Posted on 03/14/2008 2:37:19 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
Senator John McCain hailed as a spiritual adviser an Ohio megachurch pastor who has called upon Christians to wage a "war" against the "false religion" of Islam with the aim of destroying it.
On February 26, McCain appeared at a campaign rally in Cincinnati with the Reverend Rod Parsley of the World Harvest Church of Columbus, a supersize Pentecostal institution that features a 5,200-seat sanctuary, a television studio (where Parsley tapes a weekly show), and a 122,000-square-foot Ministry Activity Center. That day, a week before the Ohio primary, Parsley praised the Republican presidential front-runner as a "strong, true, consistent conservative." The endorsement was important for McCain, who at the time was trying to put an end to the lingering challenge from former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, a favorite among Christian evangelicals. A politically influential figure in Ohio, Parsley could also play a key role in McCain's effort to win this bellwether state in the general election. McCain, with Parsley by his side at the Cincinnati rally, called the evangelical minister a "spiritual guide."
The leader of a 12,000-member congregation, Parsley has written several books outlining his fundamentalist religious outlook, including the 2005 Silent No More. In this work, Parsley decries the "spiritual desperation" of the United States, and he blasts away at the usual suspects: activist judges, civil libertarians who advocate the separation of church and state, the homosexual "culture" ("homosexuals are anything but happy and carefree"), the "abortion industry," and the crass and profane entertainment industry. And Parsley targets another profound threat to the United States: the religion of Islam.
In a chapter titled "Islam: The Deception of Allah," Parsley warns there is a "war between Islam and Christian civilization." He continues:
I cannot tell you how important it is that we understand the true nature of Islam, that we see it for what it really is. In fact, I will tell you this: I do not believe our country can truly fulfill its divine purpose until we understand our historical conflict with Islam. I know that this statement sounds extreme, but I do not shrink from its implications. The fact is that America was founded, in part, with the intention of seeing this false religion destroyed, and I believe September 11, 2001, was a generational call to arms that we can no longer ignore.
Parsley is not shy about his desire to obliterate Islam. In Silent No More, he notes—approvingly—that Christopher Columbus shared the same goal: "It was to defeat Islam, among other dreams, that Christopher Columbus sailed to the New World in 1492…Columbus dreamed of defeating the armies of Islam with the armies of Europe made mighty by the wealth of the New World. It was this dream that, in part, began America." He urges his readers to realize that a confrontation between Christianity and Islam is unavoidable: "We find now we have no choice. The time has come." And he has bad news: "We may already be losing the battle. As I scan the world, I find that Islam is responsible for more pain, more bloodshed, and more devastation than nearly any other force on earth at this moment."
Parsley claims that Islam is an "anti-Christ religion" predicated on "deception." The Muslim prophet Muhammad, he writes, "received revelations from demons and not from the true God." And he emphasizes this point: "Allah was a demon spirit." Parsley does not differentiate between violent Islamic extremists and other followers of the religion:
There are some, of course, who will say that the violence I cite is the exception and not the rule. I beg to differ. I will counter, respectfully, that what some call "extremists" are instead mainstream believers who are drawing from the well at the very heart of Islam.
The spirit of Islam, he maintains, is one of hostility. He asserts that the religion "inspired" the 9/11 attacks. He bemoans the fact that in the years after 9/11, 34,000 Americans "have become Muslim" and that there are "some 1,209 mosques" in America. Islam, he declares, is a "faith that fully intends to conquer the world" through violence. The United States, he insists, "has historically understood herself as a bastion against Islam," but "history is crashing in upon us."
At the end of his chapter on Islam, Parsley asks, "Are we a Christian nation? I say yes."
Rod Parsley, whom McCain has called a “spiritual guide” has in the past:
So far, he sounds right on!
So far so good.
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I like this spiritual guide a lot better than Obama’s pseudo Nation of Islam pastor who says “Destroy AmeriKKKa.”
BTW, did anyone notice who wrote this garbage????
David, “I skipped speech class in school”, Corn. Just like Chrissy Matthews, this guy needs to carry a hankie with him when he speaks to catch all the slobber.
The intent is, of course, to try and paint McCain’s connection to this guy as the equivalent of Obama’s to his “pastor”.
McCain is from Arizona and lives in D.C. or its environs. This guy is in Ohio. It seems rather unlikely that McCain has been a member of the congregation for 20 years. Did this guy marry Mr. & Mrs. McCain? Did he baptize the McCain children? Is he cited in a McCain book? Did McCain donate thousands of dollars to the man’s church?
Didn’t think so.
I really despise the grade school tactic of justifying my guy’s stupidity/venality/dishonesty by whining that his opponent “did it too”. This never worked with my mother or father and I gave up the attempt to shift blame by the time I was about 7 years old.
None of this would upset anyone who doesn’t hate all Republicans already.
Not only that, but this story could overshadow the B Hussein pastor story in the Drive Bys.
Sounds logical.
So maybe voting for McCain will suck a little less.
He’s also gay as a goose and sillier than a salamander.
Since the country knows McCain, and Hussein is a stranger.
He’s right. It is a war. They want to eliminate us and our country welcomes them with open arms, figuratively gives them machetes to cut our heads off and video cameras to film the process.
oh my - how many Kumbayas and We are the Worlds does he have to say in penance?
I’m not supporting an anti Moslem approach, but between an anti American preacher and an anti Moslem one, I have to take libelous hatred of my own country more seriously.
Works for me!
I do.
Okay, you go to motherjones to bring this back... and post it; It must be important. What’s your point? I know you aren’t attempting to deflect right here on FR.
Question:
Did Mc go for decades every Sunday and take his young children?
Does he have two friends wanted by interpol?
Has his friends defrauded by millions the US Gov. on Iraq contracts?
Has a Baathist friend of Saddam sent him money to help buy a lot (while he bought a house), after he broke out of jail in Iraq?
Who are you voting for btw? You’re posting so you have to back someone... I gather it’s not McCain.
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