Comments on: A DAY OF SPLEEN?

by: jon

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Wow - thanks for the Bageant link….utterly fascinating reading on many levels.

by: Vidiot

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Fundamentalist Xianity is “inherently culturally isolated”? Really? Has the author ever watched cable news?

by: Bryan

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Bageant works up that much of a sweat over Christian Reconstructionists? C’Mon, Mark. Hardly worth it. Clever though, of him, to lump all evangelicals and conservative Christians in as “fundamentalists.”

by: Mark Hasty

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Well, Bryan, in my experience, there are lots of people out there who agree with much of what Reconstructionists believe. And there are those who believe that the Rapture is something which can be brought about (or at least encouraged) through the political process. That, to me, was the value of the Bageant article–pointing out some of the motivation behind some of the admittedly more extreme elements of the Christian right.

I suppose you could say that Bageant’s failure to distinguish among fundamentalists and evangelicals underscores his point that there’s plenty of ignorance out there about the disparate groups, but since he claims to be intimately familiar with that subculture, it’s probably an attempt to obfuscate.

by: bryan

Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

I’d say it was a small minority that actually believed that the rapture could be ushered in by political means (since the U.S. isn’t even in the book of revelation). I think there are more who are looking to usher in the rapture by reaching every nation with the gospel.

It’s tempting to point out the extreme and draw the hasty generalization to others (no pun intended), but it’s no more true of conservative Christians than it is of all liberal Christians want to have sex in the pews and celebrate Gaia along with YHWH.