A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
“These proposals included cries for billions of new money for social assistance in the name of “child poverty” and for more business subsidies in the name of “cultural identity”. In both cases I was sought out as a rare public figure to oppose such projects.” (Stephen Harper, The Bulldog, National Citizens Coalition, February 1997)
I have lived in the same neighborhood for more than twenty five years. When we moved here there was a little church around the corner, that I was told had been there at least twenty years before we arrived. I had never been inside and could not tell you what denomination it was. But it was a familiar landmark. "Go past the little church on the corner" ... "turn right at the little church on the corner".
And besides the Sunday services, it was often a hub of activity. School buses lined up to take members of the congregation on picnics. Evening meetings, where voices were raised in song. There always seemed to be something going on.
And every year they held a lawn and bake sale on the parking lot, and every year I attended. (Someone made the best banana bread on the planet). But last summer the sale seemed to be bigger than usual, with furniture, folding chairs and even a piano. I asked the woman at the table if they were renovating, but she said that they were going out of business. They could no longer afford to operate.
I noticed that one table had a rather large selection of John Hagee books and tapes, with a ridiculously low sale price. I think maybe fifty cents apiece. In my mind I thought there was a connection, not only in the fact that they had such a large collection of them, but that they had now deemed them to be almost worthless.
I was going to buy Jerusalem Countdown, out of curiosity, but decided that I didn't want that garbage in my house.
I've always believed that these small community churches serve such an important function, as they become like an extended family. Someone always knows when you are in hospital, under the weather or down on your luck. In a different variation to the song, "everyone dies famous in a small church." Somehow John Hagee didn't fit.
The Tithes That Bind You Up
The above video is of Hagee screaming "starve" to applause. Now first off, he has the Bible quotation wrong. He says the man who "does not work", while it should be the man "unwilling to work". There is a difference, but clearly he does not see one.
You know it's very easy for Pastor Hagee to call anyone without a job "lazy", when he lives on a $5.5 million dollar ranch with its own private airstrip, smokehouse, skeet shooting range, etc. and launders money through his non-profit "church related activities", while drawing a salary of more than a million dollars a year. In fact he is now known to be the highest-paid nonprofit executive in San Antonio.
And a lot of his money comes from bullying people into tithing 10% of their income to his church.
When you give to God, He controls your income. There is no such thing as fixed income in the Kingdom of God. Your income is controlled by your giving." Believing or not believing in these principles is one's choice, and if you make the wrong choice, you've clearly sided with Satan and will be cursed financially: "The difference between living a life of prosperity and a life of poverty is a matter of choice. ... Tithing is a choice. If you choose to not tithe, you will be living under a financial curse." (1)
And his wife pleads with other women, even suggesting that should leave their husbands if they will not tithe:
Real men tithe to their church and follow the word of the Bible, which according to Hagee "is the only foundation on which America can build and survive" and provides the greatest financial counseling in the world. To emphasize the supernatural power of its blessing, Hagee added that "it will do for you what the phone booth did for Clark Kent." But even when her husband is not abiding by the biblical imperative to tithe, the wife should still submit to his wishes, even though she knows his position is unbiblical. "I minister to many wives who are tormented by the fact their husbands refuse to give back to the Lord one-tenth of what the Provider has allowed them to earn," Diana Hagee writes. "A man who rejects the principle of tithing cannot understand the feelings of a woman who believes and trusts in the Word of God regarding prosperity."
What to do, in Diana Hagee's view? The woman "knows that the Lord requires the tithe, . . . that he will provide blessings to those who obey the Lord with their tithe, . that the Lord promises to devour the enemies of her family when her family is obedient to the tithe." Yet obedience to her husband supersedes all of God's laws: "Based on the Word of God, she does not have many options. She must be obedient to her husband's decision." A former member of Hagee's church said that Cornerstone's marriage counselors hewed to that philosophy: "If your husband was a big tither, and you had money, you were in the wrong.... But if he wasn't a good tither, and a big tither, leave him. (2)
But all these promises of riches if you just hand over your cash, rarely materialize, and many people have suffered financially, simply because they could not afford to keep feeding Hagee's enormous appetite for the good life.
One former member of Hagee's church, fearful to talk on the record because Hagee is "really powerful" and has "got so much clout," described Hagee as "very angry" and "not approachable." The former member, who attended Cornerstone for about ten years, recalled that she had been going to Cornerstone for six years before she actually met Hagee. "I said, 'Oh, Pastor Hagee, I'm finally getting to meet you after six years,' and he said, 'Oh, I've been back here every Sunday' and turned and walked off." Her husband is bipolar, and when they went to marriage counseling, the church "told him he was a loser and an infidel." The counselors encouraged the former congregant to leave her husband, but "thankfully, I prayed enough. ... I began to see trouble, you know, I began to see things that wasn't right."
[She] said that even though she and her husband wrote a big check to the church after they sold their house and tithed close to 10 percent of their income, "We never prospered there." Most of the people she knew there were struggling financially, including some who were evicted from their apartments because they couldn't pay their rent. Hagee, she said, has a "very powerful hold, and you don't even realize it. ... We were there ten years, and I knew something was wrong, but I couldn't figure out what it was." She even feared speaking to a reporter: "If I say too much about him, God's going to get me. ... [Hagee's] got so much money and he's so powerful, he could take everything we have in a minute."
Another former member told of tithing even when she had to borrow out of her 401(k) plan to make her mortgage payments. At one point, she said, "at Christmastime I didn't have gifts under my tree. Two small gifts for my kids, that was it. I was so broke, and I was tithing." At the time, she believed that tithing would result in her own blessing. Still another former member, a single mother divorced from an abusive husband, told of tithing out of her child support checks, even though she was living in an apartment with subsidized rent. Contrasting her small apartment with Hagee's home in an exclusive San Antonio subdivision and his multimillion-dollar ranch, she added, "I don't even have a house! My kids grew up on top of each other like sardines. ... I just want a little house." She added, "I thought something was wrong with me. Why am I still [living like this]. I've given and given and given and tithed and tithed and tithed." But while attending Cornerstone, she, like the others, felt guilt and enormous pressure not to question Hagee or his doctrine, and that atmosphere was reinforced through multiple church services each week and mandatory meetings with smaller cell groups whose leaders were vetted on the basis of classes, tests, and the faithfulness of their tithing. As a result, the former member said, "I looked to Pastor Hagee as a god." (1)
I wonder what Hagee's god has to say about that? Single mothers giving him money from that "cheque in the mail every month"?
John Hagee is a swindler. If he wasn't hiding behind his religion he would be in jail. And that is the man helping to dictate Stephen Harper's foreign policy. Business partner of Jim Flaherty's pal Charles McVety.
These people don't represent Christianity, but if ordinary Christians don't start speaking out against this nonsense, there's are the only "Christian" voices we will hear. And those little "churches on the corner" that provide so much comfort, will be a thing of the past.
In the 1970's when Israeli prime minister, Menachem Begin, decided to foster a relationship with the Moral Majority (Religious Right) to act as a lobbying partner, there was a rise in Evangelical groups promoting Israel.
In 1975, riding the wave; Evangelical pastor David Allen Lewis, formed a group called Christians United for Israel, which was not really a religious organization but a registered lobbyist, just as it is today. He led regular tour groups to the "Holy Land", and continued to do so until his death in 2007.
Under Begin and later Netanyahu, the relationship continued and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), begun in 1963, also gained prominence. The New York Times calls AIPAC "the most important organization affecting America's relationship with Israel." It has also been described as one of the most powerful lobbying groups in Washington, DC, and its critics have state that it acts as an agent of the Israeli government with a "stranglehold" on the US Congress. (1) And the Religious Right can be credited with much of their success.
Israel's principal Washington, DC lobby, American Israel Public Affairs Committee, also became a powerful force, and some now say while its clout in the media flows directly from Jewish network executives, publishers, journalists, and advertisers, its hold on Congress is further strengthened by "60 million Evangelical Christians" who, as lobby advertisements put it, "believe the creation of Israel is the fulfillment of God's prophecy."
There's a complication in that, which neither Israel's Jewish supporters nor the two remaining most prominent televangelist leaders of this supposed pro-Israel horde, Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, mention. (The other three nationally prominent pro-Israel televangelists, Oral Roberts, Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker Tammy Faye's ex-husband all suffered an apparent cooling of ardor for Israel while serving jail time for unrelated sins.) The way these Charismatic Christians look at it, the "in gathering of the Jews" in Jerusalem is a necessary prelude, like the battle of Armageddon, for which they pray, to the second coming of Christ. They believe that they and others "who accept Christ as their personal Saviour" will be "raptured" into heaven, and the Jews, and probably the Christians who haven't set their watches to Christian Coalition time, will be left on earth to face "tribulations." It's not clear to this writer what these "tribulations" associated with Armaggedon are. Presumably they also await all of the four-fifths of the human race who are Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Theosophists and such, and to whom the British Rev. John Nelson Darby probably never gave a thought when in the 19th century he twisted fragments of Biblical prophesy into this gloomy scenario.
So U.S. support for Israel is based on America's 5 million Jews, who think Israel is a nice place to visit but wouldn't want to live there, and an earthly host of born agains who follow Pat Robertson and recently were enjoined by him to convert those Jews. (When Jewish leaders taxed him with "anti-Semitism" for trying to mess with their children's minds, he indignantly responded that it was impossible to call him anti-Semitic because he is so pro-Israel. It's not logical but nevertheless a neat defense.) (2)
But not all Israelis were happy about this relationship and things came to a head when Rev. Morris Cerullo of Worldwide Evangelism Inc. of San Diego, CA, mailed one million copies of a missionary tract entitled The Peace to Israelis in late 1996, and with a population of about 5 million Israelis, it amounted to about one copy per Jewish household.
As a result a law was drafted banning proselytizing.
In March [1998] ... the first draft of a law banning Christian missionary work in Israel ... makes it a criminal offense punishable with up to 15 years' imprisonment and subsequent deportation for foreigners "to teach or propagate Christian doctrine" in the Holy land.
Catholic or Protestant clergy, teachers or aid workers will be allowed into Israel only while traveling "in a wholly private capacity, as tourists or transients, with no public religious functions or observances included in their itinerary." Israelis have long resented Christian clergy, both the liberal kind who support Palestinian human rights, and the evangelical kind who encourage Jews to convert to their religion. (2)
This ruffled more than a few feathers on the Evangelical circuit:
Neither Pat Robertson nor Jerry Falwell, both of whom have been involved in Christian proselytizing by radio from Israel's "security zone" in southern Lebanon, and both of whom could be arrested, expelled, or even imprisoned on their next visits to Israel, could not be reached or would not comment after passage of the draft law. Others did, however. "We see the noose of religious repression tightening all over the world," said DavidKammerdiener, executive vice president of the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board. "We certainly now even see it flowering in Israel." Citing American Jewish protests when the Southern Baptists adopted a resolution to support proclamation of the Gospel to the Jews," Kammerdiener said of the Jewish responses in both Israel and the U.S., "either one is an attack on liberty." (2)
And even Pastor Lewis from Christians United For Israel felt betrayed:
Even those Evangelical Christian ministers generally assumed to be receiving Israeli financial support, channeled through front organizations, found the law impossible to defend. "This bill means great hardship for Zionist evangelicals like myself," the Rev. David Allen Lewis, president of Christians United for Israel, told Spotlight, a Washington, DC national weekly frequently critical of Israel. "It will revive the argument of Christian anti-Semites who say: 'How can you support the Jewish nation when they are against Christianity?'" (2)
Not long after he abandoned CUFI and the lobbying group ceased it's operations. When Ariel Sharon became prime minister of Israel, the hard line commitment to holding on to the West Bank softened, as he took a more moderate stand. Fearing their road to Armageddon was being dug up, the Religious Right went on the attack:
As former Likud politicians such as Sharon and Olmert have moderated their stance, what has been the response of their allies in the American religious right? The response of the Christian right has been to lobby harder against any Israeli government effort to negotiate land for peace and any American effort to lead in that regard. What’s more, Pat Robertson has suggested that Sharon is in a coma because of his evacuation of Gaza settlements. Pastor Hagee has said that Hurricane Katrina happened because the Bush administration supported Sharon’s Gaza plan. (He also said it was because New Orleans was planning a gay pride parade. Poor man gets confused some times)
And Christian Zionist lobbying efforts have played no small part in the Bush administration downgrading of the conflict on the America agenda, with the result that there has been no serious negotiations in almost 8 years. There is an even darker side, to this movement of the religious right that calls itself “Christian Zionism.” Many of these groups have supported some of Israel’s most extreme and most dangerous elements with large amounts of money and legitimacy. (3)
In November of 2005, Charles McVety called John Hagee to notify him that there would be a Toronto “Night to Honour Israel” the following May. Hagee is said to have replied that “there’s no reason why we can’t do the same thing in every major city of North America.” After first seeking permission from Reverend Lewis to resurrect CUFI:
Subsequently, on February 7, 2006, 400 pastors and others joined together at Hagee’s Cornerstone Church to establish Christians United for Israel with Christian rightist leaders Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson prominently included and with Charles McVety named National Chairman for Canada. Others in the Canadian group are John Howarth (Executive Director), who is on the faculty of McVety’s college, Reverend John Tweedie of Brampton (National Chairman) and Reverend Dean Bye of Centralia, Ontario. (4)
This brings us to the present. Netanyahu is back in power, CUFI has been reborn and John Hagee has said of Stephen Harper: "God has promised to bless the man, the church, the nation that blesses the Jewish people." (5)
But as Rabbi Broitman points out:
Zionism is the movement for Jews to take control over our own history and destiny. Christian Zionism, as the religious right has formulated it, is an attempt to move us toward an end-time where Jews are lacking any power other than being passive actors in someone else’s prophetic drama. I do not doubt that the majority of evangelicals have a sincere love and concern for Israel and for Jews, whom they deeply believe are God’s chosen. Many of their leaders, however, have taken this love in the wrong direction. We do not want to be loved, so to speak, to death. (3)
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
"How utterly repulsive, insulting, and heartbreaking to God for his chosen people to credit idols with bringing blessings he had showered upon the chosen people. Their own rebellion had birthed the seed of anti-Semitism that would arise and bring destruction to them for centuries to come." John Hagee (1)
If anything defines the hypocrisy and viciousness of the Religious Right, it's their disdain for Jimmy Carter. Himself an evangelist, and one of the most caring people on the planet, he is treated by them as though he's the devil himself.
And why? Because he promotes peace in the Middle East.
At one of John Hagee's “Nights to Honor Israel”, the "evangelical" crowd get whipped into a frenzy:
They get even more stirred up when keynote speaker Michael Oren, an author and senior fellow at the Shalem center in Jerusalem, calls Jimmy Carter’s 2006 book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, a “reprehensible” work, and the mere mention of Carter’s name earns a chorus of boos so hostile they would probably frighten a Philadelphia hockey fan. (2)
Jimmy Carter, for heaven sake, the creator of Habitat for Humanity. Is Christianity ever taking a nose dive.
So how did this happen? Rabbi Caryn Broitman explains:
The beginning of this evangelical-Jewish alliance around Israel goes back to the aftermath of the Six Day War but intensified in the late 1970’s. At that time, two concurrent political developments were taking place in Israel and in the United States: the election of Menachem Begin and the rise of Likud party in Israel; and the rise of the Moral Majority and the religious right in the United States. The Likud party is a secular party, but it emphasizes Jewish rights over the whole of the Biblical land of Israel including the West Bank.
Begin made an alliance with the nationalist religious movements of Israel such as Gush Emunim to promote the religious settlement movement on the West Bank. President Jimmy Carter, however, was pressuring Begin to negotiate with Palestinians based on a principle of land for Peace. Begin needed American allies to counter this pressure and who better than Christians who believe, as Pastor Hagee says, that Israel is the only country established by God himself and that “any nation that forces Israel to divide up their land will experience the judgment of God.” It was a match made in heaven.
When Menachem Begin became Prime Minister, he made it a point to cultivate relationships with the American religious right. He became good friends with Jerry Falwell, inviting him and hundreds of other evangelical pastors for trips to Israel at the expense of the Israeli government. Falwell responded with endorsements of the Likud Party’s strategy of building Israeli Settlements throughout the West Bank. Begin’s government later gave Falwell his own jet to make his travels to Israel easier.
Falwell and other leaders of the religious right, including Hal Lindsey, Pat Robertson, and Oral Roberts came through when they were needed by Likud politicians to lobby for their policies. In 1998 when Likud Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came on a state visit to the United States, his first stop was to see leaders of the religious right, such as Ralph Reed director of the Christian Coalition. “We have no greater friends and allies,” he said to them, than the people sitting in this room.”
Netanyahu’s statement may be startling to some, but it does make sense if one’s priority for Israel is to hold on to all the biblical land. They were Netanyahu’s best friends, better friends than President Clinton from that perspective, with whom he was meeting the next day and who was pressuring Netanyahu as well as the Palestinians to meaningfully negotiate. For the Likud party and their supporters, this was a smart political alliance.
Liberal objections about the real motives of these Evangelicals were not persuasive. True, these Christian right leaders believed the real significance of the State of Israel was its role in the apocalyptic end-times scenario, which they believed would culminate in the wiping out of most Jews and the conversion of the remaining few. This is deeply problematic and offensive for us as Jews. One could argue, however, that we don’t believe in these visions of the end time anyway, so what do they matter? If we agree on what should happen in this world, why not agree to disagree on what happens in the next. (3)
And one of the evangelical leaders to visit Israel in the 1970's was Pastor John Hagee, recently divorced and remarried to the woman with whom he'd had an affair.
With his reputation badly damaged by the divorce and apparent infidelity, he found solace — and a new career niche — in the Holy Land. In 1978, he and Diana (then pregnant with Matthew) made a trip to Israel, and came back committed Zionists. In 1981, when Israeli air strikes destroyed Iraq’s prized nuclear reactor, Hagee felt the need to defend Israel against the harsh criticisms of the international media.
Although he initially received little support from Jewish leaders (who looked at him “like he had a contagious rash,” according to Hagee) aside from Aryeh Scheinberg, a local Orthodox rabbi, Hagee inaugurated his “Night to Honor Israel,” meant to be a fundraiser for Jewish and pro-Israel causes, and a festive show of solidarity from Christians to the nation of Israel.
Hagee says his support for Israel stems from a heartfelt conviction that Jews have an unshakable biblical claim on Israel, but skeptics counter that his end-times theology, largely derived from the menacing imagery of the Book of Revelation, depends upon a prophesied invasion of Israel by Russia and Iran. If Israel brokered a two-state solution in the region and achieved a lasting peace with its neighbors, Hagee’s end-times checklist would be disrupted. Consider this passage from his best-known book, Jerusalem Countdown: “[God] has dragged these anti-Semitic nations to the nations of Israel to crush them so that the Jews of Israel will confess that He is the Lord. America and Europe will not save Israel — God will!” (2)
The Likud Party* has been returned to power with Benjamin Netanyahu once more at the helm. And he has also fostered a relationship with the Religious Right, though it is no longer just with the Americans. He also now has the support of Canada's Religious Right and it's extension: The Harper government. When Israeli seized a Turkish ship in international waters last month, killing nine peace activists, we were one of the few countries not to speak out against this criminal act:
While governments around the world denounced the Israeli attack and Turkey decried it as an act of "state terrorism," Prime Minister Stephen Harper cheerfully followed through with a planned meeting the next day with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Appearing with Netanyahu, Harper merely expressed regret about the loss of life and the fact that it interfered with Netanyahu's visit to Canada: "I'm sorry this has coloured this [visit]," said Harper, "but delighted you were able to join me at least last night and today, and we've had some important talks, so welcome to Canada." (4)
During the 2008 presidential race, Hagee threw his support behind John McCain, but the entire thing blew up in McCain's face, as the real John Hagee was exposed.
Hagee endorsed Republican Senator John McCain for president over a more obvious choice, Southern evangelical Mike Huckabee. McCain had courted Hagee for months, and stood by the San Antonio pastor’s side while saying that he was “very honored” by the endorsement.
Over the next three months, McCain found himself continually having to defend Hagee’s endless backlog of inflammatory pronouncements: that the Catholic Church is the “great whore” of scripture, that New Orleans brought the devastation of Katrina on itself by sinfully planning a gay-pride parade, that all Muslims want to destroy Christianity, that God will punish the United States if our political leaders urge Israel to give up some of its land (“This nation is going to go through a bloodbath because of what you’ve done.”), and that God sent Hitler to help drive the Jews to the promised land. Finally, after the slow drip of McCain repudiating Hagee statements one by one, on May 22, he rejected the pastor’s support, leading a bitter Hagee to announce that he would never again endorse a political candidate. (2)
I think that John McCain is a decent guy and may have been able to steer the Republicans back from the depths of hell, but between Sarah Palin and John Hagee, not to mention the legacy of George Bush, he didn't stand a chance.
So what does this have to with us, besides the fact that we're the only nation supporting piracy and murder? Hagee is losing credibility in the United States (though not with his flock), while his Canadian business partner, Charles McVety is gaining power in Canada.
Not only is McVety a long time friend of Jim Flaherty's, but he also has a close relationship with Stockwell Day and Jason Kenney, and according to McVety himself, can get Stephen Harper on the phone anytime he wishes. Hagee rents office space from McVety in Toronto, and his books and tapes are sold from McVety's Christian college. (5)
Even in the reliably conservative world of mega-church evangelism, the old order is changing. Hagee’s incendiary political attacks and Armageddon fear-mongering suited the post-9/11 anger and anxiety that gripped America, but the rising stars on the evangelical circuit are now touchy-feely compassionate conservatives such as Joel Hunter, an Orlando, Florida, evangelical who delivered the benediction at this year’s Democratic National Convention, and Rick Warren, who heads Saddleback Community Church in California and hosted a faith summit with Barack Obama and John McCain this summer. (2)
The Tea Parties have created a bit of a surge for Religious fanaticism, Fox News and Republican nonsense, but I think even that is starting to burn itself out, they've become so ridiculous. Ann Coulter is now boring and Glenn Beck parodied more than Sarah Palin.
So will people like Hagee find a more willing audience north of the border? After all we did have a visit from the Queen of spite recently and Stephen Harper has signed a deal for a Fox News North. Welcome to our future.
Footnotes:
*Interestingly, McLaughlin and Associates, an American Republican consulting firm, takes credit for the career of both Stephen Harper and the Likud Party, as well as many Religious Right endorsed Republican politicians.
Sources:
1. Columbia Journalism Review, March 7, 2008
2. The Zionist in winter, By Gilbert Garcia, The San Antonio Current, November 12, 2008
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
John Hagee was born in 1940, in Baytown, Texas, and came from a long line of Anabaptist Mennonite pastors. Considered part of the Radical Reformation, Anabaptists preached of charismatic manifestations, such as dancing, falling under the power of the Holy Spirit, "prophetic processions" and speaking in tongues. Some, "excited by mass hysteria, experienced healings, glossolalia, contortions and other manifestations of a camp-meeting revivals.
As a boy, Hagee travelled with his family in a mobile home as the Hagee Family Singers. His father would preach revivals all over Texas, while John, his older brother Bill, and parents provided the music. As a young man of 18, he addressed a congregation at his father’s Houston church in 1958.
Prophesy factored heavily into the family's belief system, with Israel and the Israelites playing a prominent role. In 1948, when Israel became a state, the Sr. Hagee saw it as a fulfilment of destiny. But what they probably didn't realize at the time, was how much Christians were suffering in the area.
Donald Neff, former Israel Bureau Chief for Time Magazine, writes:
Desecration of Christian property and churches—arson, window breaking, burning of the New Testament—had long marred relations between the two communities. A small but fanatical group of Jews wanted no Christians, whom they considered fallen Jews, in Israel. This virulent strain of prejudice had been present since before the Jewish state was founded.
For instance, after the capture by Jewish forces of Jaffa on May 13, 1948, two days before Israel’s birth, there was desecration of Christian churches. Father Deleque, a Catholic priest, reported: “Jewish soldiers broke down the doors of my church and robbed many precious and sacred objects. Then they threw the statues of Christ down into a nearby garden.” He added that Jewish leaders had reassured that religious buildings would be respected, “but their deeds do not correspond to their words.”
On May 31, 1948, a group of Christian leaders comprising the Christian Union of Palestine publicly complained that Jewish forces had used 10 Christian churches and humanitarian institutions in Jerusalem as military bases and otherwise desecrated them. They added that a total of 14 churches had suffered shell damage, which killed three priests and made casualties of more than 100 women and children.
The group’s statement said Arab forces had abided by their promise to respect Christian institutions, but that the Jews had forcefully occupied Christian structures and been indiscriminate in shelling churches. It said, among other charges, that “many children were killed or wounded” by Jewish shells on the Convent of Orthodox Copts on May 19, 23 and 24; that eight refugees were killed and about 120 wounded at the Orthodox Armenian Convent at some unstated date; and that Father Pierre Somi, secretary to the Bishop, had been killed and two wounded at the Orthodox Syrian Church of St. Mark on May 16. (1)
John Hagee married his first wife Martha in 1960, with whom he had two children. But he became involved with a young woman, and divorced his wife in 1975. He and the young woman were married six months later.
The Liberty Flame reported in May 1994 that during the time when Hagee was serving the Charismatic congregation at Trinity Church (1976) in San Antonio, he divorced his wife, resigned and married a young woman in the congregation, Diana Castro. Custody of Hagee’s two children by his ex-wife, Martha, went to her. In a letter to the church, Hagee admitted immorality, which later became part of the court records in the custody battle. Martha later also remarried and started another family. Not surprisingly, there is a hiatus from 1976 to 1987 left out of Hagee’s web site biography. (2)
Things were changing for Israel as well, after the 1967 war, where they captured East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza. Things were not much better for Christians though, at the hands of some of the Israeli:
Churches were again desecrated during the 1967 war when Israel captured East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, completing the occupation of all of Palestine. On July 21, 1967, the Reverend James L. Kelso, a former moderator of the United Presbyterian Church and long-time resident in Palestine, complained of extensive damage to churches adding: “So significant was this third Jewish war against the Arabs that one of the finest missionaries of the Near East called it ‘perhaps the most serious setback that Christendom has had since the fall of Constantinople in 1453.’”
Kelso continued: “How did Israel respect church property in the fighting...? They shot up the Episcopal Cathedral [in Jerusalem], just as they had done in 1948. They smashed down the Episcopal school for boys...The Israelis wrecked and looted the YMCA...They wrecked the big Lutheran hospital...The Lutheran center for cripples also suffered...”
Nancy Nolan, wife of a physician at the American University Hospital in Beirut, who was in Jerusalem during and after the fighting, charged that “while the Israeli authorities proclaim to the world that all religions will be respected and protected, and post notices identifying the Holy Places, Israeli soldiers and youths are throwing stink bombs in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.
“The Church of St. Anne, who crypt marks the birthplace of the Virgin Mary, has been severely damaged and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem also was damaged. The wanton killing of the Warden of the Garden Tomb followed by the shooting into the tomb itself, in an attempt to kill the warden’s wife, was another instance that we knew first-hand which illustrated the utter disregard shown by the occupation forces toward the Holy Places and the religious sensibilities of the people in Jordan and in the rest of the world.”
“The desecration of churches...includes smoking in the churches, littering the churches, taking dogs inside and entering in inappropriate manner of dress. Behavior such as this cannot be construed other than as a direct insult to the whole Christian world.” (1)
And they would later enact laws to take the persecution of Christians even further:
On Dec. 29, 1977, Christians in Israel and the occupied territories protested a new law passed by the Israeli parliament making it illegal for missionaries to proselytize Jews. Protestant churches charged that the law had been “hastily pushed through parliament during the Christmas period when Christians were busily engaged in preparing for and celebrating their major festival.” The law made missionaries liable to five years’ imprisonment for attempting to persuade people to change their religion, and three years’ imprisonment for any Jew who converted. The United Christian Council complained that the law could be “misused in restricting religious freedom in Israel.”
Nonetheless, it came into force on April 1, 1978, prohibiting the offering of “material inducement” for a person to change his religion. A material inducement could be something as minor as the giving of a Bible. Although the Likud government of Menachem Begin assured the Christian community that the law applied equally to all religions and did not specifically mention Christians, the United Christian Council of Israel charged that it was biased and aimed specifically at Christians since only Christians openly proselytized. Council representatives also cited anti-Christian speeches made in the parliament during debate on the law. Parliament member Binyamin Halevy had called missionaries “a cancer in the body of the nation.”
The next year Rabbi Ovadiah Yosef, considered a political moderate, issued a religious ruling that copies of the New Testament should be torn out of any edition of a Bible owned by a Jew. Israeli scholar Yehoshafat Harkabi wrote that he was disturbed by “these manifestations of hostility-the designation of Christians as idolaters, the demand to invoke the ‘resident alien’ ordinances, and the burning of the New Testament.” Observed Harkabi: “Outside of the Land of Israel Jews never dared behave in this fashion. Has independence made the Jews take leave of their senses?”
And it was into this political climate that Hagee brought his new bride:
With his reputation badly damaged by the divorce and apparent infidelity, he found solace — and a new career niche — in the Holy Land. In 1978, he and Diana (then pregnant with Matthew) made a trip to Israel, and came back committed Zionists. In 1981, when Israeli air strikes destroyed Iraq’s prized nuclear reactor, Hagee felt the need to defend Israel against the harsh criticisms of the international media.
Hagee says his support for Israel stems from a heartfelt conviction that Jews have an unshakable biblical claim on Israel, but skeptics counter that his end-times theology, largely derived from the menacing imagery of the Book of Revelation, depends upon a prophesied invasion of Israel by Russia and Iran. If Israel brokered a two-state solution in the region and achieved a lasting peace with its neighbors, Hagee’s end-times checklist would be disrupted. Consider this passage from his best-known book, Jerusalem Countdown: “[God] has dragged these anti-Semitic nations to the nations of Israel to crush them so that the Jews of Israel will confess that He is the Lord. America and Europe will not save Israel — God will!” (2)
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
"Rob is a true reformer and a true conservative. He has been a faithful supporter of mine and I am grateful for his work." ( Stephen Harper endorsing Calgary West Conservative MP Rob Anders)
In October of 2008, Harper MP Rob Anders, told a humanitarian rights lawyer that he believes Canadian diplomacy and humanitarian work should focus on changing foreigners' language to English and their faith to Christianity.
Ms. Kennedy-Glans, a Calgary West constituent, said she has come forward in the middle of the election campaign because she wants fellow voters to understand his perspective. She recognizes missionary work has value, but as the founder of a volunteer agency that helps train female professionals in Muslim countries such as Nigeria and Indonesia, she believes Mr. Anders' apparent views pose a security risk to Canadians abroad.
"If anybody in the world saw or heard that the MP in my riding was saying that he thought humanitarian agencies should go out and change religions, I am at personal risk and so are the volunteers that get on the plane and go do this work," said Ms. Kennedy-Glans, founder of Calgary-based Bridges Social Development. (1)
Naturally Anders claimed that his remarks were taken out of context, but another person who was privy to the conversation, states that Kennedy-Glans was accurate in her interpretation.
However, there was something else that was part of Ander's defense that I found interesting: He has also been a staunch defender of liberties of Falun Gong practitioners and Tibetans, harshly decrying the actions of the Chinese government.
Falun Gong is something that is coming up a lot with the theocons lately, here and in the U.S., which I've generally dismissed, but when one of the more controversial members of our government goes on record as defending them, I thought it warranted a second look.
From their own website: The Falun Gong teachings borrow terms and concepts of Buddha school and Tao school, but it is not a religion like Buddhism and Taoism. Falun Gong does not have any religious formality or worship .... And yet all of the claims made about their conflict with the Chinese government, cite religious persecution.
So What is Falun Gong?
First off, what I've discovered is that, like Yoga, it has helped many people, by combining a spiritual and physical regimen. But what I've also discovered is that it is a very powerful political movement, that has gained a lot momentum, earning the support of many western governments.
But it has also garnered warnings about cult-like practices, stemming from the beliefs of the movement's founder Li Hongzhi, which can be found in his own writings and interviews with foreign press. For instance, he claims that the Earth is under attack from extraterrestrial aliens who are getting ready to clone and supplant the human race even as we speak. From Time magazine, May 1999:
Suddenly, however, conversation veered to a topic Li has thus far broached to none but his inner circle: aliens on earth. "One type of alien looks like a human but has a nose made of a bone ... others resemble ghosts. The extraterrestrials, who arrived circa 1900, have not been idle. "Everyone thinks that scientists invent on their own," said Li, "when in fact their inspiration is manipulated by the aliens." The aliens intend to replace all humans with clones, he added. "In terms of culture and spirit, they already control men." (2)
And also from his book Zhuan Falun:
Li's rambling dissertation, Zhuan Falun, has only added to accusations that Falun Gong is a cult. Li writes he can personally heal disease and that his followers can stop speeding cars using the powers of his teachings. He writes that the Falun Gong emblem exists in the bellies of practitioners, who can see through the celestial eyes in their foreheads. Li believes "humankind is degenerating and demons are everywhere"extraterrestrials are everywhere, too and that Africa boasts a 2-billion-year-old nuclear reactor. He also says he can fly. (3)
Mythology in religion is nothing new, but he relies on a mythology of his own modern day creation. However, what warrants a second look are his remarks about homosexuality, that are not unlike those of some members of the Religious Right.
"Is homosexuality human behavior? Heaven created man and woman. What was the purpose? To procreate future generations. A man being with a man, or a woman with a woman-it doesn't take much thought to know whether that's right or wrong. When minor things are done incorrectly, a person is said to be wrong. When major things are done incorrectly, it's a case of people no longer having the moral code of human beings, and then they are unworthy of being human…
When gods created man they prescribed standards for human behavior and living. When human beings overstep those boundaries, they are no longer called human beings, though they still assume the outer appearance of a human. So gods can't tolerate their existence and will destroy them." (4)
However, after being accused of being not only a cult, but a homophobic cult, Li suggests that he is actually on earth to save homosexuals:
"Let me tell you why today's society has become how it is. It results from there not being an upright Fa to keep human beings in check. This Dafa is taught right in the most chaotic environment, at a time when no religion can save people, and where the circumstance is that no god takes interest in people anymore. The Fa is almighty. The best time periods wouldn't require such a great Fa to be taught. Only in the worst time periods can the power of the Fa manifest. There are other reasons, too."
"Let me tell you, if I weren't teaching this Fa today, gods' first target of annihilation would be homosexuals. It's not me who would destroy them, but gods. ... You know that homosexuals have found legitimacy in that homosexuality was around back in the culture of ancient Greece. Yes, there was a similar phenomenon in ancient Greek culture. And do you know why ancient Greek culture is no more? Why are the ancient Greeks gone? Because they had degenerated to that extent, and so they were destroyed." (4)
That same speech could have been given by John Hagee or Charles McVety. And yet we have a Parliamentary Falun Gong Friendship Group.
I understand that it was formed in response to human rights violations imposed by the Chinese government on practitioners of Falun Gong, but for someone like Rob Anders and other, what are being dubbed 'Christian Conservatives, who have little to do with Christianity or conservatism, there is a different agenda: anti-Communism.
Falun Gong and a Holy Purpose
Tim LeHaye, one of the founders of the American Religious Right movement, recently reassured his followers that Obama was not the Antichrist. He knows this because before the end times can occur, we must first get rid of communism. Apparently this was chiseled into a stone tablet.
This brings us to the reason why end timers defend the Falun Gong movement. They pose a direct threat to Communism in China.
Banning the fastest growing religious group in modern Chinese history may be a risky move for Beijing, but letting it flourish may have been even riskier. That appears to be thinking behind a government decision Thursday to declare the 70-million strong Falun Gong religious cult illegal. The move came as protests continued in Beijing and other major cities against the arrest Wednesday of thousands of members and leaders of the group. "The government fears that Falun Gong, as a nationwide movement with more members than the Communist party, could become a lightning rod for the political frustrations of a nation undergoing traumatic social and economic changes," says TIME correspondent William Dowell. "Their belief system is a symbolic representation of the difficulties of modern life, and that could make it a very powerful force in a largely peasant population easily swayed by mysticism." (5)
And:
Even more terrifying for the government is the possibility that Falun Gong could morph into a political organization, as has happened with other sects in Chinese history--most famously during the 19th century Taiping rebellion, when a martial-arts cult triggered a civil war that left more than a million dead. But so far police have found no evidence of a political conspiracy, and the official media have accused Li of being a cult leader who promotes superstition and witchcraft. (6)
And:
Historically, secret societies and spiritual masters have challenged, and even toppled, Chinese dynasties, and President Jiang Zemin has stressed a need to "suppress cults and the use of religion to engage in illegal activities." (2)
Rob Anders has always been a vocal opponent of China and communism in general. In 2000 he was lauded on the xtremist C-Far site, by Stephen Harper's old pal* Paul Fromm:
Wednesday night, at a Chinese New Year's celebration on Parliament Hill, he [Anders] was asked by officials of the Red Chinese Embassy to leave because he was quietly wearing a tee-shirt calling on the Communist Chinese to get out of Tibet. The shirt also proclaimed: "Stop Tiananmen tanks, forced abortions, burning books" and "Independent Indo-China, Korea, and Taiwan." (7)
As an elected Member of Parliament, this is not the way to go about opposing a foreign country.
He was also the only MP to deny an honorary citizenship to Nelson Mandela, which would have had more meaning if it could have been unanimous.
I don't think that, you know, anybody would argue that if Nelson Mandela was saying, you know, 30 years ago, that you should go around with matches and necklaces and strangle people or burn them out of their homes, that is not terrorism ... "[Honouring Nelson Mendela is a] total political-correctness poster-boy thing... He was a Communist. He was a terrorist... " (8)
Human rights abuses need to be challenged by any government, but is it wise to put so much support behind a political movement whose leader believes he can fly? (Stephen Harper only thinks he can walk on water) And should we not condemn their blatant homophobia? Despite the fact that it might give Jason Kenney a case of premature rapture-lation, Falun Gong's leader believes that only he can save Gays from annihilation, when no one else has even used the term.
However, there is another reason why we must proceed with caution.
The Falun Gong and Media Manipulation
Dr. Heather Kavan, a lecturer in Communication, Journalism and Marketing at Massey University, New Zealand, spent a year with the Falun Gong, to assess in part whether they were indeed a cult or as it's followers suggest an organization that promotes spiritual and moral well-being, and cures illness. Maybe it's both.
Dr. Kavan began her quest with empathy and a desire to learn why Falun Gong was banned, while she has no doubt that there are human rights violations against them, also discovered that "much of the material about Falun Gong in the Western news misleads the public."
Falun Gong, literally law wheel practice, is a new religious movement that is now illegal in China. Of all religious adherents, Falun Gong members are perhaps the most media savvy. They have despatched thousands of press releases, staged headline-generating events, maintained a strong Internet presence, and brought defamation suits against anyone who publishes unfavourable material. Consequently, Falun Gong adherents have been treated relatively kindly by the western press, who have sometimes supported their religious and political agendas.
While several studies have examined how Falun Gong, the Chinese media, and the Western media have framed and presented their material, from a practical perspective the issue of the material's accuracy is more important. Western governments' policies regarding human rights issues in China are often largely based on media reports ... (9)
This certainly shows things in a different light.
Conflict with the media has been central to Falun Gong almost since its inception, for it was not the Chinese government, but journalists, writers, scientists and ex-members who first criticised Falun Gong. Li's unscientific claims and professions of divine status invited scepticism, and by mid 1996 Chinese journalists began to publish critical articles about Falun Gong's supernatural beliefs and Li's egoism. In response, Li directed members to defend the fa (his spiritual law) whenever it was attacked. The protests were large and relentless.
... In China the media are free only as far as they facilitate social stability, so when Falun Gong threatened civil unrest, media managers were quick to capitulate to their demands. For example, when 2,000 protestors surrounded Beijing Television after the station broadcast a segment about a doctoral candidate who became psychotic while practising Falun Gong, the station fired the reporter, aired an immediate sympathetic portrayal, and – to show extra goodwill – handed out 2,000 boxed lunches to the protestors.
Having learnt that such protests were fruitful, Falun Gong members were unstoppable. To prevent social unrest, Beijing authorities introduced a blackout against any negative media reports on the movement. However, not everyone was aware of the blackout, and an obscure academic magazine in Tianjin published a critique of Falun Gong by renowned physicist He Zuoxin. The article might have gone unnoticed, except that six thousand Falun Gong protestors occupied the University over three days, demanding a retraction. The editors refused, responding that scientific publications do not print retractions. The protest developed into a riot – although this appears to have happened after the riot police arrived – and up to 45 people were arrested (the numbers vary in different accounts). (9)
So it would appear that the Chinese government is not suppressing religious beliefs, but a powerful political movement that threatens to create social unrest. Dr Kavan concludes:
At the heart of the battle between the Chinese government and Falun Gong are two warring ideologies with highly committed protagonists. Both use the media as pawns. Both use the same rhetorical strategies: issuing blanket denials when accused, devising conspiracy stories, and redirecting allegations by accusing the other of the same thing. What is being played out is a conflict of intransigent beliefs. The Western media's uncritical acceptance of Falun Gong's version suggests that Li, by appealing to ideals of amelioration of suffering and freedom of religion, has produced a story that the West wants to believe. (9)
That the West WANTS to believe.
Kavan also mentions her own confrontation when news of her own story was leaked.
When the research was finished, I was quoted in a press release on new religious movements, in which I said that the FBI's definition of a potentially violent religion was so broad that several groups in New Zealand would fall into it, and cited Falun Gong as one of several examples. Falun Gong members monitor the media daily, and discovered the press release even before I did. They were offended that they were classified with other religions that they perceived to be "totally evil", and I received a phone call warning me that I would be deluged by a hundred callers from a Falun Gong email list. Several emotionally–charged phone calls followed, in which the callers demanded the press release be removed from the Internet. A member contacted me at home and relayed accusations that I was being paid large amounts of money by the Chinese government, and repeatedly said that the situation was "extremely dangerous". Each time I asked exactly what the danger was, she did not explain. (9)
We need to be very careful here, because even for those who oppose communism, is the alternative really better? Maybe for Rob Anders and other extremists, but Canadians have to be diligent, especially when we already have a Parliamentary Falun Gong Friendship Group.
Footnotes:
*In 1987 Reform Party member, Paul Fromm, arranged to have author and journalist, Peter Brimelow, speak at their convention. As reward, he was allowed to set up a table in the hall, where he distributed literature and sold memberships to his anti-immigration organization C-FAR. (10) Peter Brimelow's book Patriot Game: Canada and the Canadian Question Revisited, is said to have been one of the motivations behind the formation of the new party. After reading it, Harper and his buddy John Weissenberger, were so enthralled with the book that they bought ten copies and gave them to friends. (11)
Sources:
1. MP says comments on aid, religion 'torqued': A lawyer and humanitarian says Calgary West Conservative MP Rob Anders told her he believes Canadian diplomacy and humanitarian work should focus on changing foreigners' language to English and their faith to Christianity, By The Ottawa Citizen, October 1, 2008
2. The Man with the Qi, By Jaime A. FlorCruz/Beijing; Time Magazine, May. 10, 1999
6. Inside The Falun Gong, By Mia Turner/Beijing;Terry McCarthy/Shanghai , Time magazine, August 09, 1999
7. Calgary West MP Rob Anders deserves the thanks and appreciation of all Canadians Citizens for Foreign Aid ... . By Paul Fromm, Citizens for Foreign Aid Reform Inc. (C-FAR), February 12, 2000
8. Conservative MP Rob Anders after blocking a resolution to declare former South African president Nelson Mandela an honorary Canadian citizen, June 11, 2001. Anders also implied that South Africa was better off during Apartheid than it is today. (Hansard)
10. Of Passionate Intensity: Right-Wing Populism and the Reform Party of Canada. Author: Trevor Harrison Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1995. ISBN: 0-8020-7204-6, Pg. 48
11. Stephen Harper and the Future of Canada, by William Johnson, 2005, ISBN 0-7710 4350-3, Pg. 52
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
"God says in Jeremiah 16 - 'Behold I will bring them the Jewish people again unto their land that I gave unto their fathers' - that would be Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - 'Behold I will send for many fishers and after will I send for many hunters. And they the hunters shall hunt them' - that will be the Jews - 'from every mountain and from every hill and from out of the holes of the rocks.' If that doesn't describe what Hitler did in the Holocaust... you can't see that? So think about this - I will send fishers and I will send hunters." - Pastor John Hagee in a sermon
"Then God sent a hunter. A hunter is someone with a gun and he forces you. Hitler was a hunter. And the Bible says -- Jeremiah writing -- 'They shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from the holes of the rocks,' meaning there's no place to hide. And that might be offensive to some people but don't let your heart be offended. I didn't write it, Jeremiah wrote it. It was the truth and it is the truth. How did it happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel." - Pastor John Hagee in a sermon
Rather astonishing words by John Hagee suggesting that Adolf Hitler was doing God's work. But it speaks to the ideology of Christian Zionists who believe that the end times are near, so they must get all the Jewish people to Israel.
But there is actually more to it than that.
Theodore Herzl (1850-1904)
"Theodore Herzl is the father of Zionism. He was a Jew who at the turn of the 19th century said, this land is our land, God wants us to live there. So he went to the Jews of Europe and said 'I want you to come and join me in the land of Israel.' So few went that Herzl went into depression. Those who came founded Israel; those who did not went through the hell of the holocaust." - Pastor John Hagee in a sermon
That is a very simplistic description of who Theodore Herzl was and in fact Herzl would never have cared much for people like John Hagee.
In fact he hated organized religion. When at university he belonged to the Burschenschaften, an association of university students inspired by liberal and nationalistic ideas.
As a Jew he saw the poison of anti-Semitism and really felt that it could not be defeated or cured, and the only solution was the establishment of a Jewish state.
“ The Jewish question persists wherever Jews live in appreciable numbers. Wherever it does not exist, it is brought in together with Jewish immigrants. We are naturally drawn into those places where we are not persecuted, and our appearance there gives rise to persecution. This is the case, and will inevitably be so, everywhere, even in highly civilised countries—see, for instance, France—so long as the Jewish question is not solved on the political level. The unfortunate Jews are now carrying the seeds of anti-Semitism into England; they have already introduced it into America. ”
He met with with Sultan Abdulhamid II to put forward his proposal for a Jewish state in Palestine, but the Sultan was not supportive of the idea. "if one day the Islamic State falls apart then you can have Palestine for free, but as long as I am alive I would rather have my flesh be cut up than cut out Palestine from the Muslim land."
Eventually the Balfour Declaration created the state of Israel, but Herzl had already inspired the Zionist movement. But he did not intend for it to be used in the way that the Christian fundamentalists are using it. They should be ashamed.
John Hagee and Hitler
When John Hagee suggested that Hitler was doing God's work, he probably meant more than the fact that he forced the Jewish people from their homeland of Germany, which is unforgivable, but he no doubt also appreciated that Hitler went after the Communists.
As many in the Religious Right were calling Obama the Antichrist, Tim Lehaye assured them that Obama was not the Antichrist because they had to get rid of the Communists first.
What happened to the goodness of Christians? This is not spiritually, it's evil. Pure evil.
Fortunately, most Christians do not think like that but what is alarming is how many in the governments of both the Unites States and Canada do. Bruce Wilson did a lot of research into the Hitler/Hagee preaching and has written extensively on the subject. He has videos as well. I find it all very sad.
Hitler and the Nazis were sent by God, to chase Jews back to the land of Israel. Because that's where God intends them to be. So, the Holocaust was a gruesomely inefficient system of divine "persuasion", and Hitler and the Nazis were doing "God's work". But Hagee also depicts this divine ethnic cleansing imperative as a future project: it will happen.
In Hagee's 2006 "Jerusalem Countdown", Hagee says anti-Semitism, and the Holocaust, were and are the fault of Jews - a divine curse for worshiping idols.
What a horrible man. What the Religious Right may not realize is that they have probably created more atheists that communism ever could. I no longer believe in God because of them and it makes me mad as hell.
Hagee is no better than Hitler because that man supports the genocide of the Muslim people. Evil did not die with Adolf Hitler.
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
"The Quran teaches that all Muslims have a mandate to kill Christians and Jews. Yes, it teaches that very clearly." John Hagee
The video above was taken at a 'Christians United for Israel' conference. The first man being interviewed is Tom Lehaye, a Republican senator.
John Hagee is the author of the book Jerusalem Countdown, in which he describes an end day prophesy, where all the Jews are herded to Israel (after the Middle East is levelled). They will then accept Christianity or be slaughtered, so that born again Christians can feel "the rapture".
It might be tempting to roll our eyes or chuckle, but unfortunately a large number of people who not only believe this but feel they have to accelerate it, belong to our current government; the Conservative Party of Canada, and their supporters.
And Stephen Harper is even basing our foreign policy on the wish list of what has been called the Canadian Religious Right, which explains his unprecedented support of Israel.
Many theologians denounce his actions, and several are speaking out, but they are not being given a proper platform. One of them is Stephen Scheinberg. Dr. Scheinberg was emeritus professor of history at Concordia University (1), and Co-chair of Canadian Friends of Peace Now.
He explains how the group came about:
McVety and his associates are associated with the dispensationalist brand of the evangelical movement, a grouping sometimes termed Christian Zionists. They are fundamentalists, believing in the authority of an error-free scripture and opposed to abortion access, gay marriage, or use of embryonic stem cells for medical research, while favouring traditional roles for women and protection of the public from what they deem to be pornography.
The appeal of these extremist Christians to the Jewish right is obvious, since the prophecies of the former cannot be implemented until the return of all the Jewish people to all the lands of ancient Israel. CCanadian dispensationalist clergy are part of Hagee’s Christians United for Israel and claim to have taken a lead in establishing that organization, beginning with a telephone call from McVety to Hagee in November of 2005 to notify him that there would be a Toronto “Night to Honour Israel” the following May. Hagee is said to have replied that “there’s no reason why we can’t do the same thing in every major city of North America.”
Subsequently, on February 7, 2006, 400 pastors and others joined together at Hagee’s Cornerstone Church to establish Christians United for Israel with Christian rightist leaders Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson prominently included and with Charles McVety named National Chairman for Canada. Others in the Canadian group are John Howarth (Executive Director), who is on the faculty of McVety’s college, Reverend John Tweedie of Brampton (National Chairman) and Reverend Dean Bye of Centralia, Ontario.
[From] Reverend Bye ... North American Jews must recognize they must all “return” to Israel and he warns: “the time of the U.S.A. being a safe haven for the Jews has ended!” ... He adds that “we don’t throw them overboard [like Jonah] but lovingly assist them home to Israel.” I believe that Bye’s implicit judgment, then, is that like Jonah North American Jews have turned their backs on God and must recognize that their only true home is in Israel.
Unfortunately for Dean Bye, most of the Jewish community has not responded to his generous proposal that they leave their homes for aliyah to Israel.
It is no surprise that Reverend McVety also has close ties to the Conservative Party. Liberal MP Garth Turner claimed that McVety told him that he can call and get Prime Minister Harper on the phone within minutes.
A good many of the party’s candidates in the last election were social conservatives, including several current cabinet members, for example Attorney General Vic Toews, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day and Flaherty. It was perhaps through Day that McVety made his connections to Ben-Ami and then his alliance with B’nai Brith. (2)
Raising the alarm over the religious Right does not mean that you are persecuting Christians. Nor does it mean that you are denouncing evangelism. These people are Christian extremists and their beliefs conflict with those of the majority of Canadians. And yet they are the ones who are currently directing both the domestic and foreign policies of our government. This is a very dangerous thing.
We need to not only hold our current government to account, but also our media. They have a duty to inform Canadians and yet most have failed to perform that duty.
Marci McDonald has written a great book (1) on the subject, but it's still up to us to get the word out. We can think of this as our holy mission.
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
"All hurricanes are acts of God, because God controls the heavens. I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God, and they were recipients of the judgment of God for that." John Hagee
John Charles Hagee is the founder and senior pastor of Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas, that boasts 19,000 regular members. He is also the chief executive officer of Global Evangelism Television andJohn Hagee Ministries. And he is the founder and National Chairman of the Christian-Zionist organization Christians United for Israel, incorporated on February 7, 2006.
Born in 1940, he came upon his calling early, having travelled with his family in a mobile home as the Hagee Family Singers. His father would preach revivals all over Texas, and John, his older brother Bill, and parents provided the music. Today his wife and children have revived the Hagee Family singers and the sale of their CDs show a very handsome profit.
Some critics believe there is a bit too much profit taken from Hagee's ministry.
With the dozens of men bearing glinting platters in the aisles, and six cameramen capturing the moment, Hagee instructs church members to hold their money toward the heavens. The thousands repeat after him: "Give and it shall be given."
"When you give, it qualifies you to receive God's abundance," he tells his listeners. "If God gives to you before you give to him, God himself will become a liar. ... If you're not prospering, it's because you're not giving ... And it is a message that has helped his nonprofit television arm, Global Evangelism Television, become a prosperous, global, moneymaking family enterprise that has netted millions year after year peddling prayer, inspirational books, tapes and the promise of prosperity.
Since Hagee and his wife, Diana Hagee, founded GETV 25 years ago, the organization has gone from a back-room operation broadcasting Sunday sermons to San Antonio area viewers to a 50,000-square-foot multimedia studio broadcasting to 127 television stations and 82 radio stations nationwide. "God has blessed it until it has literally reached the Earth," Hagee recently said at his studio about his television evangelism enterprise. (1)
However, like many key players of the American Religious Right, Hagee has set his sights on Canada and has firmly entrenched himself with Stephen Harper and the Reform-Conservative movement.
He has rented office space at the Canadian Christian Bible College and is business partners with the College's owner, Charles McVety. McVety is a cohort of Jim Flaherty, Stockwell Day and Jason Kenney. The Bible college also sells Hagee's books and tapes. (2)
And the Texas preacher is a fan of Stephen Harper's.
Hagee lauded one of Stephen Harper’s first post-election acts: after Hamas militants won power in the Palestinian Authority, Harper became the first world leader to cut off its funding, trumping even Bush ...“I am so delighted that Canada’s prime minister immediately denounced Hamas terrorism when he became the leader of this great nation.”Hagee’s assessment of Harper isn’t based on news clips alone. His Toronto host, not to mention his longtime Canadian major-domo, was Canada Christian College president Charles McVety, one of the most outspoken players in this country’s religious right wing.
During the last election, as head of a handful of pro-family lobbies including the Defend Marriage Coalition, McVety emerged as a power to be reckoned with. He bought up the rights to unclaimed Liberal websites such as josephvolpe.com and stacked a handful of Conservative nomination contests in favour of evangelical candidates adamantly opposed to same-sex matrimony, a campaign he has vowed to repeat.
As Harper navigates the tricky waters of minority rule—keeping the lid on any eruptions of rhetorical fervour from the rambunctious theo-cons in his caucus—it is noteworthy that he has continued to cultivate a man regarded as the lightning rod of the Christian right. Last spring, those around the prime minister drafted McVety to help sell the government’s contentious child-care policy, and on budget day he was the personal guest of Finance Minister Jim Flaherty in the Commons’ vip gallery.(3)
But more importantly, Hagee appreciates Stephen Harper's blind devotion to Israel.
During this summer’s Middle East war, Harper reversed decades of Canadian foreign policy with his adamant support for Israel, even after its jets smashed a clearly marked United Nations observation post, killing a veteran Canadian Peacekeeper. His admirers argue that steadfastness could turn the burgeoning bond between evangelical Christians and Jews into a powerful and unprecedented alliance that could leave him unbeatable at the ballot box.
But a growing chorus of critics warns that Harper has already paid a high price for that strategic calculation, irrevocably alienating Canada’s mushrooming Islamic population and leaving in shreds the country’s reputation as an even-handed peace broker. (3)
We should be very concerned with this relationship because as Marci McDonald points out:
Harper’s stand has also raised more unsettling questions. What does it mean if and when a believer in the infallibility of Biblical prophecy comes to power and backs a damn-the-torpedoes course in the Middle East? Does it end up fuelling overenthusiastic end-timers who feel they have nothing to lose in some future conflagration, helping speed the world on Hagee’s fast track to Armageddon? (3)
A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada
Wild, dark times are rumbling toward us, and the prophet who wishes to write a new apocalypse will have to invent entirely new beasts, and beasts so terrible that the ancient animal symbols of St. John will seem like cooing doves and cupids in comparison. Heinrich Heine, Augsberg Gazette, 1842
When I was in about grade four, there was a story on the front page of our local newspaper, with the headline The World will end Tomorrow.
It was a spoof article, discussing the predictions of a man who used numerology to calculate that our end was not just near, but imminent. (That was about 45 years ago).
I remember my dad reading parts of it out loud, and laughing between the paragraphs. But not everyone found it funny.
At school the next day, our 'lay' teacher, (I use the term because I attended a Catholic school, where the teachers were mostly nuns) began to prepare us for the end of days. Literally.
She had us clean out our desks and began telling us horrendous tales. The only one I remember had something to do with the Communists coming to put sticks through our tongues.
My parents weren't the only ones to visit the school the next day, and that teacher was immediately removed.
But what I remember most about that incident, was her genuine fear. She had lived in Holland under the Nazis, and it clearly left scars.
Fear can be a very powerful motivator. It helped to keep George Bush in office and it's made a lot of so-called Evangelists very rich. But it also brought William Aberhart, the founder of the movement now spearheaded by Stephen Harper, to power.
William "Bible Bill" Aberhart and the Politics of Fear
When you read stories of William Aberhart, founder of the Canadian Social Credit movement, that bred the new Conservative Party of Canada, you might wonder how he was able to not only gain power but hold onto it for so long. His views were pretty extreme and he kept none of his promises.
Alberta’s drought in the early 1920s paled in comparison to Alberta’s 1930s Armageddon-like world. Drought, hordes of grasshopper infestations, wind storms, and fires left much of southern Alberta a barren landscape. When rain did fall, the eroded or fire-scorched land could not absorb the water, which caused major flooding. People abandoned their homes. Towns disappeared. People living hand-to-mouth were on the move.
It was a made to order, catastrophic world, just waiting for the man who Time magazine referred to then as the 'Messiah' (1). According to author and journalist Gordon Laird:
In both the 192os and the 1930s, people who preached cure-all salvation were also firmly wed to the idea of apocalypse. Just as Aberhart continually warned lapsed Christians they would "be left behind at the Rapture to face the branding irons of the Antichrist," evangelicals of all stripes develop a symbiotic relationship with crisis, real and imagined. And crisis tends to legitimize authority and inhibit questioning. As previous puritanical movements have proven, the proposed solutions to a crisis are often worse than the original problem. (2)
"Bible Bill's" radio broadcasts were a mixture of righteous indignation and end of times prophesy, that found a growing audience of those looking for salvation, in both heaven and on earth.
And Aberhart's warnings came from on high. Well not really from on high, but from a man by the name of Cyrus Scofield.
Bill had taken Scofield's correspondence Bible study course, based on his immensely popular Reference Bible. According to Wikipedia: It was largely through the influence of Scofield's notes that dispensationalism and premillennialism became influential among fundamentalist Christians in the United States.
And one of those fundamentalist Christians, who like Aberhart, follow Scofield's words to the letter; is John Hagee.
Fast Forward to Stephen Harper and the Politics of Fear
When the Reform Party was just a glint in Preston Manning's eye, he studied the success of William Aberhart, and referred to the Social Credit movement as:
... the political equivalent of a prairie fire. It's generic name is "democratic populism" and faith in it's potential lies at the heart of my own political life and the formation of the Reform Party of Canada. (3)
As Manning's disciple, Stephen Harper also tapped into the success of the movement, as a means to gaining and holding onto power, based in a large part on blind faith.
And according to Marcie McDonald, author of the book The Armageddon Factor, when he was speaking at the Civitas Society:
... he outlined plans for a broad new party coalition that would ensure a lasting hold on power. The only route, he argued, was to focus not on the tired wish list of economic conservatives or “neo-cons,” as they’d become known, but on what he called “theo-cons”—those social conservatives who care passionately about hot-button issues that turn on family, crime, and defence ...Arguing that the party had to come up with tough, principled stands on everything from parents’ right to spank their children to putting “hard power” behind the country’s foreign-policy commitments ..." (4)
And it wouldn't be long before that "hard power" promise would be put to the test: According to Dennis Gruending, when speaking of Pastor John Hagee (the modern day voice of Cyrus Scofield), and his Canadian counterpart Charles McVety:
When hostilities broke out between Israel and groups in Lebanon in the summer of 2006, he [McVety] emerged as the Canadian chair of a group called Christians United for Israel, an offshoot of the Christians United for Israel - America. That organization included prominent evangelicals such as the late Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson as well as Reverend John Hagee. He is a prominent Texas televangelist and author of Jerusalem Countdown, a book predicting that the world will soon end in Armageddon.
Hagee was guest speaker at an Israel support rally that McVety organized at his college in Toronto. At about the same time McVety also appeared on television news to say that that the fighting in Lebanon created conditions that resembled end times as predicted in the Bible. (The belief in end times is common among Christian reconstructionists). McVety made common cause with several Canadian Jewish organizations lobbying the Harper government to take a pro-Israel position in the conflict. The prime minister did not disappoint, when he described an Israeli campaign that took 1,000 Lebanese lives as a “measured response” to the kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers.
So if you try to view Harper's actions through a conservative lens, you might find them confusing. But if you view them through the eyes of William Aberhart and the original Social Credit movement, you would see that they are based on the principles of the original crusade.
Gordon Laird stated that: Just as Aberhart continually warned lapsed Christians they would "be left behind at the Rapture to face the branding irons of the Antichrist," evangelicals of all stripes develop a symbiotic relationship with crisis, real and imagined.
Another rapture-ready modern day prophet, with ties to Stephen Harper is Tim LaHaye. In fact much of the current dispensationalist belief comes from a series of books he co-authored as the 'Left Behind" chronicles.
LaHaye is also one of the founders of the Council for National Policy, where Harper delivered his 'I really hate Canada' speech in 1997.
A person's religious beliefs are private, and have no bearing on whether or not they can be a member of our government. However, when that person tries to govern from the old testament, and works to accelerate prophesies, then we have a problem. As Marcie MacDonald asks:
What does it mean if and when a believer in the infallibility of Biblical prophecy comes to power and backs a damn-the-torpedoes course in the Middle East? Does it end up fuelling overenthusiastic end-timers who feel they have nothing to lose in some future conflagration, helping speed the world on Hagee’s fast track to Armageddon? (4)
