Falwell and Robertson: Right on the money. Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit source - "My Sisters in Christ's Forgiving Light" My Beloved Sisters in Righteous Theology: I see that the greatly respected spiritual leaders Falwell and Robertson are coming under attack from all sides following their calls for repentance. I must disagree with these smallminded critics. As long as one looks to the central, ahem, thrust of their charges, one sees they are well-founded; indeed, one of their suggested remedies is heartfelt repentance of misdeeds, and this is something each of us agrees is urgently needed and must be the basis for action going forward. While I'm a bit confused as to how they have derived their "curtain" of Divine Protection over the US from wthin the Bible - while such things are mentioned there, my memory is that one requires the Ark of the Covenant in order to have them, and that even then they tend to be relatively limited in range - I'm sure that these greatly learned men will soon be presenting us an exegesis of the origin of this newly-discovered property of our Land. From the AP wires: ------------------- Falwell added later, "God continues to lift the curtain and allow the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve." "Jerry, that's my feeling," Robertson responded. "I think we've just seen the antechamber to terror. We haven't even begun to see what they can do to the major population." Falwell said Friday that he didn't mean to blame any one group for the destruction. "But I'd say this is a wake up call from God," he told The Associated Press. "I feel our spiritual defenses are down. If we don't repent, then more events might happen in the future." On Thursday, Robertson issued a statement on the attack that said America had insulted God and lost divine protection. "We have insulted God at the highest level of our government. Then, we say, 'Why does this happen?"' he wrote in a statement released through his Christian Broadcasting Network. "It is happening because God Almighty is lifting his protection from us." ------------------------------- Absolutely; I think it's fine to consider this from a Ten Commandments and Seven Deadlies perspective. (The Commandments actually stem from His Largeness Himself; the Deadlies from a Saint, who suggested that they are deadly because they lead one to violate the Commandments.) Blow jobs in the oval orifice, which appears to be what Brother Robertson is referring to at "our highest levels of gov't" are not mentioned particularly in these central instruction sets; while adultery certainly does come up, we have it on the authority of none less a scholar than Newt Gingrich himself that a blowjob is not, in fact, a sexual act. I think that means it's one of nourishment. But let's look at the guidance Our Lord has provided for us, and reflect on what elements of it are violated continuously and intentionally by our government with majority support on a regular basis: 1. You shall not have other gods before me. You shall not carve idols for yourselves in the shape of anything in the sky above or the earth below or in the waters beneath the earth; you shall not bow down before them or worship them. For I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous God, inflicting punishment for their father's wickedness on the children of those who hate me, down to the third and fourth generation; but bestowing mercy down to the thousandth generation, on the children of those who love me and keep my Commandments. Mt Rushmore, anyone? The WTC towers themselves, at which we run to the temples of the dollars and which - following their destruction - are rapidly being formally as well as informally sanctified. 2. You shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain. For the Lord will not leave unpunished him who takes his name in vain. We should have a look at whether or not His Largeness gets mentioned in the treaties we signed with the Injuns or the Mexicans. I'm guessing the answer is "yes." 3. Remember to keep holy the sabbath day. Six days you may labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord, your God. No work may be done then either by you, or your son or daughter, or your male or female slave, or your beast, or by the alien who lives with you. In six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them; but on the seventh day he rested. That is why the Lord has blessed the sabbath day and made it holy. Well, our government employees tend to give themselves both the Sabbath and Sundays off. So I think they're likely okay on this one. But perhaps we do need to reinstitute the blue laws just in case. 4. Honor your father and mother, that you may have a long life in the land which the Lord, your God, is giving you. Not clear to me that this one can easily be twisted, erhm, fit to discuss a national government. 5. You shall not kill. Oh, my. I'm afraid we're in trouble here. 6. You shall not commit adultery. Bill, zip it up, just to be on the safe side. 7. You shall not steal. Oh, shit. Again, we're looking at policy here, from the acquisition of Manhattan forward. (N.b.: fraud and theft do include knowingly taking advantage of a seller who doesn't know the value of what he sells - I believe there are actually legal codes on this, but in any remotely reasonable ethical sense we all know this to be true.) Then there's the deeply troubling issue of slavery; while the top ten countenances slaveholding in a lot of its clauses, there is this troubling issue that once you've outlawed it, there are some back wages owing. At the very least, the back wages from Texas, where the slaves weren't told they were free for months after the war. But again, from any reasoned ethical perspective, we're deeply in arrears on a lot of our payments. 8. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. John Negroponte. Elliott Abrams. Otto Reich. Just three who spring to mind of late. 9. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife. Okay, I think we're good to stone Bill to death now. But I'm confused, because one of the others we have him on is "thou shalt not kill," but, uhm, that seems to pretty much cover stoning as well. Perhaps we could just banish him to the desert? 10. You shall not covet your neighbor's house, nor his male or female slave, nor his ox or ass, nor anyhting else that belongs to him." Oh, my. Again, we're in extensive trouble here; what is the policy of Manifest Destiny - official policy for quite some time - but a direct contravention of this? Okay, on to the Seven Deadlies, which I will mention here but not analyze per se, as they are not Divinely Authored. 1.Pride 2.Jealousy or Avarice 3.Envy 4.Sloth or Acedia 5.Gluttony 6.Wrath or Anger 7.Lust I think it is time for all of now to reflect deeply and urge our leaders to begin national acts of repentance and contrition. Any further commentaries on the complex theology which is only just barely scratched by my reflections on the Commandments are of course welcome. Yours in Christ, Peter ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytfem-09.17.01-05:23:03-15111