Friday, December 4, 2009

JAMES HIPPS' INTERVIEW WITH FRANK SCHAEFFER.

Below is a very interesting interview with Frank Schaeffer by James Hipps on Blog Talk Radio, about, in part, the need for the separation of Church and State. Please also listen to James Hipps' commentary at the end of his interview with Frank Schaeffer.

For a flavor of where Frank Schaeffer is coming from, here is an excerpt from his latest post on his blog, Frank Schaeffer, dated December 3, 2009, entitled, Will Rick Warren Go to The Hanging (Killing Gays) Or Just Duck (Again)? I urge you to read his post in its entirety:

Nothing illustrates the danger we face from our own Taliban better than the way American "Christians" are now tangled up with the homophobic—now potentially gay murdering – Ugandan Christian/political leadership.

The Ugandan Parliament is considering a bill that would impose the death penalty on gays. One American must be cheering from the grave. Here’s what the late R.J. Rushdoony, Reconstructionist theologian and founder of the modern movement of that name, wrote in a letter to gay rights activist Mel White: “God in His law requires the death penalty for homosexuals.”

Disclosure: Both Mel White and Rushdoony were friends of mine, back in the day I was a Religious Right leader and sidekick to my father – the late Francis Schaeffer – who is “credited” by many, including by Karen Armstrong and Max Blumenthal – with being a key father of the Religious Right… along with RJ Rushdoony. I quit the movement over its hate for the “other” and got out by the late 80s and started writing novels like Portofino, aimed at the heart of the movement through humor at fundamentalist’s expense.

Back in the day before Mel came out he was working with me on one of my father’s movie/book projects. We both left our far right “faith.” Mel acknowledged that he was gay and I said I’d had it with hate. These days I propose an anti-right progressive Christianity in my book PATIENCE WITH GOD: Faith for People Who Don’t Like Religion (or Atheism)

That said… The problem of American exceptionalism combined with a theocracy in which the “we” of evangelical faith finally destroy the “they” (everyone else) is growing. Who do you think Fox News rabid followers are? Who do you think calls Obama "Hitler" while using the tactics of fascism themeselves?...

More "respectable" leaders like Warren, Huckabee and Palin won’t admit it but they would like to do here what the Ugandans are doing there, and not just to gays, to all the "other" who are in the way of their taking America into the darkness of theocracy.

Pastor Rick is the epitome of the two-faced friendly evangelical leader today: say one thing for the public, believe another thing and work for it.

Reconstructionists persist and the movement is growing while key figures in Congress to big time pastors routinely deny they are part of this political/religious movement. Meanwhile they’re fixin’ to go to a hangnin’ in Uganda, with the blessing of the smiling nice guys like Rick Warren and and a wink and a nod from the Reconstructionist handmaid Sarah-Tea-Bagger-Palin.


Here is James Hipps' interview with Frank Schaeffer that I think you'll enjoy:

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