A Further Defense of the Despised Westboro Baptist Church

I listened to a sermon by Rev. Fred Phelps of Westboro Baptist Church. I would be pleased to say that his sermon reeked from the moment he cleared his throat to his last "Amen".

But I can’t say that. Agree or disagree with it, Phelps’s theology -- at least from this sermon -- is consistent and not outright laughable. It demands to be taken seriously.

1. The serious theology of Rev. Phelps.

Phelps drew the sermon that I listened to from the Biblical book of the prophet Jeremiah. Phelps emphasized from Jeremiah imprecatory prayer: prayer to bring harm upon a person, a people, or a nation; a curse. Phelps directs his imprecatory prayer toward America, just as Jeremiah directed his imprecatory prayer toward Judah, the remnant of the Jewish state before Babylonian captivity. For example, Jeremiah prayed:

O Lord of Hosts who art a righteous judge, testing the heart and mind, I have committed my cause to thee; let me see thy vengeance upon them. (Jeremiah 11:20 (NEB).)

And:

Drag them away like sheep to the shambles;
Set them apart for the day of slaughter. (Jeremiah, 12:3 (NEB).)

So Rev. Phelps preaches imprecatory prayer.

That an American pastor would curse America might shock, but it shouldn’t surprise. We’ve seen this before. Remember Jeremiah Wright? Remember "God damn America!"? Phelps is Jeremiah Wright, version 2.0.

2. God and America.

But here’s the thing. For all we know, Phelps might be right. His monomania about gays reveals shallowness; but it might be that God is in the process of withdrawing his blessing from America.

I say withdrawing his blessing, because I cannot look at American history without seeing divine protection and abundant blessing. Here is the briefest possible proof: in times of greatest peril, we have been gifted with indispensable leaders. We had irreplaceable George Washington when we needed George Washington. We had irreplaceable Abraham Lincoln when we needed Abraham Lincoln. We had irreplaceable Franklin D. Roosevelt when we needed Franklin D. Roosevelt. This is only a glimpse of the hand of God guiding, protecting, and strengthening America.

God has kept us safe in times past, but America today is different than what it has been. We are more distant from God than our forebears. The evidence of this is that throughout our history, our culture was infused with scripture; that is no longer true. "The pervasiveness of the Bible in American culture from the colonial period onward has often been observed . . .." (Robert Alter, Pen of Iron, 1) But "[t]he Bible is surely not ubiquitous in American culture as it once was . . .." (Ibid., 6.)

America’s alienation from God is supported by an argument from scripture.

3. America as Babylon.

I cannot read parts of the Book of Revelation without an unease that I am reading about us. Not necessarily America as it is today, but America that is becoming. Revelation chapter 17 prophecies what will happen just before the end of history and the coming of the eternal Kingdom of God: the destruction of Babylon. And we might be Babylon.

Revelation chapter 17 describes Babylon as "the great whore that sittith upon many waters". (Revelations 17:1 (AV).) It also speaks about "The seven . . . mountains, on which the woman [Babylon] sitteth." (Revelation 17:9 (AV).) These two passages puzzle scholars. Historical Babylon sat on canals – "many waters" – but it had no seven mountains. Historical Rome had seven hills, but although the Tiber flowed through it, this hardly is "many waters." But Babylon and Rome were the superpowers of their day, as we are today. So a plausible interpretation of "Babylon" is not a particular city at a particular time, but any profane superpower. I draw on George Eldon Ladd’s fine A Commentary on the Revelation of John in this analysis, though Ladd’s interpretation of Revelation chapter 17 is somewhat different than mine.

There is more that points from Babylon to America. After Babylon’s swift destruction, nations will mourn her – at least, they will mourn their loss of wealth from trading with her:

The merchants . . . which were made rich by her, shall stand afar off for the fear of her torment, weeping and wailing, and saying, Alas, alas that great city, that was clothed in fine linen, and purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold, and precious stones, and pearls! For in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every shipmaster, and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as trade by sea, stood afar off, and cried when they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, What city is like unto this great city! And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate. (Revelation 18:15-19 (AV).)

This passage in Revelation reveals that Babylon was loved for its capacity to make people rich; but it also implies the catalyst for Babylon’s downfall – its love of luxury. (1 Timothy 6:10: "[T]he love of money is the root of all evil . . ..") I submit for your consideration that all superpowers share this vulnerability, including America. Our love of comfort and consumer goods crowds out our love of God. And what nation but America is the vortex of world trade?

There are hurdles to this interpretation of the Book of Revelation’s Babylon; one hurdle is not so insurmountable. That is, the Book of Revelation speaks of Babylon’s deadliness toward the people of God: "And I saw the woman [Babylon] drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus". (Revelation 17:6 (AV).) Well, we aren’t known for assassinating prophets and Christians.

But the time might come. Prophets provoke. In fact, authoritative commentator Abraham Heschel finds it remarkable that the people of Israel and Judah tolerated the prophets at all:

The striking surprise is that prophets of Israel were tolerated at all by their people. To the patriots, they seemed pernicious; to the pious multitudes, blasphemous; to the men in authority, seditious." (Heschel, The Prophets)

I can imagine an America further from God than it now is, and a prophet who desecrates a cherished, even a patriotic, belief, provoking us beyond our capacity to endure. Those who dispose of the prophet or the prophets, and those who give silent assent to this, will become the agents of Revelation 17:6.

4. Signs of America’s plunge.

Just like a person can stand by a river and know that there was a flood upstream by the flotsam going by, an observer of America today can see evidence of America’s flight from God in the pollution of American morals.

When I started out in law, yes, lawyers lied; but the ones who lied stood out. Now I confront in my profession a tsunami of liars. What once evoked my outrage now gets a checkmark in the margin. Also, I hear shameless, unselfconscious lies from political leaders and from the media. I don’t remember this in earlier times. I see this calculated un-tethering from reality as the dead canary in a moral mineshaft foretelling fatal fumes. Jeremiah lamented commonplace lies before God destroyed Judah by foreign conquest.

They . . . never speak the truth; they have trained their tongues to lies; . . . deceit follows deceit." (Jeremiah 9:5-6 (AV).)

5. Conclusion.

So Rev. Fred Phelps’s theology of God’s outrage at America is far from laughable. Perhaps pastors who assure their congregations that God wants them to be rich do worse than Phelps.

The credibility of Phelps’s theology is another reason that I hope that the Supreme Court does the right thing and protects him and his provocative congregation. His theology is serious, but unpopular. And if he commits outrage to call attention to his beliefs, at least he succeeds in bringing attention to a word that is heard in few other places, so far as I know. If you are hearing these kinds of things from your pulpit, I would like to hear about it.

One last thing. Writing about religion makes me self-conscious. I really, really hope that I don’t come across as touting my own holiness. I have none. And I don’t mean that in the Apostle I-am-the-chief-of-sinners Paul sense. I mean that, truly, I am appalling.

Note:

I provide a link in the text to Amazon.com when I cite a book.  This is only for your convenience.

Eliminating Bigotry for a More Perfect Union, Part 2

(Part 1 below.)

Bigotry against Muslim Americans is headline news, even if the bigotry is not the headline. In contrast, bigotry against Roma makes little news, but it also is not usually recognized as bigotry.

1. Bigotry and Muslim Americans.

Bigotry against Muslim Americans comes from a mix of political calculation and public ignorance. Politicians and pundits exploit ignorance to incite hatred of Muslims. They do this to gain advantage over their political opponents.

                    a. Politically purposeful bigotry.

Politicians and pundits eagerly condemn the planned Muslim mosque in Manhattan near the site of the former World Trade Center. They  assert hateful accusations against Muslim Americans, gaining political capital while our peaceful Muslim neighbors pay the price. They assert that the promoters of this Manhattan mosque are "insensitive" to the victims of 9/11, even though some 9/11 relatives support the mosque, and even though the mosque is intended in part as an interfaith meeting place. They assert without evidence that the mosque is intended to be a terrorist command center.

These politicians, pundits, and most of the public do not distinguish between the responsible, decent Muslims behind the Manhattan mosque and the deeply-evil mass murderers who piloted planes into buildings nine years ago. I discuss other defamations against Muslim Americans in my September 4, 2010 post, "Not Enemies but Friends", in the section called "Wedge issues".

To these cynical politicians and pundits, the Muslim American victims of their political opportunism are mere collateral damage. They victimize Muslims, but to them this is an un-intended but un-important byproduct of their political exploitation of the pain and anger over the events of September 11, 2001. The purpose behind perpetrating hatred of Muslims is the accumulation of political power.

This lingering pain and anger from September 11, 2010 puts most Americans out of sympathy for the rights and well-being of Muslim Americans.  So demagogues enhance their political standing by telling lies about Muslims that the public is eager to believe. And this public anger means that when demagogues denounce Muslims or their freedom to build places of worship, they inflict harm on any adversary who dares to defend Muslims, tolerance, and religious freedom. Any opposing politician or pundit pays a price for appealing to the better angels of our nature.

The political boon of anti-Muslim bigotry goes even further than that. Some eighteen percent of Americans believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim, up from eleven percent in March, 2009. Politicians and pundits disseminate this disinformation hoping to politically damage the President. This is a new incarnation of an oldest, simplest political argument: "He’s not like us." This is the very base of bigotry.

As Republican former Secretary of State Colin Powell stated on Meet the Press, leaders in his own party encourage people to believe that Obama is a Muslim. As Powell points out, this is wrong-headed on two levels. First, there is nothing wrong with being a Muslim; there is no reason that a Muslim child should not be able to grow up to be president. But the accusers insinuate otherwise. Second, Obama is not a Muslim.

                   b. Ignorance as the agent of bigotry.

Eric Sevareid was a television essayist for CBS News. In his 1977 farewell broadcast, he articulated certain self-imposed "rules". Among them: "Not to underestimate the intelligence of the audience and not to overestimate its information." Politicians and pundits know that rule too, not so much honoring the intelligence that Sevareid spoke of, but manipulating the lack of information. They manipulate broad swaths of the American public who never thought about Muslims until planes flew into buildings in New York and Washington; nor learned more about Muslims thereafter; or, if they did, only fitted the information into a template of anger and hatred formed on that day.

Hatred of Muslims as a group is wrong, but I am not completely out of sympathy with my countrymen-and-women who harbor grudges against Muslims. I express this and the reason for it in my August 28, 2010 post, What the Islamic Community Center Controversy Teaches Me about Loving My Country. I also talk about the need for Christian humility among Christians: Muslims are better than we tend to think, and Christians are worse than we tend to think. I note thriving Muslim democracies, and I list relatively recent atrocities committed by Christian countries. I won’t repeat myself here, but if you want to see those positions argued, you know where to go.

On some level we tend to know that it is wrong to judge a group by its most perverse members; we ourselves could not emerge upright from such judgment. But the present political climate makes us overlook that simple truth. Leaders appeal to our baser judgments, counting on a feeble push-back, if any, from a public largely preoccupied with their own anxieties, affairs, and entertainments.

2. Bigotry against Roma.

Roma is the name for the group formerly known as Gypsies.

I’m not aware of national news concerning Roma, like news about African Americans, Latinos, or Muslims. But I have personal knowledge of bigotry against them.

More than other groups that are discriminated against, I find that there is no self-consciousness about holding against Roma the fact that they are Roma. For example, when I was a prosecutor in Alhambra, California, there was a sandwich shop run by Roma. Their sandwiches were good, made with fresh-baked bread. I once invited a detective to go there. He immediately said, "But it’s run by Gypsies – they piss in the bread!" Whether he literally believed this or not, his immediate, un-self-conscious response was a racial put-down. Having almost daily contact with this detective for two years, I never heard him speak that way about any other race or group.

On another occasion, I represented a Roma man in Monterey, California. He was accused of theft; having a loaded firearm in his car; and child endangerment. (The child-endangerment charge was because the children were young, and the gun was loaded and under a seat.)

The theft consisted of money taken for repairing a damaged fender. My client’s repair of the fender was, in the vernacular sense, a "rip-off", because he did a poor repair job. A poor repair job is not a crime, however; but it was treated as such. The officer wrote in his investigation report that this was a scam perpetrated by "Gypsies" all over California. To this day, I have no basis to believe that the officer had actual information to back up that statement; none was stated in the investigation report.

But, true or not, that statement was inappropriate and prejudicial. It was like saying that an African American must have intended to sell the drugs he had (a more serious crime than mere possession) because that is what African Americans do.

Character evidence is frowned upon under California law – generally, in a court of law, you can’t hold against somebody his own prior bad acts. But this was worse than character evidence. This was tarring my client not with his own prior bad acts.  It was tarring him with alleged prior bad acts by others over whom he had no control, and for whom he had no responsibility.

Among the prosecutor, the judge, and me, I was the only one who seemed to perceive the inappropriateness of this statement in the officer’s investigation report. Only after hard bargaining and aggressive argument, I got the theft and child-endangerment charges dropped.

Bigotry against Roma is not inconsequential, even though it is not national news. Hitler persecuted Roma, as he did Jews, Slavs, and homosexuals.

3. Conclusion.

In part 1, I examined bigotry against African Americans and Latinos. Here, I examined bigotry against Muslim Americans and Roma. In part 3, I will discuss how bigotry saps America’s strength and afflicts bigotry’s perpetrators, and what we should do about it.

Sources:

9/11 families who support the Manhattan mosque: http://www.peacefultomorrows.org/

The truth about the promoter of the Manhattan mosque: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/22/nyregion/22imam.html?_r=1

An article about the promoters for the Manhattan mosque, and the plans concerning it: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/bf1110d8-a5b0-11df-a5b7-00144feabdc0.html

18 percent of Americans think Obama is a Muslim: http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1701/poll-obama-muslim-christian-church-out-of-politics-political-leaders-religious

The complexity of characterizing the "typical" Muslim: an article about the Sufis: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/17/opinion/17dalrymple.html

An homage to a great, tolerant Muslim elected leader: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704842604574642353284811682.html?KEYWORDS=wahid

YouTube video of John McCain refuting a supporter who calls Obama an "Arab": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzoyADkoFUk

YouTube video of former Secretary of State Collin Powell on calling Obama a Muslim and patriotism among Muslim Americans: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYELqbZAQ4M&feature=related

YouTube video of Eric Sevareid’s 1977 farewell broadcast: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHGHm8iPeUY