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11/9/2018

Fundraising is a chore we have to do because it literally is the only way we’ve been able to carry out this mission for 10 years.

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Christian progressives let their voice slip for too long. We work very hard to reverse that trend.

This is our standard week-end sponsored fundraising post. We’re here 24/7/365. The only way that’s possible is through your ongoing support each week. Please contribute what you can. Thanks for your support!

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Fall Fundraiser 2018 - The Christian Left

11/8/2018

You can hang out with 370,000 Christian progressives and their allies any time you want, wherever you live, in real time. Our community is available 24/7/365 right here on social media. That’s worth your support.

We’re stable. We’ve been here a long time. We were one of the first Facebook pages ever created. We discuss daily news, elections, cultural events, politics and religion from a Christian progressive perspective. The next two years are going to be interesting to say the least.

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We post articles every hour, every day. Every article has a discussion thread you can participate in. We continuously search the internet for articles that will likely be of interest to you. We moderate all discussions and keep the conservative trolls and Russian bots away.

The only way we keep all this going is through your support. There’s nothing out there like this community and ministry. Make a contribution to our 2018 Fall Fundraiser if you have any extra. Here’s how to make a donation (Click Here).

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The Christian Left
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Hillsboro, OR 97124

Frightening Viewpoints Of Powerful "Christian" Right "Ministry" - We're Among The Few Counternarratives

4/24/2018

Most people don't really know the extent to which The "Christian" Right's power and influence has grown exponentially over the past 40 years. It is truly frightening.

We've been monitoring them for 10 years. Here is one small example of a "ministry" with immense power:

Ralph Drollinger and Capitol Ministries has way, way too much power in DC and around the world. Read their list of viewpoints.

Among them is that "Liberal Christians aren’t really Christians, they’re simpletons," "Catholicism is one of the primary false religions in the world,” "People with government positions should not 'compromise Biblical absolutes' and should hire only other 'righteous' people," and "Christian public servants are required to support the death penalty and oppose marriage equality."

Also, "entitlement programs (like Social Security) have no biblical authority," and "God is a capitalist."

After you read the below article please come back to this blog article and help us combat this insanity.

Group That Runs Fundamentalist Bible Studies For Cabinet & Congress Growing ‘Beyond Our Wildest Imaginings’ Globally

We try to think of a creative way to put it each week-end but The Christian Left is a user sustained internet ministry and community. Contributions have been down lately. We are one of the few counternarratives to The "Christian" Right in existence.

Without user support we would have to fold in less than a month. If having TCL around matters to you, make a contribution and be a frequent supporter. We understand some don't have extra. If you do, please chip in to keep TCL alive.

This is the kind of feedback we see every day:

“I thank God for this page & all the members who promote the love & acceptance of Jesus Christ. I live in a rural area of the South where Christian bigotry runs rampant. It does my heart good to come here and read encouraging & uplifting words.” -- Rebecca P., member of The Christian Left

Frankly, that’s why we started this ministry and also why we’ve kept coming back every day for close to 10 years. We knew we were not alone. We knew the voice of Christian progressives was being suppressed. Christianity Inc. had become a powerful force. They had become the religion of wealth and empire. They had forgotten about the teachings of Jesus.

It has taken thousands of person-hours to build and maintain this ministry. Our effort continues daily. We set up and maintain a website, a blog, a Twitter page, a store, an Instagram page, a Facebook page and a broadcast mailing list. During the 2012 election season we formed a super-PAC (which is now dismantled due to lack of support).

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The Christian Left
2001 NW Aloclek Dr., Box #108
Hillsboro, OR 97124

The Christian Left's Curated Collection of Essential Articles and Books

4/4/2018

Taking Back Christianity From The Religious Right

"Very little in the actual teaching put forward by Jesus here would support the political philosophy of the Christian right, with its worship of military might or its obsession with capital punishment. But it’s probably too much to ask them to consider what Jesus actually said."

The death of Christianity in the U.S.

"Christianity has died in the hands of Evangelicals. Evangelicalism ceased being a religious faith tradition following Jesus’ teachings concerning justice for the betterment of humanity when it made a Faustian bargain for the sake of political influence.

The Evangelicals’ Jesus is satanic, and those who hustle this demon are “false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants also masquerade as servants of righteousness. Their end will be what their actions deserve." (2 Cor. 11:13-15, NIV)

The Last Temptation

"The moral convictions of many evangelical leaders have become a function of their partisan identification. This is not mere gullibility; it is utter corruption. Blinded by political tribalism and hatred for their political opponents, these leaders can’t see how they are undermining the causes to which they once dedicated their lives. Little remains of a distinctly Christian public witness."

The Real Origins of the Religious Right

(Four Page Must Read On How It All Went Down)

"Today, evangelicals make up the backbone of the pro-life movement, but it hasn’t always been so. Both before and for several years after Roe, evangelicals were overwhelmingly indifferent to the subject, which they considered a 'Catholic issue.'

it wasn’t until 1979—a full six years after Roe—that evangelical leaders, at the behest of conservative activist Paul Weyrich, seized on abortion not for moral reasons, but as a rallying-cry to deny President Jimmy Carter a second term. Why? Because the anti-abortion crusade was more palatable than the religious right’s real motive: protecting segregated schools. So much for the new abolitionism."

How Corporate America Invented Christian America

At a gathering in 1940 Reverend James W. Fifield Jr. told industrialists that clergymen would be crucial in regaining the upper hand in their war with Roosevelt. As men of God, ministers could voice the same conservative complaints as business leaders, but without any suspicion that they were motivated solely by self-interest. They could push back against claims, made often by Roosevelt and his allies, that business had somehow sinned and the welfare state was doing God’s work. The assembled industrialists gave a rousing amen. “When he had finished,” a journalist noted, “rumors report that the N.A.M. applause could be heard in Hoboken.”

It was a watershed moment—the beginning of a movement that would advance over the 1940s and early 1950s a new blend of conservative religion, economics and politics that one observer aptly anointed “Christian libertarianism.” Fifield and like-minded ministers saw Christianity and capitalism as inextricably intertwined, and argued that spreading the gospel of one required spreading the gospel of the other.

The War On Pain Patients - Cracks Appear In "The Opioid Crisis"

3/11/2018

By Charles Toy

“Pain is whatever the experiencing person says it is, existing whenever and wherever the person says it does.”

-- Margo McCaffery, RN, MS, FAAN, leader and pioneer in pain management for nursing.

Over the last 3 years I have been forced to become a student of chronic pain and a pain activist. The pain I've endured in my left shoulder has been brutal, unrelenting, and at times unbearable.

I'm finally emerging on the other side after having my shoulder replaced last May. They told me it takes about a year to completely recover and that's about what it has taken. In a month and a half it will have been a year since my surgery. I feel about 10/12ths in to my recovery.

My odyssey has been long. My story is long too. I'm going to add to it over the course of time. I've been treated like a junkie and fed falsehoods from the medical community that I knew weren't true. The medical community on the whole knows the least about this issue unless they're chronic severe pain sufferers themselves. They are being fed propaganda by the CDC which lumped street opiates in with prescribed opiates to come up with their bogus numbers. The medical community is operating out of fear and a very bad case of group think. The full truth will come out eventually. It's beginning to emerge right now.

Some of the things I've been told I know to be false because I've experienced it myself. They include:

"It's really the Acetaminophen (Tylenol) in opioid pain medication that provides relief from the pain. The opiates only provide euphoria."

This is patently false. No, it isn't the Acetaminophen that provides all the relief. Acetaminophen alone didn't even touch my pain, neither did Ibuprofen, and they were both tearing my stomach to shreds. Percocet (Oxycodone and Acetaminophen) did provide relief, and it had nothing to do with euphoria. It had to do with what works at relieving the pain and what doesn't. Opiates are by far the most effective pain reliever there is. Every one of the hundreds of accounts I've read of people suffering from chronic severe pain say the same thing.

In the course of being put through the wringer I was forced to try Lyrica, Cymbalta, Gabapentin, Amitriptyline, Nortriptyline, and Tramadol. I was taken to the highest recommended doses on all of them. None of them even came remotely close to the pain relief of narcotics (opiates).

It didn't matter to the doctors I went to, two "pain doctors," one orthopedic surgeon, my primary doctor, all of them said, "I'm not giving you narcotics and that's that." I literally could not sleep at night in any position without enduring brutal pain, and I mean brutal. None of them cared. They all fear the CDC and the DEA that much. They started telling themselves lies.

As it turns out the vast majority of pain patients don't abuse their medication and they don't die from it. It's worth repeating ... the CDC lumped deaths from street opiates like heroin and illicit pills in with deaths from prescribed opiates taken by pain patients, came up with one number, and called it "The Opioid Crisis."

At one point I was desperate so I called a medical malpractice group of attorneys to get their take on all of it. I was told, "You can't do anything to a doctor unless they actually harm you. We get calls every day from people literally crying, telling us their doctor took them off their opiate medication for chronic pain after 20 years. Most of them are in unspeakable agony. Their doctors don't care."

I didn't give up. I couldn't give up. The pain wasn't something you could "live with." A Naturopathic Doctor pain managed me with opiates for a few months before and after my shoulder replacement. The point came where she felt like she had reached the limits of her expertise.

I finally went to the pain clinic at Oregon Health and Science University. I found a bastion of sanity there. They deal with many of the tough pain cases in the region. They acknowledged the craziness taking place around this issue and told me mine wasn't a difficult case compared to most they see. They listened to my history and put me on the low-dose opiate regimen I needed. That was that. I've been tapering down per my own decreased need for pain relief as I reach full recovery.

The truth is starting to come out. I just ran across the best, most comprehensive article I've seen thus far on this topic. It begins to expose what is really going on. It's from Reason Magazine, the April 2018 issue. I highly recommend it. The title of the article is, "America’s War on Pain Pills Is Killing Addicts and Leaving Patients in Agony," by Jacob Sullum. Here's an excerpt:
________________

PUNISHING PATIENTS

In contrast with these harm reduction tactics, continuing attempts to discourage the use of prescription pain medication promise to cause a lot of needless suffering without making a noticeable dent in opioid-related deaths. Prescription guidelines that the CDC issued in March 2016, which minimize the benefits of opioids, exaggerate their risks, and encourage doctors to be stingy with them, exemplify this misguided strategy.

A 2016 critique published by the journal Pain Practice challenges several key aspects of the CDC document, including its recommended dose ceilings, its general declaration that nonopioid treatment is “preferred for chronic pain,” its suggestion that opioid prescriptions for acute pain last no longer than seven days, and its statement that doctors who decide to prescribe opioids should begin with immediate-release products rather than extended-release or long-acting (ER/LA) analgesics.

The criticism of that last recommendation sums up what is wrong with the guidelines in general ...
________________

I'll end it here for today. This is only the beginning of my writing on this topic. This blog post will expand over time. I haven't even begun to tell you about the nightmare of the two "pain clinics" I went to before the university. Talk about humiliation. Again, I recommend reading the articles linked in this post. It's a lot of information to process. Those who suffer from chronic pain will feel validated after being treated like junkies and criminals by a medical community overcome by hysteria.

Another Brilliant Article We're Preserving On Our Blog

3/8/2018

Pro-Born: A Former Evangelical on the Single-Issue Politics of White Christians
By Bradley Onishi

[Excerpt]

"First, you get to deny the messy stakes of loving the born and bodied—those with melanin in their skin, different kinds of hair, gender-queer expressions, immigrant parents, and non-Christian faiths. Second, you get to deny the messiness of the social contract—of the political realm and all its irreducible details and multiple voices.

You are absolved of responsibility for the brown skin of Dreamers, the unwashed hair of refugees, the cry of bullied trans teenagers, the mourning songs from families of black men and women killed by police. Myopic and unwavering focus on abortion is the way to avoid the carnality of living, breathing beings. The way to get away from bodies."

Link To Full Article

The Death of Christianity in the US

3/7/2018

Every now and then an article comes along that speaks the truth in no uncertain terms. When we spot such an article we like to preserve it on our blog. This article doesn't candy-coat the truth.

We were saying what the author says back in 2009. It was too much for most people to process. They weren't ready to hear it. Many accused us of hyperbole.

Below are a couple of excerpts from the article and then a link to the entire piece. Please don't just read the excerpts. Read the whole article as well. It's important to understand what has happened. The author is Miguel De La Torre, professor of Social Ethics and Latino/a Studies at Iliff School of Theology in Denver, CO.

"Christianity has died in the hands of Evangelicals. Evangelicalism ceased being a religious faith tradition following Jesus’ teachings concerning justice for the betterment of humanity when it made a Faustian bargain for the sake of political influence.

The Evangelicals’ Jesus is satanic, and those who hustle this demon are “false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants also masquerade as servants of righteousness. Their end will be what their actions deserve." (2 Cor. 11:13-15, NIV)

When he speaks of "the Faustian bargain for the sake of political influence" he is referring to the takeover of Christianity in the US by far-right extremists. They used the fake issue of abortion to hoodwink Christians into believing they had to be Republicans. Politico did a very well-researched, 4-page article meticulously documenting the history of how this was pulled off and by who. Click here to go to that article: "The Real Origins of the Religious Right"

This blog post will make the most sense if you read the whole blog and then go to the links contained within.

Here's the link to Mr. De La Torre's piece: The death of Christianity in the U.S

Trolls will descend on our Facebook page and inevitably quote this scripture and others like it:

"Now the word of the Lord came to me, saying, 'Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born, I consecrated you'..." (Jeremiah 1:4-5)

As author Joyce Arthur points out:

"This passage is specific to one, very special person—Jeremiah the prophet, whom God has called to provide miraculous powers and authority to the world. Since we are not all destined to be divine prophets, this verse cannot be construed as applying to any fetus except the unborn Jeremiah."

The same is true for Psalm 139:13-16.

"All this passage states is that God is directly involved in the creation of a fetus and knows its future. This is useless for the anti-choice position, since God creates all living things, including trees and bugs. Plus, just because God is supposedly omniscient doesn't give fetuses any special status—it simply means God already knows whether they will live or die. It is dishonest to conclude from this verse that a fetus is a human being deserving of more protection than women. The passage is poetic prose that anti-choicers have twisted and trivialized by giving it a literal, objective meaning where there is none."

When they run out of arguments people usually resort to: "What about 'Thou shall not kill?'"

A fetus is not a 'baby.' A fetus becomes a person when it draws its first breath.

One last fact that most people are unaware of: Before the far right's takeover of Christianity in the US it was the clergy who advocated for universal access to safe, legal abortions.

We know most followers of the right-wing, political cult will scoff at all of this. Their brainwashing is complete. We're going to speak the truth anyway.

“Speaking the truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act."
-- George Orwell

The Kind Of Nutty Trash Conservative "Christians" Pass Around The Internet

3/2/2018

We get trolled by conservative "Christians" all day, every day. Sometimes we're not quite sure if someone is a troll so we go look at their Facebook page. This is the kind of garbage we usually find. Our commentary continues after the graphic.

We pulled this graphic from the Facebook page of one gentleman who came to our page to lecture us. His personal Facebook page was full of Tucker Carlson videos, NRA videos, and Duck Dynasty videos mixed with assorted "Christian" admonishments.

After doing what we do here every day for close to ten years we can say unequivocally that the biggest purveyors of "Fake News" are conservative "Christians" who watch, read and listen to nothing else but conservative media.

We don't "hate" these people. On the contrary, we feel sorry for them. They have been brainwashed by a conservative propaganda machine. We speak against an ideology here and the opinion leaders who spew it out 24/7. Unfortunately that group now includes all the leaders, preachers and politicians who make up The "Christian" Right.

There is nothing Christian about modern right-wing ideology. It's the biggest lie foisted on our culture over the last 40 years. It is an ideology that uses the two red herring issues of abortion and gay marriage to hoodwink Christians into being Republicans. Modern right-wing ideology is more akin to Satanism than the teachings of Jesus Christ. All you have to do is look at the fruit of their policies and the impact it has on the Least of These.

Modern right-wing ideology and policy passes all of society's resources upwards and crushes the Least of These underfoot labeling them as 'lazy freeloaders.' Right now, given the majority of evangelicals subscribe to these lies it looks as though Satan has won.

We know better.

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” -- Jesus, John 16:33

Read more about The Least of These here.

Return To Related Facebook Post

Beyond Sick and Tired of The "Christian" Right's Lies About Abortion and Homosexuality

3/1/2018

After almost ten years of dealing with the brainwashed fanatics trolling our Facebook page every day about abortion and homosexuality we're going to throw some facts out there. We don't need to be wordy because they are simple truths.

A fetus becomes a person when it draws its first breath. The Bible backs that up. Numbers 5 condones abortion via the ordeal of bitter water.

Jesus excused 'eunuchs who were born that way' from his stated marriage laws saying, 'not everyone can follow these laws. Those who can, should.'

Biblical scholars and historians have proved that 'eunuchs who are born that way' are LGBT.

These two issues were a clever ploy from the Father of Lies to rope Christians into the Republican Party, a party whose policies are really the opposite of everything Christ taught.

It's beyond time to start talking back to these liars. They won't bother to read these articles but you should. It's time to arm ourselves with the facts.

As one of our members pointed out:

"Every single argument the US religious conservatives have about social issues has two sides, one of which could be addressed from a progressive, rational perspective. Two sides … every single issue. Their pig-headed evangelical salesmanship is a threat to Democracy."

"Homosexual eunuchs are a normal and natural part of God's wonderful creation. They are accepted and loved by God the way they are. During the time of Jesus Homosexual eunuchs were often physically intact gay men, lesbians and even transgendered people, and he knew it." Here's the article.

When the Bible Commands Abortion - Here's the article.

Meme Credit: Forward

A Milestone In Perception Is Here

1/26/2018

By Charles Toy

I started The Christian Left in 2009 as a Facebook group. In 2010 I converted it to a Facebook page and after numbers started to grow I slowly added an admin team from a few page users eager to participate. That same core admin team is still with me, Rev. Mark Sandlin and Roger Smith. We have many other long-time admin team members but Mark and Roger have assisted in planning and daily operations since I asked them to join me not long after I began.

A ministry and a community began, for people who saw what was taking place and were persecuted for bringing it up.

From the beginning we've proclaimed loud and clear that The "Christian" Right had lost its way. This has always been one of the main motivations of our mission. Long before Donald Trump we've been sounding the alarm that our faith had been infiltrated and taken over by impostors and false teachers. We no longer recognized our faith in our churches. That was profoundly saddening to us.

We've been hammered relentlessly from the beginning about the two fake issues The "Christian" Right invented, marriage equality and women's reproductive justice. The fact is these issues were invented to coalesce a right-wing political movement within the church. The history of how this happened is detailed here.

You couldn't find many people who would agree with us in public. Everyone was afraid to cause hardship for themselves and their families whether it was personal, professional, or both. We took a pounding in the beginning. We still do.

That's starting to change. People are beginning to see the truth and speak up.

Miguel De La Torre, Professor of social ethics and Latino/a studies at Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colo. wrote a piece in late 2017 that perfectly echoes what we've been saying for almost a decade.

"Christianity has died in the hands of Evangelicals. Evangelicalism ceased being a religious faith tradition following Jesus’ teachings concerning justice for the betterment of humanity when it made a Faustian bargain for the sake of political influence. The beauty of the gospel message — of love, of peace and of fraternity — has been murdered.

Evangelicalism has ceased to be a faith perspective rooted on Jesus the Christ and has become a political movement whose beliefs repudiate all Jesus advocated. A message of hate permeates their pronouncements."

We've probably made every one of those points 1,000 times.

The point of this blog is that perceptions are slowly changing. People are beginning to notice that following the teachings of Jesus has all but vanished in the US for the majority of evangelicals. 82% of them voted for Trump and stay loyal to right-wing extremism every election. Yet they represent themselves as the 'party of God.' The Gospel has been replaced with a cruel right-wing ideology.

You, the members of The Christian left, have been early pioneers in rejecting the false teaching of The "Christian" Right.

Then this happened:

That's pretty big coming from a former chair of the RNC. We'll take any allies we can get on this point. This is another thing we've been saying for almost a decade.

They lost any authority to preach when they fell prey to reprobate minds precipitated by replacing Jesus with right-wing ideology. It's happened many times in history. The most recent turning away is well documented.

Some have suggested that real Christianity has been forced underground in the US. It wouldn't be the first time.

— The Christian Left is a user supported ministry and community. We've been able to carry out the ministry and maintain the community for almost a decade only through your generous support. Thousands of man hours support the services provided here as well as on or blog, our website, our Twitter page, our broadcast mailing list, our store, our unique apparel designs, our formation of a Super PAC during the 2012 election cycle, ads we've taken out in newspapers and on social media. The list of our activities over the years is lengthy.

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