Writer of Kirk Cameron’s Monumental Movie Dismisses Mental Illness as Cause of School Shooting, Blames Sin and Educational System

Marshall Foster, president of the World History Institute and co-writer of Kirk Cameron’s documentary on American history, Monumental, issued a press release today dismissing the role of mental illness in the Newtown CT school shooting. Instead, he blamed sin.

School Shooting Caused by Sinful Soul, Not Imbalanced Brain

NEWTOWN, Conn., Dec. 18, 2012 /Christian Newswire/ — “I’m sick and tired of the media’s attempt to make excuses for Adam Lanza’s mass murder at Sandy Hook Elementary School. In the face of all the politically correct mumbo jumbo from pundits and religious leaders alike, it’s time that someone took a stand and told the truth. The culprit is not an imbalance of chemical enzymes in Lanza’s brain; the culprit is Lanza’s sin nature! Man is wicked beyond belief,” declared Dr. Marshall Foster, Christian historian, founder of the World History Institute and author of the introduction to the newly republished 1599 Geneva Bible.

While many conservatives are calling for significant attention to the nation’s mental health system, Foster calls talk of brain imbalances “mumbo jumbo.” Foster also appears to blame the victims for their death because of the educational system.

“Connecticut and the other 49 states have rejected the original vision for education which was to develop the moral character of the students in favor of the fiction that everything is morally gray. That kind of education emboldens mass murderers like Adam Lanza,” said Dr. Foster.

The press release through Christian newswire also includes a link to his new Geneva Bible. Cameron is shown promoting it on the website.

This is an irresponsible and misguided press release in my opinion. While the victims of the shooting are trying to grieve and recover, this would-be Christian leader uses the tragedy to hawk his products. Furthermore, he blames the victims and opines about something he clearly knows nothing about.

David Barton’s bad media day

No TGIF for David Barton last week.

First, the Wall Street Journal published a book review of The Jefferson Lies by Alan Pell Crawford which briefly takes apart the book. Crawford begins by agreeing with Barton that Jefferson’s connection to his slave Sally Hemming’s children has not been established. However, from there on, the review identifies problem after problem with The Jefferson Lies.

Continue reading “David Barton’s bad media day”

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: America a Christian Nation?

Religion writer Ruth Ann Dailey penned a thought provoking op-ed examining the  notion of America as a Christian nation for today’s Post-Gazette. She mentions one of my heroes, Roger Williams, and then refers to my work debunking David Barton’s claims about the Founders.

Roger Williams was not mentioned as much by the Founders as John Locke but Williams preceded Locke in time. I especially like this Williams quote which Dailey worked into her piece:

Their persecution drove the great theologian and linguist Roger Williams to flee the Massachusetts Bay Colony and establish Providence Plantations — now Rhode Island — where, as he envisioned it, “the most paganish, Jewish, Turkish [Muslim] or antichristian consciences and worships” could live together in liberty.

Williams’ story is well worth examining for anyone, but is especially instructive for Baptists of today who seem to have more in common with the Congregationalists of the Colonial period than the Baptists Williams, Leland and Backus of earlier times.

Ron Paul’s death-penalty-for-gays pastor interviews Monumental co-producer

Remember Philip Kayser? He is the Omaha, NE pastor that endorsed Ron Paul in the Iowa GOP primary who teaches that U.S. civil law should reflect the Old Testament book of Leviticus. In December, 2011, I wrote about his views on the death penalty for adulterers, disobedient children, gays, etc., which led to at least two national stories about Kayser’s endorsement. Very soon after those stories appeared, Kayser’s endorsement was pulled from Ron Paul’s website.

In book on the death penalty, Kayser wrote:

Difficulty in implementing Biblical law does not make non-Biblical penology just. But even on Bahnsen’s strictest interpretation of the death penalties, the results would not be as dire as people often predict. For example, while many homosexuals would be executed on Bahnsen’s interpretation, it would not be nearly as many as critics try to imply, because homosexuals would likely keep silent about their lifestyle…

Other Levitical sins (adultery, idolatry, disobedient children, etc.) are addressed in his book, which I examined briefly here.

Rev. Kayser here interviews Marshall Foster, now famous as a guest and co-producer of Kirk Cameron’s movie Monumental, about the biblical foundations of liberty, something that sounds a lot like Cameron’s movie. Cameron is offering material from Foster for sale on the Monumental website.

Marshall Foster Interview from Biblical Blueprints on Vimeo.

Biblical Blueprints is the ministry of Rev. Kayser. In 2011, Marshall Foster was the special guest and keynote speaker of the Providential History Festival, held yearly in Nebraska. The Providential History Festival is underwritten by Kayser’s Dominion Covenant Church and Christian reconstruction groups like the Chalcedon Foundation.

Mr. Foster may not agree with Rev. Kayser on the death penalty (I have seen nothing on that) but he is enough in sync that he appears to support Kayser’s approach to history. Kirk Cameron said at the end of his movie that he wants monumental to be a movement. With Mr. Foster involved, I think it is fair to ask what the movement is about.

Monumental: Shouldn’t a movie about history be historically correct?

Crosswalk published my commentary today on the revisionism of the movie Monumental.

In it, I look at three claims made in the clips released in advance of the movie. Specifically, did Thomas Jefferson and a dozen founders financed the Thompson Hot Press Bible of 1798? Did Congress print the Aitken Bible and recommend it as a “neat edition of the Holy Scriptures for use in schools?” Was the Jefferson Bible just a devotional book and not an extraction of miracles and divinity?

I hope you will go read, tweet and like it.