Ain't it the Truth

By Tom Gilroy on The Huffington Post

It was under Reagan that the whole religious 'Great Awakening' began, which wasn't so much an embracing of religion as it was a repudiation of the social advances of the 60's, with Donald Wildmon and James Dobson peddling their pre-Focus on Family 'Promise Keepers,' (where men rule the household), Phyllis Schafly screaming equal rights for women undermines 'family values,' and Charles Schaar Murray declaring--with a straight face--blacks do worse in America simply because they're stupid. It was an awakening, all right.

But 'The Great Awakening' now brings us faith-based leaders promoting torture and war, who lie to us on a daily basis, and violate our constitutionally guaranteed rights. The 'national debate' about values is reduced to quippy bumper stickers like 'It's Okay To Pray' or 'One Man + One Woman = Marriage.' Our national conversation on ethics, morality, and faith has become a kind of WWF 'Religious Smackdown.'

Is it a coincidence that our most pro-faith president is also our biggest law-breaking president, presiding over our most scandalized administration in history? You tell me. Is it coincidence that our pro-faith vice president has a gay daughter he'd prevent from adopting a child or marrying her lover, a great Christian whose wife converts from writing lesbian romance novels to ethics primers for kids in the blink of a presidential campaign, a soldier of Christ who tells a senator on the Senate floor to go fuck himself? You tell me.

What all this tells us is claiming to be Christian, on it's own, signifies nothing. In fact, given the religious makeup of our populace, pedophiles, thieves, liars, hypocrites and torturers in America are more likely to be Christians than Jews, Buddhists, Muslims--or atheists. It's simple math.

This is why the Founding Fathers--God-fearing men all--were smart enough to keep religion out of government. They knew the power appealing to a people's spirituality could have, that faith could be invoked while hiding great violations of it's very tenets, encouraging otherwise docile people to do and say despicable things, to hate each other, to threaten the very fabric of a progressive, democratic, rational society.

It's not a coincidence that the most 'faith-based' government we've had in over a century is also the most corrupt, secretive, murderous, lying, and law breaking in history. In the name of 'reawakening' Christianity in government, Bush, et al, have shown us why it should be locked out. As soon as a politician starts quoting the Bible and going on about his faith, we should run him out of town.

Posted on The Human Stain