House chaplain forced out by Ryan

[Luke6_37]

Luke6_37:

Why did the GOP pass it? I think its because most Congressional Republicans are “Prosperity Gospel” Christians who believe wealth is a sign of God’s favor and blessing. It doesn’t matter how you acquire it as long as you have it.

Why don’t you show us the poll demonstrating that a majority of Repubs in Congresss believe in this. This is a pretty strong charge and, frankly, I see no possibility that it’s true.

How would you ask such a question on a poll? Seems to me that it would require a multiple item rating scale at the very least to create a valid measure that would then have to be standardized and checked for reliability against other external measures.

Or you could just skip all that and look directly at those other measures, such as their choice of leadership, legislative priorities, and voting record. The GOP’s election of Trump, their position on healthcare, and their latest tax cut bill that benefits the wealthy at the expense of the poor all indicate that there is a strong ethos in the GOP centered on the dichotomy between the elect who are blessed with prosperity and the undeserving masses who are not.

The Calvinist revival among Evangelicals has politically displaced the Social Gospel types who were prevalent in the early 19th century. This goes a long way towards explaining why so many GOP politians who claim to be Christian, and who have the support of the Evangelical base, do not act in a manner that appears very Christ-like to Christians who hold Catholic or Arminian assumptions about God and the nature of His saving grace.

Every Catholic should understand the implications of the 5-Point Calvinist doctrine known as TULIP and why it naturally leads to the Prosperity Gospel and a reliance upon unfettered market forces to decide the winners and losers in society.

If they replace the Catholic chaplain with a Calvinist preacher that would be proof positive that I am right.

 

[Theo520]

Well one does not know what one will do when one is on an outward path.

Since he is not seeking reelection, his vector just might have changed. He just might be doing his part to create enough chaos in his wake.

You are just speculating to stir the pot, nothing in his history points to being impulsive, and no GOP Senators have come out to chide him. Thus it likely is at it seems, they only disclosed some of the reasons for asking him to resign.

 

[JoshuaIsLord]

You are just speculating to stir the pot

Of course I am.

nothing in his history points to being impulsive

Nothing pointed to the las vegas shooter to be anything else than a “Law Abiding Citizen” until he pulled the first trigger.

and no GOP Senators have come out to chide him.

Thick as Thieves as the saying goes.

they only disclosed some of the reasons for asking him to resign.

And that is the shady part. Let us have full disclosure and transparency.

 

[JoshuaIsLord]

From the same wiki page…which paints a better picture.
(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
The only problem is that the wiki page data is 8 years old.
What is the current make up?

 

[upant]

I do know that I am happy to discuss issues with sincere people, who avoid lobbing labels and generalities.

most of your post follow labeled talking points.
yet you assume immediately i want elimination, who is labeling
i follow neither the dem or gop.

But we probably would also need to forgo the cry crocodile tears over Alfie Evans.

sincere? was there a need to disparage me about my prayer intentions when you don’t know where i stand on the subject. just because i don’t want big government doesn’t mean i don’t want to help the poor. i just believe there are better ways. buying votes doesn’t help the poor but it does your party. who is sincere about the poor? who is keeping the poor poor and destroying families thru the policies?

YouTube is a not a highly regarded venue for the dissemination of scholarly work.

youtube is an effective way to get an idea out to the masses, the scholar work will sometimes be linked to in the show notes. the short series gives a good review of what is wrong with the current system.

 

[dvdjs]

most of your post follow labeled talking points.

nope

yet you assume immediately i want elimination

I made no assumption. I responded on your comment with a reduction ad absurdum.

who is labeling

Not I.

was there a need to disparage me about my prayer intentions

I did not and do not disparage your prayer intentions.

i just believe there are better ways

you have not articulated any.
Nor have you even come to grips with the evidence against your glib analysis.

buying votes doesn’t help the poor but it does your party.

What party?
The idea of buying votes is a facile charge, but amking the case is not so easy.

youtube is an effective way …

I am not wasting time looking for scholarship there.

 

[SuperLuigi]

In other words, you can’t address ridgerunner’s question.

Stereotyping, right @Metis1? :2nd_place_medal:

 

[JoshuaIsLord]

Here is the most recent data with a better breakdown:

Protestant Republicans 159
Catholic Republicans 70

Protestant Democrats 82
Catholic Democrats 74

Faith on the Hill

The share of U.S. adults who describe themselves as Christians has been declining for decades, but the U.S. Congress is about as Christian today as it was in the early 1960s.

www.pewforum.org

 

[upant]

I am not wasting time looking for scholarship there.

because you don’t really want to discuss the issue. what’s being presented is possibly a different point of view than yours. the homework is determining the validity of their presentation.

you have not articulated any.

you didn’t watch the videos to get the general gist. a video provides a clearer picture than a few lines of text. they are short videos.

What party?

The idea of buying votes is a facile charge, but amking the case is not so easy.

upant:

i don’t know which party raised the eligibility. but when you go beyond what is required there has to be another reason.

 

[dvdjs]

because you don’t really want to discuss the issue

I have already told you why, but I can explain further.
A manuscript lends it self to reflective, critical analysis. A video does not, a least not without excessive tedium/
Find me a transcript, or write down a cogent analysis and I will read it.

 

[lmachine]

You are just speculating to stir the pot, nothing in his history points to being impulsive, and no GOP Senators have come out to chide him.

GOP House members are signing and circulating a petition demanding answers from Ryan.

 

[JoshuaIsLord]

GOP House members are signing and circulating a petition demanding answers from Ryan.

Considering 70 of the GOP are Catholic, I am not surprised by that at all.

 

[Ridgerunner]

In other words, you can’t prove it. You just invented it in order to be nasty toward Republicans.

And your lack of understanding of Evangelicals tells me you will call almost anybody appointed to replace the chaplain a “Calvinist Evangelical”, which in most of the U.S. is practically an oxymoron.

You should get to know more Evangelicals. The world headquarters of the largest of their denominations is right here. They are very much cooperative with Catholics in prolife and social service activities. And there are big differences among different “brands” of Evangelicals. They are not “prosperity gospel” people and are not classic Calvinists by any stretch of the imagination.

Southern Baptist writers call the 'prosperity gospel" pagan. And so it is.

So you trot out Dem talking points about Repubs in order to make them seem like the “Evangelicals” most of them are not, and condemn “Evanglicals” for being something they’re not.

But I’ll grant this. Based on what some previous poster in another thread posted about “Evangelicals” in the eastern U.S. and historic prevalence of “social gospel” movements in the “Yankee” portions of the Eastern seaboard, it doesn’t greatly surprise me that some would think of Evangelicals in the way you do. It might well apply in the eastern U.S.

 

[Theo520]

GOP House members are signing and circulating a petition demanding answers from Ryan

Good, the facts will likely come out. I’m just giving him the benefit of the doubt based on his past performance, he seemed more like a team player than an impulsive rebel.

 

[upant]

I have already told you why, but I can explain further.

A manuscript lends it self to reflective, critical analysis. A video does not, a least not without excessive tedium/

Find me a transcript, or write down a cogent analysis and I will read it

find you a transcript, really?

as i said, you don’t really want to discuss the issue

you would suffer the tedium if you did

 

[dvdjs]

find you a transcript, really?

as i said, you don’t really want to discuss the issue

I would discuss it, but for a discussion, i need o be able to read and to re-read, and to quote. I don;t think that listening to a video is conducive to discussion.

 

[Metis1]

I don’t know what you’re talking about, nor does making funny faces make your position, regardless as to what it may be, valid.

 

[Metis1]

Paul Ryan has long been an admirer of Ayn Rand, even requiring his staff to read “Atlas Shrugged”, so I tend to believe his move was mainly political, probably because the chaplain did something dirty & nasty: he actually cited the Parable if the Sheep & Goats in Matthew 25 to show that the Trump tax cuts, with its sharp reductions in Medicaid, was very much the antithesis of what Jesus taught. Ryan had been warned about this inconsistency before from a Jesuit professor at Georgetown.

If one is unfamiliar with Ayn Rand, maybe check out this link and see how well she stacked up to what’s found in the gospels: Ayn Rand - Wikipedia

 

[Ridgerunner]

You have no idea why Ryan did what he did, so it’s really just dislike of the man that you’re expressing.

Ayn Rand was an intellectual “one trick pony”, but her one trick was worth reading. She escaped the Soviet Union at huge risk to her life, and opposed socialism all her life. “Atlas Shrugged” is about what would happen if the most productive people “went on strike” so to speak. That was a revelation in its time, and needs to be at least considered by people today, particularly since we see it acted out in places like Venezuela today.

Her other works just repeat the same theme. She was harsher than most (and Paul Ryan) would be today when it comes to social obligation, but one needs to realize what her antecedents were and the fact that when she wrote her works there was not a widespread understanding of socialism.

If Paul Ryan really does require that his staff people read “Atlas Shrugged”, one can only comment that anyone who works for a House member ought to have had at least that much education and probably really should read it if he/she hasn’t already. It’s kind of like reading Sinclair’s “The Jungle”; part of the American Literary Naturalism genre that has Marxist undertones . It’s part of American history as well as being instructive concerning social issues that don’t ever quite go out of date. And, like “The Jungle” it’s part of cultural literacy for an American.

 

[stinkcat_14]

She escaped the Soviet Union at huge risk to her life, and opposed socialism all her life.

Except of course, she did receive social security, so she was in favor of redistributive socialism when she was getting the redistribution.