Review: Religion Gone Bad–The Hidden Dangers of the Christian Right

0Shares

Amazon Page

Twin to Reverend Lynn's “Piety & Politics”,

October 26, 2006

Mel White

I like to read in twos or threes, and in this case the two books I read on the religious right were Reverend Barry Lynn's “Piety & Politics: The Right-Wing Assault on Religious Freeedom,” and this one. Lynn's comes in first by a nose, but they are both excellent primers on everything going wrong both within the extreme right, and between the church and the state.

The author is a gay Christian minister who was uniquely privileged as a ghost writer for the heavy hitters on the extreme right from Jerry Falwell to Pat Robertson, work done prior to his realizing he was gay.

The author provides a useful distinction, one I often forget, between fundamentalists who are driven by fear and focused on imposing their strict version of faith on others, and evangelicals who are more reasonable and tolerant.

This book is richer in historical content than Lynns, and for that reason alone should be considered a “must read” along with Lynns' book. In addition to history the author describes a broad concern over two Americas emergent, one fundamentalist and one normal. The author takes care to discuss how Bible-based fear and loathing come from the fundamentalists, themselves, not from the Bible.

The author ends the book compassionately and intelligently. I am beginning to see a convergence between the literature on Collective Intelligence, and the literature on non-violent resistance as well as secession from the Union. I see a real possibility of the USA breaking up into at least four pieces (see my review of Joel Garreau's The Nine Nations of North America; Tom Atlee's The Tao of Democracy: Using Co-Intelligence to Create a World That Works for All; and Thomas Naylor's The Vermont Manifesto.

Click Here to Vote on Review at Amazon,

on Cover Above to Buy or Read Other Reviews,

I Respond to Comments Here or There