Fox News anchor, still-living Christian martyr, and legendary urine-drinker Todd Starnes treated the congregation of Abilene Baptist Church in Augusta, Georgia, to one beautiful "sermon" Sunday, with lots of terrifying examples of just how bad Christians have it in America today. Never mind that it was less a sermon than a collection of half-true stories from his dumb bookGod Less America -- Starnes talked about the imminent government crackdown on faith, and that was all he needed to accomplish.
But first, he explained how important crappy food is to the Christian lifestyle:
Starnes began by saying it was good to be back in the South where it was easy to find Waffle House and Chick-fil-A restaurants, which he argued was “the official chicken of Jesus.”
“I believe that the reason that God blessed America is because we know how to smoke a pork butt,” Starnes said[.]
That's pretty good, seeing as how Jesus wouldn't have eaten any of that treyf, because of that whole thing where the guy was an observant Jew and all. But never mind that, it was time to get into Tales of Oppressed Christianity:
There is a war on religious liberty in the United States of America. And this war is not targeting people of the Muslim faith or the Jewish faith or the Hindu faith. This war on religious liberty is targeting people of the Christian faith.
And as proof, he recommends that everyone read his "new" book, which was published last year, so that we can all learn why Miley Cyrus is trying to twerk her public debauchery all over America, while poor Phil Robertson the DuckMan was ... OK, not exactly silenced, but a lot of people disagreed with him, which proves there's a war on Christians! “Miley Cyrus, celebrated for her act of debauchery, but Phil Robertson castigated for standing up for the Bible.” Not mentioned, of course, were all the horrible evil secularists who also thought Miley Cyrus's gyrating butt was pretty damned silly, too, because only Christians are mocked in America.
Obviously, said Starnes, the Supreme Court's "redefinition of marriage" is just the first step to the ultimate criminalization of the single most popular faith in America, because that's basic logic -- the majority is always threatened. And then Starnes "warned" that he was about to deliver a surprising, politically incorrect thought, because he's that brave:
Brothers and sisters, my fellow Southern Baptists, the Supreme Court may have redefined marriage, but God hasn’t redefined anything! [loud applause] ... And let me tell you something, if you think the cultural purging of the Dukes of Hazzard has been breathtaking in recent days, wait until you see what they’re about to do to Christians.
And clearly, if businesses that are open to the public don't have the right to discriminate against sodomites, like Jesus commanded absolutely nowhere in the Bible, then freedom is about to disappear. Starnes took every opportunity to call attention to Great Southern Baptists -- like Starnes and the congregation! -- who are bravely resisting the tide of sodomy by refusing to do their jobs, like Linda Barnett of Mississippi, a "dear saint" who explained in her resignation letter that she could no longer do her government job because her "final authority is the Bible." And yet the War on Christians forced her to resign rather than cooperate with sexual deviants who Jesus never said anything about.
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Starnes didn't mention whether Linda Barnett had been similarly resistant to granting marriage licenses to divorced people, who Jesus actually condemned as adulterers. In any case, Starnes warned, the end of liberty is right around the corner, any day now, like it has been for his entire public career:
Churches and faith-based organizations must prepare for the lawsuits and government investigations that are on the way. Pastors who refuse to perform gay marriages and preach from the Bible should prepare for hate-crime charges. All dissent...will be silenced.
Yep, oppression on the way. Here it comes! Any moment now. They're gonna fill the jails with Christians. Real darn soon! Just as soon as all those barcodes are tattooed on us.
Starnes also told a wonderfully mythical not-quite-true story about the Lincoln, Nebraska ,school district and its mandate to do away with all recognition of gender differences:
They told the teachers you gotta stop talking about 'boys and girls;' you can't use the words 'ladies and gentlemen,'" because that might be offensive to the boys or girls which you can't say those words, so you gotta come up with something else to call the kids. And the public schools in Lincoln, Nebraska said you gotta start calling the kids "purple penguins." Purple penguins! Well I got to thinkin' about that, brothers and sisters. I was wondering what the gender-inclusive word for "stupid" is, because they got a whole mess of it there in Lincoln, Nebraska!
Now, it may not actually be true -- the district distributed materials with suggestions to teachers about being sensitive to gender identity, but never mandated a single thing -- but it is perfectly OK to tell a few lies if it helps motivate Christians to oppose their transgender oppressors.
Then it was time for the heartrending story of Barronelle Stutzman, a Washington florist -- and, as Starnes points out three or four times, a fellow Southern Baptist, brothers and sisters! -- who refused to sell flowers for a gay wedding and is "about to lose her home, about to lose her business, because she stood up for her faith." Starnes said that he called her to ask why she didn't just sell the flowers, and she told him, "Young man, who would you rather obey: God or the government? I chose God!" That poor lady, about to lose her home AND her business! Which must mean that she really is crappy at finance, because what actually happened was that she was fined $1000, and then fellow bigots helped her out with over $150,000 in GoFundMe donations, plus the Indiana pizza bigots decided to give her a significant chunk of the haul from their own GoFundMe. Talk about tragic! Somehow, Starnes managed not to mention that part of the story.
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Starnes closed with a call to action, because it's time for Christians to resist this horror, just as Dietrich Bonhoeffer opposed the Nazis, which is what the gays and the government really are. And he told the inspiring story of Roy Costner -- would you believe it, another Southern Baptist! -- who bravely tore up the valedictory speech that his school principal had approved, and then, at absolutely no risk to himself, bravely led the majority-Christian graduation audience at his South Carolina high school in the Lord's Prayer, in an empty gesture that proved he's willing to brave the hypothetical re-education camps of the nonexistent Secular Nazis. (Yet another detail that Starnes leaves out: The kid actually delivered the "government approved" speech in full, then dramatically tore it up and added the prayer.) But in Starnes's version, the Holy Spirit helped young Roy Costner -- and did we mention he's a Southern Baptist? -- TRIUMPH over the Establishment Clause of the United States Constitution, and then Jesus saved America for some really delicious smoked pork butt.
[ RawStory / Snopes / Media Matters / Daily Nebraskan ]
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