Street preaching pariahs

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“We don’t want your kind of people on the street – hateful people”. A neo-Nazi demonstration? Ku Klux Klan? Drug dealers, perhaps? No, Christians having an open-air service:

Toronto — A member of a church group that has been accused of targeting the home of a gay couple in Leslieville with its street preaching says the media and area residents have jumped to faulty conclusions.

Members of the Highfield Road Gospel Hall have never targeted specific houses, let alone individuals for their sexual orientation, said the man, who asked that his name not be used over fears the furor that has erupted could continue to grow and threaten his employment.

“You know, we’re very sorry that this has happened. We’re hurt that this has been misconstrued,” he said. “If they feel they’re being targeted, we feel sad about that. They’re not being targeted.

“We’re there for everyone to hear the gospel. We’re not there to preach to just one house. That would be discrimination.”
The dispute began on Sunday evening on Highfield Road during one of the church group’s weekly “open-air meetings,” 20-minute services during which the fundamentalist Christian congregants sing hymns such as Amazing Grace and listen to fiery sermons from a rotating roster of ministers.

This church’s approach doesn’t seem to me to be a particularly effective way to reach the lost for Christ – it certainly isn’t working in this street, judging by the cries of, “get the hell out of our neighbourhood, you’re not welcome”.

The outbreak of neighbourliness is ostensibly a show of support for a homosexual couple in the street – although there is no mention that the preaching referred explicitly to homosexuality. Perhaps Christianity is in the process of becoming the anti-homosexual religion in the eyes of the masses; still, not to worry, early Christians were accused of cannibalism. The street’s inhabitants don’t appear too keen on showing the kind of tolerance to the itinerant Christians that they wish to receive from them or that one has come to expect from a society that cherishes religious freedom. Perhaps tolerance has run a little thin, having all been lavished on Islam.

Unlike “Islamophobia”,  “Christophobia” hasn’t been dignified by a dictionary appearance yet – and probably never will be. It isn’t an appealing word, but, it captures a reality that is absent in “Islamophobia”: phobias are irrational fears; fear of Christianity is irrational whereas a fear of Islam is entirely rational.

The Canadian discharger

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Of disgusting bile. The Canadian Charger is an “alternative” (alternative to sane, I presume) magazine that, according to the professor of communication studies, University of Windsor is one of the best examples of “alternative” – I’m going to add that to my annoying words list – media.Add an Image

In an August 13th missive, Joshua Blakeney, whose photo seems to be a portrait of someone sitting on a cluster of burst haemorrhoids without the benefit of an inflatable ring cushion, declares that Christopher Hitchens, through his oesophageal cancer, is receiving his just desserts:

On June 30, Vanity Fair journalist Christopher Hitchens posted on the magazine’s website that he has cancer of the esophagus. As I was contemplating this revelation, I couldn’t help feeling that the neoconservative armchair warrior was getting his just desserts.

The prospect of Hitchens having to cancel engagements at a time when an Israeli-American assault on Iran seems imminent is positive for humanity, I argue, because it deprives the war propaganda machine of one of its most erudite apologists.

I disagree with Christopher Hitchens’ views on Christianity – although less so his opinion of Islam – and his sniping at people like Mother Teresa and Jerry Falwell was inexcusable. Even though Blakeney excoriates this with considerable relish, it is but a sidebar to Hitchens’ true crimes: what Joshua Blakeney really can’t stomach  is that Christopher Hitchens “morphed from a “Trotskyite” into a Bush-supporting neoconservative”. And he supports Israel. Bring out the garlic and holy water.

The fact is, Christopher Hitchens is one of the most engrossing and bright political and social commentators of our time; agree with him or not, his cancer is a cause for sadness not rejoicing and, if it finally kills him, the world will be a less interesting place.

The Anglican Church of Canada and the census

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The ACoC has aligned itself with Herod in demanding a full Canadian census:

The Divine Right of Statisticians

The long-form Census boosters have hit the bottom of the pressure group totem pole, they have now sought out the mainline churches:

Protecting a harmonious society, care for the poor and vulnerable, and safeguarding religious liberty are at the heart of their complaints. Like Moses’s nemesis the Pharaoh, the federal government has turned a deaf ear.

Church leaders representing 76 per cent of Canadians (according to a 2003 Statistics Canada report) have written eloquent protests, all to no avail. For example, Anglicans said removing the mandatory long-form census would place the government in danger of overlooking the value and complexity of charitable work. Anglican officials reminded Industry Minister Tony Clement how the science of charity works: “In spiritual terms, this loving human response comes by the Grace of God, but in practical terms, it is emboldened and upheld by reliable information and sound methodologies. Statistical information has to help transform thought into action in profound and life-giving ways.

A lobbyist in holy orders is still a lobbyist. The Lord may move in mysterious ways, but Church officials are more obvious in their methods and goals. The Anglican Church of Canada, which once upon a time was referred to as the Conservative Party at prayer, has largely marginalized hum drum activities like preaching Christianity. This has been largely left to the parvenus in the evangelical churches. As aging parishioners grow ever closer to the Lord in the purely practical sense, the mainline churches grow ever more distant in the spiritual sense. Its servants have become, and present themselves, as eccentrically attired social workers. Helping the poor was always part of the Church’s mission, but this was in addition to preparing for the world to come. The article finishes with this humdinger:

So while Christians seem to be at risk of losing the scientific data they need to do their social efforts, teaching about giving information to God will go on. That’s what people do when they pray. An important part of prayer is the practice of letting God have your information. Somehow, conclusions emerge in that mysterious practice, conclusions leading to discovery of self, purpose and meaning. Counted or not, that kind of activity has got to be a good thing for nation building.

“[L]etting God have your information.” Isn’t God omniscient? Maybe the new God isn’t like the old God. Like the new Churches aren’t like the old Churches. In any case we are not filing out the long-form Census for the Almighty, we are filling it out for the Government of Canada. That’s an important distinction. You shall have no other gods before him?

Even the secular press manages to see through the façade that the ACoC likes to present: that it is still a Christian church. The likening of letting God have your information to letting the government have it betrays the sad reality that the god that the ACoC actually prefers to rely on is the nanny state god.

Yet more on the ground zero mosque

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There are a number of arguments that politically liberal Christians – and non-Christians – seem to enjoy making in defence of allowing the building to go ahead:

It’s not a mosque, it’s a cultural centre with a prayer room.

This is true up to a point; it is a cultural centre, a large Islamic cultural centre with a large – a very large – prayer room. The prayer room will be large enough to house up to 2000 people; I am uncertain whether a reluctance to call this a mosque is the blinkered response of people refusing to allow a cherished preconception to be demolished or whether calling a room designed to house 2000 praying Muslims a mosque inflicts semantic violence on the word. And I don’t particularly care: the question remains – should a large Islamic building be constructed on a site where 3000 people were murdered by individuals whose inspiration was Islam.

The Imam pushing the construction is a “moderate Muslim”

I confess I have difficulty understanding the meaning of “moderate Muslim”; the only reason the term is in use at all is because there are so many immoderate Muslims wanting to blow people up – when it isn’t convenient to behead them. There is no such thing as a “moderate Christian”; the nearest category I can think of would be a “nominal Christian”. From the perspective of Christians who take their faith seriously, a nominal Christian is someone who doesn’t; and I suspect the same is true of Muslims.

I would like to posit the existence of another category: the “stealth moderate Muslim”, the Muslim who, living in an environment hostile to his ideology, holds fast to it but pretends not to. Muslims in this category occasionally let their slips show, though. A few years ago on the Michael Coren show a “moderate Muslim”, a lawyer – an apparently personable and rational fellow – admitted when pushed that yes, indeed, the Koran does advocate the death sentence for those who abandon Islam for another religion. He didn’t look particularly comfortable about it but, since it is in the Koran, he couldn’t disagree. I think Imam Feisal is in this category. Although he condemns the 9/11 murders – what idiot wouldn’t – he nevertheless thinks that “United States policies were an accessory to the crime that happened”, that sharia law is nothing other than natural law in another guise, that Hamas is not a terrorist organisation. He is a man who takes Islam seriously.

The building won’t even be at ground zero, it is two blocks away

The building that was standing in the spot where the mosque is to be built was destroyed by the events of 9/11. Why would it not be considered part of the devastation that constitutes ground zero?

To prevent the building of the mosque would be a curtailing of religious freedom

Religious freedom does not include the natural right to build a place of worship anywhere you want. Let us imagine – it might be a strain, I admit – that a group of demented Christians decided to blow up the Taric Islamic centre in Toronto killing a 1000 or so Muslims. After the dust settles, a Christian developer manages to buy the land where the mosque stood and decides to build a cathedral –in the interest of religious harmony and outreach to Muslims. Does anyone believe either that his motives would be sincere or that he would be allowed to do this in the name of “religious freedom”? He would not, and rightly so.

Further, there are 200 mosques in Manhattan: no-one is suggesting closing any of them; land some distance away from ground zero has been offered and turned down. Muslims are as free to worship as anyone.

The fact that Imam Feisal even wants to build his Islamic centre is a portent of ill intent.

Allowing the mosque to be built is the Christian thing to do

First, the decision is primarily a political one: although freedom of religion is guaranteed in the US, this freedom, like any other, is not without its limits and doesn’t necessarily encompass building a place of worship anywhere – particularly when it infringes on another’s freedom. Time will tell, but I strongly suspect that Obama’s implicit approval of the mosque is another nail in his political coffin.

Second, from a Christian perspective some seem to think that allowing the mosque to be built is the tolerant and loving thing to do – after all, perhaps this Christian hyper-tolerance will so shock Muslims it will tip them over the edge into Christianity. Others think it is the wimpy thing to do.

A Christian who takes his faith seriously cannot believe that Islam is true – if it is, then Jesus was merely a prophet and Christianity a lie. While Christians have to render to Caesar what is Caesar’s – and freedom of religion is Caesar’s in our democracy – Christian tolerance does not mean acquiescing to the promotion of false faiths – there is absolutely no Christian imperative demanding tolerance of a ground zero mosque.

Vituperative Gems

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From here:

•  Lloyd George could not see a belt without hitting below it. (Margot Asquith)
•  [Benjamin Disraeli]  is a self-made man and worships his creator. (John Bright)
•   I only wish I knew [Bill Vander Zalm] before his lobotomy. (Kim Campbell)
•  [Stafford Cripps] has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire. (Winston Churchill)
•  Clement Attlee is a modest man, who has a good deal to be modest about. (Winston Churchill)
•  [William Gladstone] is a sophisticated rhetorician, inebriated with the exuberance of his verbosity. (Benjamin Disraeli)
•  In a disastrous fire in president Reagan’s library both books were burned. And the tragedy is he hadn’t finished colouring one. (Jonathan Hunt)
•   [Gerald Ford] is so dumb he can’t fart and chew gum at the same time. (Lyndon Baines Johnson)
•  He compresses the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know. (Abraham Lincoln)
•  When they circumcised Herbert Samuel they threw away the wrong bit. (David Lloyd George)

…  William Shakespeare –

•  His brain is as dry as the remaining biscuit after voyage. (As You Like It)
•  [You are] one that converses more with the buttock of the night than with the forehead of the morning. (Coriolanus)
•   God has given you one face and you make yourself another. (Hamlet)
•  What is this quintessence of dust? (Hamlet)
•   Thou whoreson zed! Thou unnecessary letter! (King Lear)
•   [You are] an index and prologue to the history of lust and foul thoughts. (Othello)
•  Ajax, that wears his brain on his belly and his guts in his head. He hath not so much brain as earwax. (Troilus and Cressida)

A few more random tidbits:

  • He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others. – Samuel Johnson
  • I didn’t attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it. – March Twain
  • Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go – Oscar Wilde
  • He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends – Oscar Wilde

A lost art these days, I fear.

Ground Zero Mosque: an Irishman has a better grip on what’s going on than Obama

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First the truth about jihad: it really is a military imperative:

It is disturbing to note that the President Obama and his advisers are now routinely saying things about Islam and American history that are, basically, not quite true.

John Brennan, the president’s top counter-terrorism adviser recently called jihad a “legitimate tenet of Islam,” and stated that “[we do not] describe our enemy as ‘jihadists’ or ‘Islamists’ because jihad is a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam, meaning to purify oneself or one’s community…”

However, a more knowledgeable voice, the respected historian Bernard Lewis, finds that “the overwhelming majority of [Islamic] classical theologians, jurists, and traditionalists…understood the obligation of jihad in a military sense.”

Second, the truth about Islam: it is an all encompassing ideology that is political, militarily aggressive and advocates killing those who don’t submit to it:

The Ayatollah Khomeini has said: “Islam makes it incumbent on all adult males, provided they are not disabled or incapacitated, to prepare themselves for the conquest of [other] countries so that the writ of Islam is obeyed in every country in the world. . . . But those who study Islamic Holy War will understand why Islam wants to conquer the whole world. . . . Those who know nothing of Islam pretend that Islam counsels against war. Those [who say this] are witless. Islam says: Kill all the unbelievers … Islam says: Whatever good there is exists thanks to the sword and in the shadow of the sword! People cannot be made obedient except with the sword! The sword is the key to Paradise, which can be opened only for the Holy Warriors! There are hundreds of other [Qur’anic] psalms and Hadiths [sayings of the Prophet] urging Muslims to value war and to fight. Does all this mean that Islam is a religion that prevents men from waging war? I spit upon those foolish souls who make such a claim.”

Third, Obama is in a state of advanced delusion about the historical role of Islam in the US:

In a recent editorial entitled “Obama’s Islamic America – What country is he talking about?” The Washington Times says, “President Obama says Islam has always been part of America, which raises the question, does the president know something about American history that we don’t? …. Mr. Obama said the rituals of Ramadan ‘remind us of the principles that we hold in common and Islam’s role in advancing justice, progress, tolerance and the dignity of all human beings. Ramadan is a celebration of a faith known for great diversity and racial equality. And here in the United States, Ramdan is a reminder that Islam has always been part of America….’

The Washington Times says “That Islam has had a major role in advancing justice, progress, tolerance and the dignity of all human beings may come as a surprise to Muslim women. Young Afghan girls who are having acid thrown in their faces on the way to school might want to offer their perspectives….Most puzzling is the President’s claim that ‘Islam has always been part of America.’ Islam had no influence on the origins and development of the United States. It contributed nothing to early American political culture, art, literature, music or any other aspect of the early nation.”
The Washington Times’ version of history is not as nice as Mr. Obama’s. It does, however, have the advantage of being far closer to the truth.

Fourth, the Cordoba Initiative is disseminating lies:

The Cordoba Initiative, the group behind the Ground Zero Mosque, also have a penchant for rewriting history and making dubious statements. Their website says: “Despite what many think, Islam and the West have a long history of coexistence and harmony. For nearly 800 years, the city of Cordoba in Spain endured as a shining example of tolerance among the three monotheistic religions.”

This is a complete falsification of history. Sadly, Islam and the West do not have a long history of harmony, as the Crusades and almost continuous conflict for 1400 years testifies. The Cordoba Initiative harks back to the Caphilate of Cordoba as a paradise of religious tolerance. It was in fact an imperialist Islamic state which had invaded and occupied Spain, a state in which Jews and Christians were either second class citizens or slaves until the native Spanish Christians repulsed Islam from Iberia in 1492.

Yet the Cordoba Initiative continues: “there is a close similarity between the values expressed in American secular documents and those characterizing Islamic Law…”
The idea that Sharia Law bears any real resemblance to the United States’ constitution, with its Enlightenment, common law and Christian-based values is beyond parody. It is, for example, reported that Imam Rauf, the man behind the Cordoba Initiative, will not sign a document saying that apostates from Islam should not be killed. Such killing is an accepted  tenet of Sharia law. However, I can’t recall reading that in the US Constitution.

Fifth, Obama is a weak leader, the last thing that the US needs at the moment:

Last Friday the president said that Muslims’ right to religious freedom “includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan.” If that’s his opinion, fair enough.

However, the very next day he said: “I was not commenting, and I will not comment, on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there…”
Except, very obviously, he was.

Perhaps the good that will come out of all this is that it will wake everyone up to the fact that a president who won’t comment on the wisdom of building a mosque at ground zero shouldn’t be president.

Reverend Colin Coward to “marry” Nigerian male model

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A fairytale romance, especially since they are both men:Add an Image

Reverend Colin Coward fell in love with Nigerian model Bobby Egbele after they met at a Christian conference in Togo in 2007. The pair plan to tie the knot in October

From here:

A 65-year-old vicar has stunned church bosses by announcing plans to ‘marry’ his 25-year-old Nigerian male model boyfriend.

Gay Reverend Colin Coward, a priest at St John the Baptist church in Devizes, Wiltshire, is entering into a civil partnership with his boyfriend Bobby Egbele.

But the marriage has caused a stir among Christians because the couple plan to receive a ‘blessing’ service in church after tying the knot.

Rev Coward has also refused to confirm that he will remain celibate following the union, which is a requirement the Church of England asks of its ordained gay clergy.

Today, Rev Coward, who lives with Bobby in Marston, near Devizes, revealed that he hopes his union sets a ‘visible example’ to other gay people within the church.

He said: ‘My goal is for everyone within the church to feel comfortable with the situation because at the moment the majority of gay Christians marry secretly.

‘It is a taboo subject but the church is now under huge pressure to change its stance and that pressure will only increase in the future.

……

Rev Coward’s boss, the Right Reverend Stephen David Conway, who is the Bishop of Ramsbury, is also expected to ask him to remain celibate – a request he plans to refuse.

Under Church of England laws sex is only permitted for married couples and same-sex civil partnerships are not officially regarded as marriage.

Rev Coward said: ‘I have big doubts whether he will ask me that because it’s a very intrusive question. It’s a ridiculous situation and a real mess.

‘What we’re allowed to do, as a gay couple, is what this is all about and certainly those in ordained ministry are not supposed to be sexually active.

‘But in practice, some bishops absolutely will give their approval knowing that a couple is in a civil partnership and that they are sharing the same bed, and will encourage them to do that.’

As Rev. Coward notes, “it’s a real mess”; what he fails to note is that he created the mess.

This particular mess is a good illustration of the idiocy of the Church of England’s permitting its clergy to “marry” other men while asking them to remain celibate – nudge, wink. A typical Anglican attempt to find middle ground that doesn’t – and shouldn’t – exist.

BBC’s flotilla film insufficiently anti-Semitic for “Free Gaza” agitators

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Good for the BBC – for a change:

LONDON – A BBC documentary screened this week that investigated the Gaza flotilla incident on May 31 is causing a storm of protest – from critics of Israel, who are furious that the program was not as hostile to Israel as they thought it should be.

The critics, including an activist from the Free Gaza movement who was aboard the Mavi Marmara, are organizing demonstrations on Sunday outside the BBC’s London headquarters and other BBC offices, and are calling for a mass campaign of complaints to the BBC in general and the program makers in particular.
…

Calls to action began even before the program was aired. The radical group Muslim Public Affairs Committee (MPAC), whose founder Asghar Bukhari made a donation to convicted Holocaust denier David Irving in 2006, urged people to complain to the BBC ahead of time.

The BBc’s reporting of mere facts must have come as a bit of a shock to the holocaust blinkered neo National Socialist nuts, whiny Muslims and trendy liberal elites: it doesn’t happen that often.

And it was so unfair to show it during Ramadan.

I get a lot of spam

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I’m sure you do, too; here are the subject lines of some of mine – those more or less fit to print :

Subject: Your wife photos attached
And to think I nearly forwarded them to my wife before looking at them – well, I didn’t actually look at them.

Subject: Your originality starts with branded accessories. You will be able to find a lady as soon as you buy Armani bangle.
I wish I’d known that when I was 15

Subject: Mr. mr.toad, we offer 80% off. several used an
All these years I’ve been looking for an “an” and now, finally it is within my grasp.

Subject: Sale note for mr.toad – 70% lowered prices. His York is
OK, stop these tantalising headings: His York is what?

Subject: 15mg x 60 Codeine $264.00 (+4 FreeViagra pills), No RX required! Highest Quality! Buy now! 12o3
Do I take the 60 Codeines before the 4 Viagras or after?

Subject: * Wal-Mart earnings rise adenectomy aggrandizing accomodate adneural acarus
No thanks, I cleaned the acarus out of my adneural yesterday

Subject: Bang her till she drops
Can’t, tonight’s the night for cleaning the acarus out of my adneural again.

Subject: Everyone dreams about a university degree but you can get it for almost FREE. You will become a valuable employee if …
What about those of us who are looking forward to being laid off and are trying to project an aura of worthlessness?