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Thread ID: 14842 | Posts: 1 | Started: 2004-08-27
2004-08-27 22:03 | User Profile
[url]http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2004/08/26/special_reports/religion/21_45_158_25_04.txt[/url]
Two political preachers stake out foreign policy extremes for the 2004 campaign
*By: RICHARD J. OSTLING - Associated Press *
August 25, 2004
Two recently published manifestos may be poorly reasoned but at least they stake out the extremes among political preachers in this time of terrorism and partisanship:
_"Why Bush Must Go: A Bishop's Faith-Based Challenge" is by radical liberal Bennett J. Sims, retired bishop of the Episcopal Church's Atlanta Diocese and a clergy counterpart to Michael Moore. His work is recommended by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Bishop John Spong and the Rev. William Sloane Coffin.
_"The American Prophecies: Ancient Scriptures Reveal Our Nation's Future" comes from radically conservative evangelist Michael D. Evans of Bedford, Texas. He considers President Bush a wimp on terrorism and support for Israel but ---- reading between the lines ---- presumably prefers him to any Democrat.
Though Sims has a religious publisher (Continuum), Evans' tract comes from Warner Faith, a secular conglomerate's bid for the lucrative evangelical book market.
Evans thinks U.S. foreign policy must align with Israel under pretty much any circumstances.
He asserts that America was attacked on Sept. 11, 2001, because of its "support for Islamic terrorists in Israel" and an "unholy covenant" with oil-rich Arab nations that descended from biblical Ishmael and are led by "intolerant, barbaric bigots" and anti-Semites.
Sims turns paranoid regarding Sept. 11, seeing a "rising tide of suspicion" that the Bush administration was guilty of "calculated neglect of danger" and purposely disregarded intelligence warnings about what was coming.
"There may be no way short of revolution to dislodge the fierce force of apocalyptic right-wing ideology" that controls America, writes apocalyptic left-wing ideologist Sims.
Sims' main theme is that Bush endangers the environment and human survival by resorting to "unilateral war-making" and "imperialist violence," as in Iraq, rather than the feminist-inspired "international peace-seeking collaboration" the bishop favors. Ronald Reagan also takes some lumps but Bill Clinton is exempt from criticism.
Sims was an officer on a U.S. Navy destroyer during World War II but turned pacifist regarding America's use of military power. It's unclear whether he thinks violence by enemies of America and Israel is ever justifiable.
He sees moral equivalence between radical Muslims and "Christian-Zionist" America, depicted as "two snarling and self-righteous religious fundamentalisms" that both promote holy war.
As he retells ancient history, peaceful paganism was supplanted by the Old Testament Israelites with their "violence-prone male dominance." The result is "a presumed 'divinely biblical' blueprint for a predatory modern Israeli takeover of Palestinian lands," he charges.
Evans is an outspoken exponent of the Christian-Zionist zealotry Sims abhors.
Citing the biblical prophet Zechariah, Evans says "America is under a biblical curse" because it's willing to see Jerusalem divided. But God will bless the United States if it moves its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and bars Palestinians from ever governing any part of the Holy City.
He also thinks America is wrong to be rebuilding Iraq because it's the successor of biblical Babylon, which God declared "cursed for all time."
Though other prophecy preachers have downplayed the scenario since 1989, Evans clings to the claim that modern Russia is the biblical Gog and Magog and destined to attack Israel in the End Times. He also ropes in the European Union, even though it now exceeds the 10 nations that such preachers used to see predicted in the 10 toes of Daniel 2:42.
It's a florid version of the theology known as Dispensationalism. Though Protestant evangelicals generally sympathize with Israel, many of them ---- perhaps a majority ---- shun this sort of belief.
Likewise, many Episcopalians and other mainline Protestants are likely to spurn "Sims-think."
Though their books emphasize foreign policy, Evans and Sims take opposite sides on domestic matters such as the homosexual issue. Sims proceeds to target ballooning federal deficits, "consumerist market capitalism" and of course the "suspected attack" upon American democracy in the 2000 Florida balloting.