There is nothing like fear to incite human beings to action whether it is to run away, or stand and fight, for survival. There is also nothing like American evangelical fear of persecution to incite them to action; particularly if that action results in imposing a theocracy on the American people. Although the religious right has effectively, through the Catholic Supreme Court, eliminated the Establishment Clause of the 1st Amendment and wiped out religious freedom of non-evangelicals, women, and non-believers, they are still convinced they are facing an existential threat from the federal government.
To drive evangelical voters to the polls to elect bible-driven and Koch-loyal Republicans in a couple of days, a Dominionist cabal are comparing the situation of Supreme Court-empowered evangelicals in the United States to Christians being beheaded by ISIS in Syria. And they are violating their tax-exempt status with their blatant lies and fear-mongering campaigns from the pulpit; but they are new-age American Christians and they dutifully violate the law, and their bible’s commandments (Romans 13:2-6), to impose their Dominionist theocracy on America.
The “get out the theocracy” vote is a concerted effort of Dominionist leaders and conservative Christians who are girded for battle as ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’ in what they claim is an existential war for Christians’ survival. Their goal, and it will be wildly successful, is to “drum up outrage over recent political skirmishes, including the Hobby Lobby lawsuit, and to persuade believers that their religious freedoms are under attack by ungodly forces.”
The coalition of evangelical and Dominionist organizations devised an aggressive fear-mongering voter mobilization campaign replete with high-tech tools, high-profile Christian celebrities, religious Republicans, briefings for pastors, and fear-inspiring rallies simulcast to tax-exempt mega-churches around the country; at the expense of American taxpayers.
United in Purpose is the Dominionist-run technology and communications group directing the voter drive toward theocracy and they devised a variety of tools including frightening videos and voter mobilization apps to get out the evangelical vote. Apps such as one enabling clergy to compare their membership rosters with voter rolls so they can better monitor and “preach” their congregants to vote the bible at the polls. The Family Research Council and Texas-based Vision America dutifully hosted policy briefings for Christian preachers with “lavishly produced videos” and “voter mobilization events” broadcast live to evangelical mega-churches and Dominionist groups across the country.
Although there has been a rash of fear-mongering about the violent war against evangelicals and Christian churches over the past year, nothing compares to the dire warnings from the well-organized, and well-funded, group of conservative Christians campaigning for Republicans. The most frightening, and blatantly false, warning was courtesy of Dominionist crusader David Benham whose nasty anti-gay remarks got his HGTV reality-show canceled. He warned in a video broadcast to churches across the country that, “We see the struggle between good and evil, light and darkness, truth and lies, and what’s happening with swords over in the Middle East is happening over here in America.” Benham informed evangelical Christians that their vote for Republicans is a crucial part of the theocratic war against “homosexuality and its agenda that is attacking the nation,” and will hasten the biblical cleansing of “public schools teaching demonic ideologies.”
In September, two organizations, Family Research Council and Vision America, hosted an event called Star Spangled Sunday, allegedly to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the national anthem. The event highlighted a parade of prominent Christian Republicans, including Mike Huckabee and Texas Ted Cruz, who spent their allotted time warning that Americans’ religious freedoms were under a fierce government attack. The man who would be emperor-Pope, Ted Cruz, warned evangelicals that their “religious liberty is threatened” at home and that the Hobby Lobby ruling from the Papal-contingent on the Supreme Court was only “one vote difference from our federal government forcing you to violate your religious faith.”
Hobby Lobby’s Dominionist CEO joined the fright-fest and warned Christians across America that “There are struggles that people of faith are facing today that have never been faced before. So there’s a great need for men and women of faith to stand up and let their vote be heard.” Steve Green did not elucidate exactly what struggles American people of faith are facing today that are worse than the Catholic Inquisition’s burning, hanging, and annihilating non-compliant Christians, but facts and reality are not important to evangelicals suffering from Christian persecution complex because fear is a great motivator.
Two weeks ago, the Dominionist coalition joined United in Purpose to host another simulcast, called iPledge Sunday, which was shown in churches across the country. The featured message was more ominous warnings about the government crackdown on religious freedoms threatening evangelicals’ existence. Retiring Representative Frank Wolf (R-VA) warned in a pre-taped interview that religious persecution is at the “highest level it’s ever been” and lamented that Christians are not doing more to fight against it. He said, “Frankly, some people in the church may have to go to jail, and that would wake up America.”
Family Research Council leader Tony Perkins, Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee, Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson, and their Dominionist cabal intend to keep hammering the message that American Christians are suffering extreme persecution right up until Election Day. The Dominionists’ final simulcast, scheduled for this Sunday, will feature speeches from people the religious right holds up as victims of a government conspiracy to eviscerate Christians, and Christianity from America. The event will be broadcast from Houston’s Grace Community Church, a welfare-receiving church guilty of violating anti-discrimination laws that claims its bigotry is under siege; a potent tool to mobilize Christian voters. Dominionist Tony Perkins further incited evangelicals claiming the midterm election is the tool “God will use to spark the national revival that we so desperately need.
The beauty of America’s representative democracy is that all, or rather some, Americans are given an opportunity to vote for the direction they think the country should take. However, if Democrats think for a minute that evangelicals will rest on their recent Hobby Lobby victory controlling women’s access to contraception, or the High Court’s establishment of sectarian prayers at government meetings, they are sadly mistaken.
There has been a thirty-year drive to transform America’s government into a Christian theocracy, and the Dominionist sect will go to any length to achieve their goal. That includes using evangelicals’ persecution complex, fear-mongering of government beheadings a la ISIS, and imprisonment of church goers for being Christians; anything to elect Republicans.
If Americans are not afraid of Republicans imposing the Koch brother corporatist vision on the people, they damn sure should be horrified of what Republicans beholden to Christian extremists will do to persecute their mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, schools, gays, and other faiths. That is not fear mongering, it is what conservative Christians and Dominionists have promised to do to Americans for a decade and should be the most important reason to vote; against theocracy.
Born in the South, raised in the Mid-West and California for a well-rounded view of America; it doesn't look good.
Former minister, lifelong musician, Mahayana Zen-Buddhist.
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