Prometheus 6

Obama...only supports letting religious institutions hire and fire based on faith in the non-taxpayer funded portions of their activities, said a senior adviser to the campaign, who spoke on condition of anonymity to more freely describe the new policy.

Look, they're going to do that anyway. But you can't be officially condoning things like that. What are you going to do with the lawsuit that asks why, if churches can discriminate in hiring based on strongly held belief, everyone else is denied that right? What are you going to do with the church that fills their taxpayer-funded positions internally from among people hired for the non-taxpayer funded positions?

Ideology-Based Hiring at Justice Broke Laws, Investigation Finds
By Carrie Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 25, 2008; A11

Senior Justice Department officials broke civil service laws by rejecting scores of young applicants who had links to Democrats or liberal organizations, according to a biting report issued yesterday.

The report by the Justice Department inspector general and the Office of Professional Responsibility concluded that a pair of high-ranking political appointees who are no longer with the department had violated department policy and the Civil Service Reform Act by using ideological reasons to scuttle the candidacy of lawyers who applied to the elite honors and summer intern programs.

In one instance, steering committee member Esther Slater McDonald deemed "unacceptable" an applicant who professed admiration for the environmental group Greenaction and passed over another with ties to the Poverty and Race Research Action Council, the report said.

Back to when this partisanship was discovered...not by looking at this trainee program but actual hires for powerful slots. Folks like Monica Goodling, who worked with Gonzales of the stuff he resigned over. Just as she resigned. After taking the fifth, which is why I can only talk about 'stuff'.

Monica graduated...I guess you can say that...from Regent Law School. Which sucks .

"It used to be that high-level DOJ jobs were generally reserved for the best of the legal profession," wrote a contributor to The New Republic website . ". . . That a recent graduate of one of the very worst (and sketchiest) law schools with virtually no relevant experience could ascend to this position is a sure sign that there is something seriously wrong at the DOJ."

And she's not the only one.

The Regent law school was founded in 1986, when Oral Roberts University shut down its ailing law school and sent its library to Robertson's Bible-based college in Virginia. It was initially called "CBN University School of Law" after the televangelist's Christian Broadcasting Network, whose studios share the campus and which provided much of the funding for the law school. (The Coors Foundation is also a donor to the university.) The American Bar Association accredited Regent's law school in 1996.

Not long ago, it was rare for Regent graduates to join the federal government. But in 2001, the Bush administration picked the dean of Regent's government school, Kay Coles James , to be the director of the Office of Personnel Management -- essentially the head of human resources for the executive branch. The doors of opportunity for government jobs were thrown open to Regent alumni.

"We've had great placement," said Jay Sekulow , who heads a non profit law firm based at Regent that files lawsuits aimed at lowering barriers between church and state. "We've had a lot of people in key positions."

Many of those who have Regent law degrees, including Goodling, joined the Department of Justice. Their path to employment was further eased in late 2002, when John Ashcroft , then attorney general, changed longstanding rules for hiring lawyers to fill vacancies in the career ranks.

Previously, veteran civil servants screened applicants and recommended whom to hire, usually picking top students from elite schools.

In a recent Regent law school newsletter, a 2004 graduate described being interviewed for a job as a trial attorney at the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division in October 2003. Asked to name the Supreme Court decision from the past 20 years with which he most disagreed, he cited Lawrence v. Texas, the ruling striking down a law against sodomy because it violated gay people's civil rights.

"When one of the interviewers agreed and said that decision in Lawrence was 'maddening,' I knew I correctly answered the question," wrote the Regent graduate . The administration hired him for the Civil Rights Division's housing section -- the only employment offer he received after graduation, he said.

We need to dr-Regentize our government.

Report Says Partisanship Reigned in Justice Department Hiring Program
By Carrie Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 24, 2008; A07

High-ranking political appointees at the Justice Department labored to stock a prestigious hiring program with young conservatives in a five-year-long attempt to reshape the department's ranks, according to an inspector general's report to be released today.

You've Been Left Behind | Services  

Document storage and "Rapture" triggered email messaging system.

• Store up to 250mb of documents 
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Services Overview

We have set up a system to send documents by the email, to the addresses you provide, 6 days after the "Rapture" of the Church. This occurs when 3 of our 5 team members scattered around the U.S fail to log in over a 3 day period. Another 3 days are given to fail safe any false triggering of the system.

via Republic of T

Iraqis claim Marines are pushing Christianity in Fallujah
Jamal Naji and Leila Fadel | McClatchy Newspapers
last updated: May 29, 2008 07:07:49 AM

FALLUJAH, Iraq — At the western entrance to the Iraqi city of Fallujah Tuesday, Muamar Anad handed his residence badge to the U.S. Marines guarding the city. They checked to be sure that he was a city resident, and when they were done, Anad said, a Marine slipped a coin out of his pocket and put it in his hand.

Out of fear, he accepted it, Anad said. When he was inside the city, the college student said, he looked at one side of the coin. "Where will you spend eternity?" it asked.

He flipped it over, and on the other side it read, "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. John 3:16."

"They are trying to convert us to Christianity," said Anad, a Sunni Muslim like most residents of this city in Anbar province. At home, he told his story, and his relatives echoed their disapproval: They'd been given the coins, too, he said.

"He wants us to support him, but as soon as his back was against the wall, he overreacted. He is now less likely to get the evangelical vote and will have a difficult time getting strong endorsements from other ministers," said Bishop Harry R. Jackson Jr., founder and chairman of the High Impact Leadership Coalition, an evangelical group that advises ministers on political and policy issues....

Like Hagee, Parsley is a leader in a nondenominational movement within evangelical Christian churches, called "Word of Faith," that subscribes to a "prosperity gospel." It teaches that followers not only save their souls when they accept Jesus but also gain power to claim personal wealth and physical health through prayer and the spoken word....

Parsley tells people that he lives his own message. He and his family reside in a 7,462-square-foot house, valued at more than $1 million, on a 24-acre gated property.

At age 51, he is more than two decades younger than Pat Robertson, the 78-year-old chairman of the Christian Broadcasting Network, and is considered to be among the next generation of leaders who will be major political players. Last year, the Religion News Service called Parsley one of the nation's top 10 influential "kingmakers."

Using his mega-church, his television and radio shows, and two best-selling books. Parsley elevated his status among the political elite. In 2004, he campaigned for President Bush in Ohio, where he won a narrow victory.

"He started appearing on 'Larry King Live.' He wrote books that many people were reading. He became a force among politicians,'' Lee said. "McCain had to take him seriously."

In Rebuking Minister, McCain May Have Alienated Evangelicals
By Kimberly Kindy
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 29, 2008; A08

The Rev. Rod Parsley paces the stage, wiping his forehead and shouting to his congregation in a taped sermon that marriage is under attack by "tortured and angry homosexuals."

During another of his nationally broadcast television shows, he compares Planned Parenthood to the Ku Klux Klan, saying that its goal is to "eliminate" blacks. And at another service at his 12,000-member World Harvest Church in Columbus, Ohio, he punches the air and calls Islam a "false religion" that God has told America to destroy.

"We were built for battle! We were created for conflict! We get off on warfare!" he adds.

You think I'm joking? Ask him yourself.

That whole death and rebirth thing wasn't enough for Donohue, I guess. 

In his book “Jerusalem Countdown,” Mr. Hagee accused the Vatican of collaborating with Hitler in the Holocaust. In addition, some critics have interpreted Mr. Hagee’s references to “the great whore” prophesied in the Book of Revelation as a slur on the Roman Catholic Church....

Mr. McCain said two weeks ago that he was “glad to have his endorsement,”

I think it's pretty significant that it took weeks of negotiation to get this little concession.

McCain Backer Regrets Comments on Catholics
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN

The Rev. John C. Hagee, whose anti-Catholic remarks created a controversy when Senator John McCain received his endorsement for the Republican presidential nomination with fanfare, has issued a letter expressing regret for “any comments that Catholics have found hurtful.”

The letter was issued after weeks of conversations between Mr. Hagee and Roman Catholic Republicans about repairing the damage to Mr. McCain’s campaign and the alliance built over many years between conservative Catholics and evangelicals.

Oliver Willis pointed this out.

Magic trick costs teacher job
By: Janie Porter

Land 'O Lakes, Florida -- The stories in the news about inappropriate relationships between teachers and students have been overwhelming. There was even a substitute teacher in New Port Richey who got in trouble after investigators say she had a relationship with an underage student.

Well, another Pasco County substitute teacher's job is on the line, but this time it's because of a magic trick.

The charge from the school district — Wizardry!

"You are talking about combining the great American traditions of religion and consumption.''

''You drink it, and you just feel like you are in church''

sigh

Maybe I should give up. 

Holy water aims to quench thirst of body and soul
By AUDRA D.S. BURCH

The instructions are simple: Read the Prayer . . / Drink the Water . . . / Believe in God! / Believe in Yourself!

Spiritual Water, the faith-inspired venture of two Sunrise businessmen, offers its drinkers clearer focus, positive thinking and connection to a higher power.

The 11 bottles in the company's collection bear prayers and impressively detailed images of Jesus Christ, St. Michael and the Virgin Mary. Spiritual Water joins a broad slice of feel-good products -- Testamint, Bible Gum and other bottled holy waters -- emerging at the intersection of religion and commerce, entrepreneurship and pop culture.

Jesus Made Me Puke
Matt Taibbi Undercover with the Christian Right
MATT TAIBBI Posted May 01, 2008 12:00 AM

I had been attending the Cornerstone Church for weeks, but this was really my first day of school. I had joined Cornerstone — a megachurch in the Texas Hill Country — to get a look inside the evangelical mind-set that gave the country eight years of George W. Bush. The church's pastor, John Hagee, is one of the most influential evangelical preachers in the country — not because his ministry is so very large (although he claims up to 4.5 million viewers a week for his Sunday sermons) but because of his near-absolute conquest of a very trendy niche in the market: Christian Zionism.

To Catholics like me who oppose liberal abortion laws but also think that other issues -- war or peace, health care, just wages, immigration, affordable housing, torture -- actually matter, the idea that abortion trumps everything, all the time, no matter what, is both bad religion and bad civics. It's not, for God's sake, as though we're in Nazi Germany and supporting Hitler.

Or is it? Amazingly, at least one influential bishop has made just that comparison publicly, and it's a good bet that many others believe it privately.

"In our country we have, for the most part, allowed the party of death and the court system it has produced to eliminate, since 1973, upwards of 40 million of our fellow citizens without allowing them to see the light of day," wrote Rockford, Ill., Bishop Thomas Doran in 2006. "No doubt, we shall soon outstrip the Nazis in doing human beings to death." He continued, "We know . . . that adherents of one political party would place us squarely on the road to suicide as a people."

That Doran forgets his history (five of the seven justices who supported Roe v. Wade were actually appointed by Republican presidents) doesn't obscure his point. He is not alone among Catholic bishops in his attempt to anathematize the Democrats, to make the party and its candidates illegitimate in the mind of the electorate.

I Voted for Obama. Will I Go Straight to. . . ?
By Joe Feuerherd
Sunday, February 24, 2008; B05

Like most Maryland Democrats, I voted for Sen. Barack Obama in the recent Potomac Primary. By doing so, according to the leaders of my church, I put my soul at risk. That's right, says the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops -- tap the touch screen for a pro-abortion-rights candidate, and you're probably punching your ticket to Hell.

Religion Joins Custody Cases, to Judges’ Unease
By NEELA BANERJEE

MADISON, Ala. — On a January night nine years ago, Laura Snider was saved.

A 27-year-old single mother at the time, Mrs. Snider felt she had ruined her life through a disastrous marriage and divorce. But in her kitchen that night, after reading pamphlets and Bible passages that her boss had pointed her to, she realized she was a sinner, she said, she prayed for forgiveness, and put her trust in Christ.

Four years later, the conservative brand of Christianity Mrs. Snider embraced became the source of a bitter, continuing custody battle over her only child, Libby Mashburn.

In an effort to evangelize among the nation's elite, evangelicals have launched hundreds of invitation-only programs and organizations. Business leaders in Manhattan conduct Bible studies that meet in private clubs. Fellowship groups in Washington are reserved for diplomats and members of Congress. The CEO Forum, an invitation-only group for CEOs of large corporations, has been extremely important to the religious formation of many business executives. And, ironically, meetings designed to spur Christian philanthropy are held at fancy hotels and resorts. Indeed, the evangelical advance into the nation's higher circles has entailed an extension of, instead of a departure from, the privileged and powerful worlds these leaders regularly inhabit. Yet how does an exclusive religious fellowship square with Christian teaching?

A gated community in the evangelical world
Many of the nation’s most powerful believers — presidents, CEOs, entertainers and athletes — won’t be found in the pews on Sundays, thus creating a growing gap between them and ‘the people.’ It’s a trend that is having a profound effect on this faith movement.
By D. Michael Lindsay

President Bush is Public Evangelical No. 1. His presidency is the capstone of evangelicals' 30-year rise from the margins of society to the halls of power. But while the president has gone to great lengths to testify publicly to his faith, he often doesn't do the one thing that defines most evangelicals — go to church. He attends chapel at Camp David and other special services, but the president rarely can be found in a congregation on Sunday morning. (In contrast, Presidents Carter and Clinton both attended services in Washington during their tenures.)

Surprised? When most of us think of devout evangelicals, we think of people who attend church regularly and are active in their local congregations. Yet many of the most prominent evangelicals do neither. They regularly attend Bible studies and religious gatherings, including last week's National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, but many can't be found in the pews on Sunday.

May Florida come to be seen as the leading edge of a trend in this regard. 

Step one: arrest the pastor

step two: tie the pastor to the pol

7 murders, including three doctors, two clinic employees, a security guard, and an escort
17 attempted murders
383 death threats
153 incidents of assault and battery
3 kidnappings
41 bombings
173 arsons
91 attempted bombings or arsons
619 bomb threats
655 bioterror attacks (all hoaxes), 554 of which were committed by one man
1630 incidents of trespassing
1264 incidents of vandalism
100 attacks with butyric acid stink bombs

100 Greatest Quotes from fundamentalist christian chat rooms

The gospel of money
Megachurch pastors and broadcast ministries are drawing renewed scrutiny for living lavishly off the faithful’s funds. Fortunately, a divide is emerging in the world of evangelicals: the ‘haves’ and the ‘will have none of it.’
By Mark I. Pinsky

"The love of money," the New Testament teaches in I Timothy 6:10, "is the root of all evil." But what about some televangelists' fondness for major bling — such as multiple, multimillion dollar estates, luxury cars, vacation homes, exotic trips and private jets? Does that make them, in the words of one author, "pimps in the pulpit?"

Many outside the evangelical movement are puzzled by the apparent lack of outrage following reports of high-living, tax-exempt religious broadcasters. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, has been looking into six megachurch pastors and broadcast ministries, requesting financial records. Richard Roberts has stepped down as president of Oral Roberts University following charges that he used the school's resources for family perks, such as a trip to the Bahamas for his daughter.

These charges come as no surprise to those within the evangelical world. Such tales of excess and profligacy have been an open secret for years.

If you register and log in, you can download a free pdf of the book.

Science, Evolution, and Creationism (2008)
National Academy of Sciences (NAS)

How did life evolve on Earth? The answer to this question can help us understand our past and prepare for our future. Although evolution provides credible and reliable answers, polls show that many people turn away from science, seeking other explanations with which they are more comfortable.

...the world's most embarassing web site.

Albuquerque Has Renewal of Attacks on Abortion
By DAN FROSCH

A rash of attacks on abortion and family planning clinics has struck Albuquerque this month, the first such violence there in nearly a decade.

Two attacks occurred early Tuesday at two buildings belonging to Planned Parenthood of New Mexico, according to Albuquerque police and fire officials. An arson fire damaged a surgery center the organization uses for abortions, and the windows of a Planned Parenthood family planning clinic 12 blocks away were smashed, the officials said.

Neither building sustained significant damage, and activities at both of them resumed Wednesday, a spokeswoman said.

The attacks came just weeks after the Albuquerque clinic run by a nationally known abortion provider, Dr. Curtis Boyd, was destroyed by arsonists on Dec. 6.

The ministries contacted by Mr. Grassley’s office preach a so-called prosperity gospel, among the most popular evangelistic messages on television and the Internet. Prosperity gospel assures followers that the more they give, including in the form of tithes to the church, the more they will receive from God. Some prosperity gospel preachers live lavishly, as proof of the abundance God can bring....

At the outset, some churches, including those outside the inquiry, argued that Mr. Grassley’s inquiry violated the constitutional separation of church and state. But some legal and church scholars said that the government was within its rights to examine whether tax-exempt entities like churches are abiding by the law.

Senator Awaiting Records of Ministries’ Finances
By NEELA BANERJEE

Six weeks after Senator Charles E. Grassley asked six well-known evangelistic ministries to provide information on how they spent donors’ money, only two have complied.

The lawyers for one ministry have asked for more time from Mr. Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, who sent letters to the organizations in early November. Three other ministries have not been in recent contact with the committee or have said they will not cooperate.

Among those voting for the resolution was a Jewish member of Congress who has asked me not to print his name. He was outraged and appalled by the bill, he told me. But he was also afraid. He thought it would hurt him with his mostly Christian constituency if he voted against it. He told some of his colleagues about his anguish. They advised him not to be stupid. It would be better for him politically if he voted for it.

It's possible that the 10 who voted "present" also had problems with the bill but decided it was safer not to vote against it. One could also assume that some of those who were absent were not there so as not to have to deal with the problem.

Congress's Bullying Pulpit
By Sally Quinn
Sunday, December 23, 2007; B07

As a child, I went to a small school in rural Alabama near an Army post where my father was stationed. It was a very Christian town, and our teacher was "born again."

This was decades ago, but I remember clearly how she used to tell us that we must accept Jesus Christ as our personal savior. Then she would ask for hands to see who had. By age 11 I had become a nonbeliever. My father was in the Army and had fought in World War II and Korea; I concluded quickly that no loving God could have allowed those atrocities to be committed.

But we had all seen our teacher, when crossed, call an unlucky member of our class up to the front of the room, make the student lie down on her desk and be paddled. The humiliation was worse than the pain. So, when she called on us to admit that we had accepted Jesus as our savior, I dutifully raised my hand.

Thank goodness, those days are over, you might be thinking. Nothing like that could happen in this country today.

“Where the difference is, we provide both sides of the story,” Mr. Morris said. On its Web site, the institute declares, “All things in the universe were created and made by God in the six literal days of the creation week” and says it “equips believers with evidences of the Bible’s accuracy and authority through scientific research, educational programs, and media presentations, all conducted within a thoroughly biblical framework.”

It also says “the harmful consequences of evolutionary thinking on families and society (abortion, promiscuity, drug abuse, homosexuality and many others) are evident all around us.”

Green Light for Institute on Creation in Texas
By RALPH BLUMENTHAL

HOUSTON — A Texas higher education panel has recommended allowing a Bible-based group called the Institute for Creation Research to offer online master’s degrees in science education.

The action comes weeks after the Texas Education Agency’s director of science, Christine Castillo Comer, lost her job after superiors accused her of displaying bias against creationism and failing to be “neutral” over the teaching of evolution.