# How did Christianity get hijacked by bozos? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 21, 2008, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774 "2008-11-21T03:06:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Sinaijon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@Sinaijon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sinaijon)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/41 "2008-11-21T16:04:41Z")
> [@Acid\_Lamp](#): > > Yes it really has. At least in America. It has become an identifier for a specific subset of political and social beliefs, usually of evangelical derivation. No, that’s just your stereo type of them. Applying a label to a HUGE group of people based on your experience with just a few. That makes no more sense than saying being black means being a violent, poor, gang member who doesn’t care about the law and sells drugs, or that being gay means anonymous sex in the park and AIDS, or that being liberal means you are a communist, or that a conservative is racist, etc etc. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/42 "2008-11-21T16:07:37Z")
To answer the OP, it was given to (my view) or developed by human beings. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/43 "2008-11-21T16:17:20Z")
There is a finite number of people. Religions are competing for them. The financial and political wellbeing of the religion is at stake. The religions morph into something different than was intended to compete successfully. The more politically active they become,the less religious they are. ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/44 "2008-11-21T16:20:00Z")
The bozos have always been there just as they have been in every other group. The problem is that many of the intelligent, rational people have left. Religious groups have done an awful job evolving into organizations that can attract modern thinkers and other talented people. How many smart people do you know that study scripture and go to church every week? Does anyone know someone who wants to become a priest? That’s not to say there aren’t any, just that many potential leaders gravitate towards other things. The same thing has happened (to a lesser extent) to the military and the GOP. No matter how you feel about the institutions, it’s a bad thing that they are being radicalized, and that the beneficial aspects and ideas are not there to be appreciated. The other thing is that religious leaders have allowed their values to politicized in a trivial and exploitative way. Just compare Gandhi and MLK Jr., and James Dobson and Jerry Falwell. Far more people can get behind a message of instilling an appreciation for the gravity of a marriage commitment than for preventing gays from getting married. I think many religious people believe both things, but there was little outrage when people were getting divorced by the truck load. Popular religion is focused more on division than communion. As our society becomes more diverse, that kind of divisiveness becomes corrosive. They’ve allowed all of their morals and values to co-opted and commodified by people with questionable agendas. When you do that, all you are gonna have left is the true believers. ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/45 "2008-11-21T16:23:05Z")
> [@Sinaijon](#): > > [http://philanthropy.com/free/articles/v19/i04/04001101.htm](http://philanthropy.com/free/articles/v19/i04/04001101.htm) This book has been thoroughly debunked. > [@Sinaijon](#): > > Other examples of the same behavior abound. Look at the two candidates from the past election. McCain hired women in the highest posts, and payed them more than their male counterparts. Obama hired men for the highest positions and payed them more than their female counterparts. But what do you think their public positions were? Cite? ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/46 "2008-11-21T16:24:15Z")
> [@coffeecat](#): > > So what happened to you guys, or at least to your P.R. department? Politics. It infests every discipline — religion, government, science, the arts, etc. Men want to control other men, and they’ll use whatever they find useful. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/47 "2008-11-21T16:37:39Z")
Christianity has had the same policy toward homosexuality for over two thousand years. The specific attitude toward abortion has not been quite as consistent for all that time, but the church has always opposed abortion. What has changed is that some people realized it is easier to get judges to issue rulings than persuade people to vote for your preferred policies. Christians then thought that since the US is a democracy they should engage with the political process to try to get politicians who agree with them elected in order to change the policies back to ones which agree with their values. Those who oppose them have preferred to call disagreement hate and to call names rather than debate or engage in the political process to achieve compromise. Christianity has not been hijacked, rather Christians have reacted to changed circumstances. ---
**Author:** ![Sinaijon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@Sinaijon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sinaijon)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/48 "2008-11-21T16:48:38Z")
> [@brickbacon](#): > > Cite? > **[Former Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois) - Staff salaries 04/01/2007 -...](https://www.legistorm.com/member/76/Sen_Barack_Obama/37/salary/desc.html)** > > Detailed, up-to-date and accurate congressional contact and biographic data - and much more. and > **[Former Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) - Staff salaries 04/01/2007 - 09/30/2007](https://www.legistorm.com/member/69/Sen_John_McCain/37/salary/desc.html)** > > Detailed, up-to-date and accurate congressional contact and biographic data - and much more. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/49 "2008-11-21T17:15:58Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > … the church has always opposed abortion… [Same cite](http://www.slate.com/id/1005956/)as before - not quite true. > [@](#): > > The Catholic Church itself didn’t insist that life began at conception until 1869. Before that, the Church tolerated abortions through the 40th day of pregnancy. Also stated differently [here.](http://www.religioustolerance.org/abo_hist.htm) Attention to the 5th through 16th centuries please. > [@](#): > > St. Augustine (354-430 CE) reversed centuries of Christian teaching in Western Europe, by returning to the Aristotelian Pagan concept of “delayed ensoulment.” He wrote 7 that a human soul cannot live in an unformed body. Thus, early in pregnancy, an abortion is not murder because no soul is destroyed (or, more accurately, only a vegetable or animal soul is terminated). He wrote extensively on sexual matters, teaching that the original sin of Adam and Eve are passed to each successive generation through the pleasure generated during sexual intercourse. This passed into the church’s canon law. Only abortion of a more fully developed “fetus animatus” (animated fetus) was punished as murder. … > … Pope Innocent III (circa 1161-1216): > > - He wrote a letter which ruled on a case of a Carthusian monk who had arranged for his female lover to obtain an abortion. The Pope decided that the monk was not guilty of homicide if the fetus was not “animated.” > - Early in the 13th century he stated that the soul enters the body of the fetus at the time of “quickening” - when the woman first feels movement of the fetus. After ensoulment, abortion was equated with murder; before that time, it was a less serious sin, because it terminated only potential human life, not human life. > > St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) also considered only the abortion of an “animated” fetus as murder. … Careful with the "always"es. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/50 "2008-11-21T17:30:18Z")
> [@Sinaijon](#): > > [Former Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois) - Staff salaries 04/01/2007 - 09/30/2007](http://www.legistorm.com/member/76/Sen_Barack_Obama/37/salary/desc.html) > and > [Former Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) - Staff salaries 04/01/2007 - 09/30/2007](http://www.legistorm.com/member/69/Sen_John_McCain/37/salary/desc.html) That does not demonstrate what you said. > [@Sinaijon](#): > > Other examples of the same behavior abound. Look at the two candidates from the past election. McCain hired women in the highest posts, and payed them more than their male counterparts. Obama hired men for the highest positions and payed them more than their female counterparts. But what do you think their public positions were? First, you linked to a 5- month period of salaries. Second, you asserted McCain pays his women more than the male counterparts when, in fact, he paid his LD (a woman) $11k less (14%) than Obama paid his COS (a man). Both were the highest paid Congressional employee. Most Chiefs of Staff that I checked made more than McCain’s. Obama also paid his LD $10k+ more than McCain. You also forgot that both Obama and McCain had been on the campaign trail at the pay time period you linked to. That’s why McCain’s previously highest paid staff member, Mark Salter, is not on the congressional payroll. Either way, I don’t think a snap shot of their staff payroll proves anything. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/51 "2008-11-21T17:31:52Z")
(A related story. A friend of mine went to Clown College somewhere in Florida. She reported that it was run by born-again Christians. So the OP has it backwards. Clowning has been taken over my the Christians.) ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/52 "2008-11-21T17:37:07Z")
> [@coffeecat](#): > > “Christian” has come to mean “anti-gay and pro-life.” This is an overstatement; but it’s true, and it makes me very sad, that so many people’s view of Christianity is this, or is something like **Der Trihs** ’s. This is not the Christianity I know, and certainly not the Christ I know. Unfortunately, it’s not the people who are humbly and quietly trying to be like Jesus, and follow him and serve him and live according to his teachings, that get the most attention. (“The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.”) As for how Christianity got “hijacked by bozos,” whole books could be (and have been) written on the subject. One such is Bruce Bawer’s [Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity](http://www.amazon.com/Stealing-Jesus-Fundamentalism-Betrays-Christianity/dp/0609802224/ref=cm_cr_pr_pb_t). Though I can’t recommend it unreservedly, for reasons that some of the Amazon reviewer’s touch on, it makes some good points. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/53 "2008-11-21T17:39:38Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > “Hijacked”? Probably a poor choice of terminology. It is _Islam_ that has been hijacked. And naturally, nobody has any problem at all condemning Islam as a whole on the basis of its attention-seeking screwballs. Christianity, for the record, has been “shanghaied.” ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/54 "2008-11-21T17:48:00Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > Probably a poor choice of terminology. It is _Islam_ that has been hijacked. And naturally, nobody has any problem at all condemning Islam as a whole on the basis of its attention-seeking screwballs. > > Christianity, for the record, has been “shanghaied.” Christianity took three centuries to become a warring religion. Islam became that with its founder. ---
**Author:** ![Caveat\_lector\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@Caveat\_lector\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caveat_lector_1)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/55 "2008-11-21T17:54:23Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > [Same cite](http://www.slate.com/id/1005956/)as before - not quite true.Also stated differently [here.](http://www.religioustolerance.org/abo_hist.htm) Attention to the 5th through 16th centuries please.Careful with the "always"es. 🙂 As much as I love them neither St. Augustine nor St. Thomas can be cited as absolute evidence of what the Catholic Church believed or believes. They can lend weight, but they had no absolute authority. The pope is a little better, but please keep in mind that the mammalian ovum was not even discovered until [1826](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Ernst_von_Baer) and points to a somewhat lacking understanding of human development pre-birth. The Church has always opposed abortion, but a better understanding of the development of human life has allowed her to refine her position as time has moved on. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/56 "2008-11-21T17:57:43Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I think it started when the Catholic Church substituted banana cream pie for the communion wafer. Women used to have to wear a head covering to Mass; now it’s red foam noses the ushers distribute at the door. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/57 "2008-11-21T17:59:14Z")
> [@coffeecat](#): > > “Christian” has come to mean “anti-gay and pro-life.” Now homosexual acts, like building a skyscraper or not screwing your late brother’s wife, may be disparaged here and there in the Christian Bible, but I’d hardly call any of these a major theme of the book. All major religions have a certain % of “Bozos”. The Moslem faith IMHO has even a higher % of extremists that the Christian faith, but even Judaism has it share of out there wierd extremists. As for tolerence of Homosexuality, Islam is by far the least tolerant: [http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom\_isla.htm](http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom_isla.htm) _According to the International Lesbian and Gay Association ILGA there are at least seven countries today which still retain capital punishment for homosexuality: Afghanistan, Iran, Mauritania, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Yemen. The situation with regard to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is unclear._ Most mainstream large religions are not very tolerant of Homosexuality or Abortion. In Hinduism Gay tolerance and acceptance varies widely, as you’d expect with that form of Faith. It seems like Buddhism is about the most tolerant, but we can also debate whether Buddhism is a religion or a Philosphy. But even so [http://kenyangay.blogspot.com/2007/06/does-buddhism-accept-homosexuality.html](http://kenyangay.blogspot.com/2007/06/does-buddhism-accept-homosexuality.html) "\*Dennis Conkin, a retired newspaper reporter is one who holds an opposing view on the same and he writes in his 1997 article “Dalai Lama Urges ‘Respect, Compassion, and Full Human Rights for All,’ Including Gays”: “Buddhist sexual proscriptions ban homosexual activity and heterosexual sex through orifices other than the vagina, including masturbation or other sexual activity with the hand…From a Buddhist point of view, lesbian and gay sex is generally considered sexual misconduct.”\* Moderate-Liberal Christianity is actually quite tolerant of Homosexuality, even having Gay Ministers. So, the OP’s premise is based upon bias and ignorance. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/58 "2008-11-21T18:35:26Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > I’m mildly curious. If the above is true (that the Religous Bloc of the voting public are all Republican), why does the _other_ political party candidates continue to express their spirituality in a public manner? > > (Both Obama and Biden both express holding religious beliefs this campaign year.) > > I think they did it _not_ because they were trying to appeal to the opposing voter bloc, but because the _majority_ of the voting bloc is religious, and feels that they’re beliefs have some positive value. No. It’s because religiosity, specifically Christian religiosity, has become a litmus test by which all candidates are judged. Color me as one of those unhappy that the Democrats have fallen into the trap of trying to out-religious the Republicans ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/59 "2008-11-21T18:37:11Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > You’re a reporter whose job is to bring in a story that’s **news** , every day if possible. This weekm you’ve got the religion beat. Now, looking for that story, do you go hang out around Fred Rogers or Fred Phelps? I was thinking Fred Phelps or Bishop Spong - but this was better. Threads like this give atheism a bad name. We’ve got the LDS over here, encouraging its members to donate money to take away the rights of gays, and the Episcopalians over there, risking their very church on supporting those rights. This is the moral equivalent of **Bricker** not voting for Obama based on the actions of nutjobs who might claim to support him. Let’s accept or not accept Christianity or any other religion on evidence and logic, not on who claims to be for it. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774/60 "2008-11-21T18:57:46Z")
> [@Sinaijon](#): > > I’m sure it’s useless to bother explaining this, but this isn’t true at all. Most of the difference in values between the two parties aren’t as stark as you’d like to think. Republicans favor charity, social work and responsibility just as much as the Democratic party does, it’s just that they feel it should be done at a personal level, not forced by the government. It’s kinda like the whole Free Will thing. I would say you’re conveniently forgetting to include all the social restrictions that are solely promoted by the Religious Right and their surrogates in the Republican party, within all levels of the local, state, and national governmental apparatus. It’s a false assertion that the Republican party of today, currently controlled in large measure by a social conservative element, wants government out of our lives, and smaller. If you take away their penchant and love for deregulation, everything remaining screams out that they want to be in as much of everyone’s personal lives as humanly possible. If Republicans loved free will so much homosexuals would be able to get married everywhere, women would have complete control over their biology, non-Christians wouldn’t be constantly compared to and treated as evil incarnate, our immigration policy wouldn’t have a decidedly racist scent to it, and we wouldn’t start ridiculous and illegal wars to take what’s not ours and attempt to justify the killing of people who didn’t do a damned thing to us. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-christianity-get-hijacked-by-bozos/473774.md?page=4)