September 30, 2011 | 10:09 am

U.S.-born Al Qaeda leader killed by drone strike

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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Anwar al-Awlaki, the U.S. born Al Qaeda brass who inspired the Fort Hood shootings, was killed today by a drone strike in Yemen. The New York Times reports:

Yemen’s official news agency, Saba, reported that the attack also killed Samir Khan, an American citizen of Pakistani origin and the editor of Inspire, Al Qaeda’s English-language Internet magazine. Mr. Khan proclaimed in the magazine last year that he was “proud to be a traitor to America.”

The missile strike appeared to be the first time in the United States-led war on terrorism since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that an American citizen had been deliberately targeted and killed by American forces. It was also the second high-profile killing of an Al Qaeda leader in the past five months under the Obama administration, which ordered the American commando raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan last May.

Al-Awlaki had been on a U.S. capture or kill list since at least spring 2010. That resulted in a lawsuit on Al-Awlaki’s behalf alleging that being placed on the hit list violated U.S. and international law. Though the lawsuit was dismissed last year, the assassination still raises a significant legal question.

Salon’s Glenn Greenwald argues that the assassination is an attack on the due process the Constitution affords U.S. citizens—even one who had incited attacks against the United States. Conversely, law professor Kenneth Anderson, writing at the Volokh Conspiracy, said:

The government has maintained throughout all this that Al-Aulaqi was deemed a lawful target not on account of his expression of opinions, including calls to violence against the United States and its citizens, but instead on account of his operational involvement in AQAP, in ways going to leadership of an associated force terrorist organization and operational and planning involvement.  My view of this targeted killing is straightforwardly, congratulations, Mr. President.  What has been visible publicly leaves little or no doubt in my mind that Al-Aulaqi was deeply involved in AQAP in operations, and indeed at the highest levels.

September 29, 2011 | 11:11 pm

The Machine Gun Preacher’s holy war

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I caught the real Machine Gun Preacher on CNN while I was sitting in the airport today. True story. Fascinating story. Check out the trailer above for the Hollywood film, in theaters now, based on Sam Childers’ life. USA Today calls it an “unholy mess.”

As for the real Childers, the Los Angeles Times had this story:

Childers’ story is nothing if not cinematic. Act 1: He spends his youth running drugs, riding Harleys, packing heat and doing time. Act 2: In his 30s, he suddenly finds God, builds his own church and starts preaching himself. Act 3: On a mission trip to southern Sudan, he sees a child’s body torn apart by a land mine. The searing experience inspires him to build an orphanage there — and to take up arms himself against the Lord’s Resistance Army, a Uganda-based militia group notorious for mutilating, killing and conscripting children into its cult-like ranks.

The prime challenge of the film, a flawed hero’s tale, is to capture Childers’ duality — is he a man of God, a vigilante or both? — while straddling the line between real emotion and schmaltz. It’s a tough balance to strike, especially considering how the subject matter makes grown men cry when they get to talking about it.

Read the rest here.

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September 28, 2011 | 12:09 pm

Bodybuilding worship

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I enjoy weightlifting and, yes, your body is a temple (though that’s a more a metaphysical thing) but this takes the Lord’s Gym concept to another level.

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September 27, 2011 | 1:11 pm

Shana tova, they shucklin’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Aish HaTorah has this play on LMFAO for Rosh Hashanah. The blond, break-dancing Jew stole my moves.

Thanks for the tip, Aron. Shana tova!

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September 27, 2011 | 12:18 pm

Why more evangelical Christians are having premarital sex

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Here is a surprising lede from Relevant magazine:

Eighty percent of young, unmarried Christians have had sex. Two-thirds have been sexually active in the last year. Even though, according to a recent Gallup poll, 76 percent of evangelicals believe sex outside of marriage is wrong.

I’m not sure what I find more surprising: that so many evangelicals have had premarital sex or that only 76 percent believe its immoral. Probably the latter.

The entire Relevant article is worth reading here.

In following up on this article, both CNN and the Belief Beat blog tease out a theory about why more evangelical Christians are having sex before marriage. Nicole Neroulias writes:

the Bible and traditional social mores come from a time when puberty and marriage were synonymous, if not even reversed. So “waiting until marriage” was kind of a no-brainer. But now, the average Americans don’t wed until they are over 25. That’s another decade or more of polishing those purity rings — twice their lifetimes, at that point, and during the years when hormones and peer pressure are at their most insistent.

That is, no doubt, an important point. The longer one has to wait, the more difficult it is. It’s the reason that one of my college church friends used to say that if a guy at church was single, not married and not unusually weird, then he also wasn’t a virgin.

The question is what are the implications for churches and the U.S. Christian community? How should they respond?

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September 27, 2011 | 11:52 am

One hundred years later: Remembering ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Speaking of the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” and other anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, Richard Landes and Steven Katz have edited “The Paranoid Apocalypse: A Hundred-Year Retrospective on The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” Here’s the publisher’s description of what I expect to be a fascinating book:

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, first published in Russia around 1905, claimed to be the captured secret protocols from the first Zionist Congress in Basel in 1897 describing a plan by the Jewish people to achieve global domination. While the document has been proven to be fake, much of it plagiarized from satirical anti-Semitic texts, it had a major impact throughout Europe during the first half of the 20th century, particularly in Germany. After World War II, the text was further denounced. Anyone who referred to it as a genuine document was seen as an ignorant hate-monger.

Yet there is abundant evidence that The Protocols is resurfacing in many places. The Paranoid Apocalypse re-examines the text’s popularity, investigating why it has persisted, as well as larger questions about the success of conspiracy theories even in the face of claims that they are blatantly counterfactual and irrational. It considers the medieval pre-history of The Protocols, the conditions of its success in the era of early twentieth-century secular modernity, and its post-Holocaust avatars, from the Muslim world to Walmart and Left-wing anti-American radicalism. Contributors argue that the key to The Protocols’ longevity is an apocalyptic paranoia that lays the groundwork not only for the myth’s popularity, but for its implementation as a vehicle for genocide and other brutal acts.

(Hat tip: Religion Clause)

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September 26, 2011 | 10:53 pm

Rob Bell moving to Los Angeles

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

As mentioned last week, Rob Bell has decided to leave the Mars Hill megachurch that he founded in search of a bigger pulpit. And where better to broadcast out to the world than the entertainment capital of the world?

That’s right. Like many Midwestern men before him, Bell is moving to Hollywood to reach a broader audience. The story from WZZM:

He and his family will move to California in the coming months, where he will work on a variety of projects, which Bell said he could not yet elaborate on. Bell says he will continue to write books and speak on national and international tours, but he will not be starting a new church.

Bell addressed “the elephant in the room” referring to the future of Mars Hill after his departure. “You’re going to be fine and I’m going to be fine” Bell said.

He wrapped his 30 minute sermon with words of encouragement. “We serve a big God and none of this is shocking to Him. All we can do is embrace a future that is going to be brilliant.”

Read the rest here and more from Sarah Pulliam Bailey here.

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September 26, 2011 | 4:43 pm

Mearsheimer doesn’t step back from anti-Semitic endorsement

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I was going to blog yesterday about the latest John Mearsheimer controversy, but, well, fantasy football got in the way. As a reminder, Mearsheimer was the co-author (with Stephen Walt) of “The Israel Lobby,” a book that was widely criticized as playing into old notions of a zionist global conspiracy. There was much debate over the book, and the fact that Walt and Mearsheimer are distinguished academics helped deflect the criticisms of anti-Semitism.

They were not, after all, Kevin MacDonald.

But now Mearsheimer has really stepped in it. And by not blogging this yesterday, I can now bring you his non-defense of himself.

Turns out that Mearsheimer provided a prominent and gushing book-jacket review for “The Wandering Who?” Mearsheimer’s blurb had this praise:

‘Gilad Atzmon has written a fascinating and provocative book on Jewish identity in the modern world. He shows how assimilation and liberalism are making it incredibly difficult for Jews in the Diaspora to maintain a powerful sense of their ‘Jewishness.’ Panicked Jewish leaders, he argues, have turned to Zionism (blind loyalty to Israel) and scaremongering (the threat of another Holocaust) to keep the tribe united and distinct from the surrounding goyim. As Atzmon’s own case demonstrates, this strategy is not working and is causing many Jews great anguish. The Wandering Who? Should be widely read by Jews and non-Jews alike.’

The book was written by Gilad Atzmon, a former Israeli and self-proclaimed “self-hating Jew”—and not in the sense that Larry David has been accused of on “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”

I haven’t read Atzmon’s book, but it’s widely been called anti-Semitic. Why? Because of passages like Atzmon’s take on the global financial mess, which obviously was going to be blamed on The Jews. Atzmon’s words, via the Volokh Conspiracy:

I don’t think it was a credit crunch, I think it was a Zionist punch.
This war in Iraq may have something to do with energy but largely it was America acting as an Israeli mission for fighting the last pockets of resistance, led tactically by Neoconservatives and the Federal Reserve.

Alan Greenspan’s job was to create a financial boom so America’s people were not concerned with the tactics used in the Middle East.

It should have worked but it didn’t work because the all-American boom was done at the expense of the most deprived Americans, and they just couldn’t pay the mortgages so it all collapsed.

It’s not only Jews that have adopted this world view either. Bush behaved Jewishly (ideologically) — he is a supremacist, he was a tribalist, but he is not a Jew as far as I’m aware.

Many more samplings of the anti-Semitism in Atzmon’s book at Jeffrey Goldberg’s blog and the Volokh Conspiracy. And yet, despite what you can read there, Mearsheimer endorsed this book.

Now, you might be wondering whether Mearsheimer really read the book or whether he gave such an endorsement. Certainly, not all book-jacket blurbs are the result of thorough study. But, when contacted by blogger Adam Holland seeking to verify Mearsheimer’s review, he said:

The blurb below is the one I wrote for ‘The Wandering Who’ and I have no reason to amend it or embellish it, as it accurately reflects my view of the book.

I have to wonder how seriously anyone will be taking Mearsheimer going forward.

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September 25, 2011 | 12:58 am

Sentence suspended for Brit who placed bacon on mosque door

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Strange story from across the pond. It appears that a churchgoer in northern England demonstrated his disapproval of Islam by nailing some back to the door of a mosque. No word on whether it was chewy or extra crispy.

For Muslims, Pork is not halal—Islam’s equivalent of kosher. And the point of the act was denigration, not to make that particular mosque delicious, even if bacon does make everything better.

But John White’s story didn’t end with one bacon act. And the police took notice, as the Shields Gazette reported:

Concerned that the attacks could be sinister threats from a right-wing group, police trawled through CCTV footage before arresting White.

He admitted five charges of religiously aggravated harassment, but claimed that his motivations were personal, targeting a particular Muslim family, over a 20-year grudge.

White had been in custody since pleading guilty in July. Members of the Muslim community had requested the judge be lenient on White, and today he was sent home—after a little reprimand:

Judge Michael Cartlidge commended the forgiving attitude of the Muslim community and condemned White’s actions as “un-Christian” and “stupid”.

What’s the better comparison: Martin Luther or P.Z. Myers? I’m not sure even White thinks these were 95 Theses moments. His actions were more like that of Myers, the outspoken atheist who desecrated a communion wafer a few years back.

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September 24, 2011 | 11:23 pm

General news about the iPhone 5 from the Christian Post

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Why is this story on the Christian Post website?

A leading analyst has claimed that Apple will only release one new iPhone model in October, contradicting rumors that the company is set to release two or even three handsets into the competitive market.

Evolution of a Christian publication?

From what I remember, the Christian Post used to only publish story that were Christian-specific. But it looks like they’re now offering a Web publication that is, at times, general interest with tech and business stories that have no religious hook. Some of the tech stories, though, ask “Facebook, Google, Apple Censoring Religious Speech?” and are the type of tech stories I would expect to find here.

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September 23, 2011 | 6:28 pm

Jury convicts ‘Irvine 11’ of two misdemeanors

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Why is “Irvine 11” trending on Twitter right now? Because the the 10 students who interrupted a speech at UC Irvine by Michael Oren, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, have been found guilty of conspiring to disrupt Oren’s speech and then actually doing so. Both crimes are misdemeanors.

Here’s what the LA Times says the case was all about:

In a case that garnered national attention over free-speech rights, the trial centered on conflicting views of who was being censored. Prosecutors argued that Ambassador Michael Oren was “shut down” when his speech was interrupted by students who took turns shouting preplanned phrases in a crowded UC Irvine ballroom.

Six defense attorneys argued that the students, seven from UC Irvine and three from UC Riverside, were only following the norm of other college protests and were being singled out.

A guilty verdict, the defense had said during the trial, could chill student activism and the free exchange of ideas at colleges nationwide.

Each student was sentenced to three years probation and 53 hours of community service. The UCI students and the Muslim Student Union, which has been found of inviting anti-Semitic speakers to campus, were previously disciplined by the university.

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September 22, 2011 | 6:49 pm

Rob Bell leaving Mars Hill Church

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

With an eye on the broader church, Rob Bell is leaving the Mars Hill megachurch that he founded 12 years ago. Sarah Pulliam Bailey and Christianity Today have the story:

Flickering Pixels author Shane Hipps will take over for Bell during spring 2012 after Bell finishes his series on Acts in December.

The church released the following statement on its site:

Feeling the call from God to pursue a growing number of strategic opportunities, our founding pastor Rob Bell, has decided to leave Mars Hill in order to devote his full energy to sharing the message of God’s love with a broader audience.

It is with deeply mixed emotions that we announce this transition to you. We have always understood, encouraged, and appreciated the variety of avenues in which Rob’s voice and the message of God’s tremendous love has traveled over the past 12 years. And we are happy and hopeful that as Rob and Kristen venture ahead, they will find increasing opportunity to extend the heartbeat of that message to our world in new and creative ways.

Last spring, Bell stirred a real storm with the publication of his latest book, “Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived.” Here I discussed whether Bell was a universalist heretic or a marketing genius.

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