Do the Fundies know that Born Again Bush doesn't go to church?

[Virginian]

This paragon of virtue, this second son of God, this man who was chosen by God to lead us through 9/11 :eyes: is not a regular church goer.

I would like for someone to bring up religion at the town meeting tomorrow.

I believe Senator Kerry goes at least weekly. There was discussion recently about the church barring him from sacrements because he wouldn't impose the Church's viewpoint on a woman's right to choose.

Bush has a lot of money, If he were truly a Born Again, he would tithe, give 10% to the church. :think:

I think his Born again stuff is an act. I think that is why he mocked Carla Faye Tucker; he couldn't believe that someone actually does turn their life around when they find Christ because he only pretended to. It was one good way to dupe the fundies into voting for him. :think: They need to find out that he is really the false prophet the bible warned them about.

[Kikosexy2]

1. The...

Antichrist never attends church--I thought you all knew.

[Carla in Ca]

24. And, as a side note, isn't it grand that

Trininy Broadcasting (Paul "sex with another man" Crouch) is being investigated! They have $260 mil and church investigators want to know why they still ask for donations.
<http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/10/52004a.asp>

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. Kerry goes to a church near his house

and the priest there gives him the Sacrement; not every Catholic agrees with the Bishop of St. Louis.

I'm not Catholic, but I have many Catholic friends, many of whom are trying to move their Church to take a more progressive stance. I think Kerry would agree with them.

[liberal_in_GA]

26. The Pope also spoke out against the War

but you don't hear any bishops harping on that. :grr:

[dogtag]

3. Hey, it's hard enough being president! You want me to take

time out of my busy schedule to go to church? That's asking way too much.

[Virginian]

4. Jimmy Carter taught Sunday School when he was Pres.

He seemed to find the time.
Bush finds plenty of time for everything else from golf to Bike crashing. He exercises daily but you can't tell it by his spare tire.

[dogtag]

8. Jimmy never whined about hard work.

[colonel odis]

5. it'd be too much of a distraction, what with the minister constantly

having to defer to w., asking him his divine will, if his father would speak through him to the congregants, all that sort of thing.

w. not going to church is perfectly logical. plus, those hangovers can be a mofro when you're sitting in the pew with a pounding head.

[comradebillyboy]

6. probably is a follower of benny hinn

or "precious" paul crouch or some other loathsome tv evangelist

[leftofthedial]

7. they wouldn't care

fundies are irrational

[gmoney]

9. Church is optional for fundies

From my experience, most fundies don't cotton much towards churchin' -- gets in the way of the personal relationship with Jebus, and all. Like somehow they're above it.

Declaring yourself "saved" is a license to kill/steal/etc. for most of these folks -- "Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven."

So Bush can do anything he wants then just claim that he was moved by the spirit of Jebus, and that Jebus will forgive him because Jebus is his own personal trainer, I mean, Lord and Saviour.

The pathology is just staggering...

[Barney Rocks]

15. exactly!

that is what they tell me---"Jesus and me" "Jesus and me" it is my personal relationship with Jesus--it is Jesus and me.

Catholics (like Kerry) are different--the church IS the center of their religious community.

But a fundy apparently can stay home--and claim that he is reading and praying and fellowshiping on a personal level with Jesus--and I guess that that is just fine with other fundies. At least that is the impression I am getting...

:shrug:

[Voltaire]

10. The sumbitch is no more Christian than my toenail clippings

So why WOULD he bother going to church??

[davhill]

11. Why should he

He has a direct line to the Almighty, doesn't he.

[LiviaOlivia]

12. Carter and Clinton vs. W

The New Republic Online
http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20041011&s=sullivan101104
subscription req'd

WHY W. DOESN'T GO TO CHURCH.
Empty Pew
by Amy Sullivan
Post date: 10.05.04


<snip>

Around Washington, D.C., it's considered bad form to point out that Bush doesn't regularly attend church. "You don't have to go to church to be a good religious person," argue his defenders. And they're right. They have made much political hay, however, over polls that indicate Democratic voters attend church less frequently than Republicans, so even the most brazen feel compelled to offer explanations for Bush's absence from church membership rolls.

The first excuse conservatives provide is that Bush can't possibly be expected to have time to go to church, what with being leader of the free world and all. Yet, during Jimmy Carter's four years in the White House, he found time not only to attend a Baptist church in the Washington, D.C., area, but to teach Sunday school there as well. For a presidential delegator like Bush--who has freed up enough time to spend approximately one-third of his presidency on vacation--finding a few hours for church should be a snap.

But, even if Bush had the time for church services, supporters protest, the security precautions necessary for a presidential visit would drive congregants away. This is the exact same argument the Reagan White House trotted out to explain why the patron saint of the religious right hardly ever attended church from 1981 to 1989. Bomb-sniffing dogs, metal detectors, and security personnel, so the theory goes, would pose an onerous burden for the average church. "The president wants to avoid the sort of major weekly disruption that would be caused if he went to church," says David Aikman, author of A Man of Faith: The Spiritual Journey of George W. Bush.

As it happens, I attended Foundry United Methodist Church for several years during the late '90s when the Clintons were members there. The only imposition was the extra ten seconds it took to walk through a metal detector. Parishioners did not leave the church in droves; on the contrary, many were pleasantly surprised to find that the Clintons played an active role in church life, particularly while Chelsea was involved in the choir and youth group.

<snip>


Amy Sullivan is an editor of The Washington Monthly.

[Virginian]

22. Thanks, I needed that.

I just sent it to an undecided friend in Ohio. We used to sing in the church choir together.

[MoonRiver]

13. He probably has his own burning bush in the WH lawn.

:crazy:

[Barney Rocks]

14. been there, tried

that argument with the fundies already.

Interestingly enough, the fundies that I know don't seem to think church attendence is important--if you have the conversion in your heart then you are saved.

They keep throwing at me--"those who worship in spirit and in truth"? And saying that they don't have to worship in "temples made with human hands" because they worship in spirit and in truth. So I guess that you don't HAVE to go to church--you just have god in your heart?

I don't get this, because I was brought up to attend church (although I don't always do it now).

Bottom Line: I think I am going to give up arguing with the fundies. I always pick up something that sounds good over here on DU--I take it over and try to use it on the fundies--and I get my ass handed to me every time. I don't understand the way fundies think, I don't think many here do--and we probably are not going to be able to get anywhere with them at least not easily--they are stubborn as all get out.

[Bullshot]

16. I'm of the opinion that everything about Bush is an act.

They've tried to package him as the new Ronald Reagan, with religion. I think his "born again" facade is bullshit, just like his "ranch" at Crawford, Texas.

This guy isn't smart enough to wipe his ass without a script. And it may be that he's down to his last couple of brain cells because of all of the drugs and alcohol he's abused.

[Shopaholic]

18. That would be my one of my top two questions for *

if I had a chance to ask him anything. The second would be "So why, as Commander-in-Chief, have you not seen fit to attend the funeral of a single servicemember who has died in either Iraq or Afghanistan?"

[Rose Siding]

17. As long as he pulls US support for the UN Family Planning fund...

he could keep a harem, for all they care.

Otherwise, something like last year's "F--- Saddam. We're taking him out" would have made a ripple.

[pelagius]

19. Bush has gone to church in DC...

...at least once that I know of. An acquaintance of mine served as a curate (junior clergy) at St John's Episcopal Church (on Lafayette Square) and Bush showed up one morning my friend was scheduled to preach. The senior minister decided he'd take the pulpit that day. :-)

Ironically, the Episcopal Church is one of the most gay-friendly major Christian churches and, with some exceptions, a moderate-to-progressive socio-political outlook. In fact, most of the right-wing fundies abhor the Episcopal Church.

Never did hear what the minister preached about specifically, but there were many Biblical references to social justice made. I suspect it didn't sink in for W. BTW -- my friend says he hasn't been back since.

Check out the church at:

http://www.stjohns-dc.org/

[DemocracyInaction]

20. I was wondering when someone was going to notice!!

It's just like his old man. They only go when "expected"--a religious holiday or a national tragedy. THEY LITERALLY DO NOT GO TO CHURCH!! Any time he would have gotten near a church there would have been tons of photos in the press the next day---remember when Clinton used to go and reporters would shout questions to him, etc.?? Any of the 'faithful' believe you should be in church like at least twice a week---services and some Bible study. They are so goddamned used and too stupid to believe it. The Bush's mock God as much as they mock the fools that worship them as "good people".

[eriffle]

21. The Many Sins of Bushco

Thou Shalt Not Kill:
How many people did Bush personally condemn to death as Governor of Texas?

Thou Shalt Not Lie:
How many lies has Bush told while in office? The words in the State of The Union in which he was told that were probably false (and ended up being false) but told them anyway to persuade people to his idea.

Thou Shalt Not Steal:
While Dick Cheney was CEO of Halliburton they misstated their financial statements. Not only is this lying, but the lost market value of the restatement is stealing from the stockholders.

There are many more and I really wish that the fundies (and there are some good fundies out there) will wake up and realize that Bush is not representing their best interests. The "party of God" is actually the party of money hungry corporate profitteers.

[Virginian]

23. Amen -- I hear ya.

Why do the fundies allow themselves to fall for this bushit.

Anyone can just go up to them and say "praise Jesus," and they follow. They never question. Jim bakker was counting on that.

[Virginian]

25. "Do you tithe?"

I would still love to see Bush try to answer the question "Do you tithe?"

[gauguin57]

27. Share this Gail Sheehy story with the Fundies. I knew it was faked ...

when I read this ... about how it was politically expedient to pander to the Fundies because Big George didn't and lost. About how he disrupted his Bible study class that Laura had forced him to go to. It's all a bunch of horse manure, and all I keep hearing is "Bush is a good Christian man who is humbly led by God." Good Grief ... religion IS the opium of the masses!

http://gailsheehy.com/Politics/polimain_bush3.html

snip...

"In 1985, Don Evans urged Bush to join a new kind of men's group—a franchised Community Bible Study program for men, a precursor to the Promise Keepers. "That was a very pivotal time for George," Laura Bush has said. "For the first time weren't just spending their time sitting around, kicking back with hamburgers and beer." But Jones doesn't remember Bush taking that spiritual exercise very seriously either. The pastor would ask a question from the lesson: "What happened to the Jew on his way to Jericho?"

"He got his butt whipped," Bush shot back.

And when his attention span was exceeded, he set his watch to go off in the middle of the pastor's spiel. The other men guffawed, and the following week they all set their watches and the class turned into a cacophony of alarm bells. Jones, who can point to the exact date when he became a born-again Christian, never heard Bush describe a conversion experience. "He never said he was spiritually empty. It's my understanding that his profession of faith was made in 1986, after the Reverend Billy Graham visited."

... Barbara Bush is in charge of mythmaking. Probably mindful of Big George's savaging by the Christian right, Mrs. Bush told reporters that her son has always read the Bible. (Bush challenged that myth in a recent interview with The Washington Post: "No, I wasn't reading the Bible when I was younger.") It is also his mother who likes to tell the conversion story, based on a weekend in 1985 when she and Vice President Bush had invited the Reverend Billy Graham to Kennebunkport to talk to their errant son. The evangelist popped the question "Are you right with God?" Bush said no, but he thought he should be. He now refers to that talk as the "mustard seed" that eventually blossomed into his spiritual renewal. "

[gauguin57]

28. And here's a recent Washington Post story that shows the vagueness

of Bush's "religion."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A24634-2004Sep15?language=printer

snip ...

"George W. Bush is among the most openly religious presidents in U.S. history. A daily Bible reader, he often talks about how Jesus changed his heart. He has spoken, publicly and privately, of hearing God's call to run for the presidency and of praying for God's help since he came into office.

"But despite the centrality of Bush's faith to his presidency, he has revealed only the barest outline of his beliefs, leaving others to sift through the clues and make assumptions about where he stands.

"Bush has said many times that he is a Christian, believes in the power of prayer and considers himself a "lowly sinner." But White House aides said they do not know whether the president believes that: the Bible is without error; the theory of evolution is true; homosexuality is a sinful choice; only Christians will go to heaven; support for Israel is a biblical imperative; or the war in Iraq is part of God's plan.

"Some political analysts think there is a shrewd calculation behind these ambiguities. By using such phrases as the "culture of life," Bush signals to evangelical Protestants and conservative Catholics that he is with them, while he avoids taking explicit stands that might alienate other voters or alarm foreign leaders. Bush and his chief speechwriter, Michael J. Gerson, are "very gifted at crafting references that religious insiders will understand and outsiders may not," said the Rev. Jim Wallis, editor of the evangelical journal Sojourners. ......."