Moore, Trump and the Right’s New Religion

New York Times ^ | 11/16/2017 | Charles M. Blow

[SeekAndFind]

I have lived my whole life with a Republican Party with which I disagreed, but at least understood.

The first election I can remember was the presidential election of 1980. I was 10 years old. I didn’t know much about politics or party platforms. I only knew that the former peanut-farmer president, Jimmy Carter, was running against a former actor, Ronald Reagan.

But it was in that election that Jerry Falwell and his Moral Majority reintroduced religious activism into American politics. Speaking at a Dallas convention of Christian fundamentalists, Falwell proclaimed: “During the 1980s, preachers, we have a threefold primary responsibility. No. 1: Get people saved. No. 2: Get them baptized. No. 3: Get them registered to vote.”

The religious activism was in many ways a direct response to the strides made in the 1960s and 1970s on racial equality, women’s rights and gay rights.

In a way, their driving motivation was to make religious law into American law, really not so unlike the Shariah law they so fear and despise.

My brothers and I stayed up late with my mother to watch the returns on election night in 1980. When it was clear that the actor had beaten the farmer, my mother quietly left the room, and an air of solemnity and sadness filled it.

For the three decades that followed, I could count on one thing: the conservative right was the religious right. That was its branding, if not always its behavior. It was as if the foot soldiers for the conservative right had read only half of the Bible they thumped. They were harsh and vindictive like the God of the Old Testament, not generous and inclusive like the Jesus of the New Testament.

[Jim W N]

I don’t want to ignore it necessarily, just deal with it in a MUCH smarter way.

[NetAddicted]

Apparently, accusations equals guilt, nowadays.