Posted on 09/16/2005 6:45:26 AM PDT by Chi-townChief
A few days after Hurricane Katrina clobbered New Orleans, I was sitting in the lobby of the Algonquin Hotel in New York City with one of my favorite hedonists, the author Tom Robbins, mourning the destruction of the city we both adore and the suffering of thousands of poor folks who lost what little they had to begin with.
Robbins described New Orleans as "the depository of America's soul."
I hadn't heard anyone put it quite that way. It's a lovely, haunting image, and if you've ever met a real New Orleanian, you know exactly what he means.
Robbins wasn't talking about the famous (and, to some, infamous) French Quarter where unfettered decadence and nonstop music keep tourists entertained. He's talking about the folks who live outside the Quarter -- a third of whom eked out an existence below the poverty line even before Katrina struck.
'A deep state of sin'
"They are part and parcel of the soul factor. That music didn't come from those plantation houses, it came from those poor people in those shanty and shotgun houses. There is a spiritual component to the fact that this is happening to America's soul," Robbins, a spiritually eclectic fellow who is the grandson of two Southern Baptist ministers, told me, adding that he was certain sooner or later, "people like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell will say that New Orleans is being punished."
Well, so far, Robertson and Falwell, who were eviscerated four years ago for claiming that the 9/11 terrorist attacks were somehow divine retribution for America's wayward morality, have remained publicly silent on all matters wrathful where Hurricane Katrina is concerned.
Unfortunately, Dr. Wiley Bennett, pastor of Woodland Hills Baptist Church in Tyler, Texas, has not followed their example.
'People took it wrong'
Not long after several thousand evacuees from New Orleans began arriving in Tyler (including two dear friends of mine who moved from Chicago to the Crescent City last year), Bennett spelled out a fire-and-brimstone message on a sign in front of his church: "THE BIG EASY IS THE MODERN DAY SODOM AND GOMORRAH."
It's the kind of thing some people do in the name of Christ that, to borrow a line from Annie Lamott, makes Jesus want to drink gin out of a cat dish.
Sigh.
Even after several evacuees confronted Bennett and asked him to remove the offensive sign, the pastor refused. Earlier this week, after vandals knocked off a few of the letters, Bennett still wouldn't take down his damn(ing) sign.
"Right now it's a crippled sign," Bennett, 74, told me by phone from his church office. "It does not say what it once said, but it is a monument to the fact that the sign was vandalized. The original intent was to point out that the United States of America right now is in a deep state of sin."
Now, it would have been easier -- and arguably more satisfying --to begin yelping at Bennett about how his moral wake-up call was ill-conceived and cruelly timed. I could have chalked him up as nothing more than a redneck fundamentalist who is best ignored.
But I really wanted to know why he would do this. His picture on the church Web site shows that he has a kindly face. He couldn't have meant to hurt people, especially people who had suffered so much, could he?
"What I was trying to do was point out that the wickedness of the city of New Orleans brought a hand of judgment on that city," Bennett said. (He wasn't going to make this easy.) "It was never put up there with the intention of saying there are no good people in the city of New Orleans. That was a misunderstanding. People took it wrong."
He told me about two women -- the evacuees -- who came to see him about removing the sign.
"One of the ladies who came in here is the harshest person I've encountered. She said she had lost everything. Believe me, I can understand the stress and the hurt she was feeling, but on the other hand she would not listen to me," he said.
What was he trying to tell her?
"I'm trying to get as many people to go to heaven as I can," he said. "When I questioned one of them, she said, 'I'm going to heaven because I'm good.' I had to tell her that 'there is not one righteous, no, not one.' But she rejected what I had to say."
Could he blame her?
'Poor people are wicked, also'
I tried to engage Bennett in a discussion of his shoddy theological reasoning (and general insensitivity), but he couldn't see what I was saying, either.
There he was, trying to preach the message of salvation, which he believes happens by grace alone and not by anything we can do ourselves, while rubbing salt in the wounds of the downtrodden. By offering no grace, only blind judgment.
"New Orleans is a wicked city," he repeated. (Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Biloxi, Miss., and Tyler are also "wicked cities" according to Bennett.)
Judgment awaits. Katrina was a warning shot.
OK, but is there something wrong with the Almighty's aim? God missed the French Quarter almost entirely.
The Quarter is built on high ground, Bennett tried to argue.
So high that God couldn't reach it?
Why was the Quarter -- the seat of debauchery, the devil's playground -- spared the full force of the hurricane's havoc while poor people had their lives washed away by the ark-worthy floods?
"Regardless of what you believe, poor people are wicked, also," Bennett said. "The French Quarter is not preserved. It may be easier to rebuild . . . but it is not operating right now and is basically shut down."
Of course on Thursday, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin announced that the Quarter will reopen later this month.
So much for divine retribution.
I prefer Robbins' theological explanation to Bennett's.
"I think this demonstrates whose side God may actually be on," Robbins said. "Maybe all of us who like to eat, drink and make merry should relax."
No why???
Excuse me who do you think you are? Here we go with name calling. This is not FR it is PRE-School. My 4 year has even out grown the name calling stage. Gee wise you could take some lessons from her.
Gee wise you could take some lessons from her.
Sorry Gee whiz.... LOL She is helping mommy tonight
LOL. Whatever.
Why did you want me Banned :(
Great personal page. Those are my thoughts as well.
I agree with you for the most part although I don't completely rule it out.
I'm sorry if you think I'm mean. I'm not at all mean, just not PC. But I thought about your reason for not serving themselves after I said it. I stand corrected.
You know what? We have freedom of speech in this country, and you will not find me saying that this guy shouldn't be able to express his beliefs. The left can say the most outrageous things and it is cheered. Let a Christian express a belief and they want to lynch him. Disgusting.
You know, I just thought of something. Usually FR is a great place to post, full of lively conversation, and fun. People didn't always agree but there wasn't this hate and bad feeling like there has been lately. Could it be people who are here to deliberately hurt FR?
Boy isn't that the truth. OR the Christian gets banned for standing up for their beliefs as well in FR.
That is the way I have seen it since being on here. Some one told me this is such a wonderful place to get on and chat. But since I have been on now and just the past few days, all I have seen is hate from the majority of posters on here.
You have encountered posters, like me, who believe that Pastor Bennett is the one who is expressing judgment. His sign was, IMO, totally inappropriate. He has the right to express his opinion, but he should not take umbrage when people disagree with him, especially those who lost everything they own in a city he compared to Sodom and Gomorrah.
It's not hate for someone to disagree with your point of view. If you think it is, you'd better get a thicker skin, because the news/activism forum is a whole lot rougher than religious topics.
When people are new, it hurts when you think people are angry with you. I have been on FR for almost 2 years. I read on a thread the other day that if you registered after 2000, you would always be a newbie , but anyway, as I was saying, when I first came on, I got flamed right away and I cried. Now I don't get my feelings hurt anymore but when people are new, it hurts but you do toughen up after awhile.
Nah!.. San Francisco is a half way house to HELL...
Oh, I like that one!
I hear ya.
And little babies are the most innocent. The pro choice people believe in abortion right up to time of birth and some stupid study said they don't feel pain until the 4th month (although I believe they feel pain before that) but anyway even if one believes the 4th month, that would mean these monsters believe the baby's pain doesn't matter.
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