The Great Crusade To Come: Pluralism vs. Fundamentalism

Below is a transcript from the October 24th edition of MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Obermann in which both Obermann and Richard Wolffe of Newsweek are responding to Sarah Palin’s comments mocking fruit fly research, which has brought about breakthroughs in the treatment of Down Syndrome; a disorder that Palin’s youngest child has.

Obermann: “How could they let Governor Palin go out and mock research that has identified a genetic indicator for autism? Who was stupid enough to let that happen?”

Wolffe: “Keith, I’m going to be as restrained and measured as I possibly can about this. But this is the most mindless, ignorant, uninformed comment that we have seen from Governor Palin, so far. And there’s been a lot of competition for that prize. Fruit flies aren’t just to do with this kind of research. They are a standard scientific model in genetic research along with a whole range of other organisms and cells, including mice, rats. I mean, there’s nothing fluffy or funny about it. It’s scientific and if you deliver your first serious policy speech and you make this kind of basic error, you either don’t have a scientific adviser or you don’t have a speechwriter who knows what they are saying.”

With due respect to both men, neither of them has a true handle on what is really going on here. Because if either or both actually knew the REAL truth about how something like this could happen, both with update their passports and head for the nearest border immediately, if not sooner.

The simple and scary truth about Palin’s comments is that they are neither an indicator of stupidity nor of sloppy and uninformed speech writing. They are indicative of a world-view that is quite prevalent within the fundamentalist Christian community, and thoroughly shared by Palin, that shuns not only science, but the idea that science has anything relevant to say about what ails us. This argument has been going on within Christianity for almost two centuries; in deed probably much longer. But it has taken root in American politics now for several decades. To call it myopic would be way too simple. It strikes at the core of a belief system that, in its own way, is as primitive and violent as its Islamic counterparts. While it is true that Christian fundamentalists aren’t likely to fly planes into buildings or blow up cars in front of shopping malls, like Islamic fundamentalists, the similarities are frighteningly real with respect to how their ideology imparts itself within their respective communities.

In principal, fundamentalist Christians believe in the literalist interpretation of the Bible; particularly Chapter one of the book of Genesis. They shun any suggestion, no matter what the evidence suggests, that the world and the universe around it might be billions of years old, and that the story of Adam and Eve might be more of a parable rather than an actual historic event. Those who dare to suggest otherwise are called heretics; their salvation hanging in the balance.

Likewise, fundamentalists do not believe in global warming, and often refer to it as a lie from Satan meant to distract us from God’s work. The reason for this has nothing to do with doubting the empirical evidence that has now been corroborated by virtually every reputable scientist on the planet; it has to do with the Great Tribulation (Matt. 24:21), which “true” Christians believe will happen either prior to, during, or after Christ’s return to Earth. At that time all “true” believers will be taken up to heaven (referred to as The Rapture), while the remainder will be resigned to an eternity in hell. Depending on whether one is a Pretribulationist, a Prewrath Tribulationist, a Seventh Trumpet Tribulationist (in deference to Rev. 11:15 & Cor. 15:52) or a Posttribulationist, the bottom line is that man’s fate lies not in any scientific modality, but in a select group of scriptural verses that carefully lay out God’s predetermined will for all His people. Since the book of Revelation does not specifically or even remotely mention global warming as a possible end scenario for the human race, for any “true” Christian to refer to it as a legitimate threat is Heresy.

This fundamentalist world-view is not new, as I explained earlier. It was first popularized by John Nelson Darby, the father of Dispensationalism, which places a heavy emphasis on prophecy and eschatology, the study of the "end times." Dispensationalism is a Christian theological view of history and Biblical interpretation that became popular during the 1800s and early 1900s and is held today by many conservative Protestants. The belief hinges on three core tenants:

1. The Bible is to be taken literally. John F. Walvoord, in his book "Prophecy in the New Millennium," provides this explanation:

"History answers the most important question in prophetic interpretation, that is, whether prophecy is to be interpreted literally, by giving five hundred examples of precise literal fulfillments. The commonly held belief that prophecy is not literal and should be interpreted nonliterally has no basis in scriptural revelation. Undoubtedly, a nonliteral viewpoint is one of the major causes of confusion in prophetic interpretation."

2. Dispensationalism teaches that the Church consists of only those saved from the Day of Pentecost until the time of the Rapture. It is held that the Church consists of a small number of Israelites under the election of grace in the present dispensation along with a large number of Gentiles. (see Scofield note on Rom. 11 and The Mac Arthur New Testament Commentary : Romans 9 - 16). During the 70th week of Daniel, God will deal specifically with the nation of Israel to bring it to national salvation, in which Israelites who have faith in Jesus Christ during that time will inherit the promised Theocratic Kingdom and the unconditional Covenants God made with Israel. Israel will fulfill its role as the Theocratic Covenanted Kingdom promised to the nation in Old Testament prophecy.

3. Dispensationalism teaches that Israel in the New Testament refers to saved and unsaved Israelites who will receive the promises made to them in the Abrahamic Covenant, Davidic Covenant and New Covenant. (See The Millennial Kingdom by Dr. John F. Walvoord.)

Opponents of Dispensationalism argue that when the Apostle Paul spoke of the dispensation of grace, he was not speaking of an age or period of time but rather he was speaking of stewardship. But conservative Christians do not concern themselves with opponents to their theology. They are certain that theirs is the only viewpoint that is relevant, since it derives directly from the “Word of God.”

What is appallingly dangerous is not how pervasive this belief system still is throughout many Christain churches, but how much political power it still wields throughout the breadbasket of the country; in deed in many affluent, suburban communities in the northeastern and western United States. Many otherwise intelligent and thoughtful people believe profoundly in fundamentalist teachings of the Bible. Though biblical scholars have argued about scripture and its interpretation since the founding of the Roman Catholic Church almost two thousand years ago, conservative Christian preachers have remained steadfast in their denunciation of anything that seeks to challenge their preconceived notions about said scripture. Followers of these conservative evangelicals are encouraged to avoid the trappings of “the world” or the temptation to “doubt the Word of God” as though to evoke even a hint of independent thought would be akin to bringing down a lightning bolt upon one’s head. The ending verse of Revelation is used by these modern day Pharisees to keep the flock in check.

That we are still having this argument more than 1500 years after St. Augustine wrote his thesis, “The Literal Meaning of Genesis” is proof of just how powerful fundamentalism still is in the world. Individuals like James Dobson, Dutch Sheets and Lou Engle are but a few of the more prominent voices of the political landscape that threaten the nation with retreat from common sense and the supposed wisdom that God imparted onto His people in the first place.

In the last two general elections, the Conservative Right was integral in the victories of George W. Bush as President, as well as the election of many other conservative legislators to Washington. These legislators, in concert with the Administration, have led the fight to introduce the teaching of Creationism (AKA Intelligent Design) into the curriculum of America’s public school system. Advocates of Creationism claim they are only interested in presenting “their” side of the argument. Critics claim they are attempting to rewrite the last two hundred years of scientific research because it conflicts with their beliefs and values.

Pastor John Hegee is CEO of Global Evangelism Television (GETV), and is the President and CEO of John Hagee Ministries, which telecasts his national radio and television ministry carried in the United States on 160 TV stations, 50 radio stations, and eight networks, including The Inspiration Network (INSP) and Trinity Broadcasting Network. The ministries can be seen and heard weekly in 99 million homes.

Hagee is also the founder and National Chairman of the Christian-Zionist organization Christians United for Israel, incorporated on February 7, 2006 as a "Christian American Israel Public Affairs Committee" (AIPAC) lobbying Congress to support Israel.[3] He has incurred some controversy for his religious beliefs and comments regarding Nazism, Catholicism, Islam, homosexuality, Jews, and Hurricane Katrina.[4] Many prominent politicians often speak at his conventions, not out of any unilateral agreement with his controversial stances, but out of fear of his political influence. In 2007, Hagee stated that he does not believe in global warming, and he also said that he sees the Kyoto Protocol as a conspiracy aimed at manipulating the U.S. economy.[21] Also, Hagee has condemned the Evangelical Climate Initiative, an initiative "signed by 86 evangelical leaders acknowledging the seriousness of global warming and pledging to press for legislation to limit carbon dioxide emissions." Many other prominent conservative religious leaders, such as James Dobson and Tony Perkins have an equal disdain for the Climate Initiative, again not because of a dearth of data that supports it, but because it conflicts with pre-conceived notions about scripture.

What is encouraging is the fact that fundamentalism appears to be nearing its end as a belief system, not only within the United States, but throughout the Middle East, as well. Pluralism, once thought of as the four-letter word of Christians, is taking root within the body politic in ever increasing numbers. Christians have often referred to pluralism in the same manner in which capitalists often refer to socialism, as something abhorrent and ungodly. And yet many of the preconceptions of pluralism have formed the basis of our representative government. The lack of any officially recognized religion is but an example of a pluralistic tendency among the Founding Fathers, which conservative evangelicals still have a hard time swallowing.

I submit that one of the biggest hurdles that Christians need to overcome when it comes to the concept of a pluralistic society is a complete lack of understanding of what the word pluralism actually means. Like so many other belief systems, Christianity has as its core belief the need to make Disciples of others. From a purely philosophical perspective, such a mission statement suggests that those embarking on such quests to “convert” unbelievers to their faith carry two presuppositions with them: first and foremost, that their faith is indeed the one true faith. So far so good. It wouldn’t be much of a conversion process if one didn’t believe his or her faith was the superior one. But then things turn decidedly ugly, for the second presupposition implies not only a condition of superiority, but a fervent belief that to deny the obvious is a sign of demonic beliefs that somehow need to be suppressed or altogether eliminated. And that, in a nutshell is the difference between a fundamentalist and a pluralistic approach to religion. The former seeks not only a strong belief in one’s own convictions, but a total submission of the other side to the inevitable logic of the superior belief; while the latter leaves open the possibility that both are entitled to their own religious convictions, and more importantly, that both have a right to coexist within the same community without fear of retribution .

The Crusades in the first three centuries of the second millennium A.D. underscored brilliantly a fundamentalist belief system that went amok Initially their purpose was to thwart the encroachment of Muslim influence into the Byzantine Empire. However, on a popular level, the first Crusades unleashed a wave of impassioned, personally felt pious Christian fury that was expressed in the massacres of Jews that accompanied the movement of the Crusader mobs through Europe, as well as the violent treatment of "schismatic" Orthodox Christians of the east. During many of the attacks on Jews, local Bishops and Christians made attempts to protect Jews from the mobs that were passing through. Jews were often offered sanctuary in churches and other Christian buildings. As for the Muslims, after he recaptured Jerusalem in the Third Crusade (1187 – 1192), Saladin, the Sultan of Egypt, spared civilians and for the most part left churches and shrines untouched to be able to collect ransom money from the Franks. Saladin is remembered respectfully in both European and Islamic sources as a man who "always stuck to his promise and was loyal." His largess was not rewarded, however, for when Richard I (AKA Richard the Lionhearted) captured the island of Cyprus, he massacred everyone, despite an earlier promise to leave noncombatants unharmed if the city of Acre surrendered. The brutality of this incident is among the darkest pages of Christendom.

One could say that ever since Abraham bedded down with his maidservant Hagar and produced Ishmael, the world has been locked in the horns of a never-ending dilemma as the descendants of both Ishmael and Isaac continue to wage war to determine who is the true and righteous heir of God’s favor. It matters not that in Gen. 21:11-13 God ostensibly settles the question by stating that both sons (Ishmael and Isaac) will be leaders of great nations, the world continues to be consumed by the flames of intolerance that surround the combatants. Both are right, and I’m afraid both are wrong.

This incessant need not only to be right, but to vanquish any and all opinions to the contrary is what is truly wrong with religion. It is not the belief in an all powerful and loving God that has blinded us; it is this persistent drive to stamp out conflicting interpretations of that all powerful and loving God that has blinded the world with the very hatred and venom that are supposedly at odds with just such a God. Small wonder there are still atheists in the world. And even within Christianity itself, there is deep division. Norther Ireland was for centuries a seething cauldron of religious intolerance as Protestants and Catholics killed one another in the name of the same God they proclaimed to worship.

The irony of ironies is that this insanity appears to be going the way of the dinosaur, as more and more people, fed up with the apparent hypocrisy inherent to such narrow and restrictive view points are choosing to divorce themselves from their respective brethren and brake the chains of such fundamentalist and primitive thinking. Whether owed directly to an economy in free fall or simply the result of outward corruption within the ranks of its hierarchy, the Religious Right in the United States is slowly losing its stranglehold on the nation as more and more moderate thinkers are stepping up and being heard. Issues like abortion and gay rights and creationism, while still critical, are now beginning to share the stage with increasingly equal issues like poverty, climate change, disease and world hunger.

In the Middle East, it is not the bullets of American rifles that are beginning to quell the rhetoric of extremist clerics who have historically driven their followers to commit heinous acts of violence, but rather the byproducts of free-market capitalism. Nike, more than Smith and Wesson, is killing the hatred of centuries of intolerance.

The goal of pluralism is not the elimination of God from public discourse, but rather the elimination of the belief that those who do not conform to a majority religious view are not somehow entitled to the same rights and privileges accorded to us all. It is not anti-Christian to allow a Jew or a Muslim to have a contradictory opinion about their God. We have seen all too well what religious intolerance has wrought on this planet. Isn’t it time we put down our guns and picked up our plowshares? Isn’t it time we finally grew up as a race and lived out the true command of God to love one another as He loved us?

I don’t believe I’m waxing too poetically when I say that there will come a day when all the great religions of the world will finally coalesce into one gigantic spiritual community and become the children of God they were originally intended (created?) to be. Pie in the sky? Perhaps, but I can dream can’t I?

This is the Great Crusade that awaits the human race. Not erasing scientific theories that threaten narrow interpretations of scripture, nor beheading non-believers who defy religious clerics. Hatred and ignorance are the dance partners of a dark and troubled world. If evil is to forever be defeated, it must first be sought within the confines of our own hearts. It should be the mission statement of every God-fearing servant who has a heart of gold and a faith that is fearless to expose the lies of an enemy that has thousands of years of history on his side and the blood of millions to show for it!