Tag: Uganda

NYT Investigates Right Wing Christian Fascists and Uganda’s Anti-Human Religious Theocracts

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Christian Fanatics, Christian Fascists, Dominionists, Religious Bigots, Republicans, Right Wing, Uganda

New York Times Investigates Relationship Between American Dominionists and Uganda
Posted by Brian Tashman

Earlier this week, The New York Times posted an excerpt from a new Roger Ross Williams documentary on how the Religious Right in the U.S. is shaping anti-gay activism in African countries like Uganda. The documentary includes interviews with International House of Prayer (IHOP) leaders Lou Engle and Mike Bickle, whom we have followed closely here at Right Wing Watch, along with footage of IHOP missionaries at work in Uganda.

Engle organizes the anti-choice and anti-gay The Call rallies, which regularly feature Republican and Religious Right leaders. In 2010, he brought The Call to Uganda to help promote the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, which would have made homosexuality a capital offense. (He later backpedaled after facing scrutiny.)

IHOP, including many The Call figures, helped to organize Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s 2011 The Response prayer rally, which Bickle emceed.

In the film, Episcopal priest Kapya Kaoma makes a reference to Seven Mountains Dominionism, the belief that fundamentalist Christians have a mandate to take control of the seven major spheres of society: government, business, education, media, arts and entertainment, the family and the church. As Engle explains, there are “seven mountains of influence” that right-wing Christians must “reclaim” in order to win over society.

Engle and Bickle are also key players in the New Apostolic Reformation, a movement of self-appointed prophets and apostles who believe they are spokesmen for God on Earth. Bickle has claimed that gay people are the targets of “flaming missiles” from Satan and has warned that the “gay marriage agenda” is a sign of the End Times as it is “rooted in the depths of Hell.” At one IHOP service, Bickle also claimed that Oprah Winfrey is the harbinger of the Antichrist:

In 2008, Engle held massive rallies to encourage Californians to pass Proposition 8, which banned marriage equality, arguing that legalizing same-sex marriage “will unleash a spirit more demonic than Islam, a spirit of lawlessness and anarchy, and sexual insanity will be unleashed unto the earth.” His rallies have focused on creating a “movement” of ex-gays to stop a Satanic “homosexual tornado” that will “destroy America.” (He specifically targeted Ellen DeGeneres for “conversion.”) In addition, he has warned that the separation of the separation of church and state and gay rights are putting the U.S. on the path to Nazism:

While Engle and Bickle have extended their influence to nations like Uganda in order to export their anti-gay politics, they have continued to increase their clout in America’s Religious Right.

 

Related articles

American Religious Fascists Praise Uganda’s Theocratic Dictatorship

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Religious Kooks, Religious Laws, Religious Lunatics, Religious Nazis, Religious Nuts, Religious Psychos, Religious Racketeers, Religious Right, World Net Daily, World Nut Daily

American Religious Fanatics Praise Uganda for Making Homosexuality Illegal
Bad craziness
Posted by Charles Johnson
The far right freakazoids at World Net Daily are praising Uganda’s fanatical Christian fundamentalist president today for making homosexual behavior illegal and for staging a public show of “repentance.”

And American Christian Taliban leaders are pointing at Uganda as a future model for the United States.

Massachusetts pastor and activist Rev. Scott Lively believes Museveni is a model for other national leaders.

‘The Museveni prayer is a model for all Christian leaders in the world. The leaders of the West have declined in proportion to their degree of rejection of God,’ Lively said.

Lively also believes Uganda will rise as a major African power as America continues to decline. He uses Britain as an example.

‘Britain was at its height as a world power when it honored God as the Ugandan president has just done. America’s greatness has similarly diminished as we have shifted from a Christian to a secular-humanist country. But watch now for Uganda to be blessed by God for their desire to be His,’ Lively said. …

Homosexual activist groups have criticized the government of Uganda and Museveni for passing laws criminalizing homosexual behavior. A current bill before the Ugandan Parliament increases the jail sentences for homosexual acts and includes criminal penalties for those who encourage or promote homosexuality. …

Lively said he didn’t agree with the death penalty provision but supports the nation’s strong stance against homosexual behavior.

For another example: American Family Association spokesman Bryan Fischer is crowing, “It can be done!”

Homosexuality now against the law in Uganda, just as it was for 200 years in the US. It can be done.

Related articles

The Immoral Rush Limbaugh and the Lord’s Resistance Army | Rush Limbaugh Defended Inhumane Christian War Criminals

by The Age of Blasphemy, posted in Buffoons, Right Wing, Right Wing Buffoons, Right Wing Crackpots, Right Wing Crazies, Right Wing Fascists, Right Wing Hatemongers, Right Wing Kooks, Right Wing Nuts, Right Wing Terrorists, Rush Limbaugh, Rush Limbaugh Porcine Sick Ghoul, War Criminal

The Immoral Rush Limbaugh and the Lord’s Resistance Army | Rush Limbaugh Defended Inhumane Christian War Criminals
President Obama, Sandra Fluke, Rush Limbaugh, and the Lord’s Resistance Army
This isn’t breaking news, but in light of Rush Limbaugh’s vicious attacks on Sandra Fluke, I wanted to remind people—including companies that have recently pulled their advertising from his show—that this isn’t the first time that Mr. Limbaugh has engaged in morally reprehensible behavior. It’s good to have a couple of things in one place sometimes, lest we get distracted and forget.

Even more egregious than Limbaugh’s attack on Ms. Fluke, at least in my opinion, was his ignorant, knee-jerk defense of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) last year, apparently due to an overweening desire to smear President Obama at every opportunity. I say this not because I think President Obama needs protection from such a repugnant buffoon, but because of the legions innocent men, women, and especially children who have been brutalized by the LRA (more on them in a minute).

Do you remember this? On October 14, 2011, President Obama announced that he had ordered the deployment of 100 U.S. military advisers to help combat the Lord’s Resistance Army:

“I have authorized a small number of combat-equipped U.S. forces to deploy to central Africa to provide assistance to regional forces that are working toward the removal of Joseph Kony from the battlefield,” Obama said in letter sent Friday to House Speaker John Boehner and Daniel Inouye, the president pro tempore of the Senate. Kony is the head of the Lord’s Resistance Army.

More at CNN…

On the very same day, Limbaugh went off on one of his typically ugly rants, Obama Invades Uganda, Targets Christians (link goes to Limbaugh’s site, full transcript). He characterized them as oppressed freedom- and democracy-loving Christians fighting Muslims in Sudan, then went so far as to imply that President Obama was sending U.S. forces to kill them because they are Christian (which they’re not, at least not in any rational, practical sense—they’re savage thugs, terrorists, war criminals). He also implied that President Obama supported Muslim violence against Coptic Christians in Egypt. Read the transcript for yourself at the link above. There’s audio of the relevant parts at Media Matters if you’d prefer to listen instead (the embed code they use won’t work here).

Now, contrast that with actual factual information about about the LRA:

What is the Lord’s Resistance Army?

The Lord’s Resistance Army, or LRA (PDF), is a violent rebel group led by a self-proclaimed messiah, Joseph Kony. Formed in 1987, the group was first called the Uganda People’s Democratic Christian Army but changed the name to the Lord’s Resistance Army in 1991. The fight between the Ugandan government and the LRA is one of the longest running conflicts in Africa, and the LRA is one of the most brutal forces in the world, known for targeting civilians, perhaps most notably, children it forcibly recruits to fight. Though the LRA originated in northern Uganda, it has since spread to neighboring Congo, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic.

In its early years, the LRA claimed to fight against the Ugandan government to defend the rights of the Acholi, a local ethnic group in northern Uganda. However, the LRA’s extreme brutality against fellow Acholi quickly contradicted those claims. The rebel group is notorious for murder, torture, mutilation, rape, widespread abductions of children and adults, and pillaging. […]

Since 1987 the LRA has abducted tens of thousands of children, forcing them to serve as soldiers, porters, or sex slaves.

Though they are often portrayed as a Christian fundamentalist group bent on establishing a government in Uganda based on the Ten Commandments, religion no longer practically serves as a raison d’être for the LRA; rather it is used selectively to ensure adherence to military discipline and create an environment where commanders are respected and feared. […]

More at the Christian Science Monitor…

Here’s more recent news, from today, about how over the past 30 days the LRA has been going on the attack again, this time in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The U.S. special forces trainers sent to Uganda have these monsters on the run, but they’re still deadly. God only knows how much worse things would be, how many more lives would have been lost, if they hadn’t been sent to assist:

Lord’s Resistance Army: After long silence, the US-tracked rebels attack

Its numbers may have dwindled to just 200 fighters, but the Lord’s Resistance Army continues to kill, terrorize, and displace people by the thousands.

One hundred US special forces trainers are working with the Ugandan military to put an end to the rebel group. And while they may have succeeded in sending the group on the run, the LRA has proven dangerous in its desperation.

The latest attacks have occurred in the last 30 days, with LRA attacks reported in the village of Bagulupa, 35 miles east of Dungu in the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The attacks occurred on Feb. 10 and 24, and appear to have been standard raids for food. One person was killed, and 17 villagers abducted, probably for use as porters or sex slaves, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Most of the villagers of Bagulupa have fled toward the larger town of Dungu, the UNHCR says.

Fatoumata Lejeune-Kaba, the UNHCR’s spokeswoman in Geneva, voiced concern about the recent uptick in violence in the DRC, after a six-month lull in the latter part of 2011. […]

More at the Christian Science Monitor…

This is Joseph Kony, leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA):

Joseph Kony, leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army

Here is some of Joseph Kony’s handiwork:

A former abductee of the Lord’s Resistance Army

This is what Rush Limbaugh has defended. Even a contributor over at Foreign Policy was sufficiently appalled by Limbaugh’s comments to write a short piece.

I want us to have a civil society again, but as long as Americans are willing to not only tolerate—but also to even applaud or desire to emulate—the ignorant, hateful, distorted rhetoric that issues forth from the mouths of people like Rush Limbaugh, the recently deceased Andrew Breitbart, Pamela Geller, Dana Loesch, etc. then I’m afraid there’s little hope for anything approaching the civility that my parents taught me was so important as I was growing up.

By the way, I was going to include a short documentary video about Kony & the LRA from Vimeo, but while I was busy collecting & typing all this someone else posted it on another LGF Page, so I’ll just point you over there to watch it.

One last note: If you’re on Twitter #StopKony is the hashtag to use when tweeting about (or looking for info on) Joseph Kony & the LRA.

ralphieboyre: #211 Slumbering Behemoth Stinks We want maximum info for minimum words. With the main priority being on the shortness of the soundbyte. Preferably a good catch-phrase. The information content then becomes optional. Note: we are a lot more receptive… 3 minutes ago
Related articles