american family association – Page 5

Oh, so that’s why Bryan Fischer says the darndest things!

Newsweek has it all figured out. The American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer has been getting in touch with his inner imp. Zany? Wacky? Outrageous? Nah, it is all a ploy to get ratings and irritate the opponents. According to Newsweek:

You might think that attention in the form of mockery is not what a public-policy organization would want. But when your business is waging a culture war, there is no such thing as bad publicity for ideological or rhetorical extremism. Being criticized by liberals in the media raises the profile of a socially conservative organization, and burnishes its credibility among the base. Just ask Sarah Palin, or her fans. Fischer’s critics also benefit from the twofer of his being both entertaining and threatening.

Call it “hatertainment.”

But he doesn’t really mean it, does he? Here is Newsweek’s take on that question.

Getting attention from a perch so far off the mainstream media radar screen requires ingenuity. And Fischer is able to shock even jaded journalists and pundits. But does he really believe his most widely circulated statements? Yes and no. A Dec. 21 blog post earned Jon Stewart’s mockery on The Daily Show when Fischer asserted, “President Obama wants to give the entire land mass of the United States of America back to the Indians. He wants Indian tribes to be our new overlords.” All Obama had done is express approval for the nonbinding U.N. Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples which contains one passage affirming land rights. Does Fischer honestly believe that Obama is going to turn your home over to a Native American tribe? Not really, but by pretending he does—which he defends as “taking Obama at his word,”—he gets to make a ludicrous claim. “Either Obama meant what he said or he’s a bald-faced liar,” says Fischer. “I don’t think Obama meant what he said.”

Clever. Since Fischer is just pretending, let’s try that in reverse.

When Fischer says things, either he means what he says or he’s a bald-faced liar. You pick.

Maybe President Obama could be a talk show host on the AFA radio network. According to Fischer, the President has got the formula down.

According to Newsweek and Newsweek’s experts, the whole shtick is more business than conviction.

“Like all Christian political groups [AFA] has leaders who are entrepreneurial,” says Green. “In the past [Christian conservatives] have sometimes been controversial on purpose, to get attention from the rest of us and to raise money for their organizations. It’s not that they are insincere, but there are organizational motives.” So if Fischer shocks or horrifies coastal media elites by expressing views that they consider bigoted or simply baffling, he is just doing his job.

So if there are “organizational motives,” then saying goofy, offensive stuff you don’t really mean is not insincere but just part of the biz. Glad that’s all cleared up.

After reading the Newsweek piece, I am not sure which more offensive – what Fischer does with his platform or Newsweek’s cynical regard for what they portray as business as usual for Christian ministry.

Bryan Fischer too far right for the AFA?

I wondered if this might happen. The AFA now issues a disclaimer that Bryan Fischer’s views are his and not theirs.

This information comes via Right Wing Watch:

And now Fischer’s blog posts on the AFA website, like this new one calling the Cordoba House the “Timothy McVeigh Mosque at Ground Zero,” are carrying this disclaimer:

Unless otherwise noted, the opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views of the American Family Association or American Family Radio.

Last year, the AFA lured Fischer away from the Idaho Values Alliance, named him director of Issue Analysis for Government and Public Policy and gave him a two hour daily program on its radio network … but now wants to claim that he in no way represents the views of the organization?

Please.

But it is quite remarkable that Fischer has become so radical that his own employer is now distancing itself from him.

Remarkable indeed.

Another group wants to recriminalize homosexuality

US groups calling for criminalization of homosexuality did not help write the Anti-Homosexuality Bill in Uganda, but they may help provide cover for it to become law.

Add another to the group: The Michigan branch of the American Family Association. According to the Michigan Messenger:

Gary Glenn, president of the American Family Association of Michigan, has added his voice to a growing course of American leaders calling for the re-criminalization of homosexuality in the U.S.

In an e-mail to Michigan Messenger, here’s how Glenn responded when asked if he supported the criminalization move proposed by the Family Research Council’s Peter Sprigg’s comments last week on Hardball:

“The short answer to your question is yes, we believe that states should be free to regulate and prohibit behavior that’s a violation of community standards and a proven threat to public health and safety — including, as most of the United States did throughout its history, homosexual behavior.”

I suspect we may see more of these declarations in the coming days in a sad attempt to support the Ugandan bill.

AFA radio host: Legal sanctions for homosexual behavior are biblical

In a column on the American Family Association website, Bryan Fischer, host of the AFA broadcast Focal Point said the New Testament teaches that the state should criminalize homosexual behavior.

He bases this on a spurious reading of I Timothy chapter 1, saying:

I received a complaint from a listener to my “Focal Point” radio program, complaining that I had suggested that it is appropriate to impose legal sanctions on those who engage in homosexual behavior. Here is my response. The individual’s name was not attached to the email, so I wasn’t able to address him by name.

Hi!Thanks for writing me about my comments on my program regarding homosexuality.It might be worth noting that what I actually suggested is that we impose the same sanctions on those who engage in homosexual behavior as we do on those who engage in intravenous drug abuse, since both pose the same kind of risk of contracting HIV/AIDS. I’d be curious to know what you think should be done with IV drug abusers, because whatever it is, I think the same response should be made to those who engage in homosexual behavior.If you believe that what drug abusers need is to go into an effective detox program, then we should likewise put active homosexuals through an effective reparative therapy program.Secondly, I’m afraid you’re simply wrong about the Bible’s perspective on the law and homosexuality.

Paul lists quite explicitly in 1 Timothy 1:8-11 the actions and behaviors that are the proper concern of the law:

“Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine…”

The bottom line here is that, biblically, those “who practice homosexuality” should come under the purview of the law just as much as those who take people captive in order to sell them into slavery.

You express a belief in the Scriptures, and I trust your confidence in Scripture is not selective. If you believe all Scripture is inspired, then you are compelled to accept that legal sanctions may appropriately be applied to those who engage in homosexual behavior.

Thank you for contacting us, and I hope this response will help you think in a thorough and biblical way about this important social issue.

Bryan Fischer, Host, “Focal Point” radio program on AFR Talk, a division of the American Family Association

© Bryan Fischer

I wonder what punishments Mr. Fischer would impose on the “unholy and profane?” How about liars? And the quite broad category of folks: Sinners?

One contributor to the mischief is Mr. Fischer’s misreading of the word law in I Timothy. Paul is writing Timothy to warn him about false teachers who want the Mosaic law applied to the followers of Jesus. Elsewhere Paul taught that the law was a “schoolmaster” which demonstrated the need for the good news of the gospel of redemption by belief in Christ. Mr. Fischer needs to spend some quality time reading Galatians chapters 1-4.

Paul is giving Timothy religious instructions and not saying that the civil law is given to prosecute various actions at odds with Christian teaching. Paul demonstrates that spiritual salvation is view, not civil punishment, when he writes later in I Timothy 1:

¹² though I was before a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious: howbeit I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief;

¹³ and the grace of our Lord abounded exceedingly with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus.

¹⁴ Faithful is the saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief:

¹⁵ howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me as chief might Jesus Christ show forth all his longsuffering, for an ensample of them that should thereafter believe on him unto eternal life.

16 I thank him that enabled me, even Christ Jesus our Lord, for that he counted me faithful, appointing me to his service;

Fischer apparently believes this passage somehow justifies civil penalties for homosexuality. Not at all. In fact, if anything, it argues that the proper role of the church is to proclaim redemption, rather than lobby for new laws against private conduct.