Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Nation & World

God and Country by Dan Gilgoff

Mark Sanford: South Carolina's Bible-Quoting Governor

June 26, 2009 04:13 PM ET | Dan Gilgoff | Permanent Link | Print

Reader Comments

What is D's Bible?

D. refers so often to his Bible that it seems he doesn't realize it's a best-seller collection of religious myths, written by profit-seeking people who obviously knew nothing about geology or other hard sciences. They believed in magic spells and curses in the same way voodoo is used by witch doctors. The Bible writers put words in non-existent God's mouth and D. believes God said them. This is why it's impossible for me to "explain the Bible to believers." I'm talking about the authors, but believers are re-asserting their belief that "God said it." Evangelizing continues because its a money-making profession--an industry. Religion survives because so many jobs depend on it. Example: If you sell "anointing" olive oil or sacramental wine, or wafers and candles and bells and kneelers, etc. you want religion to endure.

Sanford

Sanford condemns Clinton for doing the exact same thing he, Sanford, has done. The only problem is, Sanford won't do what he said Clinton must do: step down. Is it any wonder that with "leaders" like Sanford (does Newt come to mind?) the Republican party is on life support?

For D--Christ as world-saver

Without the invention of religion, we'd be free of tax-exempt churches. Our tax bases would not be so narrowed that a few of us carry the tax load for fire and police departments, public schools, and government administration. We wouldn't be wasting taxes to support conceptions that were not aborted so they wind up on welfare rolls. How Absentee Dads must be snickering at male taxpayers who are forced to be surrogate fathers!! There never was a God, especially not one who had no mother but had a navel he duplicated in non-existent Adam and Eve. Study the painting of God touching Adam's finger. Is the artist drawing attention to the IMPOSSIBLE navel on MOTHERLESS God? He was angry that the pope was not paying as agreed, so it's possible he did the painting that way to show Genesis is nothing but lies.

For Marie and other Bible quoters including Sanford

It's 2009, but vast numbers of people still quote the Bible, meaning they believe writers who invented Yaweh, God, Christ, the Holy Ghost, Satan, Adam and Eve, Noah and the whole circus of non-existent characters. The creation of gods was the biggest money-making scam ever invented. Need proof of that statement? Mention any part of religion or worship that doesn't have money or other MATERIAL GOODS connected with it. You join and you get a pledge envelope to hold installments of the amazingly high ten per cent of your lifetime earnings. You buy a Bible and are told to read it and re-read it. That way, it reminds you that the first sacrifices were to be the very best and tastiest animals, fruit and vegetables. You work to create them, but preachers eat them. It reminds you to forgive crooks and to love them!! It attacks homosexuals even though it also insists God created them as part of everything. All congregations have collection baskets or boxes. There are church laws banning the abortion of potential tithers. If preaching were free, all churches would close.

Sanford

Oh God, how I love to watch and listen to these bible thumping hypocrites quote the bible! Bray it a little louder, you sniveling jerk! You get the full measure of pleasure in it when you realize that all their preaching over the years has nothing to do with what they expect for themselves, and everything with reaching out to the "little people", far below them, who appear stupid enough to fall for this baloney. Pound the bible furiously enough and you can be assured that plenty of the idiotic "faithful" will fall in line, Sanfords little flock. The jokes on us, little people. Maybe it's time we showed these jerks we're sick of their act, and have them shut up about faith, God, and Jesus, about which they know, and about which we care, nothing.

Pathetic example of a leader

"me thinks he do protest to much..." -William Shakespeare

This guy is not unlike so many of those who say how this country is immoral, due to whomever they don't like at the moment.

We have leaders that are willing to kill millions of people in a phony fro profit war and yet preach "right to life.

Kick him to the curb, not for the affair( that is his problem)but his lack of care for the office for which he was elected.

D days try to understand what the Bible teaches

The Bible teaches believers to make a profit and give at least a tenth of it to a church to feed, cloth and shelter preachers. When people were inventing religion as a money-making scheme, one of their coins was a "talent." A tale starts with a rich man teaching employees lessons of greed. He hands a talent to some of them and says when he comes back, he wants to know what each one did with them. He praises the man who got interest from lending it to a borrower. Scripture glorifies capitalism. But casual readers think it was "socialistic" for mythic Christ and his disciples to share with each other what they got from doing nothing but begging. A vital lesson is that begging by Christ sets the example for begging by all churches. Read the parts that describe what kind of "food sacrifices" believers must make. They must give only the best animals to be "burnt," that means roasted and the best parts to be eaten by preachers. As for greed and gathering MATERIAL GOODS, see cathedrals with altars made from gold mined by New World natives. See costly costumes and worship equipment in catalogs of worship merchandise.

Mark Sanford is sorry he was found out.

This man defied his wife when she told him not to see this woman again. Except when you fall in love with someone, you have to see them...even if you have to fly all the way to Argentina! Even if you have to leave your job unsecured.It's not right what he did, but the man followed his heart and not his head. Knowing what type of wife he had at home, he felt as if his home situation would be kept safe from the public. That's why Jenny simply said she didn't know where he was. But that statement came from a woman scorned and the delivery of the statement is what caused suspicion to surface. The marriage cannot survive due to the concrete fact that Sanford not only had an affair with his Argentinian Beauty, but he fell head over heels in love with her. Sanford stated in the mutual emails with his mistress by saying " this is grounds that I have never crossed before" This eludes to the idea that Mark Sanford may have loved Jenny when he married her but may not have been in love with her. And it is impossible to be in love with two people at the same time anyway, so this leaves Jenny out. And children need two parents who are in love with each other and who respect each other. I doubt very seriously that Jenny could ever respect Mark Sanford ever again. And she appears as if she could care less what happens to him and she certainly does not seem like the type of woman who can be forced to stay in the relationship by the people for appearances sake. She seems so much stronger than that. My point is, Mark Sanford can quote all the bible verses he wants, he really screwed up at home. He may keep is career, who knows. But with Jenny, things will never be the same. She's not the Stand By Me kinda woman like all the others. She's a strong woman who will not be programmed or rolled over. And thank God for that!

The wages of sin

Maybe Sanford should have read on into the next chapter where the consequences of David's infidelity (& murder of Bathsheba's husband) come out: God kills the infant child conceived of their infidelity. [2 Samuel 12:14 & 19] Is that's the kind of resolution Sanford has in mind when he said "David worked things out with God"? It's often said you can find an excuse for anything by cherrypicking passages from the Bible, but if Sanford had the teensiest speck of honesty about him, he would read the story of David & Bathsheba in context. What a disgrace he is!

The Constant Weader at www.RealityChex.com

D's fantastic comment wierdly proves my points.

Soap operas have lots of sex and infidelity. They're in many parts of Scripture, numbered so readers can find them. It's full of porn, perhaps better called "the traveling salesman dirty joke." A classic bit of porn is the male desire to be "the only man in he world," making all females sexually available. That happens in the Lot myth. The porn part is that God does remove the protective mother and the girls to be incested are VIRGINS. They're blamed and D thinks they deserve it because the pornmeister gave Lot the alibi of being drunk. Lot gave them the impression nobody was left in the world and his sperm had to repopulate it. D mentions "evil." Let's look at Isaiah 7:45 and see where God is setting believers straight. He says "I form the light, and create darkness: make peace, and CREATE EVIL: I the Lord do all these things." What do believers think when they read stuff like that? They seem to let it go over their heads. But they memorize and drool over horrible parts where Bible writers condemn homosexuals and say it's OK to beat a wife if the "rod" isn't big enough to kill her after a few whacks. "Raze all churches and salt the ground--" Would life be better then for most people?

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Dan Gilgoff covers religion for U.S. News & World Report. He is the author of The Jesus Machine: How James Dobson, Focus on the Family, and Evangelical America are Winning the Culture War, and is a former politics editor at beliefnet. E-mail Dan at godandcountry@usnews.com.

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