The Real Sins of Sodom and Gomorrah - An Indictment of the Far Right

This blog often looks at what I deem to be hypocrites and hypocrisy.  It's something that makes it impossible to not talk about the Republican Party, the Christofascists and those who strut about with religion on their sleeves.  Especially those who incessantly condemn gays by grasping a few selective Bible passages and then twisting them to condemn others.  A piece in Formerly Fundie looks at the hypocrisy of too many Americans and points out that the tale of Sodom and Gomorrah really applies to them, not necessarily gays.  The author is kinder than I am because he fails to specifically target the far right Republicans and the Christofascists/Tea Party.   But what he describes is them, plain and simple.  Here are highlights from the post that is dead on target:

On election day in 2012, I received an e-mail from someone who had been my friend for 16 years. He had been growing dismayed with the changes I went through during my 4 years at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, especially my new-found passion for biblical social justice, my advocacy for the poor, and my defense of immigrants. Having spent years wrestling with scripture at seminary and working that out within the context of a community of believers, I broke with conservative politics for the first time in my life, and voted to re-elect Barack Obama. This, clearly, was the last straw in what I thought was a life-long friendship.

His reference of “sins so grave”, was the sin of “sodomy”, which he claims Obama is guilty of (via his support of Gay Marriage). This caused me to realize that in American Christianity, we have completely lost sight of the biblical sin of sodomy– which in the Bible, had a completely different meaning than what it does now.

[T]he most direct reference regarding the sin of Sodom in the Bible,  is what helps us no longer view this story as being about someone else:

Ezekiel 16

⁴⁹ “‘Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. ⁵⁰ They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.”

Here we have it…

Sodom was arrogant.

Sodom was overfed.

Sodom was unconcerned for the poor and needy.

Sodom was disdainfully proud (haughty).

Am I saying that the sins of Sodom are absent sexual immorality? Certainly not. Please don’t misread this post. The point of this article is that too often, we find a story of sin and judgment and find a way to make it about them when really it includes us.

The story of Sodom, includes us. Their sins are our sins.

We are arrogant and haughty.

We don’t like the word arrogant, so instead we use a term called “American Exceptionalism” to express how different and special we are. ² During the Presidential Elections, I was disgusted by the nationalistic arrogance expressed by both candidates. I cringed as I heard President Obama say that “America is the greatest country on earth”, and wanted to yell “heretic” when I heard Romney say that America was “the hope of the earth.” ³

As a world traveler, I learned early on that Americans are perceived as “rich, loud, and proud” by the rest of the world, and this is not an unwarranted stereotype.

We are overfed.

While 870 million people go hungry in the world and early 5 million children die every year due to malnutrition, America throws nearly half our food in the trash.

We have more food than we know what to do with, so we toss it away at a rate of 400lbs per person, per year.

We live in the country of “bigger and better” while 1 of 4 children in the world is stunted due to lack of healthy food.

We are unconcerned for the poor and needy.

This isn’t to say that we’re not concerned at all; I know a lot of Americans who do great things for the poor and needy among us and around the world.

However, as a culture, we are not nearly as concerned as we should be and far too many of us are concerned only for ourselves. Just look at the cultural shift which has occurred in our nation in the past few years with the birth of the Tea Party– a party who’s basic platform is: “leave me alone and get your damn hands off my money”. As Americans, we want what is ours. We are intoxicated with protecting our money and our “rights.” While the rest of the world is living on dollars a day, eating two bowls of rice and having to drink water tainted with human feces, we’re concerned with making sure that our pizza arrives hot enough, that we get a great parking spot at the mall, and advocating to ensure we don’t have to wait for a background check before we buy our assault weapons.

We fight against ensuring the poorest among us have access to healthcare, so that we can keep more of what’s “ours”.

As I write this, the US House of Representatives is pending a vote to cut $20 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which would put nearly 2 million people off a program designed to help them out of poverty. Meanwhile, we have no problem with runaway military budgets, over-the-top executive salaries, unscrupulous lending practices, and tax reductions which tend to benefit the wealthy.

We might not all be unconcerned, but a good portion of American culture is unconcerned– just like Sodom.

It's no coincidence that the cult of American exceptionalism, obesity and poverty combined with a lack of social programs/safety nets tend to be the worse in the Bible Belt.

 

On election day in 2012, I received an e-mail from someone who had been my friend for 16 years. He had been growing dismayed with the changes I went through during my 4 years at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, especially my new-found passion for biblical social justice, my advocacy for the poor, and my defense of immigrants. Having spent years wrestling with scripture at seminary and working that out within the context of a community of believers, I broke with conservative politics for the first time in my life, and voted to re-elect Barack Obama. This, clearly, was the last straw in what I thought was a life-long friendship. - See more at: http://www.formerlyfundie.com/sodom-gomorrah-a-story-about-us-and-not-for-the-reasons-you-think/#sthash.llhDOYlL.G6xSp2iq.dpuf

On election day in 2012, I received an e-mail from someone who had been my friend for 16 years. He had been growing dismayed with the changes I went through during my 4 years at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, especially my new-found passion for biblical social justice, my advocacy for the poor, and my defense of immigrants. Having spent years wrestling with scripture at seminary and working that out within the context of a community of believers, I broke with conservative politics for the first time in my life, and voted to re-elect Barack Obama. This, clearly, was the last straw in what I thought was a life-long friendship. - See more at: http://www.formerlyfundie.com/sodom-gomorrah-a-story-about-us-and-not-for-the-reasons-you-think/#sthash.llhDOYlL.G6xSp2iq.dpuf