second best time to start worrying about Christian nationalism is now.
Evangelicalese allows Trump’s MAGA supporters to hide their extreme positions in plain sight
A deep dive into the policies proposed in Project 2025 reveal the theocratic intent of its framers. Using language that evangelicals will recognize to hide its authoritarian intent demonstrates they recognize how unpopular these policies will be once implemented. But then it'll be too late.
One of the key architects of Donald Trump’s plans for a second...
These are the people tasked with developing policy for a second Trump administration. If you're not deeply scared of what they're proposing, you are not paying attention.
An extremist evangelical movement has set itself up to formulate the governing priorities of a second Trump administration.
The worst part isn't even that they're trying to do this. Of course they've been wanting to do this ever since they started losing power during the Enlightenment. The worst part is that the average American either doesn't know about this, or has somehow talked themselves into believing it's not a real threat. We're watching the scene play out in which the man says, "of course the leopards won't eat my face!"
A men-only, Christian-only, right-wing secret society with the aim of installing certain...
Because clearly, what we need is yet another Christian Nationalist secret society that only offers membership to men. Right.
Dammit, The Handmaid's Tale is not supposed to be a guidebook!
“Religious freedom” is having a moment in federal courts.
FTA:
> > > Since the installation of the current conservative supermajority on the U.S. Supreme Court, RFRA has been used several times to advance Christian, conservative interests. In Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, the Supreme Court held that Philadelphia’s nondiscrimination policies violated RFRA by precluding a Catholic adoption agency from contracting with the city because it refused to place children with LGBTQ+ families. The court also used the free exercise clause and RFRA to invalidate the mandate for employers to provide contraceptive coverage in Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania. The Ninth Circuit itself relied on the free exercise clause to overturn a public school’s decision not to recognize a Christian student group that required students to hold Christian beliefs to join in Fellowship of Christian Athletes v. San Jose Unified School District. > >
"I dare you to pass this bill and allow me to send chaplains to your schools." -not a verbatim quote.
Reprinted from Lies: And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them-A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right by Al Franken by permission of Dutton, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Copyright c Al Franken, Inc., 2003. "Supply Side Jesus" illustrations c Don Simpson. All rights reserved. This excerpt, or any parts thereof, may not be reproduced without permission.
Koch's reason.com. One of the most ironic site names in the history of the Internet.
Just because there are a few thousand people who still worship Norse gods doesn't mean the religion is thriving.
Yes, they're still making noise. If anything, they're making more noise than ever. But public sentiment is against them by a wide majority. Even a majority of Republican voters favor gay rights along with female reproductive rights. What we're seeing is the impact of a minority imposing its will on the majority, and it cannot last.
They're the dog that caught the car, but they can't keep it.
Who wants to voluntarily move into a slum?
It's not like new culture wars won't be started and fought just the same. But there was a time when slavery was the topic of a fierce culture war in the US, and it wasn't resolved until it broke out into a literal war. Now, nearly two hundred years later, it's still unacceptable to suggest that people who look different are better off as property rather than people. Even Florida's attempts to whitewash Southern slavery doesn't go so far as to blame the slaves weren't people.
They've lost this culture war, just as they lost the fight for slavery and later to keep the population segregated. They'll try again in time, but for the moment, the question of abortion and homosexual rights is largely settled at a cultural level. The conservatives lost, and that's why they've largely moved on to nitpicking the definition of gender and trying (unsuccessfully) to defend their legal victories on women's reproductive rights.
This is a perfect example of how liberalism enables fascism
Today I learned that being inclusive and working toward the betterment of all people instead of a privileged elite is fascism.
As the article points out, they're determined to bull through anyway. But the effort is doomed to failure. Even if they achieve victory conditions (effectively ending democracy) it won't last. It'll just make the next revolution that much more painful. But their sense of entitlement won't allow them to stop.
So the staff of "Never Back Down" are backing down.
Paul Ryan is mostly upset that Trump beat him to it.
In buildings. Heat pumps are amazingly efficient, and pumping hot air from inside to outside (or the other way around) is something we've been doing for generations.
That still doesn't make this a black and white situation. Would Israel be able to get away with selling their atrocities to the Israeli people if Hamas weren't dedicated to doing the same to Israel? If the Palestinian government had been willing to accept compromise forty to fifty years ago, would Israel have been able to do what they've done?
The answer, of course, is no. No one's hands are clean. And there's really no easy solution that doesn't violate ethics because we're on the outside looking to force solutions on them. Just like they're doing to each other. If we abandon Israel, then they'll suffer what they've done to the Palestinians, and the Israeli people don't deserve that any more than the Palestinians. You can't tell me you have a better solution because you don't.
So you know exactly what details give you the moral probity to make these confident statements? I'm glad we have authorities like you to give us moral clarity. I had no idea you were in possession of state level secrets.
Genocide is bad. Both Hamas and the Israeli government are guilty. But the Israeli people and the Palestinian people are not their governments. We can't abandon either of them and keep the moral high ground. So how do we accomplish all of those goals and get their governments to accept it.
You can't force your black and white perspective on this no matter how satisfying you might find it.
Yup. UFOs are definitely a major concern. Certainly more important than fascists taking over our government.
It would be nice if the world was so easily divided into black and white, but it isn't. Politics is complicated, and the actions of the Israeli government are not the actions or even the will of the Israeli people. Israel deserves to exist, and so does Palestine. Acknowledging the rights of both people doesn't negate condemnation of what either government has done in violation of human rights.
Trying to walk that middle line between their right to exist and disavowing their actions is harder than you think. You think it ought to be easy, except for the people who think differently from you and insist that the opposite solution you want is the only acceptable path.
We don't have the privilege of knowing everything about the situation. Trying to drive from the back seat isn't helpful.
These aren't his plans. These are the plans of smarter, more capable men. Organizations like the Heritage Foundation don't go away easily.
