In the Closet with Pastor Ted

October 19, 2010 By thegirlcanwrite 16 Comments

by Lorette C. Luzajic
Part 29 of Pillars of Faith

Trapped by Fidelity

Pastoral trysts with twinks are blamed on everything from queer demons, to weak flesh, to tests of faith. The most obvious reason- “I’m gay”- seems unthinkable.

In the case of  Rev. Ted Haggard of New Life Church, also then-president of the National Association of Evangelicals, another preacher went so far as to insinuate the blame for such dalliances rests on the wife.

A woman just might push her husband to liaison with men and get high on meth in a sleazy motel. In Kathryn Joyce’s brilliant book, Quiverfull, she quotes pastor Mark Driscoll on his blog: “It is not uncommon to meet pastors’ wives who really let themselves go,” Driscoll wrote.  Since a woman may feel her husband is “trapped into fidelity” she may not bother being “sexually available to her husband in the ways that the Song of Songs is so frank about…”

But Haggard himself was at least noble enough in his resignation letter to point out that she had nothing to do with it.

Sex, Drugs, and Rock’n’Roll

Haggard was born in Indiana, saved in Texas, and “educated” at Oral Roberts U. In Colorado, his brand of candid apostleship grew a church from a basement to a strip mall to the New Life megachurch of 14 000. But in 2005, it all fell apart. Prostitute Mike Jones found out his client of three years was a hugely influential Christian pastor and adviser to the White House. Jones told ABC he had to “expose the hypocrisy.” Later, another man claimed Pastor Ted sent him dirty text and jerked off in front of him.

What followed is familiar by now:  Ted denied allegations of cheap sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Church brothers blamed the defamation on the evil gay agenda. Ted even passed a series of volunteer polygraphs. Then his story shifted: he’d had a massage but not sex from his hired hand. Later still, Ted admitted that he was a hypocrite and liar.

I don’t often empathize with disgraced pillars of faith. But there was, to me, always something affable under Ted’s creepy countenance.  When he said a part of him “is so repulsive and dark that I have been warring against it for all of my adult life,” my heart went out to him.  It is no small horror to grow up believing your sexuality is “repulsive and dark.” Later, he told Oprah, “I was so ashamed…that dark area of my life that I’d worked so hard to keep secret and fight against was coming to the surface…”.

Back Into the Closet

But to my dismay, Ted didn’t use his influence to bring truth to light. He drove it further back into the closet. Seeing as the world already knew, this would have been a great chance to proclaim that hypocrisy was the sin- not being gay. He could have helped countless suffering. He could have demonstrated to gay church kids a role model of a happy, healthy gay man who made it through the trial by fire, who turned his deepest shame into triumph.

Instead, Ted went into “restoration” and conversion therapy and is now “heterosexual” again. “I don’t think I’m gay,” Ted told Oprah.

It was a missed opportunity to point out that if we all view our sexuality as empowering and natural, there will be a lot less slimy slinking around and lying. This message can liberate gay and straight people alike: perhaps if men aren’t brought up in shame, they won’t have to beat or violate women who provoke their desire. Maybe women who aren’t taught that their entire value rests on their “purity” will start feeling valuable instead of soiled.

I hope the next time Ted’s caught with his pants around his ankles, he’ll find a real therapist. Maybe he’ll read a copy of Troy Perry’s The Lord is My Shepherd and He Knows I’m Gay. But for now, Ted has merely placated the homo-loathing hordes who helped create his internal hell, spread disinformation, and justify discrimination. He has chosen to rejoin their ranks. And he’s still deceiving the one who needs his love and honesty the most: himself.

Filed Under: Biography, Hypocrisy, Morality, Sexuality Tagged With: , , , 16 Comments

God's Lunatics

September 29, 2010 By thegirlcanwrite 2 Comments

by Lorette C. Luzajic

Those of you who enjoy reading my Pillars of Faith column may like Michael Largo’s book, God’s Lunatics, even more (Harper Collins, 2010). My columns offer a brief sketch of revered Christian leaders- the unflattering stuff they’d rather you ignore while offering unwavering obedience. Largo’s compendium doesn’t seek to skewer authority-abusing Christians so much as to reveal how very many religious are truly nuts. Far from being a rare aberration of faith, the nut may be the norm, and is usually the seed that grows into a full-fledged cult or religion. Largo introduces us to a fascinating medley of “lost souls, false prophets, martyred saints, murderous cults, demonic nuns, and other victims of man’s eternal search for the divine.”

Some may decry the choice of title, arguing that it belittles the sacred lost. But it’s a perfect fit. You probably know that the words “lunatic” and “lunacy” have something to do with “lunar”- the moon. Lunatics are literally followers of the moon- of Luna, the moon goddess. This marvelous treasure trove spans history and cultures, giving tantalizing sketches of religious lunatics of every stripe. By bringing so many stories into one collection, it’s easy to see how madness pervades religion. Far from being the exception to the rule, religion is densely populated with bizarre ideas and fixations. In these vivid illustrations, Largo dismantles our sacred cows.

Help yourself to some capezzoli di St. Agatha- Sicilian breast-shaped pastries in honor of Agatha, who endured the torture and excision of her breasts rather than sully them through marriage’s sexual demands. Find out how Buddha got his belly. Meet the patron saint of hemorrhoids. Revisit one of the first megachurches, Sister Aimee’s Angelus Temple. Learn how the Virgin Mary herself handed the first rosary to St. Dominic in 1214. Choose from among a wide sampling of alien or UFO religions. Meet ascetics of every flavor, including Simeon, who crawled atop a flagpole in the sixth century and stayed there for 37 years. Incidentally, his mother had had a vision, where the severed head of John the Baptist floated before her and announced that her son would become a saint.

Since the author has a sweetly sarcastic sensibility, his cheerful storytelling seldom veers into mean-spirited terrain. And while the collection collates endless sources to extract the nutty bits, the brief snippets can’t possibly provide the whole story. This book is not meant to be an academic treatise, so verifying and expanding any given information remains the responsibility of the reader. It’s meant as a tantalizing smorgasbord for the curious, with an invitation for follow up in a library of over 400 suggested titles. Ironically, it is the sheer variety of madness, hucksterism, conviction, and oddity through all of religious history that shows us how it’s all the same.

Filed Under: Book Reviews, Religion Tagged With: , 2 Comments

American History X: David Barton

August 18, 2010 By thegirlcanwrite 58 Comments

by Lorette C. Luzajic
Part 28 of Pillars of Faith

Thou Shalt Not Lie

David Barton is reclaiming America for the Lord. He is tirelessly educating Americans about their historical roots and beloved constitution. He talks about the secular invasion in America, and he’s taking it back and giving it to God.

We’ve heard about one nation under god so often that we believe it. We know that in the beginning, God wrested America from the pagan hands of the devil’s children and gave it to his righteous servants.

But this is wishful thinking. Barton and his kind are Christian Revisionists, revising and denying history and spreading lies to suit an ideological agenda.

“The notion that America was founded as a Christian nation is a central animating element…of the Christian Right…The idea that America’s supposed Christian identity has somehow been wrongly taken, and must somehow be restored, permeates the psychology and vision of the entire movement,” writes Frederick Clarkson in The Public Eye.

The End Justifies the Means

Pullquote: “What harm would it do, if a man told a good strong lie for the sake of the good and for the Christian church… a lie out of necessity, a useful lie, a helpful lie. Such lies would not be against God, he would accept them.”
Martin Luther

Christian Reconstructionists don’t just re-construct a nation for God- they reconstruct facts. And history revisionism is a huge part of the movement. Forget that the Old Testament law that they aspire to return to forbids false witness. Lying is a standard modus operandi for so many “Christian Nationalists.” The end justifies the means.

We don’t have room for all details- suffice it to say that the word “God” was not in the Constitution, and the founding fathers, Christian or not, were adamant about separation of church and state. “We’ve seen how religious beliefs (and other ideologies) inspire people to view others as subhuman, deviant, and deserving of whatever happens to them, including death. It is the stuff of persecution, pogroms, and warfare. The framers of the U.S. Constitution struggled with how to inoculate the new nation against these ills…” wrote Clarkson.

And “In God we Trust” did not become the official motto until 1956.

Enter Christian Nationalist David Barton, a major player in the Texas Republican Party, and founder of WallBuilders, a Dominionist group hell bent on “restoring” theocracy. Time (2005) named him among the 25 most influential evangelists. He is on the advisory committee for National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools, and for Providence Foundation, “training and networking leaders to transform nations.” Reconstuctionist groups like Providence ultimately aim to “reinstate” Old Testament law, including the stoning of homosexuals, witches, and disobedient children.

Barton lectures and ministers all over the Christian and mainstream media, given a voice by bigwig networks of all faith stripes, spreading his fiction gospel about the roots of the nation. He insists in The Myth of Separation that only Christians should hold office!

His flock won’t balk at his extremist views- or his falsehoods. Goaded by “authority” figures like James Dobson, the late D. James Kennedy, and Glenn Beck, they praise Barton for holding up the Constitution. His teachings inform politicians, too. Never mind that Barton has lectured alongside holocaust deniers for white power “Christian Identity” groups like Scriptures for America. Barton claims he didn’t know, a weak protest for someone so politically astute.

Revising History

Barton’s research in his speeches and books is convincing- how can all those facts be wrong? With so many quotes and references to so many documents, he makes a strong case even if we don’t like that case, no?

No. History scholars refute Barton’s teachings. He misquotes past presidents, and twists their ideas. He deliberately leaves out quotes and distorts contexts.

He also makes it up as he goes along.

Barton has been thoroughly debunked. Rob Boston writes frequently on this, showing us that scholars have questioned quotes pumped by Barton and attributed to the founders. Not only did they find no sources for many facts and quotes, but Barton himself admitted some were bogus!

He’s an admitted liar. His education is from Oral Roberts University, ahem. But now he reviews material for curriculum textbooks. And his words are as good as God to homeschoolers. Say what?

AFTER all of his lies became common knowledge, Barton’s influence and popularity increased. Go figure.

Filed Under: Biography, Christianity, History, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , 58 Comments

The Lies of James Dobson

June 26, 2010 By thegirlcanwrite 48 Comments

by Lorette C. Luzajic
Part 27 of Pillars of Faith

Guilty as Spongebob

Jim’s writings were revered like Apostle Paul’s in my childhood home. His Focus on the Family propaganda is so wholeheartedly American that it became brand. After three decades of homo-terror warnings, not even his ridiculous boycott of Spongebob made him lose credibility among disciples. Spongebob is guilty of “homosexual advocacy,” Dobson says.

He was born in Louisiana in 1936 and born again at three. He received his doctorate in child development in 1967, and later founded both Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council.

Both oppose women, gays, and science. Dobson describes gays as “Nazis” and “THE greatest threat to your children. It is of particular danger to your wide-eyed boys, who have no idea what demoralization is planned for them.”

They want more funding for abstinence ed, a proven failure since the U.S. has 70 times the rate of gonorrhea among youth than European countries with sex ed, and among the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the world.

The Same Song and Dance

His evidence is often based on the work of Paul Cameron, disbarred from the APA for making up research. Other sources have made it clear that Dobson has twisted their work or not even read it.

Dobson quoted in Time, Drs Carol Gilligan, of Harvard: Kyle Pruett, of Yale, and Angela Phillips, of Goldsmiths College. All 3 were irate that he lied about data, among a barrage of letters from experts he’d used in various works. Some asked him to post their letters on his Focus website with a public apology. He didn’t.

Dr. Robert Spitzer was among the outraged. He helped remove the disorder status from homosexuality in 1973. And so his 2001 research showing that “gays could change” was praised by Dobson for the “courage” to overturn the “myth.”

But Dr. Spitzer said Focus “once again reported findings of my study out of context to support their fight against gay rights.”

Calling Dobson on his lies doesn’t faze him. “Communities do not let prostitutes, pedophiles, voyeurs, adulterers, and those who sexually prefer animals to publicly celebrate their lifestyles, so why should homosexuals get such privileges?”

Poor Little Wiener Dog

Unruly wiener dogs are another thorn. Jim brags in one book about beating his dog for not heading to bed on time. “That tiny dog and I had the most vicious fight ever staged between man and beast. I fought him up one wall and down the other,” he writes.

His other pet issue is against “population control.” Dobson supports fringe extremist prolifers like Randall Terry. He thinks taking the Pill or the morning after pill is abortion, too.

Tubal ligation? “For obvious reasons, the Bible is absolutely silent on these recent technological procedures.” Umm, yes. Obvious reasons.

But for a man who concerns himself with “helping families thrive,” he sure hates children. “… pain is a marvelous purifier,” he has famously written. In one of many parenting guides, he calls kids: bratty, pugnacious, anarchists, horrid, negative, sour, sullen, selfish, insane, obnoxious, spoiled brat, groaning lump, and so forth.

Dobson also demanded the resignation of a minister who asked Christians to care about creation! The climate controversy is shifting the “emphasis away from the great moral issues of our time, notably the sanctity of human life, the integrity of marriage and the teaching of sexual abstinence…”

Let it Rain

But does any of Dobson’s nonsense really matter?

Time Magazine called him “the nation’s most influential evangelical leader.” His media empire spans 150 countries and 7,000 TV stations, reaching 220 million daily. Chris Hedges called him “perhaps the most powerful figure in the Dominionist movement.” He is widely accredited with rallying the Lord’s troops to vote for and land the win of George Bush.

Obama of course is “lowest common denominator of morality” with a “fruitcake interpretation” of the Constitution, who edits “God’s word to fit his liberal worldview.” So Dobson’s servants released a video commanding Christians to pray for “rain of Biblical proportions” on the day of Obama’s historic nomination speech.

It was sunny all day. But rain it did — at the Republican convention. Hurricane Gustav hurled itself at the southern Bible belts, causing the largest U.S. evacuation exodus in history with 2 million people headed north.

The Lord has spoken.

Filed Under: Biography, Christianity, Fundamentalism, Parenting, Sexuality 48 Comments

Don't Mess With Texas's Doyle Davidson

April 29, 2010 By thegirlcanwrite 58 Comments

by Lorette C. Luzajic
Part 26 of Pillars of Faith

Blame it on the Boogie

Pastor Doyle Davidson doesn’t believe in mental illness. “I do not believe that any mental illness exists other than demons, and no medication can straighten it out, other than the power of God,” the Texas preacher said.

The founder of Water of Life Ministries in Plano, Texas, was “called” to plant a church after God told him Plano was possessed by the demonic spirit of Jezebel, whose evil seductions “forced” 850 godly men into fornication. A staple of his ministry has been the “loosing” of Jezebel demonesses from women parishioners.

Stranger still is the circle of dancers, singing and jangling tambourines, prancing around the septuagenarian like trained foals. His sermons are peppered with the f-word, and include calling members of his flock “bitch,” “stupid,” and “mindless twits.” The Dallas Observer reported that he once barked at a crying child: “Shut that brat up.” Glenna Whitley quotes him as saying, “I guess if I took my gun and shot every third person in this front row I bet I’d get your attention.”

But what he loves most is preaching against women, offering from his pulpit such devotional inspirations as “my wife is a slut” and, “Who told me she was a slut? God did.”

Thou Shalt Not Suffer a Witch to Live

Said wife was never Doyle’s wife at all, but his secretary. He stayed married to Patti, but she had become infected with that darned Jezebel spirit. “God put a sword between us, and that was it.” Lisa Staton was an emotionally unstable young woman who sought refuge in her pastor.

Their 17 year long relationship ended with Doyle’s arrest. He’d gone to Lisa’s house to exorcise a devil. Her husband came home and found Doyle drunk, pinning Lisa down while choking her.

But Doyle simply posted the “facts” online — quoting from the book of Acts. The Lord sent an earthquake to deal with the false arrest of Paul and Silas, who had merely been exorcising demons. “This is the way God deals with false arrests for casting a devil out of a woman.”

Doyle says Lisa and the police were lying sorcerers. (Lisa and her husband have gone into hiding.)

But Doyle’s obsession with possession has contributed to more than broken homes. There are multiple tales of coercion, manipulation, lying, and threatening from former members who claim they were brainwashed by fasting, controlled socializing, and terror of hell. His family members are too scared to talk about him.

But one woman’s harrowing story stands out over them all.

Isaac Revisited

Dena Schlosser was prone to depression and odd spells. One day after her daughter was born, she slit her wrists. She was diagnosed as psychotic, with postpartum depression, and hospitalized. Dena didn’t want to leave the hospital, but her husband, encouraged by Pastor Doyle, took charge after “praying.” Dena was to throw away all of her meds and refuse further treatment. Prayer and exorcism would heal her.

Dena became obsessed with evil spirits, after Doyle continually fed her garbage about Satanic women. She was taken to hospital again in 2004 after a psychotic break, but her husband feared that the shrinks would “misinterpret” her demon talk for insanity and give her pills, which their church forbade. When Dena’s mother tried to intervene with Doyle, she says he told her, “People who oppose me have been known to disappear.”

In Nov. 2004, 911 took a call from a “euphoric” Dena. They heard hymns playing. She announced that God ordered her to kill her baby. She’d been reading her Bible around the clock and was moved by a verse saying that if your arm offends you, cut it off. And so she chopped the arms off of her infant daughter with a kitchen knife.

The reverend, who counseled the couple multiple times in the week before the murder, told authorities he “barely” knew them. He said he never told anyone to stop taking medication.

Dena was deemed not guilty by reason of insanity. Later, an inoperable tumour was found in her brain.

Doyle says he doesn’t interpret the Bible; he only preaches it. “That’s why the world hates me,” he says.

Filed Under: Biography, Christianity, Cults, Fundamentalism 58 Comments
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