Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Chritianophobic hate-speach promoted at the Welsh Assembly

Action: Welsh readers should complain. 'All I preach is deicide'? The combination of ridicule of religious beliefs with with attacks on believers would make this work indefensible if the religion in question were not Christianity. It is now being promoted by the Welsh Culture Secretary in a reading at the Welsh Assembly: this is a kind of official endorsement. Email Peter Black, the culture secretary, and ">your own Assembly Member

From Christian Voice: WELSH LIBDEMS BECOME THE 'INSULT JESUS' PARTY.

Dated 10.40am 14th November 2008

The decision by Peter Black AM to invite the poet Patrick Jones to insult Jesus Christ in the National Assembly has been condemned by a Christian prayer and lobby group.

Christian Voice described the event, due to be held on 11th December, as a disgrace to the Assembly itself. The Waterstone's bookshop in Cardiff cancelled a reading of Jones' poetry on Wednesday night. after a 24-hour campaign by Christian Voice, whose members emailed and phoned the store to complain. At no time did Christian Voice make any threat of disruption to Waterstone's, who took the decision themselves.

But Peter Black, who is the LibDem's culture spokesman, has now invited Jones, a militant atheist, to read his poems, which insult Jesus Christ and call for an end to Christian worship, in Committee Room 24 of the Assembly at 12 noon on Thursday 11th December.

On BBC Wales yesterday afternoon, after being repeatedly challenged by Stephen Green, Black eventually agreed to extend an invitation to Christians to attend. Christian Voice is now awaiting an invitation.

Stephen Green, National Director of Christian Voice, said today:
'This is a creepy event in the seat of government at which Jesus-hating AM's can swoon over poems packed with hatred for Christianity and which speak of Mary Magdalene and the poet having sex with the Lord Jesus Christ. They will also hear Jones' unfettered hatred of Christianity, which he has somehow managed to convince himself is indistinguishable from Islam.

'What they will not hear is Jones insult the prophet Mohammed. He dare not do that at all, let alone in the sexual way he insults Jesus Christ, whom he sees as a soft target.

'Christians in Wales must not take this lying down. We need to stand up for our Lord against this attack on His honour and on the Church itself by Peter Black. Black has gone out of his way to show contempt for Christians in Wales. As he is the LibDem Culture Spokesman, that means insulting Jesus Christ is now official LibDem policy. The LibDems have thus become a political party Christians can no longer in conscience
vote for or take any part in.'

NOTE: Patrick Jones emailed some of his poems to Stephen Green on Tuesday morning, then denied he had done that on BBC Radio Wales Thursday morning, then admitted it on the same station Thursday afternoon.

Waterstone's told Christian Voice they had cancelled Jones' reading at 10am on Wednesday morning, but did not email Jones to tell him until 2pm that afternoon.

The poems aren't actually much good, they hardly rhyme, they rarely scan or have rhythm, but they possibly have enough profanity and references to female genitalia to get the literati excited. One of them, to which we are taking the greatest exception, includes the blasphemous if not terribly original line: 'just like mary magdelene (sic), i f****d jesus'.

Other lines include: 'All I preach is deicide', 'today I have become a born-again atheist' and 'god does not die because he was never alive.'

One poem describes God as 'the first absent dad' who 'lorded it upstairs' while Jesus was on earth.

Another strikes at the fundamental right to hold a religious view and have freedom of worship, as Jones expresses his desire for 'prayers to be abandoned ... synagogues closed, churches morphed into pound shops' and concludes 'then they shall all be f***ing saved.'

3 comments:

Griff said...

May I suggest that readers check out the crass profane attempts at poetry evident on Jones's website and then leave a review of his works on Amazon, who are stocking the title. That's what I've just done. Enough negative comments on the website of a major seller like Amazon are bound to reduce the numbers of people buying and reading this childish doggerel.

Anonymous said...

So now you are giving a platform to Stephen Green and Christian Voice... You have to be kidding??

Green and his Assemblies of God sect are a far bigger threat to the Catholic Church than some silly little book of poems. They practice healings and speaking in tongues while Green constantly claims to speak for God and know his will. This group's heresy is far more offensive than the actual thing you are protesting against.
Especially since they support both the death penalty and Zionism.

Again I urge you to show balance, you cannot attack Live Simply and Pax Christi because of some vague link to Gay groups then cosy up to Bible literalist, Rapture craving, fundamentalist, fideistic and theologically shallow Christians.

Dominic
Edinburgh

Hercules said...

Quoting Green's press releases is no more showing our support than (heaven help us) quoting the Government's. He's putting out news no one else is.

It is up to us and our readers to decide if his campaigns are worthy of support. Of course his views are not Catholic - he doesn't claim they are. Does that need to be spelt out?

Pope Leo XIII's Prayer to St Michael

Holy Michael, Archangel, defend us in the day of battle. Be our safeguard against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray, and do thou, Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the power of God, thrust down to Hell Satan, and all wicked spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls. Amen