Liberal Christianity comes not from a closer study of Scripture, but of culture

Kristin Kobes du Mez accuses biblical Christians of being shaped by culture instead of Sacred Scripture.

There is an enormous audience available for a message that tells the public that Jesus wants them to live just as they wish, with all the room in the world for abortions and sinful sexual relationships. 

"(LifeSiteNews) — Earlier this month, conservative evangelical Denny Burk, pastor and professor at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, faced off on Twitter with progressive Kristin Kobes du Mez, whose book Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation has been the toast of the mainstream press for the past year. There is obviously much the two disagree on, and their back-and-forth on LGBT issues was an interesting exchange, with both penning blog posts to articulate their disagreements more clearly.

"What struck me about this debate, however, is not that Denny Burk, a conservative Baptist and staunch pro-lifer, and Kristin Kobes du Mez, a progressive scholar who displayed thinly veiled contempt for pro-lifers through her recent book, have much to disagree on. It was du Mez’s implication that it was Burk’s theological views which were primarily shaped by culture rather than her own.

"Now, to be fair, du Mez did not state that she has definitively concluded that she supports LGBT rights as such — although Jesus and John Wayne made it crystal clear where her sympathies lie. But she did state that she was re-evaluating her stance on sexuality, as is her denomination. Many churches, she pointed out, have been doing so over the past several decades. And she’s right — many major mainline Protestant denominations have abandoned the traditional biblical view of sexuality just before imploding.

"But when liberal Christians claim that evangelicalism is primarily shaped by American culture, this seems an almost brazen projection. It is certainly true that churches are impacted by culture and vice versa, and it is also true that there is a peculiarly American version of masculinity that has been absorbed into certain strains of evangelicalism (I noted this in my review of her book earlier this year). But it is absurd for du Mez to imply that the denominations parting ways with 2,000 years of Christian consensus on homosexuality are somehow more thoughtful, compassionate, or theologically faithful than those who cling to the company of everyone from Augustine to the Reformers.

The Democrats are playing with fire in their efforts to gaslight the public on inflation

 Thomas Lifson  "Inflation is the dynamite that will explode and demolish the Democrats' hold on public support, and they are doing a terrible job trying to neuter the issue.  In fairness, they don't have any good case to make because Biden's policies have sparked inflation, starting with canceling the Keystone Pipeline and creating an artificial labor shortage via the "stimmy checks."  Energy and labor costs spiraling upward are driving prices up, as is the gigantic increase in the money supply through the Federal Reserve's funding of deficit spending via the purchase of Treasury obligations.

"But if there were a Hippocratic Oath for political propagandists — "first, do no harm" — the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC, usually called the "D triple-C") would have violated it yesterday with this insulting tweet:

"Sure, the graph shows prices going down, but if you squint and look at the vertical axis, you see that prices have gone down a whole two cents a gallon over a selected seven days in late November.

"The problem is that this selective graphing convinces nobody.  It contradicts what lefties like to call the "lived experience" of people.  What people experience and remember is closer to this graph (hat tip: Steven Hayward, who titles his blog post "How stupid do they think we are?"): . . ."

Dems showing signs of panic over gasoline prices as Biden gaffe in Kansas City speech will make for great GOP video ads

You can do this too!

Hillary Clinton reminds us what an awful president she would have been

Andrea Widburg  "Yes, Joe Biden is far and away the worst president in the history of the United States. However, the four-year Trump interlude between Obama and Biden gave the U.S. at least a little resiliency to stand against Biden’s hard-left administration. Imagine how much worse things would have been if Hillary had immediately stepped into Obama’s shoes. America wouldn’t have stood a chance. And lest you forget just what a horrible human being Hillary was, she just gave us a reminder as she spoke with Today’s Willie Geist about herdecision to read her “victory speech” aloud for a MasterClass.

"A snippet of her reading the speech made headlines because Hillary started to cry when she got to the part in the speech that saw her imagining telling her long-deceased mother that Hillary was America’s first woman president. Ironically, this emotional breakdown occurred in a masterclass the topic of which is “the power of resilience.” A woman who has spent the last five years whining about losing the election and now cries because she couldn’t, in her imagination, tell her mommy she won, is not resilient.

"Still, any student who signs up for a MasterClass taught by Hillary Clinton has already drunk the Democrat Kool-Aid and will already have taken the side of a woman who rode her husband’s coattails as far as he could take her, at which point she fell down all by herself. A presidential candidate who calls at least half of the American electorate “deplorable” is a fool and deserves to lose.

"There’s also the little problem of Hillary’s incredible corruption (making her and Biden birds of a feather). And of course, the fact that Hillary’s unsecured server damaged national security in a way that would have seen an ordinary, politically unconnected person spend the rest of her life in prison—which, not coincidentally, is where Papa Joe belongs for using his debauched son Hunter as the bagman for decades of anti-American corruption." . . .

The Demonization of Rosanne Boyland Begins

en-volve

 American Greatness

Boyland may not have many defenders at this point, but the truth eventually will do the talking for her.

"Yet another lie animating the phony narrative about the events at the Capitol complex on January 6 is about to be exposed: the falsehood that Rosanne Boyland, a Trump supporter from Georgia, died of an accidental drug overdose that day.

"As American Greatness has reported for months, incriminating video footage and firsthand witness accounts instead support numerous allegations that D.C. Metro and Capitol police contributed to, if they did not directly cause, Boyland’s death in the late afternoon of January 6.

"Boyland’s family reportedly has hired an attorney to investigate the circumstances of her death at the age of 34; the D.C Medical Examiner’s Office issued a report in April disclosing the cause of death of four Trump supporters who died on January 6 during what the coroner called “an unprecedented incident of civil insurrection.” It determined Boyland had succumbed to “acute amphetamine intoxication.”

"But it’s increasingly obvious that the ruling is untrue. (The same D.C. Medical Examiner’s office intentionally delayed the results of Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick’s autopsy; even after confirming Sicknick had died of a stroke caused by blood clots, the coroner nonetheless insisted the chaos at the Capitol protest “played a role in his condition.”)

"With the potential release of three hours of security camera footage that recorded exactly what happened inside the lower west terrace tunnel—the location where Boyland died—on January 6, law enforcement officials could face fierce public scrutiny for their behavior that day. It’s only a slice of the 14,000 hours of surveillance video captured by the Capitol Police department’s closed-circuit television system that Joe Biden’s Justice Department is hiding under protective orders, deemed “highly sensitive” government material.

"There’s a good reason why. Court filings detail shocking instances of police brutality including the use of a noxious gas that caused people to vomit and pass out; beatings by some officers using weapons and their own fists; and at least one officer dragging Boyland’s lifeless body, face up, back through the tunnel to hide her from public view until paramedics arrived." . . .

Who was Rosanne Boyland?

My God @CapitolPolice were beating Rosanne Boyland and they told us all she died of a drug overdose. They won’t even let her family have access to complete autopsy. What is @January6thCmte doing to investigate her death? Nothing. pic.twitter.com/dq4cpsWbOY

— Rosie Memos (@almostjingo) November 22, 2021

Who was Roseanne Boyland? Julie Kelly writes,

. . ."Boyland may not have many defenders at this point, but the truth eventually will do the talking for her. And MSNBC’s contemptible smear campaign against her is the clearest proof yet that they know the truth is coming.

"Rosanne Boyland is a victim—and not of Donald Trump or QAnon. She’s a victim of the Left’s insatiable bloodlust for Trump supporters; the Democratic Party’s propaganda organ otherwise known as the national news media; and sadly, even her own family, who seemed at the time desperate to distance themselves from the political views of their maligned loved one."  As the left-wing press reported: "Capitol Rioter Rosanne Boyland Died From Drug Overdose, Not Trampling: M.E."

The Fauci Who Cried Wolf

Image by The Slammer.

Ann Coulter   Wow, the opposition press isn't what it used to be!

"In a clip of Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., criticizing Fauci for keeping the public in a state of raw panic over COVID. 

Johnson: "Fauci did the exact same thing with AIDS. He overhyped it. He created all kinds of fear, saying it could affect the entire population, when it couldn't. And he's doing -- he's using the exact same playbook for COVID."

"At that point, the anchor is supposed to say something like, "Dr. Fauci?" and let him respond. 

"But CNN apparently thinks Fauci is too delicate a flower to answer an attack all by his lonesome. So, before turning it over to the interviewee, Tapper blathered: "Obviously, that's a bizarre and false assertion. President George W. Bush gave you the Presidential Medal of Freedom because of your leadership in the AIDS crisis. But I did want to give you an opportunity to respond." (I guess this is how you apply for Chris Cuomo's job at CNN.) 

"At that point, Fauci merely had to join Tapper in sneering at the senator: "Jake, how do you respond to something as preposterous as that?" 

"Thank you, Dr. Fauci for that penetrating response. Next up on CNN ...

" Actually, Fauci then went on to use the Hillary Benghazi defense: HOW DARE YOU QUESTION ME WHEN PEOPLE DIED!!! He said: 

"Overhyping AIDS? It's killed over 750,000 Americans and 36 million people worldwide. How do you overhype that? Overhyping COVID? It's already killed 780,000 Americans and over 5 million people worldwide. So, I don't have any clue of what he's talking about."

"That would have been a fantastic answer if Sen. Johnson had questioned whether anyone had ever died from AIDS or COVID. Unfortunately, he didn't do that. Rather, he accused Fauci of overhyping the risk of COVID, terrifying everyone -- as he did with AIDS -- instead of concentrating protections on high-risk groups." . . .

Jeff Zucker Failed To Address Serial Sexual Misconduct At CNN And Should Be Fired Immediately

The hit to the network’s already damaged reputation and the potential legal vulnerabilities for CNN should be more than enough reason to fire Zucker immediately. 

The Federalist  "In a move more typically associated with shady politicians than a news network supposedly committed to transparency, CNN had a whopper of a news dump on Saturday night, announcing it was firing primetime news anchor Chris Cuomo.

"This followed a weeklong suspension after government documents proved his involvement in covering up the sexual misconduct of his brother, disgraced former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, was much more extensive than previously known. The emails and text exchanges released by the New York attorney general’s office showed Chris Cuomo not only assisted with the public relations strategy to help his brother evade accountability, but used his relationships in the media at outlets like MSNBC and Politico – that he had gained from his job at CNN – to help him do it." . . .

. . ."Worse, why did it take nearly six months for Chris Cuomo’s employer, CNN President Jeff Zucker, to suspend his network’s star anchor? As I wrote in August, journalists should have been leading the campaign to hold Chris Cuomo accountable and CNN should have fired him immediately after his initial involvement in the coverup of sexual abuse came to light.

"Unfortunately, we know exactly why “media critics” like CNN’s Brian Stelter failed (or rather refused) to seriously investigate their colleague or comment on his misdeeds, even when they already knew of serious misconduct, and instead even chose to defend Chris Cuomo. These people, and most in their profession, could be more accurately described as lazy, partisan, and unserious rather than journalists. They are much more interested in vapid, click-bait hit jobs on Trump and Republicans than they are in holding their industry, and Democrats – which are increasingly synonymous – accountable. " . . .

The Racist of NBC News

In the case of [Joy] Reid, she is a prime wrangler for people running risk of thinking for themselves. The former blogger with a long history of homophobia and anti-Muslim posts now spends her time insisting others are destroyed because of what they say or how they look. She really is the worst of the worst.

 Townhall  "Beauty is only skin deep, but in the case of the NBC News race-baiting host ironically named Joy Reid, every bit of her is ugly. She finds race everywhere, especially when it’s not there. It’s her brand, and hate is her medium – her sculptor’s clay. She works in racism the way Van Gogh used paints or Hunter Biden uses crack, it’s where she thrives and all she brings to the table. Inside and out, Reid is the worst person on cable news, and NBC News, which employs her, Comcast, which owns NBC Universal, and every Comcast customer pays her to do it.

"In an era of “diversity officers” and other stupid, left-wing virtue signaling creations, Reid is an anomaly. Racism has always been tolerated by the left, Democrats having fostered it the entirety of that party’s existence. But it wasn’t always front and center, featured proudly on cable news, which should really drop the “news” part since none of the networks do anything but pay lip service to the concept. ". . .

That leaves you with only 2 choices: is Joy Reid stupid or a liar? The answer is yes. 

In San Francisco, they like smash-and-grabbers more than police

 San Francisco restaurant that ordered cops out is poster child for the local wokester idiocyl   "To get a sense of how a beautiful city like San Francisco could first elect a crazed leftist like Chesa Boudin, and then find itself mired in car burglaries, home break-ins, shopliftings, and smash-and-grab organized lootings, get a load of this pair if you haven't already heard of them:". . .

"Not surprisingly, that's what's on San Franciscans' minds, and the restaurant got scored on Yelp, Twitter, Instagram, and any other place where they had an internet presence.  On Yelp, there were more than 1,000 negative reviews, many from local San Franciscans and Bay Area denizens.". . .

Things have since moved on since 2020, though, and now it's organized smash-and-grab looters with no stated politics and district attorneys who carry the politics for them, under the Soros-influenced rubric of "ending mass incarceration" and "social justice."  The lootings are out of control now, and fancy restaurants are not exempt.  Just yesterday, a different San Francisco restaurant, RT Rotisserie, got sacked and trashed, with its cash register emptied out, by organized looters.

"Here's a sample from just the Yelp reviews:". . . 

San Francisco restaurant apologizes for denying service to armed, on-duty police officers

And yet....California Needs To Stop Its Crime Spree Before It Goes National   "Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is apparently convinced that the shoplifting and smash-and-grab robberies in California are a myth. But they are real, perversely spectacular, and likely to spread across the country if they remain unchecked.

"The retail heart of San Francisco, with its abundance of luxury shops, is usually overflowing with commerce at this time of the year. Instead, it’s become a “ghost town.”

“Widespread ‘flash mob’ looting turned Union Square – the city’s most fashionable shopping district – into an area resembling a blighted neighborhood in Detroit,” Michael Shellenberger writes in a recent New York Post op-ed. "

"Much of the state “seems to have become a plunderers’ paradise,” says the Pacific Research Institute.". . .

'We Made a Mistake': San Francisco Restaurant Backtracks After Refusing Service to Police Officers

Uh, Oh. CNN's Don Lemon's Name Just Came Up at the Jussie Smollett Trial

 PJ Media

But it’s what other things Lemon texted that may be of interest in the corner office at CNN.

Now that CNN has established a bright-line test for getting rid of its anchors — no, not for lying on the air, but using the network’s resources to help friends and family — Don Lemon might be wondering if he might be “Chris Cuomo’d.”

The CNN anchor’s name has come up in the Jussie Smollett hate crime hoax trial and he might have some ‘splainin’ to do.

No one less than Jussie Smollett himself testified on Monday that he texted with the CNN anchor and the message was pivotal to his defense. Indeed, right after the “attack” on Smollett, Lemon admitted to texting the actor every day because “there’s not a lot of us out there. Sometimes he responds, sometimes he doesn’t.”, , ,

Matthew Briggs

@mbangelsfan

If CNN is to be impartial they need to suspend Lemon until further review, but they wont because the blow back would be huge to suspend a black gay guy. A cis white male is so much easier to discipline.. . .

This, Sadly, Is CNN  Things are so bad that Chris Cuomo’s downfall isn’t even all that surprising.  . . .

"CNN is an embarrassment. It might be the single most dishonest media entity on the planet. Even the Korean Central News Agency, the mouthpiece of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, doesn’t pretend to be objective as it blasts out propaganda to the world. But CNN does.

"None of that is news, of course. It’s been two decades since CNN gave up on attempting to be objective. They just lie and say they are these days. But what makes CNN’s corruption noteworthy is that it has branched out beyond the airwaves.". . .

Why would they care? Why would these actions be disqualifying? CNN isn’t a news organization; it’s an advocacy and propaganda shop. It exists to push narratives favored by its corporate overlords or the petty middle managers who run its newsroom. Or the pet causes of its on-air talent.

Talent? 

Don Lemon to be the next one out at CNN?

It's an outrageous break with newsroom ethics around the issue of conflicts of interest. Here Lemon was using his privileged position in the news to help a hate-crime suspect beat charges by giving him an advantage. His thumb on the scale of justice here amounted to a whopping conflict of interest.

Chris Cuomo prepping to sue CNN for more than $18M over contract: sources

His contract was reportedly worth $6 million annually, leaving between $18 million and $20 million that he would be owed, sources said, adding that Chris Cuomo would also likely seek damages. But CNN has “no intention of paying [Chris] Cuomo a penny,” an insider said.

Pearl Harbor according to MSNBC

The planes swooping down were a merry caravan with smiles and waves from the pilots, according to MSNBC

United States Observes 80th Anniversary of Pearl Harbor Attack

DISGUSTING: The Media Is LYING To You!

Epstein, Victim Virginia Roberts Guiffre, Does Ghizlane Maxwell In: ‘She Was Pulling The Stings’ She’s A ‘Monster’

Unite America First  . . .“ 'Ghislaine was much more conniving and smart than Epstein ever was,” Giuffre said.

“ 'I know that woman. I’ve known her really well. Put it this way — Epstein was Pinocchio, and she was Gepetto.”

"Giuffre had still more choice words for Maxwell.

“ 'She is a monster. She’s worse than Epstein. She did things even worse than Epstein did. She was vicious. She was evil. And she’s a woman.”

"As things now stand, Maxwell has been accused of procuring young women for, and participating in sex crimes against them with, Epstein.

"If Roberts-Guiffre is right then it’s highly likely that Maxwell really does hold incredibly compromising evidence against a number of high-profile and powerful icons of business and politics to use as leverage as her lawyers bargain for her freedom." . . .

. . ."Holding compromise over so many international power players made Epstein and Maxwell powerbrokers in their own right…

"Who thinks that way?  Well, for starters, Clinton followers who swallowed the PeeGate narrative hook, line, and sinker.

"What type of deals would Epstein and Maxwell have been capable of driving, and what would be the worth to American politicians and/or foreign governments?" . . . Full article here

Jeffrey Epstein survivor Sarah Ransome details being groomed by Ghislaine Maxwell:  'Once you’re there, you can't get out'  

Ransome later served as a witness in a defamation case filed by Virginia Giuffre, another victim of Epstein's sex trafficking ring, against Maxwell. Over the years, she has met with other survivors who were taken to Epstein’s island and experienced similar trauma. In the future, she hopes to continue working with other victims of sexual abuse, and she wrote Silenced No More to let other survivors know they aren’t alone.  Silenced No More: Surviving My Journey to Hell and Back

Giuffre v. Dershowitz