Always Be Closing!-Wait! That’s another rant, but now that I think of it, not really. The only way that Evangelicals can hope to maintain their numbers, much less grow them, is by intense recruitment, by Selling! From infancy, family members are indoctrinated and recruited with fear, guilt and intimidation. They are sold the myth of eternal life, a ridiculous fairy tale that is nonetheless swallowed by tens of millions who cannot cope with their own mortality.
Fear is the stick and heaven is the carrot and this choice is offered to the young and the impressionable by those they trust the most. Yes, it is despicable, but this is the only way that the cultists can survive.
Sometimes, however, the tables are turned as many indigenous people did not appreciate the intrusion of missionaries on their land, and these unwelcome guests often paid with their lives.
Biblical Literalism-Hand in hand with Biblical inerrancy, the absurd notion that all things in the Holy Bible are to be taken literally is another tenet of this belief that Evangelicals claim with a slack jaw and a straight face. According to the Fundies, there is no verse of scripture that cannot be validated as 100% true, with apologetics, deflection, special pleading, hermeneutics or outright lies. In reality, one only has to go a few words into Genesis before the Bullshit Meter is in the red zone and common sense is offended.
Cult-Everyone’s religion but yours, that’s a cult. Evangelicals hotly deny the thousands of gods claimed by other religions, but are outraged when someone denies the existence of theirs. A cult is very simply defined as a system of religious veneration and devotion directed toward a particular figure or object. All religions are technically cults, but one that actively practices ritualized cannibalism and worships a Jewish Zombie who is both himself and his father would definitely seem to qualify, don’t you think?
Devil did it-Whether you call him The Devil, Satan, The Great Deceiver, Lucifer, Beelzebub or just that pesky snake in the Magical Garden, Satan has always been the most powerful of the Christian gods. Evangelicals will become purple with rage upon hearing this, but the fact is that god’s “whipping boy” is responsible all of the world’s problems, directly or indirectly. In spite of that powerful verse (Isaiah 45:7) and the Epicurean paradox, God is always absolved of all things negative, making Satan responsible for epic human atrocities like The Holocaust, or just your team losing on Sunday afternoon.
Evolution-Or Evilution is the feared fact of nature, and Evolutionary Theory is the even more feared explanation of its undeniable presence. Evolutionary Theory explains the wide diversity of life we observe on this planet, and this bedrock theory of science is in direct conflict with what the Evangelicals embrace and believe. The grim reality for the Fundamentalists is that they cannot embrace their creation myth and evolutionary science as they are totally incompatible. More liberal theologians have tried to marry the myth and the scientific reality of evolution without juxtaposition, but this totally fails within the framework of Evangelism.
Fundie-A unflattering nickname for a fundamentalist or member of an American conservative movement that believes in the inerrancy of the Bible and its absolute authority over mankind, like it or not. These cement-headed individuals come in several varieties, namely the urban and the rural, but they all have one thing in common. Their commonality is that no scientific or observable fact or event, no matter how pervasive or compelling, can override the unequivocal truth found in their holy writ.
When confronted with any rational and apparent contradiction to their book of ultimate truth, the Fundie will retreat to the safety of translation error or some bizarre symbolic analogy with a hidden or unknowable meaning. Dinosaur fossils that predate human existence by tens of millions of years were cleverly hidden in the geological strata by Satan to appear old. These unfortunate reptiles perished not from asteroid striking the Yucatan 65 million years ago, but on the ark of Noah, in the form of dinosaur eggs, the adults being too large to fit. Nothing, I mean nothing is impossible with the rabid rationalization of the Fundie, if self-deception will somehow support a version of this earth’s history written by a bunch of primitive, Bronze-Aged animal herders.
Global Warming/Climate Change-In spite of overwhelming and compelling scientific evidence, climate change and man’s role in accelerating this change is vigorously denied by Evangelicals. With their twisted logic Evangelicals somehow believe that God will simply not let such a catastrophe occur, while ignoring the stark evidence that their God has stood by idly in the face of other disasters, both man-made and natural.
Hate the Sin, Love the Sinner-Widely attributed as a quote of Jesus, these words were actually written by St. Augustine in the 5th Century. Having nothing to do with love and everything to do with hate, this spurious cop-out is aimed almost exclusively at the Gay and Lesbian Community. Evangelicalism is the greatest perpetrator of hate this world has ever known.
Isaiah 45:7– This verse tells you everything you need to know about the Christian God and his wacky followers. Read it and see what I mean.
Jews-In the minds of Fundamentalists they were the Christ-Killers, the Money changers and the inevitable cause of WW2, but these rabid Evangelicals will support without question, all things Israel, even total thermonuclear war. Why? I mean, these were god’s chosen people, but caused God such angst and rage that he sent the entire planet (save the ark crew) to a watery grave in Genesis.
They also soundly rejected and still do to this day, the crucified and humiliated Christ, Son of God. What in the hell? The answer is simple and terrifying, Armageddon. The very thought of these prophecies being fulfilled in craziest book in the Bible, Revelations, makes the average Jesus nut hard as iron. Blood, guts and death. That’s what it is all about.
Killing (Drunk With Blood)-This is a book by Steve Wells. He also wrote The Skeptic’s Annotated Bible ,which is a highly recommended breakdown of Biblical violence and absurdity. I kill, I wound, I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and mine sword shall devour flesh, Deuteronomy 32:39-42. Without question, the God of the Old Testament is the worst mass murderer in all of fiction. The estimated total is over 25 million. By contrast, the evilest character for Christians, Satan, only killed a total of 10. Role models count, choose them wisely.
Logic, Evangelical Style-Or-Hector’s Law* Lives-
Christian: God sends no one to hell
Skeptic: Read Isaiah 45:7, besides, I refuse to go to hell.
Christian: How do you stop God from sending you there?
Skeptic: [Smiling]
Christian: [Getting flustered] Stop twisting my words!
Skeptic: [Smiling]
Christian: Ill pray for you [Leaves]
*Hector’s Law-Given sufficient time, a Fundie will debunk his or her self.
Martyrs– Many modern-day Evangelicals suffer from Crucifixation, which is a state of mental duress inside a Fundamentalist’s brain that admires blood, suffering, agony, drinking the blood of God and eating his body and they usually wish to be crucified and/or martyred themselves. This sort of behavior was validated in the success of Mel Gibson’s snuff film, as well as Fox News well-worn whining about the War on Christmas.
Nicene Creed-It was decided in 325 A.D. that three gods were better than one, and throwing in the virgin birth borrowed from the Mithras myths was pretty cool too. Add in Constantine’s visions and you have the best thing since New Coke.
Obfuscation-Along with apologetics, deflection, I will pray for you or just downright dishonesty and lying, this is a method used by Evangelicals to try to get around Biblical contradictions, smarmy or uncomfortable Bible verses, or the practices and rhetoric of their religion that look unseemly. A more common description of this tactic is to muddy the waters which is not to be confused with tossing out red herrings or other common logical fallacies.
Paul, The Apostle-The founder of Christianity, The Apostle Paul is a revered hero to Evangelical Christians. It is glaringly obvious that most Christians have not read much of Paul’s writings, as even a cursory reading reveals a deeply disturbed individual. Not only do his writings cast legitimate doubt about the existence of a physical Jesus, but they also reveal a deep despair about his own life and existence. Paul dwells on his sin, a horrible sin that is never revealed and it is easily understood why. This implied sin, coupled with Paul’s open disdain for women, leaves me with the impression that Paul may have been mired deeply in the closet. I have no proof, but it makes a lot of sense.
Prayer (Honorable Mention)-Indistinguishable from chance, nothing fails like prayer. Prayer is just a self-serving cop out in lieu of actual help.
QuiverFull-As disgusting as this is, it is really not my business if some Fundamentalist woman wants to use her vagina as a clown car. What is unacceptable is those Evangelicals who endeavor to push their reproductive craziness upon others, and to deny birth control to other women. These joyless crazies view sex as only a vector for reproduction, and any accidental pleasure derived from such activity is sinful. Throughout the centuries, archaic birth control policies have kept the masses of believers in poverty and under the thumb of their Religious Masters. Cover your head and spread your legs, it’s all part of gods wacky and unknowable plan.
Real True Christians– A Real True Christian is a Christian that has not yet been caught lying, stealing, cheating on his spouse, engaging in gay sex, bedding with prostitutes, molesting children, bearing false witness, swearing, being publicly intoxicated, smoking weed or any other multitude of sins that the Real True Christian had formerly been accusing others of committing. After being exposed, the offending individual becomes a Not A Real True Christian.
Salad Bar Christian-This is a very common type of Evangelical who, like a feeder at a salad bar, picks and chooses which Bible verses he or she wants to embrace and enforce. Coincidentally, these verses almost always coincide with the Salad Bar Christian’s own personal, cultural, geographical or philosophical beliefs. Eating shrimp, having tattoos, getting divorced, masturbating and wearing dacron/wool are all practices that are equally forbidden in the Bible. People who live in glass houses should not play with rocks.
Thomas-The doubting Apostle. Most of the Disciples in the New Testament were pedestrian ass-kisser and Yes Men, but Thomas was a guy that I could respect. Barely mentioned in the Bible, Thomas was left in obscurity and eventually shot and killed by some near-sighted aristocrat who was practicing his archery on peacocks. No, I can’t make this up. Anyway, Thomas thought that Jesus was a fake and so do I, so he’s at the top of my list of unsung Biblical heroes.
Unitarian Evangelicals-Dividing by zero.
Virgin Mary, Mother of God-Evangelicals have always had a problem with Mary, that is as anything other than a magical sperm receptacle for the Holy Spirit. Women, even mothers of God, should know their place, so Mary has always been a bone of contention between more conservative Protestants and their hell-bound Papist brothers in Christ. Of course, Mary was nothing more than a knocked-up knockoff of the rock mother of Mithras and other legends, but give the lady a little respect, OK?
Women-A constant policy of any Fundamentalist Religion is control and subjugation of the women. How any woman who has a modicum of self-respect can embrace Evangelical Christianity is totally beyond me. Like their Middle-Eastern counterparts, Evangelicals want their women silent, subservient and pregnant.
X-is the Greek letter for Christ, the Chi, the Cross. Ignorant Evangelicals continued to be offended by things like XMas as they ignorantly think that the X is not different from the X that you might see on a Tic-Tac-Toe board.
Yahweh-Is the all-powerful, all knowing, jealous, violent, bipolar spoiled brat of a god in the Old Testament. One of the great difficulties Evangelicals have is merging the merciless killer of a god in the Old Testament with a supposed god of love and redemption in the New Testament.
Some try to sweep this unsavory character under the rug by using Apologetics and claiming that Jesus wiped the slate clean and brought a New Law to the land. The problem with this rationalization is that Jesus clearly states in the New Testament that he is not here on this earth to abolish the Old Law, but to fulfill it. When confronted with such glaring contradictions most Evangelicals either ignore you with genuine loathing in their eyes or state that God works in mysterious ways OK, which god?
Zombies Revisited-There are many incredible whoppers in the Evangelicals inerrant Bible, but these verses trump them all with regards to belly-laughing absurdity.Matthew 27:51-53 states:
At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to the bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They went into the city and appeared to many people.
If you can believe this, you can believe anything. Such a colossal event certainly would have attracted some National attention, but after these verses there is no mention again in the Bible about this very extraordinary claimed event. Here’s the bottom line, if a cult claims that their holy book is totally without flaw and totally true, it takes only one incident to falsify it. This one should do it.
Also Check out these articles about the Bible:
The ABC’s of the Old Testament: Part One
The ABC’s of the Old Testament: Part 2
The ABC’s of the New Testament: Part One
The ABC’s of the New Testament: Part 2
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