Tuesday, May 17, 2016

General Stupidity

There seems to be a lot of fretting about the united methodist general conference today. I haven't followed it, and hadn't intended to comment, as life is far too pleasant since having escaped that organization several years ago. I have one friend inside the dragon, and a few acquaintances of one distant level or another. And after some significant amount of puzzlement/despair/frustration/anger on their parts, well, here are my thoughts.
It is mystifying to me that people of good will are still shocked when conservatives act like conservatives. That club that claims to be a church was long ago taken over by operatives of an extreme right-wing crew that had already succeeded in comandeering most of the rest of America's religious clubs. I have become very grateful to Bishop Dick and his lackies for teaching this to me. After all, why should I have wasted any more of my life? There is no such thing as church. There is simply a club that rewards those who play along with the conservatives, and massacres those who don't.  Never having been much of an ass-kisser, I'm better off out.
The leaders of the club pretend to be things they are not. For instance, many of them continue to insist that a "church" is not obliged to worry about what is wrong and what is right. They simply need to plot a course that will allow them to keep their members, and, more importantly, their members' money. Which is interesting, because the ones who keep threatening to leave if they don't get their way are the conservatives. Think Texas republicans' constantly stated desire to secede. They aren't going anywhere. They are just playing games. Now, if there were any such thing as a church, you would think that distinguishing right and wrong and standing with right might be fairly important to it. The methodist church just wants to talk about "making disciples," and address the continual loss of members and money over the last 40 years. 
When you pretend to be a church, and you won't stand for what is right and against what is wrong, you won't draw in new people. You'll just sit around watching the angry old conservative assholes slowly die off.
While your club dies, too.
I've been to enough funerals. 
 

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