Franklin Graham on Going Back to God

Rick Santorum on Religious Liberty

h/t:  A.F. Branco

       The College Fix 

      

Abu Musaab Wajdi Akkari on Saying "Merry Christmas"

It would seem that this Muslim Imam is immune to sharing glad tidings during this holiday season from infidels and people of the book who do not profess faith as he does.

It seems dubious that even a politically correct holiday greeting would suffice.  Should American society accommodate seemingly lone voices of perpetual offense, especially in sharing a Christmastide greeting?

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CBS Late Night Spotlights Strident Iconoclast Alternative Rock Singer

CBS' The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson recently gave alternative rock singer Kristeen Young her American network television debut singing "Pearl of a Girl".

For those who found Young's singing to be more discordant disharmony rather than what NPR shills as "beguiling and visceral" singing, here are the lyrics to "Pearl of a Girl":

I never knew I was a girl until they stopped to tell me. 

I never knew I was disturbed until they dropped three volumes on me.

But in the Bible/Torah/Quran there are really no good roles for me except concubine and wash woman.

I used to be the sad one now I just want to stab them it's so severe, it's brutal.

They've needed to have the law so they can legally bind us.

They've needed the church so they can morally ground us.

They've needed to make the dough they've must be so scared of us.

So their stories are of ghosts.

I only wish the virgin would've had an abortion.

 Young's iconoclastic lyrics sought to condemn all major religions for centuries of religious persecution and keeping women in subservient roles.  Yet fashion and imaging for "The Knife Shift" goes out of its way to insult all of the Abrahamic faiths. And she does the Knife Shift to suggest that the Virgin Mary should have aborted the Christ child. 

For example, Young prides herself on creating her own fashion.  Young proudly describes a skirt that she designed which she painted on symbols of the three major religions which she intentionally defaced.  The cross and the crescent moon were positioned upside down and the Stars of David looked like it was a shirukin throwing stars.  

The iconoclast artist also claimed: "I feel like making and wearing something Satanic". This provocative fashion and lyric is a marked contrast to her avowed approach to art "the freedom and diversity of many styles grouped together".  Young not only felt compelled to shout her song from the rooftop but to insult all with whom she disagrees. So much for coexist. 


"The Pearl of a Girl" was not the 37 year old strident chanteuse's first foray into what charitably can be seen as clashing with religious and cultural constraints. In her six album discography, her tracks include "No Other God", "Commit Adultery", "Devil Girl", "The Devil Made Me", "Son of Man",  and "Protestant".  Somehow, it seems unlikely that one would hear tracks from "Music for Strippers, Hookers and the Odd On-Looker" (2009) on  a Praise music channel. 

Some interviews with Kristeen Young intimate a woman who was troubled by her youth in St. Louis where she struggled with religion and non-conformity.  But instead of fashioning these inclinations like Madonna, they manifested themselves like her estwhile mentor Morrissey with a panache of Lady Gaga.

It is not uncommon for rock musicians to push the envelope of taste and engage in épater le bourgeois.  After all, a famous Rolling Stones song is "Sympathy for the Devil" (1968) which attributes the tumult of the 1960s to the hellish anti-hero.  In addition, the Rolling Stones also issued a record: "Their Satantic Majestic Request" (1967), which was their only attempt at psychodelia.  Mick Jagger summed it up best: 

 "There's a lot of rubbish on Satanic Majesties. Just too much time on our hands, too many drugs, no producer to tell us, 'Enough already, thank you very much, now can we get just get on with this song?'"

Rather than adopt a anti-hero narrative or compose a session stoned, Kristeen Young consistently follows a world view that it ardently iconoclastic and anti-religious as most people of faith would understand it.

So why give Young the publicity which she cravenly covets?  It shows how CBS has stooped to conquer. When The Doors appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1967, they were asked to change the Robbie Krieger lyrics to "Light My Fire" so as not to sing "Girl we could get much higher".  Of course, Jim Morrison flouted this promise and The Doors got banned.  That same year, the Rolling Stones--the bad boys of rock and roll--changed the lyrics to a popular song to "Let's spend some time together" to not scandalize audiences.   

The CBS "Pearl of a Girl" spot exemplifies the mainstreaming of alternative lifestyles which the great silent majority finds alien and mildly offensive. This is a nation which is tolerant of a wide variety of views and lifestyles, but the Lamestream Media and the cultural intelligentsia is pushing a weltanschauung which excludes all but the politically correct perspective of the moment.   The episode underlines why Christians feel like they are under attack, albeit in this instance culturally. To change this cultural assault, the faithful must recognize the challenge in order to peacefully confront challenges. 

Considering his choice in guests, it is no wonder why Craig Ferguson was not fingered to be David Letterman's replacement.

Atheists Fight to Forbid High School Wrestlers from Wearing Shirts with Bible Verse

For over a decade, wrestlers from the Parkersville South (West Virginia) High School have chosen to wear shirts which bear the scriptural verse: "I can do all things through Him who strengthens me."  This motto was also emblazoned on the team's website.

After a complaint from the Wisconsin based Freedom from Religion Foundation, Wood County (WV) School Superintendent Pat Law, demanded that the team take the motto off their web presence, but for the time being the students can continue to voluntarily wear the shirts. It was prudent for the grapplers to take the verse off their website so that there is no question about the separation of church and state.  But the privately funded tee shirts with the empowering message are another story altogether.

The school is concerned about agitation from aggressive atheist groups who want to wipe any expression of Christian faith from the public square, while balancing the rights of citizens.
Even though the Parkersburg South wrestlers had been voluntarily wearing these shirts (paid for by parent boosters), the school system rolled at the raising of one complaint.  Presumably this was to avoid costly law suits.  It is dubious if the Wood County will dare to bar other t-shirts which others might find "offensive".

The Freedom from Religion Foundation proclaim that it "works as an umbrella for those who are free from religion and are committed to the cherished principle of separation of state and church." Yet their news over the past three months only consists of Judeo-Christian agitation.  No mention is made on the FFRF website about the many municipal accommodations which are made for Muslims. None of their current lawsuits tackle topics like the incorporation of Sharia law, New York schools taking days off for Muslim religions holidays, public foot washes etc.  Their fight to enforce the separation of church and state could be given more credence if it took on those troubling topics instead of just being contrarians curmudgeons against Judeo-Christian traditions.

Even though the Parkersburg South wrestlers had been voluntarily wearing these shirts (paid for by parent boosters), the school system rolled at the raising of one complaint.  Presumably this was to avoid costly law suits.

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Aside from the outcomes of games, high school sports teach valuable lessons. The Parkersburg South Wrestling kerfluffle demonstrates that a lone dissenting voice can overcome an empowering message with the quisling support of a politically correct administrator.  The Plymouth/Canton bleacher imbroglio exemplifies that a politically correct America will enforce equality at all costs and the PC government  can override and rip out privately funded improvements to make its point.

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