{"id":11202,"date":"2015-12-04T03:00:36","date_gmt":"2015-12-04T08:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/monkeymind\/?p=11202"},"modified":"2015-12-04T11:08:55","modified_gmt":"2015-12-04T16:08:55","slug":"christian-isis-a-call-for-christians-to-recognize-to-challenge-and-to-reign-in-their-fanatics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/monkeymind\/2015\/12\/christian-isis-a-call-for-christians-to-recognize-to-challenge-and-to-reign-in-their-fanatics.html","title":{"rendered":"CHRISTIAN ISIS: A Call for Christians to Recognize, to Challenge, and to Rein in Their Fanatics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"Dominionist<\/a>
\nThese are times to try people\u2019s hearts.<\/p>\n

With this week\u2019s terrible shooting rampage in California, those who have been offering prayers but otherwise discounting the deaths in the so many mass shootings in our country over the past few years finally have something to dig their teeth into. There have been, I understand somewhere in the neighborhood of three hundred and fifty mass shootings in the country since the first of the year. But this was a bit different. In three words. Muslim extremist terrorists. <\/p>\n

I think anybody with their head screwed on right has reason to be concerned with Muslim extremists. ISIS is an abomination living out the fetid dreams of al-Qaeda. And before ISIS, of course, the Taliban created a personal hell for women and all who did not believe like them out of Afghanistan. And, of course, there\u2019s that nasty little open secret about where much of the support for those extremists comes from. Wahabi Saudi Arabia. Might make one think about what an ally is.<\/p>\n

And, in this country, here within our borders, while there is little doubt we should think about Muslim extremists, I think where our real worries should lie are being misdirected, mostly by ourselves, nothing quite as powerful as willful ignorance, after all, but with a pretty good assist from an ignorant corporate media. There are a lot of reasons we don\u2019t want to see this reality. It means our dominant religion is no less liable to the worst form of extremisms than the great other, Islam. Let me be frank, I don\u2019t think it would take much of a turn for the worse for many Christians to put on a bomb vest. Or, our tastes run a little differently, to bring a couple of fully loaded automatic weapons out on a rampage. <\/p>\n

Oh, that\u2019s right. It\u2019s already happened. How many times now? <\/p>\n

And, we ignore it. Each time. Isolated incident. Lone gunman. Crazy loner.<\/p>\n

But it is vastly worse. There is a cancer in the heart of Christian America vastly more dangerous than any Muslim extremist. It is Dominion Theology. Its largest variation Christian Reconstruction calls for creating a Christian theocracy in America. There is also the New Apostolic Reformation, cleaned up a bit, and subtly popular among various Evangelical and Pentecostal<\/a> Christian communities.<\/p>\n

Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates (cited here from Paul Rosenberg\u2019s \u201cExposing Religious Fundamentalism in the US) writes \u201c\u2018Soft\u2019 Dominionists are Christian nationalists. They believe that Biblically defined immorality and sin breed chaos and anarchy. They fear that America\u2019s greatness as God\u2019s chosen land has been undermined by liberal secular humanists, feminists, and homosexuals\u2026 Their vision has elements of theocracy, but they stop short of calling for supplanting the Constitution or the Bill of Rights.\u201d While \u2018hard\u2019 Dominionists \u201c\u2026want the United States to be a Christian theocracy. For them the Constitution and Bill of Rights are merely addendum to Old Testament Biblical Law.\u201d Daniel Burke writing for the Huffington Post points out \u201cDominionism is more a school of thought than a social group. Its influence can be seen in textbooks that portray the Founding Fathers as devout evangelicals, in an anti-gay bill in Uganda and in the home-schooling movement\u2026\u201d It is pervasive. It has come to be in the water we drink.<\/p>\n

Chris Hedges wrote an essay in 2013, \u201cThe Radical Christian Right and the War on Government,\u201d where he harshly presented their views. \u201cDominionists believe they are engaged in an epic battle against the forces of Satan. They live in a binary world of black and white. They feel they are victims, surrounded by sinister groups bent on their destruction. They have anointed themselves as agents of God who alone know God\u2019s will. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey sanctify their rage. This rage lies at the center of the ideology. It leaves them sputtering inanities about Barack Obama, his corporate-sponsored health care reform bill, his alleged mandated suicide counseling or \u2018death panels\u2019 for seniors under the bill, his supposed secret alliance with radical Muslims, and \u201ccreeping socialism.\u201d They see the government bureaucracy as being controlled by \u2018secular humanists\u2019 who want to destroy the family and make war against the purity of their belief system. They seek total cultural and political domination.\u201d<\/p>\n

These people have been insinuating themselves into the heart of the Republic for a very long time now. The generally respected conservative organ, Christianity Today, called the late Rousas Rushdoony, the father of Christian Reconstruction, and perhaps the singular example of \u201chard Dominionism\u201d among our \u201cmost impressive political theologians.\u201d Francis Schaeffer, while he disavowed any connection to Christian Reconstruction has also, nonetheless, been an important influence in the development of the Dominionist theology as an example of \u201csoft Dominionism.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daniel Burke tells us that Evangelical experts find \u201cno evidence of Dominionist thought among conservative Christian elites.\u201d Of course what is an elite is an interesting question. The televangelist and one-time presidential candidate Pat Robertson has from time to time put forth Dominionist positions on his television program. A program that is a staple in far more Evangelical homes I suspect than the writings of any theologian. Similarly the popularity of James Kennedy, another popular Christian in Evangelical circles who espouses many Dominionist positions continues to present these radical views with impunity.<\/p>\n

Dominionists seem to be reaching out to the military, particularly the officer corps, seeking recruits to their principals. On the political front today almost no one in public office is willing to say out loud that these people are past dangerous. Instead it is a rare Republican aspirant to national office who hasn\u2019t a kind word for these people. Some openly flirt. For instance former Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin was famously video taped accepting a prayer for her and her candidacy from a notorious Dominionist pastor. And two-time presidential candidate Governor Rick Perry of Texas openly courted Dominionist pastors. Other politicians on the national scene including former Governor Mike Huckabee, seated Governor Scott Walker, former Representative Michelle Bachman, Governor Sam Brownback, all appear to hold Dominionist views.<\/p>\n

Perhaps most scarily, current aspirant for the Republican nomination for president, and standing as he does right behind the meteoric Donald Trump, quietly waiting to pick up the pieces when and if the meteor crashes, and genuinely possible presidential candidate for the party, Senator Ted Cruz\u2019s father is a Dominionist pastor. The senator has never distanced himself from this view, in fact today he belongs to Dominionist influenced independent branch of the Baptist family of churches. And his father has on more than one occasion called his son \u201cthe anointed one.\u201d More importantly it appears the son believes it.<\/p>\n

So, a couple of suggestions. First, Christians need to stop pretending the Dominionists aren\u2019t there, and if they are, they aren\u2019t so dangerous. A little bit too much like those days when everyone denied there was a mafia. And second. There is a popular wave of opinion in this country that muslims need to stand up against their radicals. I think that\u2019s good advice. And goose and gander, I think it seriously past time for Christians to stand up against their radicals. And to call for moderate forms of their ancient and lovely faith.<\/p>\n

These are times to try people\u2019s hearts.<\/p>\n

How will the scales tip for you?<\/p>\n