Friday night found the Holy Prepuce channel surfing over to the Christian Broadcasting Network membership telethon. My interest in Pat Robertson's flagship media organ had been piqued by Robertson's Charles Foster Kane-worthy plan to buy the Virginian-Pilot newspaper, presumably in order to shut down its critical coverage of him. (Among other topics, the Virginian-Pilot has exposed Robertson's non-profit Operation Blessing as a front for his commercial diamond mining enterprise.)

The segment in progress as I tuned into the telethon concerned the proprietor of a Florida-based Karaoke entertainment company, who attributed his growing success to the favor of Jesus Christ. A few years ago, this fellow had been nearly bankrupt. God had spoken to this man and told him to spend his last dollars not on, say, rent, but instead as a "seed offering" to CBN. Sure enough, within a few months the karaoke business took off, and three short years later he employed eighteen DJs and a fleet of as many mobile karaoke units. And all because he had "sown" his cash with CBN--a practice he now continued through tithing, which he emphasized was "not about the money, but about obedience."

Following a brief intermission of typical telethon fare (donation thermometer rising, bells ringing, operators cheering) a new segment began. This vignette concerned a young couple who had been scrounging to make ends meet. But after sending one dollar, just one dollar to CBN, the wife found a ten dollar bill in the laundry. She sent this money to CBN, and three weeks later, her grandmother's estate settled (it had been tied up in the courts for over a year) and she received $10,000. God then spoke to the husband "in that way that God speaks to you," and directed that 10% of this windfall be "sown" with CBN. Flash forward one year, and the couple now lives in a beautiful home, with new cars, a thriving business, etc., etc.

Occasionally the program would cut away to a segment about the relief work performed by Operation Blessing in some developing nation, but clearly such details about what CBN planned to do with the money were secondary to the monetary payback the almighty had planned for viewers who would only pick up the phone and "seed."

This was not the first time I had encountered the sow/reap metaphor from a Christian "ministry"--I have received several appeals in the mail from an Arizona outfit known as the Don Stewart Association, promising me "an Unveiling of Money Blessings" if I would "stretch [my] faith and Prove God with a Seed Faith Gift of $30." One of the mailings even included a packet of oil, with which I was instructed to anoint my "purse or wallet, some financial papers, or bills."

But something else struck me as familiar about CBN's appeal--a feeling that I had seen all of this before on cable television. And then it dawned on me where: those "No Money Down" real estate infomercials! The plot lines were nearly identical: an impoverished protagonist makes a small investment, and through some mysterious process (the details of which are never very clear), winds up rolling in dough. The visual elements are interchangeable--well-coiffed white people in big houses with oversized furniture, interspersed with cutaways of expensive cars driving along the ocean. Of course, the paths to riches being sold are different--I'll leave it to the reader to predict whether slipping Jehovah a sawbuck for some Karaoke bookings has greater prospects for success than hitting up complete strangers for seller-financing--but the central concepts are the same.

Part of me feels that anyone credulous enough to believe the creator of the entire universe will go to bat for them in probate court if they send $20 to some cable channel deserves to go broke. But another part of me, the part with empathy for those less fortunate, wishes there were a way to shut down these con men who wrap themselves in the mantle of spirituality while shaking down the desperate for their last dollars.

I am all for religiously-based charitable appeals when there is some trace of theological content to the request. If you want to get on the air and ask for money to feed the children of Madagascar because that's what Jesus would have done, more power to you (assuming the money goes where you say it will.) But the telethon I saw was strictly a dollars-and-cents proposition: lay a C-note on God (who doesn't handle cash directly, so CBN will gladly accept it on his behalf), and the big guy will hit you back with a grand. If CBN's message were directed at rich people, I would shrug and say a fool and his money are soon parted. But when it is so obviously targeted at people struggling to ends meet, I say it's nauseating.

The Answers In Genesis Creation Museum is open at last! From previous posts, you will know of my fascination with this institution. The finished product has by all accounts exceeded my expectations. Animatronic tableaux feature human children frolicking alongside dinosaurs; videos demonstrate how metaphorical interpretations of Genesis lead inevitably to internet pornography and abortion.

And the really excellent news is that the museum is seeking a qualified barista. Faithful reader Eliza R. alerted me to this opening at the Museum's "Noah's Cafe." The key job responsibility is the preparation of "fine coffee and other related gourmet beverages," including espresso, latte, and something called "Frappes Chai." As one might expect, other duties include working the register, clearing dishes, and taking inventory.

But the ability to discharge these functions is hardly the sole qualification. Along with her resume, an applicant must submit a "creation belief statement," "salvation testimony," and a written confirmation of her agreement with the museum's Statement of Faith.

Exactly what must one believe in order to serve up a skinny half-caff at Noah's? Some key elements are as follows:

• "No apparent, perceived or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record"
  


• "The only legitimate marriage is the joining of one man and one woman. God has commanded that no intimate sexual activity be engaged in outside of marriage"
  


• "The Noachian Flood was a significant geological event and much (but not all) fossiliferous sediment originated at that time"
  


• "Those who do not believe in Christ are subject to everlasting conscious punishment."
  

Nice. When I visit the museum (and I will), perhaps the successful applicant will kindly leave some room in my mocha. It sounds like there's no extra charge for a shot of eternal damnation.

Looking back over the past few posts, I realize that I've been harping on some pretty heavy shit. First Ladies dying in the White House, smokers snuffing it before they can collect their pensions, families of slain police officers viewing graphic simulations of police officer slayings, racist tribal elections, Iraq . . . It's as though I had forgotten that the world is still, at base, a Zippy the Pinhead comic full of carefree aesthetic delights, free to be savored by all takers. In order to restore some balance, I would like to bring two items to your attention.

First, inspectors in Spring Valley, New York recently busted an illicit backyard matzo lab operating out of a converted school bus. Rabbi Aaron Winternitz had been running the operation for the last three Passovers, ever since he bought the derelict vehicle and installed an oven, a human-powered wheat mill fashioned from a stationary bicycle, and, more problematically, an unauthorized gas line from his house. The purpose of the gas line is unclear, since the matzo oven itself is wood-fired--as attested to by the shoulder-high stack of firewood surrounding the vehicle.

Not surprisingly, local officials found the combination of a massive open-flame oven, stacks of combustible wood and dried wheat, and do-it-yourself natural gas fittings problematic when operating 10 feet from a residential structure. Spring Valley matzo futures no doubt traded up on news of the reduced supply; at peak production, the bus was capable of turning out 100 lbs of product per day.

Second, Michael Jackson has announced plans to build a 50-foot robotic effigy of himself in Las Vegas. According to press reports, the device will wander through the surrounding deserts shooting laser beams out of its eyeballs. This is all fine and good, but I know where I'm not taking my 50-foot robot twelve-year-old boy.

If the mid-term election results proved anything, it was the fallacy of the red state / blue state "two Americas" theory hyped by the media since 2000. November taught us that if a 60/40 victory constitutes a landslide, then our most powerful political element is the vast ideological center. Pleasing "the base" on either side is useful, but races are won and lost on the shifting alliances of the pragmatic.

Despite this lesson, certain members of Congress are already out of the gate for 2008 with old-school demagoguery calculated to energize the "real America." Take, for instance, Rep. Virgil Goode (R-VA). Goode could not remain on the sidelines while the right-wing media lambasted incoming Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) over the planned use of a Koran at his ceremonial swearing-in next month. Never mind that the event is a photo-op, the actual oath being taken en masse and without any religious texts. And never mind that Ellison would not be the first to use a book omitting the New Testament--Hebrew Bibles and the Book of Mormon have served the purpose without incident. The good Rep. Goode felt the need to warn his constituents that

if American citizens don’t wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran. . . . I fear that in the next century we will have many more Muslims in the United States if we do not adopt the strict immigration policies that I believe are necessary to preserve the values and beliefs traditional to the United States of America and to prevent our resources from being swamped.

Goode later fretted to the press that if immigration is not restricted, we may have "a majority of Muslims elected to the United States House of Representatives."

Addressing this last point first, if we assume that Goode believes naturalized citizens usually vote for their coreligionists, he must therefore believe that America is in danger of absorbing enough Muslims to outnumber our roughly 200 million Christians. I wonder how he squares this projection with the usual anti-immigration bogeyman: the tidal wave of illegal Latinos necessitating (and apparantly taking jobs on) the Southern border fence project. Last time I checked, most of these folks tend to be, um, Christian.

With regard to the proposal that Ellison be required to use a Bible, I suppose Goode has probably heard that Article VI of the pesky old Constitution forbids religious tests for office. (And indeed permits an affirmation of office, rather than an oath--an option exercised by Presidents Franklin Pierce and Herbert Hoover.) But then, politicians of Goode's stripe have never been too concerned about Constitutional restrictions on theocratic government.

One might pause, though, to consider the reason behind the use of religious texts in oath-taking. The whole idea of an oath is that it is a promise of especial solemnity, one on which the obligation to make good goes beyond the ordinary ethics of keeping one's word. Swearing on a sacred text is meant to invoke divine judgment on the oath-taker's later fealty to the promise. In earlier times, Roman Catholics swore by placing their hands on a cloth used to cover the Eucharist, quite literally swearing a "corporeal oath" on the body of Jesus Christ. So if the point of Ellison's swearing an oath of office is to make a really, really important promise to do a good job--one that he had better not break, or else--then maybe it would make sense to let him use the book he believes sacred? It seems like swearing on the New Testament for a non-Christian is rather akin to swearing with one's fingers crossed.

Meanwhile, in the Senate, the confirmation of federal district court appointee Janet Neff is on hold because Judge Neff, currently on the Michigan Court of Appeals, had the audacity to attend a neighbor's same-sex commitment ceremony in Massachusetts. This was not a same-sex wedding, mind you; it took place in 2002, before the Supreme Judicial Court legalized gay marriage in the Bay State. Nor did Judge Neff preside at the ceremony; even had same-sex marriages then been legal in Massachusetts, a Michigan judge would have had no authority to perform one.

Such distinctions do not matter to Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS), eying a presidential run in 2008. Mere attendance at such a Satanic function is enough to taint Neff, never mind that she is a Bush appointee and already vetted by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Brownback has put a hold on Neff's nomination until such time as her confirmation hearing can be re-opened for testimony regarding her role in the ceremony, her legal views on same-sex unions, and her ability to rule impartially on the issue.

I had not realized that bias-by-association was such a concern in judicial confirmations, but now I'm worried for my own future. If I'm ever nominated to the federal bench, I'll have to explain my attendance at my cousin's public high school graduation back in 1987. I distinctly remember it opening with a prayer, and I suppose I'll have to defend my ability to rule impartially on Establishment Clause issues. Oh yes, and lately I've been seen frequenting an obstetrician's office. This is only a guess, but I'll bet that sometime in her training the good doctor has performed an abortion.

At least I could testify honestly that neither of these associations took place in Massachusetts. You know, Ted Kennedy's Massachusetts.

The Pope sure stepped in it this time, didn't he? One offhand remark about the Prophet Muhammad preaching "things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached," and the whole world goes apeshit.

But let's give this thing a little context. Last Tuesday, Pope Benedict stopped by his old teaching gig at the University of Regensburg for a bit of discourse with the science faculties. In an erudite, if somewhat opaque address, the Pontiff called for re-integration of theological questions into the realm of rational inquiry. He suggested that the natural sciences necessarily give rise to questions beyond the scope of their methodology, and that only through such a synthesis can we achieve “that genuine dialogue of cultures and religions so urgently needed today.”

The beginning of the speech more or less tracked Toastmasters International Opening 2A: pleasantries about the venue, followed by a personal reminiscence, followed by a joke foreshadowing the thesis, followed by a statement of the thesis. (Yes, the Pope did tell a joke of sorts, relating a colleague's quip that the University of Bonn, with its two theology divisions, possessed two entire faculties devoted to something that did not even exist.)

The trouble started when the Pope moved into Toastmaster's Transition 3C: "I was reminded of all this recently, when I read..." 3C of course requires a quotation, and the one Benedict chose came from that well-known personality, Manuel II Paleologos, Byzantine emperor from 1391 to 1425. Manuel's point, essentially, was that religious conversion by violence is irrational because "faith is born of the soul, not the body." The Pope used Manuel's statement about Muhammad as a launching point for an examination of the historical relationship between rational inquiry and religious faith. His address never returned to the subject of Islam, nor to the question of enforced conversion.

I think we need to chalk this one up to the "everyone's an idiot" category. On the one side, you have Benedict who, needing a quotation on the theme of rational spirituality, chose one that not only denigrates the central figure and entire belief system of a 1.4 billion-member religion, but trots out the most problematic stereotype plaguing its adherents today. On the other side, you have a Simpsons-like raging horde of reactionaries, setting the world on fire over a mistaken belief that the Pope had endorsed Manuel's viewpoint.

Did any of the people currently setting churches on fire, shooting nuns, recalling ambassadors, et cetera, actually bother to read the Pope's speech? It's right there, in four languages, on the Vatican website. I only ask because I don't find the following conversation very likely:

Point being: everyone's in the wrong here. So let's let the Pope say he's sorry for selecting about the worst page imaginable from Bartlett's, let's let "the Muslim street" apologize for reflexively kirking out, and can we all please just simmer down? Jeez.

I recently was privileged to introduce to you Petersburg, Kentucky's pride and joy, the Answers in Genesis Creation Museum. I know you are revving the engines of the John 3:16-Mobile as we speak, but if you examine the museum's website carefully, you will notice a small obstacle to your pilgrimage: the damned thing isn't actually built yet.

How is a poor sinner to help, you wonder? Well, donations are of course appreciated, as are charter memberships. But if you really want to save our children from the Luciferian cesspool of "evolutionary natural history," why not sign up to pray for the museum? By entering your email address, you'll make a one year commitment to fast one day per month, and pray daily that God will "glorify His name in the specific requests relayed to me."

These specific requests, conveniently available online or by weekly email, are grouped by department. So, for instance, the Warehouse Department makes this request:

...while Museum Operations asks the following:

As a public service to those of you who may not have had time to peruse the FBI's application for a warrant to search the Congressional office of Rep. Bill Jefferson, I have digested the application thoroughly and provide you with the following summary:

Dude, they totally have the goods on this guy. Unless the Bureau has engineered a frame-up more elaborate than the LAPD pulled on O.J., Jefferson has been a very naughty fellow.

What I find more amusing are the protestations that this search somehow violated the Constitutional separation of powers. Let us play a round of Armchair Constitutional Scholar, shall we? Below, I will list some instances in which separation-of-powers challenges have been raised. Your task is to identify the challenge that is full of shit:

A) President attempts to seize and federalize nation's steel mills. Mill owners protest that President may not do so without congressional authorization.

B) President refuses to spend money that Congress has appropriated for particular federal programs. Program beneficiaries protest that such refusal violates separation between Congress's power to make laws (including appropriations) and president's duty to "take care that the Laws are faithfully executed."

C) Immigration statute gives single house of Congress power to "veto" executive actions. Administration protests that separation of powers permits Congress to act only via bills approved by both houses and presented for the President's signature.

D) Congressional leadership protests that FBI search of Congressman's office violates separation of powers under the following circumstances: After Congressman resists grand jury subpoena for eight months, FBI obtains search warrant for his office based on 100+ page affidavit indicating the following: Informant wearing wire records Congressman promise to make official visits to Nigeria and Ghana to facilitate approval of telecommunications projects. In exchange for these official acts, Congressman accepts part-interest in the business, registered in his children's names. Meanwhile, businessman pleads guilty to having paid Congressman $400,000+ in bribes for prior, similar deal. Back at the ranch, Congressman tells informant he needs $100,000 to bribe Vice President of Nigeria. Informant later gives Congressman suitcase containing $100,000 in cash. Over dinner, Congressman tells informant he has given money to Nigerian V.P., then passes series of notes to informant demanding greater share of the venture. Jokes "'All these damn notes we're writing . . . as if the FBI is watching." Subsequent search of Congressman's house reveals that he has lied to informant; money has not actually gone to Nigerian V.P. but is instead in Congressman's freezer, neatly wrapped in $10,000 aluminum-foil bundles.

Did you choose D?