My story 'Instrument' released in a new fiction anthology

A new fiction anthology from New Lit Salon Press entitled Southern Gothic has just been released, and it contains a short story of mine entitled "Instrument."

The genesis of the story is this. In the mid-to-late 1990s, a phenomenon began at a Toronto area Pentecostal church called the Toronto Airport Vineyard. (Much as this sounds like an airport hotel, it was simply a branch of the Vineyard Fellowship of Pentecostal churches with an unusually anodyne name.) The phenomenon was marked by an outbreak of seemingly out-of-control emotional outbursts. The phenomenon came to be known as "the laughing revival" because one of the behaviors on the part of church attendees was uncontrolled laughter or crying. It lasted for years and spread to many other Pentecostal and charismatic churches.

I developed a morbid fascination with the phenomenon, which also took root in Brownsville Assembly of God in Pensacola, Florida. I was fascinated by the stories of wild behavior and the claims that the Holy Spirit was behind it all, when a distanced observer could clearly see it was nothing more than mass hysteria.

Despite my personal disdain for this brand of religion, I sensed that sincere people were flocking to such churches for a reason. They wanted not only experience, emotion, and entertainment, but also something genuine. They wanted what the revivalists were promising: not just an overflow of emotion, but to be truly changed.

With this in mind, I developed a story about someone who came to such a church out of curiosity. He's not a true believer, but a skeptic, a not-particularly-religious young man who looks at spirit-filled Christians not with envy but with pity. Nevertheless, he finds himself at one of these revivals, and is tempted by the offer of a truly changed life.

My character Roy is assistant manager of a Chevron station. But he has a secret wish: to become an EMT, an ambulance attendant. And when he attends the revival he is caught up in the experience and dares to think that despite his doubts his life might really change.

Southern Gothic, with my story and 14 others, is available now in many e-book formats, handsomely illustrated by Nathan Mark Philips.

Foamer conflates United States with Biblical nation of Israel

One of the real wack jobs I follow is a guy who posts occasionally to a blog entitled (all caps, please) HELL ON EARTH. Today's post, in which he applies the standards to which Jehovah held the Old Testament children of Israel to the modern-day U.S., is typical.

Just one sentence, punctuation uncorrected (at least he got the hyphenated adjectival phrases right):

Turning towards an ungodly course of embracing sin such as the love of money, no-fault divorce, promiscuity, abortion and the asexual agenda, America has drifted far off its' God-set course.

Strange and even frightening as it may be to believe, this is the way true fundamentalists feel. Just as the Taliban apply the most reactionary interpretations of the Koran to Afghanistan, real Christian fundies genuinely expect the modern-day world to have the relationship to God as Israel did three thousand years ago -- as reported in the Old Testament, which they take as literal, historical fact.

I did like "asexual agenda." Not just homosexual agenda -- asexual agenda. I wonder what that's about.

There is no point in struggling against this mind-set, no hope of talking to them or attempting, however gently or violently, to re-educate them. They are as truly lost and left behind in the modern world as the poorest residents of ghettos or rural America, only they're capable of holding down jobs. And now (unlike before 1975) they vote, thanks to people like Lee Atwater and Karl Rove, whose pawns they are.

Of course, this blog post -- my words, the one you're reading now -- is simply a mirror image. I'm no more capable of changing my mind about what I believe politically or, for that matter, religiously.

Dobson 'stuns' fellow fundies with Gingrich slander

In a meeting of 150 powerful evangelical Christian leaders last week in which the group voted to endorse former Sen. Rick Santorum, Focus on the Family founder James Dobson "stunned" fellow attendees when he attacked another candidate, former Rep. Newt Gingrich. Contrasting Santorum with the former House Speaker, who is infamous (apparently even among right-wing Christians!) for dumping two wives before settling on his present one Callista, Dobson said:

I want to tell you that I've gotten to know Karen [Santorum] and she is just lovely. She set aside two professional careers to raise these seven children. She would make a fabulous first lady role model. And Newt Gingrich's wife, she was a mistress for eight years. ... Who do you want as your first lady?

-- politico.com

A "chill" set in the room, an attendee said, adding that many present were offended. That makes sense, as Gingrich, having converted to Catholicism to marry his present wife, has made the requisite apologies and repentences for dumping his first wife while she was in the hospital for cancer and cheating on his second during the same time he was leading the charge in Congress to impeach President Bill Clinton for like behavior. And in the evangelical world, you can be forgiven for anything. So for an evangelical to bring it up in a gathering of other evangelicals would indeed be shocking.

But all it really shows is Dobson's decreasing influence, even within the evangelical world. Like Pat Robertson, his high profile is about all that's left of his formerly dominant position; these withered eminences may still have their box seats, but they're like Marge Schott at a Reds game: not only do they no longer control the team, but the whole organization is embarrassed by them.

Meanwhile, Twitter is ablaze with rumors that a prominent interview with Gingrich wife no. 2 will be aired tomorrow on a major network. The former Marianne Gingrich spoke with Esquire in 2010 (via @hollybdc)

His pleas for donations unsuccessful, manic Pentecostal admits 'I need a job'

John Burton, the manic Pentecostal preacher who often uses his blog to beg for money -- my favorite post being the one where he asserted that "believers live in an different economic system" and asked for dough so he could work on a book and spend the rest of the time in prayer -- has finally admitted: "I need a job."

I guess he found he didn't live in a "different economic system" after all.

Praise the Lord and pass the sniper scopes

Trijicon, a Wixom-based supplier that has a $660 million multi-year contract with the Marine Corps and additional contracts with the U.S. Army, inscribes coded references to New Testament Bible verses on its ACOG high-powered rifle sights sold to the military.

-- news stories

Focus on the Fundies: FOTF sheds famous anti-gay program

Focus on the Family is still having money problems and has decided to end support for its anti-gay "Love Won Out" program -- one of those "ministries" which attempt to provide "encouragement" for gay people to stop being gay and pretend to be straight. The infamous Exodus International group will be taking it over, and that's got to be a natural fit. Exodus is the "ex-gay" organization whose co-founders finally gave up and stopped the pretense and went back to being as gay as the day they were born.

technorati: Focus on the Family, Love Won Out, antigay

Focus on the Fundies: They'll pay you to save money?

Another update on the strange Pentecostal minister who, in my last mention, begged for money so he could work on his book without having to actually work. This guy has a few obsessions, and money is definitely one of them -- I guess having several kids and no job has something to do with it.

One of his so-called income streams is from an Amway-like business with the unfortunate name of Melaleuca. In a recent post he and his wife agonize over why someone "declined to participate" in the pyramid scheme-like business:

I wonder if we communicated what we were really trying to say well enough. Did this person really understand that they will not be paying any more money than they already do now and that they will be getting much better products? It's really strange. And, we offered to write them a check to pay for a bunch of their groceries this month. What did we miss here? I can't think how it makes sense to NOT enroll. They actually lost money by declining. Plus, it would have been great way to support our ministry. Hmmmm...

OK, here's a clue: Some people don't want to "participate" or "enroll" -- you have to fill out a form just to shop with the company, much less become a marketer -- just to shop for household items. They just want to buy the stuff. It's too much trouble.

Even if (and I'll take your word for it) it saves them money? Well, maybe they don't want other people to be privy to their household purchases. Maybe they'd like their grocery shopping to be separate from "supporting your ministry;" assuming they want to do so, they'll get a tax deduction for just writing you a check instead. And offering what seems like a bribe to get them to "participate" makes it even creepier, even as it provides another example of how this guy's "ministry" is practically inextricable from his focus on lucre.

As for whether or not the Melaleuca business itself is on the up-and-up, I can only point out that the phrase "Melaleuca scam" gets over 75,000 results on Google, including several videos. I think if someone has taken the time to actually make a video about what a scam something is, that might be a bit of a red flag.

technorati: MLM, Melaleuca ,

Today's fake: a troubled pregnancy

A Chicago area blogger who kept readers spellbound with reports on her "pregnancy with a terminally ill baby" was faking the whole thing, local media reported yesterday. Faced with the problem of finally coming up with a baby, the 26-year-old woman, Beccah Beushausen of Oak Park, furnished a picture of herself cradling a swaddled doll. Readers quickly noticed the deception:

"I have that exact doll in my house," said Elizabeth Russell, a dollmaker from Buffalo who had been following the blog. "As soon as I saw that picture, I knew it was a scam."

By Monday, outraged followers on dozens of Christian parenting Web sites unmasked "April's Mom" as a hoaxer, and hundreds more vented their anger.

Notice who got upset. The only problem with this was that it was not intentionally designed to punk the anti-abortionists, but was merely a symptom of a sick mind.

"I've always liked writing. It was addictive to find out I had a voice that people wanted to hear," Beushausen said.

"Soon I was getting 100,000 hits a week, and it just got out of hand," she said. "I didn't know how to stop. ... One lie led to another."

There goes the book deal!

technorati: Beushausen, April's mom, abortion

How Colorado Springs became the 'evangelical Vatican'

The Colorado Springs Gazette, which seems to have doubled down on its coverage of the local evangelical industry -- somewhat belatedly, but any documentary evidence is a good thing -- today publishes a piece on how Colorado Springs became the nation's center for big-box Christianism.

technorati: Colorado Springs, evangelicals

Focus on the Fundies: Haggard refuses to go away

Though he dropped off the radar for a few months after the excruciating HBO broadcast of the documentary film about him, former evangelical leader Ted Haggard is back in the news pages of the Colorado Springs Gazette, which continues to cover him the way the FBI tails former KGBers in the U.S. Included in the latest visit with the disgraced megachurch ringmaster is a scolding and eventual forgiveness by a former church member, as well as the news that Haggard and his wife are appearing on an upcoming episode of the TV show Divorce Court. Yes! And it's a two part episode, starting appropriately enough on April Fools Day. Behold!

I'll pause while you pick your jaw up off the floor.

Oh, and he's going to begin guest-preaching at Colorado Springs megachurches, billed as "a Christian businessman," a nod to his current supposed career as insurance salesman. And thus begins his real rehabilitation -- not the one he supposedly underwent soon after his outing that supposedly turned him back into a heterosexual, but the one that will inevitably return him to the only job he can do: evangelical preacher.

technorati: Ted Haggard, Colorado Springs, evangelicals

Focus on the Fundies: Obama not the Anti-Christ, authors decide

The authors of the "Left Behind" series of Christianist novels have announced they do not think Barack Obama is the Anti-Christ.

The frightening thing is that some people might have been waiting for that word from them. And what if they had said the opposite?

technorati: Left Behind, fundamentalists, right wing Christians

Focus on the Fundies: Obscure minister predicts calamity

Courtesy John Burton, that manic Christian "prophecy" guy I link to from time to time for laughs, here's another "minister" with an "urgent message" about "AN EARTH-SHATTERING CALAMITY ... SO FRIGHTENING, WE ARE ALL GOING TO TREMBLE."

For ten years I have been warning about a thousand fires coming to New York City. It will engulf the whole megaplex, including areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. Major cities all across America will experience riots and blazing fires -- such as we saw in Watts, Los Angeles, years ago. There will be riots and fires in cities worldwide. There will be looting -- including Times Square, New York City. What we are experiencing now is not a recession, not even a depression. We are under God's wrath. ... If possible lay in store a thirty-day supply of non-perishable food, toiletries and other essentials.

Yes, when the righteous tremble, at least they will have a thirty-day supply of toilet paper. I'd love to see their shopping lists, actually. Imagine what's on them.

technorati: prophecy, Christians, evangelicals

BREAKING: Dobson resigns from Focus on the Family

James Dobson, founder and head of the Focus on the Family religious education and lobbying organization, is stepping down, the Associated Press reported.

The 72-year-old Dobson, who is a psychologist by training, has been one of the most powerful religious conservatives in the U.S. for decades. His Focus on the Family organization, despite a financial downturn in recent years, is one of the most influential right-wing Christian organizations. It was a major donor to California's anti-gay-marriage Proposition 8, and its daily radio program is heard on hundreds of religious radio stations around the country.

However, the Proposition 8 win (after which Dobson said he was "jubilant" over the anti-gay law) may have been the group's high point. Earlier this month they lost a battle when the Colorado House passed a domestic partners health care bill. And while it was giving lavishly to the Prop. 8 battle, it continued to suffer financially, laying off 20% of its staff.

The new head of the organization is a retired Air Force general -- Colorado Springs is also home to the Air Force Academy, which has been the site of alleged proselytizing by evangelical Christians -- who is also a former executive with defense contractor Northrup Grumman.

technorati: Focus on the Family, religious right, conservatives, Republicans, Dobson

Focus on the Fundies: Colo. legislator says homosexuality akin to murder

After an openly gay Colorado legislator introduced a bill to extend health care benefits to domestic partners of gay people, a Republican colleague alleged it was an attempt to whittle away at the anti-gay marriage law passed by voters and equated homosexuality with murder, saying "I'm not saying this (homosexuality) is the only sin that's out there. We have murder. We have all sorts of sin. We have adultery. And we don't make laws making those legal, and we would never think to make murder legal." There's much more disgusting bigotry quoted in the article.

technorati: Colorado, homophobia, gay rights

Focus on the Fundies: Evangelist tries to profit from Australian fire disaster

An Australian fundamentalist is claiming that the Australian fire disaster is God's punishment for the state of Victoria allowing abortion.

Pastor Danny Nalliah says he had a dream that God's "conditional protection has been removed from the nation of Australia, in particular Victoria, for approving the slaughter of innocent children in the womb." Of course, this is exactly what American fundies said after Sept. 11 and after Katrina: that the disasters were holy retribution for New York or New Orleans allowing whatever it is they don't like. Of course, when floods hammer the Mississippi valley, or tornadoes decimate a Southern town, they don't have much to say.

It's always been like this: preachers said the same thing when San Francisco was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake. After a distiller paid firefighters to save his warehouse, a local wag wrote:

If, as they say, God spanked the town
For being over-frisky,
Why did He burn His churches down
And spare Hotaling's whiskey?

technorati: Australia, wildfires, abortion

Focus on the Fundies: Skeleton springs out of Haggard's closet

The other shoe has dropped in the latest Ted Haggard scandal, as the young former congregation member of New Life Church publicly discusses how Haggard masturbated in front of him, offered him pills of some sort, and confided that "You can be a man of God and have a little bit of fun on the side."

Meanwhile, Haggard himself appeared on the Oprah show, his successor at New Life Church revealed that Haggard had several inappropriate relationships, and a Colorado Springs bail bondsman and amateur investigator is looking into the financial and legal aspects of l'affaire Haggard.

To top it all off, Haggard's wife Gayle told Oprah that he'd told her years ago that he struggled with same-sex attractions, or, as she put it, "some thoughts."

This story is truly a gift that keeps on giving.

technorati: Ted Haggard

Focus on the Fundies: Congressman, two others 'anoint' Capitol doorway

As workers readied the inauguration stage in front of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 7, a right-wing Georgia congressman and two evangelical ministers prayed over and anointed with oil the Capitol doorway that President-elect Barack Obama and other dignitaries will pass through on Inauguration Day.

Georgia Rep. Paul Broun, who introduced an anti-abortion bill days later after Congress convened for the first time, was accompanied by two far-right ministers: Rev. Rob Schenk, a long-time anti-abortion activist and head of something called Faith and Action in the Nation's Capital, and Rev. Patrick Mahoney, also an anti-abortion activist and director of something called the Christian Defense Coalition.

An aside: clearly, the thing to do if you're a right-wing Christianist "activist" and all-around media whore is not to have your own church, but to have your own non-profit foundation in Washington DC, so you can do things like anoint the Capitol and appear on Pat Robertson's CBN.

Don't invite Mahoney to any inaugration parties, as he is fasting until Inauguration Day in solidarity with poor people "as well as the 50 million innocent victims of abortion."

technorati: Congress, Schenk, Republicans

Focus on the Fundies: Ted Haggard promotes HBO doc

Ted Haggard appeared yesterday before the press to promote the HBO documentary about him, "The Trials of Ted Haggard." (An ironic title, by the way, since Haggard has never been charged with any crime despite admitting to buying and possessing methamphetamine.)

Among the entertaining statements and revelations made by the formerly influential Colorado Springs megachurch pastor:

• Haggard, who preached against homosexuality before being outed as gay, now thinks "sexuality is confusing and complex." Clearly, he learned that lesson the hard way.
• Haggard has softened his views on gay marriage, saying that government should fully recognize the union between any two people and that churches are wrongly fighting a "war" over the word "marriage."
• Speaking of his firing and the way he perceives he has been treated since the scandal, he says he "knows about hatred than I ever dreamed" -- a statement that epitomizes his self-pitying view. Other pitiful statements include the satisfying "At this stage in my life, I'm a loser—a first-class loser" and "It is a sad story... I made myself sad; I made everybody that loves me sad."
• The "spiritual solution" to his fall "was not enough;" he also needed "secular therapy methods."

In a separate story from the dozens covering Haggard's HBO press conference, the Colorado Springs Gazette said the current pastor of Haggard's former church has discharged him from the severance agreement, one of the terms of which was that Haggard would not discuss the scandal publicly. The generous severance package hasn't kept Haggard from saying that his firing from and subsequent treatment by New Life was the equivalent of being told "Go to hell," and complaints like that have some former supporters angry. "The fact that he's attacking the church or New Life Church, when they did so much to help him and his family, is below the belt," said H.B. London, one of the Focus on the Family pastors assigned to "rehabilitate Haggard after his firing.

technorati: Ted Haggard, HBO, documentary

Focus on the Fundies: Set phasers to stun

I was loath to join in the howling condemnation of Obama's choice of celebrity pastor Rick Warren to say a prayer at the Inauguration, but it has been good for something: it's given more visibility to Warren, whose renown across America has been limited to other evangelical Christians. Take a look at this hit piece by Christopher Hitchens on Slate (courtesy 3 Quarks Daily). Hitchens himself is hard to stomach, so I like the spectacle of some snaggle-toothed leftist hawk tearing into the soft belly of the Midwestern megachurch ringmaster. Before Hitchens chokes on his own indignation, maybe he can tackle a few more people on my list. Could you take a look at this guy, Chris?

technorati: Rick Warren, Christopher Hitchens

Focus on the Fundies: Haggard says 'I never said I was heterosexual'

The Colorado Springs paper has seen the documentary "The Rise and Fall of Ted Haggard," which will be shown on HBO next month, and has these tidbits:

• Haggard, pronounced "one hundred percent heterosexual" after his three-week rehabilitation experience following his 2006 implosion, says "he never claimed to be heterosexual, as was once reported, and he continues to struggle with same-sex attraction. But he's committed to living a heterosexual life because he believes it's better for children to be raised by a mother and a father."
• Haggard's wife says she stayed with him to restore honor to the family, in some mixed-up way.
• Haggard now works selling insurance -- not so far from being a salvation-selling preacher -- but has not yet been successful at it and says, "Right now, I am a loser."

He sure comes off that way. Welcome to the real world, Ted! Maybe that other foamer will have to get a job, too.

Update: On Open.Salon.com, a former member of Haggard's church and babysitter for Haggard's children comments on his attempts to parlay the documentary into more fame.

technorati: Ted Haggard, New Life Church, Colorado Springs