Check out this interview of a Maoist and a Marxist at Occupy Philadelphia from Michelle Malkin's blog.
The Maoist thinks the figures of people killed by Communist regimes in the 20th century are "made up." The Marxist thinks we just can't know what happened. How very convenient; I wonder if he is a 9/11 Truther too.
It is interesting that Nancy Pelosi, Debbie Wasserman-Shultz and other leading Democrats up to and including the president are rushing to embrace Occupy Wall Street. I agree with George Will who said he hoped the movement lasts and that the Democrats continue to cuddle up to it. It will make electing Republicans so much easier in November 2012.
Clearly, the OWS movement is bringing out every weirdo in town to join in an orgy of self-pity by aggrieved self-proclaimed victims. That is the way Democrats build "coalitions" out of victim groups. But somehow I just don't think these victims will generate much sympathy from independent voters in the middle of a recession. And I can't see Mitt Romney shaking in his boots at having to go up against Barack Obama and his pal "Rainbow Boy."
Mind you, I could be wrong. Maybe gender-confused Maoists and hippie Marxists straight out of central casting will turn out to be the Democrats' secret weapon.
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I have come to believe that our country is being divided between those who smoke marijuana and those who don't. From personal experience (60's) I know that marijuana and other psychedelics open a portal to a demonic realm which has the capacity to communicate its own values and perspective to the users. The influence may be subtle, especially in the beginning but the end result is an increasing antagonism to the hierarchical sovereignty of God and those institutions and values of traditional society which owe something to the Christian understanding of truth.
if pointing out that weirdos have joined a certain movement is testimony to that movement being questionable then the church is screwed.
Daniel,
Well . . . there is weird - and then there is homicidal, genocidal, murderous tyrant supporting weird.
Craig,
Are you referring to the ways in which your boy Ratzinger supported death-dealing dictators and tried to silence liberation theology in Latin America? Because, yep, that sure is weird and, yep, it sure is part of the church.
Liberation Theology is just Marxism for the gullible. And nothing says death & murder like the imposition of Marxist regimes.
I know you hate the Church and if I hated it I might slander it like you do too. Or maybe not; at least I hope I wouldn't.
Craig,
You should be embarrassed by this video. Post something by Chris Hedges, Zizek or Klein and criticize their arguments if you want to comment on Occupy Wallstreet - not this absurd video.
Jack, unfortunately I've never seen a fair description or judgment from any of Craig's posts.
He likes to speak in extremes and speak against the extremes with a few snarky comments muddled in there. This blog, from as far as I can tell never furthers along a conversation nor does it engage in them either. It is just piece after piece of unfiltered blabber making fun of those that he's already got some label for and then moving onto the next post without doing much engaging in the comments.
I learned about your blog last year from Touchstone and haven't stopped reading since. Excellent work. Are you planning to post about the "Son of God" muslim translation issue?
Jack,
It is not me who should be embarrassed by this video but rather anybody who gives the OWS protesters any support whatsoever. I denounce the entire movement, the entire protest and the entire political ideology behind it. Why should I be embarrassed?
Nathan,
It is odd that you call for dialogue and engagement in the context of defending a movement that calls for putting rich people in jail just for being rich. If you are so concerned about honest discussion and debate why don't you criticize Roseanne Barr, Michael Moore, Bill Mahar and all the rest of the "behead the bankers" crowd?
The problem here is that the OWS protest is bringing right out into the open (where cameras can record it) the nihilistic, irrational, hate-filled nature of today's Left. I don't blame you for being embarrassed and upset. But why don't you take it as a wake up call and become critical of the anti-capitalist, anti-American, anti-church, anti-family Left?
(BTW,I think it is hilarious that the label you slap on me for posting video of extremists is "extremism." I think the term for this is "Projection.")
Hi Craig,
I don't hate the church. In fact, quite the opposite. I am a member of the church and I love her dearly. That doesn't mean refusing to criticize the church when that is needed -- like when Ratzinger makes part of the church complicit in the deaths of tens of thousands of people -- but you should know this. After all, didn't one of your crushes refer to the church both as a whore and as his mother?
Your brother in Christ,
Dan
Dan,
I am completely fine with criticizing the church too; I do it all the time on this blog.
But there is a catch: I only think it is OK to criticize the church when it actually does something wrong.
With John Paul II's support, Joseph Ratzinger did a tremendously good service to the universal church and the poor everywhere when he explained patiently and calmly why, and in exactly what way, Latin American Liberation Theology is incompatible with orthodox Christianity in his two "Instructions" in the 1990s. LT has a false philosophical anthropology and it operates with a false materialistic ontology. These theological issues are the root causes of its many other failings. What becomes clear is that the borrowings from Marxism are the problem in Liberation Theology and the dodge that they were just using Marxism to critique Capitalism doesn't cut it.
The imposition of Marxism on the poor people of Latin America is a tragedy and a crime. The complicity of the Catholic clergy in this crime has seriously damaged the RC Church in Latin America. The final outcome may well be a Protestant continent, if Pentecostalism keeps growing the way it has been growing.
My only problem with the Catholic Magisterium's rejection of LT is that it is too mild and that it does not draw the logical conclusion that democratic capitalism is the best economic system for justice in Latin America. But the Pope is constrained by the fact that the Catholic Church has too few Michael Novaks and too many aging hippies who continuously confuse the "Spirit of '68" with the "Spirit of Vatican II" and who forget that neither has anything to do with the Holy Spirit.
Craig,
I tried to find any sort of substantial criticism in your remarks about Marxism and liberation theology (have you actually read much of either??) but the most I could find was the statement that Marxism operates with a "false philosophical anthropology and it operates with a false materialistic ontology" (no mention of the problems with its eschatology?). As far as criticisms go that's about as good a reason to reject liberation theology as asserting that the differences between Gospel chronologies (say John vs. the Synoptics) coupled with the accounts of genocide are good reasons to reject Christianity (orthodox or otherwise... although there never has been a single orthodox Christianity, there have ever only been competing forms of Christianity that laid claim to that label, and generally only those with wealth and power were able to impose their understanding of "orthodoxy" onto others... really, using that language is a rhetorical power-play devoid of any real foundation).
Your form of orthodoxy is the kind that supported Pinochet in Chile (to pick just one example). That kind of rule is the sort of favour JPII and Ratzinger supported in Latin America. So, sure, liberation theology isn't perfect, and marxism is even less perfect (IMO), but what was being created in Latin America over against people like Pinochet and the Chicago Boys who assisted him -- and what Ratzinger helped to kill -- was a way of structuring life together so that the abundance of God's creation was made available to all and was not just hoarded by some at the expense of others.
In this regard, I suggest you begin by reading a series of essays by Jon Sobrino called "No Salvation Outside the Poor". I might be amazed at what you discover there (BTW, did you ever read Segundo's response to "God's Rottweiler"? I'd be curious to hear why you think his argument isn't more persuasive than Ratzinger's.)
Still your brother, and still an anarchist after the likes of Jesus and Paul,
Dan
I for one won't be reading an heretical tract called, "No Salvation Outside the Poor", as the New Covenant which Jeremiah promises is for all people, from the least to the greatest. Joel promised that the spirit would be poured out upon all flesh, not just the poor, and as Peter says, "whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." Paul says it is not by works, but through faith. It is not social class but being in Christ that matters (Gal 3.28). So all salvation is "outside the poor" because all salvation is in Christ, whether of the poor or of the rich. Someone who teaches that salvation is in the poor is teaching another gospel (see Gal 1.8).
"although there never has been a single orthodox Christianity, there have ever only been competing forms of Christianity that laid claim to that label, and generally only those with wealth and power were able to impose their understanding of "orthodoxy" onto others."
I know the above claim is very popular these days, but it is simply false and reveals a deficient understanding of church history, which is pretty sad for someone who graduated from a seminary.
"Dan O" studied at Regent College, and I believe his thesis supervisor was Prof. John Stackhouse. Is that right, Dan?
"although there never has been a single orthodox Christianity, there have ever only been competing forms of Christianity that laid claim to that label, and generally only those with wealth and power were able to impose their understanding of "orthodoxy" onto others."
@Whatheavenallows:
Perhaps you know that the opinion that orthodoxy was just one competing strand of Christianity in the primitive church was the thesis of Walter Bauer, Rechtglaeubigkeit und Ketzerei im aeltesten Christentum, and later popularized in American theology by James Robinson and Helmut Koester in Trajectories through Early Christianity. It is correct to classify Robinson and Koester as belonging to the liberal stream of Christianity, and indeed, there is little in their writing that is recognizably Christian to those who love and serve Jesus Christ and believe in the Bible. Thus, those who use their writings to support notions such as the one that Dan O suggests are standing on the shoulders of the most notorious liberal scholars of our age (both Robinson and Koester--from the stand point of the North American biblical scholars, are at the top of the field). Dan O. however uniformly gives it a liberation theology twist, in order to make the orthodox look like capitalist pigs or some such nonsense.
In what sense were the orthodox martyrs such as Polycarp and Ignatius, Perpetua and Felicitas, Cyprian, representative of wealth and power? This statement is so ridiculous that even Bauer, Koester and Robinson would have trouble not being embarrassed by it.
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