Focus on the Fundies: Still stuck in early stages of grief

The NYT did an article about hillbillies who are shocked at Obama's victory. Finding a remote county seat, they walked into City Hall and started chatter with "the" (sic) administrative assistant who, asked for his reaction to Obama's election, said:

This is a community that's supposed to be filled with a bunch of Christian folks. If they're not disappointed, they need to be at the altar.

That's one Don Dollar, in Vernon, Alabama, seat of Lamar County, where 76% of residents voted for John McCain -- a 5% increase over the number who voted for George Bush in 2004.

By "to be at the altar" he is not suggesting marriage, but contrition. Fundamentalist churches have "altar calls" in which people are invited to dedicate, or rededicate, themselves to Christ.

I think he's saying, "I thought everybody here was just like me. I can't believe almost a quarter of people aren't. And since I do everything I'm told, anybody not like me must be a sinner.

"Of course, they aren't so far like me that they don't share my religio-cultural context, so surely they belong to a church just like mine, with identical values. I fully expect them to feel they have sinned in not mourning the victory of the Democrat, and to repent of it."

The word "Deliverance" comes to mind -- the film, not the doctrine.

Link to churches in and around Vernon, AL. Five of the first ten are Baptist, two others are Church of Christ, and one is simply a "Full Gospel Worship Center."

technorati: fundamentalists, Baptists, Alabama, election, Christians, sin, repentance, white trash