Re: [xmca] critique of pure tolerance

[Jay Lemke <jaylemke@umich.edu>]

RE: extreme religious discourse against health care reform

But my question is this: are the evangelical rank-and-file being manipulated for political purposes by their leadership and its political allies? or do they really believe that health care reform is the devil's work?? 

or maybe more to the point: given their other beliefs, would they have come to the same conclusion if no one had told them what they should believe on this issue?

are we hearing a discourse playing out its internal logic? or are we hearing a discourse being used rhetorically to achieve a specific political end?

JAY.


Jay Lemke
Professor (Adjunct, 2009-2010)
Educational Studies
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
www.umich.edu/~jaylemke 

Visiting Scholar
Laboratory for Comparative Human Communication
University of California -- San Diego
La Jolla, CA
USA 92093






On Dec 28, 2009, at 7:57 PM, Tony Whitson wrote:

> For anybody who's not clear about how very extreme the Evangelical movement is becoming (and even if you think you know, you might be surprised by this), you might want to listen to this:
> 
> http://www.frcaction.org/prayercast
> 
> They held a 90-minute session feverishly imploring God to save our nation from health care reform. Obama is demonized -- more literally than you might think possible -- but God is asked to intervene and sway the hearts of those members of Gongress who are not beyond saving.
> 
> There are two important Senators participating, plus two members of the House of Representatives. These members are not unique: for example, they don't include Senator Coburn who said from the Seanate floor that Americans should pray for God to intervene more directly by rendering a Democrat incapable of attending and casting a vote (this was widely interpreted as praying for the death of 92-y-o & ailing Sen. Byrd of West Virginia). See
> http://curricublog.wordpress.com/2009/12/26/democracy-vs-filibuster/
> Shortlink: http://wp.me/p1V0H-VM
> 
> The first hour is streamed on the Internet as a "prayercast" (top link above). The reason for listening would be to actually hear the rhetoric of the Discourse they inhabit. It seems to me quite closed off from any kind of conversation, or any input from outside of their world.
> 
> On Tue, 29 Dec 2009, Andy Blunden wrote:
> 
>> Question: Do you Americans think that it is feasible to draw a line between Evangelical Christians (Intelligent Design etc) and Christians who belong to mainstream churches (which have harboured science for 600 years)? Anglicans, Catholics, Presbyterians etc., are as threatened by Charismatic Christianity as are secular people, and I would have thought that approaches which patently put Evangelicals off-side but appealed to Christians with a plausible theology would be a good basis for ground rules.
>> 
>> Andy
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