House of Eratosthenes

Jack Jenkins is ThinkProgress’ Senior Religion Reporter and has a Master’s of Divinity from Harvard University. Zack Ford is ThinkProgress’ LGBT Editor and an out and proud atheist who has spoken at various secular conferences nationwide. This week, they went to see the new film God’s Not Dead 2 together.

You can read the whole thing at your leisure. The two things that really resonated with me were…

1. The nerd-slap-fight at the beginning, over the pen. They were both supposed to take the “reviewing” assignment seriously enough to take notes, but prepared for this by arriving, somehow, with only one pen between the two of them…the result of which is one liberal blaming the other for hogging the pen. Well that is worth a giggle and a snort. I know it goes over the head of a dedicated liberal, and non-liberals were likely never supposed to see this…but, isn’t that just like ’em? Because of this, the first two paragraphs read like parody of liberal entertainment sites, written by a conservative. Except, I think, they’re serious about it.

2. Continuing on to the very end, what you get out of it is the same as what you get when you take it upon yourself to argue with a liberal, on any given day. Here, I’ll summarize it: “You lost us when you acknowledged the victimhood of, or identified with, someone we don’t think should ever benefit from victimhood.” The difference between that, and the whole review, is just some volume of idle mockery. But that gets right to the heart of it. Trans-genders, gays, atheists, women, blacks, and illegal immigrants can be victims. Along with felons who are actually guilty. Boy Scouts, home-schoolers, business owners, conservatives, Republicans, stay-at-home Moms, whites, straights, men…and Christians, cannot be.

A tempest-in-a-teapot has emerged over whether the film accurately portrays the legal challenges some Christians have encountered as they freely exercise their faith. The producer of the film maintains that the plot is taken from real-life examples, and to bolster this point as listed 25 such cases at the end of the credits. The so-called review links to an effort to debunk some of these, but it amounts to nothing more than any given left-wing “debunking,” it’s far less of a debunking than an exercise in “we can’t [afford to] let anyone else have the last word on anything, ever.”

What I got out of the actual movie they don’t want anyone to take the time to go see, is a point that seems to have gone sailing straight over their heads. And it isn’t complicated: There’s a big difference between a state that is dedicated to non-establishment of an official religion, and a state that is dedicated to establishing non-religion as its religion. In the United States, we have arguably managed to achieve the second of those two things, albeit outside the purview of written legislation, through a chilling effect. Yes, that’s a real legal term, because it’s a real legal concept.

And here begins a fascinating discussion. Someone should make a movie about it. Actually, someone did, but the liberals, thinking they’re responding to & prevailing in this ensuing discussion, could much more fairly & accurately be characterized as refusing to participate in it. Because it acknowledges people could be shorted, slighted, wronged…the foundational premise of any civil-remedy system…while maintaining membership in classes liberals don’t like. And liberals refuse to participate in any contemplation, in a group environment or in solitude, that allows for such a possibility.

Heh — “has a Master’s of Divinity from Harvard University.” Which means he’s never even cracked the cover of the Bible, and wouldn’t recognize Jesus if He turned his venti soy latte into wine right in front of him. Harvard’s Div School has a rep second only to Yale’s as a wretched hive of scum and villany, and I know some folks personally who went to Yale Div. It’s a great school if you want to rationalize being a gay Wiccan transgender Buddhist-Jain-Shaman fusionist who’s “spiritual, not religious.” Bible stuff, not so much.
- Severian | 04/21/2016 @ 06:10
If I can’t remember to bring a pen, can I have a Master’s Degree too?
- mkfreeberg | 04/21/2016 @ 06:23
So long as you can use it to write an essay justifying why the Government should give all Americans free pens at the expense of “the rich,” because that’s what Jesus would do. Also Obamacare.
- Severian | 04/21/2016 @ 06:52
But Jesus could just turn water into pen ink. Or better yet, printer ink, which somehow has become the most expensive liquid on earth. Too bad in this scenario the libs have succeeded in destroying the rich so that everyone’s poor, otherwise we could have sold the printer ink and fed the multitude.
- P_Ang | 04/21/2016 @ 07:59

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Liberals Review “God Is Not Dead 2”Thursday, April 21st, 2016

Liberals Review “God Is Not Dead 2”
Thursday, April 21st, 2016