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CHRISTIAN COALITION LEADER REVEALS
THE TRUE NATURE OF A CHRISTIAN NATION
By Jerry Sloan
ã
ARE YOU COMFORTABLE, MY DEAR?
Remarks made in a February, 1995 meeting by a man who is frequently asked to represent and speak in place of Sara DeVito Hardman, Executive Director of the California Christian Coalition, added fuel to the fire of accusations of anti-semitism against Pat Robertson and the Christian Coalition which have appeared February, 1995, in the New York Times, the New York Review of Books and Dissent magazine
At a forum titled "Religion and Politics: Dangerous Liaisons?" sponsored by the Center for Ethics and Social Policy of Berkeley's Graduate Theological Union, John Stoos, standing in for Hardman, revealed how in a Christian society Jews would probably feel out of place. It appears, according the San Diego Union Tribune, that his statements cost him his job as Executive Director of the 55,000 member California Gun Owners lobby.
Stoos is a Christian Reconstructionist and one of the most astute Republican political strategists in California. His credentials and connections read like a who's who of the Radical Religious Right and social conservative politics:
- He was former legislative aide to CA State Senator H.L. (Bill) Richardson, (a former John Birch Society field organizer and Radical Religious Right person before there was a Radical Religious Right).
- He heads up the California chapter of Newt Gingrich's Conservative Opportunity Society which in 1994 raised nearly
$ 300,000 to help elect social conservatives to the California Legislature.
- He is a Vice President of the California Republican Assembly, the largest Republican volunteer organization in the state and an editor of their monthly newspaper. The CRA has been completely taken over by the Theocratic Right. At the February, 1997 state Republican convention the CRA elected a virtually unopposed slate of officers and committee chairs to run the state party.
- He has been a lobbyist for English Only and American Life Lobby
Along with Republican campaign consultant Wayne Johnson who sits on the Board of Trustees of the country's leading Christian Reconstructionist think tank, Chalcedon, Inc., Stoos attends Covenant Reform Church in Sacramento.
To those who have researched or followed the rise of the Christian Coalition and the Radical Religious Right Stoos' pronouncements revealed nothing new. But, many have been shocked by what he said.
In a February 11, 1995, story written by B. Falconer Newhall, the religion reporter of the Contra Costa Times, Stoos is quoted as saying:
"There is no such thing as a pluralistic society...You can't say we are all going to agree to disagree and go on our way because that (leads) to relativism and chaos."Those quotes are relatively benign. What got him into trouble was when he said that American society should be founded on "Christ's kingship" and biblical law. He then said that Jews and other non-Christians would be "
tolerated ."His comments were challenged by Marty Kassman from the ACLU and a board member of the American Jewish Congress who said:
"I don't wish to be tolerated in this country. I was born in this country. I don't think it is anymore your country than mine. Or any more a Christian's country (than) a Jew's."Stoos shot back to Kassman that in the Christian society he envisions
"You would not have total acceptance. You would feel more at home in Israel."
A BUMPY FLIGHT
These comments are similar to one Stoos made to this writer during a conversation we had as our plane sat on a Sacramento runway for a flight to Los Angeles.
Stoos was seated in front of me. As no one was seated next to either of us I reached over and tapped him on the shoulder to introduce myself to him. We made some small talk about our opposing political views and then I said to him, "
You know I have been reading Rushdoony recently (the Rev. R.J. Rushdoony is the leading apologist of Christian Reconstruction theology in America) and I don't see that in Rushdoony's society there is much room for Buddhist, Moslems, Jews or Atheists."He replied with a chuckle,
"Well, Rush would say 'it is better to obey God's 600 laws than man's 6000 laws'", then, with another chuckle, he continued, "No, there would be room for Buddhists, I just don't know how much."
At that point our plane started to take off and we terminated our conversation and did not speak during the rest of the hour it took to get to LA. Besides, I was fascinated by the book I brought along to read on the flight - The Blue Book for Grassroots Politics: Proven, Election-winning Strategies for Supporter's of Traditional Values Candidates.
A CORNER ON THE TRUTH
Stoos' position on religious minorities in the society he envisions are based on the theology of Christian Reconstructionism which would reconstruct society from a democracy, which Rushdoony refers to as a "heresy", into a theocracy.
Rushdoony has matter of factly written in his 1500 page, two volume treatise on the Ten Commandments titled The Institutes of Biblical Law:
Every social order institutes its own program of separation or segregation. A particular faith and morality is given privileged status and all else is separated for progressive elimination."
(emphasis added, JS)
And
:
Every faith is an exclusive way of life; none is more dangerous than that which maintains the illusion of tolerance."
The Christian Reconstructionist society would have no tolerance or illusion thereof. Not only would it not tolerate other religions but it would not tolerate homosexuals, or anyone who deviated from the societal rules and values.
Only "godly" families would be permitted to continue to live in a "Christian" society. All others would fall into one of the 18 categories of capital crimes and would be dealt with by being stoned to death.
Rushdoony defines the spreading of false propaganda as the spreading of false religions i.e., Buddhists, Moslems, and Jews. So, non-Christians would be "tolerated" as long as they did not publicly try to promote their religious beliefs.
Stoning, according to Gary North, Rushdoony's son-in-law, in his book, Victim's Rights is a
"communal activity " - something in which all the members of the family can participate. The purpose of this "communal activity" is to instill fear in the community so that if they deviate from the theocratic rules laid out by the elders, they know stoning would be their fate.
Ignorance Is Bliss
In Mein Kampf, Hitler wrote:
It is not necessary that every individual fighting for this philosophy should obtain a full insight and precise knowledge of the ultimate ideas and thought processes of the leaders of the movement. What is necessary is that some few, really great ideas be made clear to him, and that the essential fundamental lines be burned inextinguishably into him, so that he is entirely permeated by the necessity of the victory of his movement and its doctrine. The individual soldier is not initiated into the thought processes of the higher strategy either. He is, on the contrary, trained in the rigid discipline and fanatical faith in the justice and power of his cause, and taught to stake his life for it without reservation."
What Stoos has done with his comments is breach the higher strategy of the Radical Religious Right leaders by revealing that a Christian America would be intolerant of all but the fervent faithful.
Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson, the Free Congress Foundation's Paul Weyrich, James Dobson of Focus on the Family, Bill Bright of Campus Crusade and the other powers that be in the Radical Religious Right have sold their faithful followers on a "few really great ideas" such as abortion is wrong, unborn babies must be saved at all costs and baby killers must be punished. Sodomites must be driven from the land. Prayer and the teaching of creation science must be restored to public schools.
In the last two or three years we have seen a few foot soldiers be willing to die or at least suffer prison time for some of these "really great ideas" by killing doctors and health clinic employees or by becoming arsonists.
Rest assured, in the coming years more incidents of violence will occur as more foot soldiers are recruited from evangelical churches to become "Christian" soldiers in their "citizen militias" until America will once again be in the midst of a civil war.
Right now, Paul and Patty Pew-Warmer seem to be sitting comfortably in their church sanctuaries on their padded pews with uplifed hands singing songs of praise as the words appear on the overhead projector screen and they apparently haven't a clue as to what their leader's have in mind for a Christian America. They have not once stopped to think or ask the question, "
It's a Christian America, now what?"Maybe, if they really listen to men like John Stoos and got up off of their blessed assurance to read the likes of Rushdoony and North they will be repulsed and take a stand for true tolerance, and America would truly become a land with liberty and justice for all.
Author's Note - July, 1997 - After this incident Stoos resigned as an advisor to the CA Christian Coalition. He is now the Chief of Staff for California Assembly Member Robert Margett..
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