Your School. Your Paper. Since 1936.

The Suffolk Journal

Your School. Your Paper. Since 1936.

The Suffolk Journal

Your School. Your Paper. Since 1936.

The Suffolk Journal

Editor’s word: March 6, 2011

An April 2 New York Times article titled, ” An Iowa Stop in a Broad Effort to Revitalize the Religious Right” noted a recent religious romp in Iowa among Evangelical pastors, hosted by the one and only Mike Huckabee.

Pastors/ministers and their spouses  were invited to an all expenses-paid two-day trip for a Pastor’s Briefing at a Sheraton Hotel. It was all a part of the Iowa Renewal Project, a program that features several right-wing “superstars” as well as four presidential contenders in an effort to bring more evangelicals into the political arena.

The recent meeting in Iowa was only one of at least 14 similar meetings in the last several years in which pastors and their spouses are treated to an all-expenses paid trip that is basically a conservative ego trip. And we have Mike Huckabee to thank in large part for all of the nonsense that comes with these “meetings.”

At the meetings, right-wing leaders and public figures speak, as well as leaders of the church. They talk about conserving the America that once was — the America where people had to hide from themselves and real life in a sense. The meetings are completely counterproductive, emphasizing the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman in a world where it’s finally OK, if not pretty cool, to be openly gay. They  talk about the humanity that lies within an unborn baby and the importance of abolishing abortion  in the country completely. They talk of the importance of restoring America as a Christian nation, truly “one nation under God.” They talk of the Environmental Protection Agency spreading lies, and even  say that the Obama health care law is one step closer to the U.S. becoming a dictatorship.

And the scary thing is, people are buying it. Lots of them. So far, these meetings have been attended by nearly 10,000 pastors from across the nation, who then spread their Republican enlightenments to their parishes. And as if the Evangelical community weren’t involved enough in politics (or batshit radical about them), fools like Huckabee and Michelle Bachmann are calling out for more. 2012 may be a very scary year, and we may be one step closer to becoming a one religion, almost Puritanical society.

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Editor’s word: March 6, 2011