The Problem

The problem is not a lack of civility.  The problem is not an occasional or even habitual reliance on violent rhetoric.

The problem is that for over fifty years now the Radical Right, which has taken over the Republican Party, has been obsessed with the idea that they are the only real Americans and the rest of us need to…not be here.

The new governor of Alabama, Robert Bentley, put it starkly:

Anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I'm telling you, you're not my brother and you're not my sister…

The sanctimonious twit added that he wants to be a brother to those of us who have not accepted Jesus Christ as our personal savior, which is to say the majority of Americans, but by his bigoted, self-aggrandizing religion, that can only happen if we convert.

AP frames his remarks as offensive to non-Christians, which of course they are.

But here’s the thing.  Bentley and his fellow Right Wing Fundamentalists give themselves the power to define Christian and they define it an extremely narrow way that is basically “Us.”

Accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior is not a Christian practice.  It is a practice peculiar to a particular kind of Christian, Evangelicals.

Catholics, Episcopalians, most Methodists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Congregationalists, and even many Baptists do not make being “saved,” something that Evangelicals believe only happens when a person has this very personal relationship with Jesus, the centerpiece of their faith.

One of the reasons for this is that it is presumptuous and arrogant.  It assumes that the mind of God is knowable to human beings.  And it follows from this that the person who thinks he knows what God---Jaysus---is thinking grants himself a superiority to everybody who doesn’t share the same special knowledge.

If you are not saved like me, you are damned.

You are as good as in hell already.  You are of the Devil’s Party.

Yes, what Bentley said is offensive to non-Christian.  But it’s important to keep in mind that by his lights everyone of us who does not think, believe, and practice what he thinks, believes, and practices is not a Christian!

And it’s also important to remember that they believe the United States is a Christian country.

They mean a Right Wing Fundamentalist Christian country.

Telling people they are not Christian is the same to them as telling us we are not Americans.

And this has been what the Right has been telling us and each other for decades. 

It doesn’t matter how civilly or uncivilly they put it.

They divide the country into Americans and Christians—themselves---and the rest of us, who should just go to hell.

Comments

[Kevin Wolf]

Per their definition, I'm going to hell, and I'd just as soon do that than be the sort of jerk Bentley is.

[Mark]

These "christians" don't even read the words (as given in their bible) of the man they believe is god, because Jesus never said anything at all like they think. How can you be saved? Love god and love your fellow man as you love yourself. Nothing about accepting Jesus as your personal lord and savior. This current religion that calls itself christianity is nothing at all like the religion preached by Jesus, which was, of course, a humanistic Judaism. I have a feeling that if Jesus could somehow have looked into the future, he would have been mortified to see that he was worshipped as a god, and that this religion would be taught in his name.

[Sue]

Hah. As a member of the United Church of Christ, I assume my beliefs are way too liberal for these folks. I believe 'inclusive' is the word that puts their undies in a bundle.
See you in hell, my friends. Maybe we can all get a table together.

[minstrel hussain boy]

when i am confronted with the threats of hell and dmanation i usually square myself up, give them my best country boy squint, often spit for emphasis and say:

ya'll really can't threaten me much with hell. i was a junkie in vietnam. i been. hell's doable. parts of it are even kinda fun, like the hookers in bangkok, ya know? fun.

usually shuts 'em right up.

[actor212]

Even Glenn Beck told this asshat to shut up.