Evangelical Christianity is now, literally, an existential threat to America

Religion poisons everything, warned atheist Christopher Hitchens convincingly, but whose analytical failing was in conflating theology with ontology. That is to say, to the best of my knowledge Hitch never disentangled his denunciation of man-made religious doctrines from his devout denial of some other-dimensional, higher existence; to him, revealing doctrinal absurdities was the same as disproving a supreme beingness. Thus as a construct of argumentation, Hitch's approach to preaching atheism contained a philosophical black hole.

Nonetheless, his axiom of "religion poisons everything" has received a noteworthy boost of late. I've seen videos of evangelical pastors informing their congregant petrie dishes of natural selection that God will protect them from covid-19 — incontestable proof that religion, as an agent of the pandemic, can poison even one's soft tissue. And then there's this, from WaPo:

"More than 550 parishioners packed Sunday service at the Life Tabernacle Church in the Louisiana town of Central. Megachurches in Ohio and Florida also reported their halls teeming with congregants. In Virginia, Liberty University last week welcomed back from spring break some 1,900 of students to its Lynchburg campus."

These defiantly oblivious Trumpian schmucks are, without a doubt, American society's greatest threats of today. Covid-19 is "not a concern" to us, says the Tabernacle Church's "pastor" as he sends forth his flock of more than 500 potentially contagious fatalities. "The virus, we believe, is politically motivated," he added dumbfoundingly, in that this virus, if politically motivated, can't kill? Then again, who the hell could know what this moron is thinking, except this: "We hold our religious rights dear, and we are going to assemble no matter what someone says" — omitting that those someones are epidemiologists and infectious disease experts, who are motivated less by their perfectly logical disdain of Trump than by their professional interest in saving lives.

And let us not depart without hearing from this nation's most invidious of all theocratic charlatans, Liberty University's president, Jerry Falwell Jr., who also propagates covid-19 as a plot to destroy that most invidious of all political charlatans. "I think we have a responsibility to our students — who paid to be here, who want to be here, who love it here — to give them the ability to be with their friends …" etc., etc., madness atop imbecility. Who could have known that Falwell's responsibility to his students would by yesterday result in a dozen of them being "sick with symptoms that suggested covid-19"?

Which brings us back to Hitchens. On at least a secular level, perhaps his entanglement of theology and ontology — religious doctrines and human existence — was not, after all, far off the mark.

Comments

[Anne J]

Evangelical Christianity has been an existential threat for forty years. Anyone with the ability to think long term could have seen the danger in courting the religious fanatic vote, in that eventually they were going to want something in return for their vote. Something that might suit their narrow needs but would be dangerous to just about everyone else. So it's no wonder that they were courted by the party that doesn't do long term planning.

[Peter G]

That first paragraph could have been written by a Jesuit priest. In fact it was, verbally, made to me. Man those guys could make you think.

[John H. Haas]

If we're going to make a sociological case--rather than simply asserting an alternative statement of faith ("religion poisons everything")--then we need to do a little more work at the empirical level. The argument above isn't completely without merit, but its reach excedes its grasp: It's a little like making a few references to Spring Breakers insisting they're going to fight for their right to party, and then concluding that "young adults are literally an existential threat to America."

[Peter G]

Interestingly enough, social distancing would have been extremely useful and easier to accomplish in rural areas. That would be a good thing since the hospital facilities to deal with severe cases simply do not exist. Well they found a fix for that, religion. It doesn't have to leap from farm to farm. Now it can go to church first.

[David Duff]

Sensible comment - a rarity on this site!

[Halster]

I think this post was a little more nuanced than you perceived. Hitchens was actually taken to task in the first paragraph. Crazy evangelicals don't represent all religious persons any more than spring breakers and covid partying kids represent all young adults. These subsets, however, are literally existential threats to America.

[Peter G]

I wonder what other religious denominations or sub genres of such are completely ignoring sane rules of social distancing? And who are demographically and geographically likely to carry this to populations otherwise less likely to be swarmed by cases?

[Peter G]

They sure are going to wish they had signed up for Obamacare. Sadly for them Trump has declined to reopen enrollment.

[Freesia]

Why did he decline? What was the rationale?

[Anne J]

Consider the source? How could you possibly expect anything else from him? Even now, the cruelty is the point.

[Jason]

It’s a good time to be a Buddhist,

Dammit I wish I was a Buddhist!

[Peter G]

I assume because it would help.

[Freesia]

Yes. What was I thinking? Even if the troll strung together a fairly coherent implausible explanation,that somebody else wrote, through his slipping dentures and the fog of his secret medications and sociopath motivations, would it matter? Sometimes I have this lapse where I think
I still live in a time when adults and sane people held the office of President of the United States of America and I try to figure out their reasoning. Cruel freak is squatting there now and I forget.

[Freesia]

:-)