With a tip of the hat to one of my favorite features of The Daily Show, I thought I’d kick the ol’ “God Machine” into gear and highlight some of the more provocative stories of the week from the world of religion.
First up is the Concerned Women for America, a leading religious right group, which believes the manufacturer of Barbie dolls is trying to use the dolls to advance a transgender agenda.
On Dec. 30, CWA, a leading Christian conservative group, noted on its Web site that on the Barbie Web site, www.Barbie.com, “there is a poll that asks children their age and sex.” The age choices were 4 to 8 but children “are given three options for their choice of gender”: I am a Boy, I am a Girl and I Don’t Know.
Bob Knight, director of CWA’s Culture and Family Institute, said Barbie manufacturer Mattel was being influenced by the “transgender movement.” To pose “this transgender question at little girls, they’ve really crossed the line,” Knight said, who added that “bisexuality gender confusion” is the Web site’s agenda, which is “very dangerous.”
It turns out this was just an innocent error and Mattel intended for the third option to be “I don’t want to say.” The site’s been fixed, which is more than we can say for Concerned Women for America’s twisted worldview.
Next is the strange story of some religious right activists anointing the chairs that will be used for Samuel Alito’s confirmation hearings. Literally anointing, with holy oil.
Insisting that God “certainly needs to be involved” in the Supreme Court confirmation process, three Christian ministers today blessed the doors of the hearing room where Senate Judiciary Committee members will begin considering the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito on Monday.
Capitol Hill police barred them from entering the room to continue what they called a consecration service. But in a bit of one-upsmanship, the three announced that they had let themselves in a day earlier, touching holy oil to the seats where Judge Alito, the senators, witnesses, Senate staffers and the press will sit, and praying for each of the 13 committee members by name.
“We did adequately apply oil to all the seats,” said the Rev. Rob Schenck, who identified himself as an evangelical Christian and as president of the National Clergy Council in Washington.
In a post-9/11 era, the fact that strange men can sneak into congressional hearing rooms with liquids of undetermined origins suggests maybe, just maybe, we might want to boost Capitol Hill security a bit.
And finally, one South Carolina Oklahoma pastor will need a better excuse if he plans to get away with stuff like this.
A pastor who has spoken out against homosexuality was arrested after propositioning a male undercover police officer outside a hotel, authorities said.
As the Rev. Lonnie Latham, 59, left jail Wednesday, he said “I was set up. I was in the area pastoring to police.”
Latham, a member of the Southern Baptist Convention’s executive committee, was arrested Tuesday and charged with offering to engage in an act of lewdness, Capt. Jeffrey Becker said.
Latham, of course, has been a supporter of a Southern Baptist Convention initiative to convince gays and lesbians that they can become “ex-gays” if “they accept Jesus Christ as their savior and reject their ‘sinful, destructive lifestyle.'”
Latham insists he was only “pastoring.” Is that what the kids are calling it these days….