Digby (who you should be reading anyway) talks about the ‘mainstreaming’ of the religious right into a more mainstream, more politically-palateable entity through the efforts of political consultants to Democrats. And he also gripes that Democrats are kindasorta too stupid to figure it out, calling these consultants ‘missionaries,’ which makes perfect sense.
He links to a fairly well written ‘blog entry by Frederick Clarkson about the ideological shifts occurring in mainstream churches, calling it a ‘war of atttrition.’ They’re basically being influenced by think-tank-ish organizations such as the Institute for Religion and Democracy, to the extent that we just saw a schizm in the Episcopal Church over gay rights.
And, in fact, Clarkson links back to an article by digby, talking about the relationship between think tanks and the intersection of religious and public life. It turns out, in this case, that the American Anglican Council’s vice president is also the president of Discovery Institute, the think tank which first tried to give political legitimacy to the notion of ‘intelligent design.’ So we have the Discovery people being the same people as the Anglican Council people, with giant donations to both coming from the same Episcopalians: Super-rich Howard F. Ahmanson Jr. and his wife Roberta. So essentially, the Episcopalian schizm was engineered to ensure the continued fundraising by millionaires from Southern California.
So the question is: How outrageous is this? Is it something that doesn’t matter?
I recall in the ’80s, I’d complain about the amount of money and thus political power being concentrated in the hands of a few influential churches and religious movements. My concern wasn’t contagious enough, though, and I think that anyone within earshot was more willing to believe I had a gripe with religion itself than with the political danger. But here we are on our slow descent into an Americanized fascism, and I hate to say I told you so, but, well… The Episcopal church just split over the issue of human rights for gays, mostly at the behest of a rich guy and his think tank.
