Jack Chick -- a vent

[whatevergirl]

I received an email from ‘catholic answers project,’ from Jimmy Akin today. It was relating to Jack Chick, and his proganda against the Church. Have any of you read Chick’s materials? I glossed over his comics briefly (after doing a quick google search on his name)…oh my gosh, I thought I was going to be ill.

For those of you not familiar–he claims that we Catholics worship a ‘cookie,’ and popes…and that we believe we will earn salvation, through good works. That priests ‘do magic’ over ‘a cookie’ and everyone ‘just believes that it’s Jesus.’ The most shocking thing he wrote was that Catholics believe that the pope and priests are ‘mini Jesuses.’ I can’t believe that someone who tells such lies about our faith, is a best selling author. I mean, it’s not even closely resembing anything that is true about the Church. It’s like he knows NOTHING about the Church:banghead: , and just runs with whatever he thinks is happening or something. I can almost see if he left the Church, and is sharing his story…but not just boldfaced…MADE UP lies.

All in the name of making a buck, I would imagine.

I just wanted to vent. Anyone else get that email today?

 

[ralphinal]

I did. Every now and then I see some of his manure. The comics are pooly drawn. And that is the most redeeming quality of them!!

I am shocked that they are still going strong.

 

[tobinatorstark]

I seen one where the male figure was named 2 different names throughout the comic. How can one man be so hatred against a religion. We shouldn’t hate any religion as Christians and Catholic. I just don’t understand him

 

[ralphinal]

The funny thing is that this hatred controls him. In effect, the Church is in control of his life. Granted, he has chosen the wrong path, one that may bring him to a horried eternity (i think he is dead, by the way).

 

[Della]

I think a lot of people see them as offensive, Catholic or non-Catholic. The booklets are sold in bulk and passed out to all and sundry. It’s the people buying them in bulk who ought to be truly ashamed of themselves.

I have to wonder why Mr. Chick doesn’t just read the Catechism for himself. Maybe because it would either take away his reason for existence and/or because he believes (perhaps even sincerely) that the Church has “hidden teachings” on all the things he writes about that it doesn’t tell the world or even its own members?

Whatever his reasons for remaining in abject ignorance and bigotry, the man needs our prayers and our pity. He writes a lot about supposedly disillusioned Catholics standing before God at the judgment. Well, it would be easy enough to write one in which he is standing before God and explaining the vile lies he’s been telling about Christ’s own Church for so many years. Yup. It ain’t gonna be pretty, poor man, unless he repents and recants.

 

[whatevergirl]

I don’t know if I’m just naive or what…I have heard his name bantered around…I remember seeing a thread on here about the guy, and meaning to come back to it, but never did. I was just bowled over with what he is writing…and selling out there.

I was telling my husband about it just now–he called me from work…and he said, whatever happened to blasphemy? You never hear this anymore?

He’s right…why does anything go as it relates to making fun of and persecuting the Catholic Church. I never see that word used much anymore…and frankly, it fits with the writings of Chick.

 

[Isambard]

He’s good for a giggle. It is sad though that such brazen bull seems to be the norm among religious apologetics.

 

[Isambard]

I seen one where the male figure was named 2 different names throughout the comic. How can one man be so hatred against a religion. We shouldn’t hate any religion as Christians and Catholic. I just don’t understand him

He believes the Catholic Church is a secrative bureacracy who’s an institution created by Satan to misguide and persecute christians by its creation of Islam, Satanism, Atheism, Nazism etc etc.

Think Protocals of the Elders of Zion, but with the Catholic Church instead of Jews.

 

[mercygate]

There was a riotously funny thread about him on these forums about two years ago – maybe three? Found it. One contributor had built an entire edifice about how Jack Chick was actually a Jesuit. Good thing not to be drinking coffee anywhere near your keyboard when you find that thread.

 

[Carjack1]

He is still alive according to wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Chick

 

[vocatio]

If it were up to me…Pope for a day…I’d say “LOCK AND LOAD, WE"RE MOVING IN!!!” Jack Chick is nothing less that a scandalizing liar. I would not want to be him at the judgment.

I’m amazed how man folks have never read his trash since it’s propogated by nearly every fundamentalist group out there on one level or another. Sad stuff.

 

[GeorgiaPeach]

Someone left a Chick tract on my grandfather’s grave earlier this year. The tent was still up from the funeral too. Low and behold, someone stuck a Chick tract right in the middle of one of the flower arrangements. They even took the time to have it laminated.

 

[vocatio]

Someone left a Chick tract on my grandfather’s grave earlier this year. The tent was still up from the funeral too. Low and behold, someone stuck a Chick tract right in the middle of one of the flower arrangements. They even took the time to have it laminated.

Like I said…it’s time to lock and load…take names later. I’ve seen the same tactics. It’s down right shameful… No worse than eurinating on someones grave on purpose. Sorry for the crudeness. But I once was on the extreme anti-Catholic side myself… but I had reasons to be really angry… I had to learn how to forgive the worst offenses. But I was never that far gone. My Catholicity stuck in that I always felt that everyone deserved dignity no matter what. I’m joking about the “lock and load stuff”… Just expressing anger in what I hope is seen as tongue in cheek.

 

[latin_rite]

jack chick is a idiot. any catholic who falls for his lies are idiots. to whom i say good riddance. If the Catholic church as a whole is a flock. then those we loose to chick tracks are nothing more than dingle berries. Good riddance to bad tidings.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

I think a lot of people see them as offensive, Catholic or non-Catholic. The booklets are sold in bulk and passed out to all and sundry. It’s the people buying them in bulk who ought to be truly ashamed of themselves.

I have to wonder why Mr. Chick doesn’t just read the Catechism for himself.

Probably because it comes from what he sees as an evil source. If so, he’s no more like to read it than a Catholic is going to read a book expounding satanism & the delights of satanolatry.​

There is no rational means of showing the CC is not a devilish fraud - in his world-view, the Church is satanic from square one, so everything we say, no matter how Christian, Biblical, Evangelical, & so on, can be dismissed as a diabolical deceit: the more Christian we sound, the more hellish that shows us to be. People who think this way have imprisoned themselves in a world-view from which escape is impossible.

They remind me of the dwarves in “The Last Battle”, who had made it impossible for themselves to believe in the reality of Aslan - no matter what he did, they had an explanation for it. In the same way, some Christian anti-Catholicism can explain the CC as devilish, no matter what it does or says.

Maybe because it would either take away his reason for existence and/or because he believes (perhaps even sincerely) that the Church has “hidden teachings” on all the things he writes about that it doesn’t tell the world or even its own members?

Whatever his reasons for remaining in abject ignorance and bigotry, the man needs our prayers and our pity. He writes a lot about supposedly disillusioned Catholics standing before God at the judgment. Well, it would be easy enough to write one in which he is standing before God and explaining the vile lies he’s been telling about Christ’s own Church for so many years. Yup. It ain’t gonna be pretty, poor man, unless he repents and recants.

It could well be that he is in perfectly good faith, & is entirely innocent of bigotry. From what I’ve heard now and again, he is easily imposed upon - so I think he is sincere, though often wrong about us. If he had “reasons [my **emphasis] for remaining in abject ignorance and bigotry” that would imply that he had at least a fleeting suspicion that he was wrong; & I see no evidence of that.​

 

[Mirdath]

It ain’t gonna be pretty, poor man, unless he repents and recants.

Funnily enough, that exact sentiment appears in basically every one of his tracts that doesn’t have the happy-hallelujah-sinner’s-prayer ending (and some that do!). Talk like that, and you’ve just bungie-jumped off the moral high ground without a rope :tsktsk:

The list of complaints one can have about Chick is long enough already without stooping to his level:

• inaccurate, slanted, and outright fabricated ‘facts’
• Alberto Riviera (see above)
• takes to extremes the bizarre persecution complex displayed by many American Christians in spite of the fact that the vast majority of Americans are, as it happens, Christian
• terrible art (although he later hired a fairly decent artist)
• ridiculous writing (the one with the gang drive-by – I think there’s only one of those – was vastly improved with every word and sound effect replaced by the word ‘bingo’)
• inane plots that appear to be resolved with a coin-flip deciding whether the protagonist says the sinner’s prayer or spends eternity getting pitchforked in the bum
• can sound more like Robert Anton Wilson than not the moment someone brings up sex, drugs, rock’n’roll, Jesuits, supercomputers, Communists, Islam, homosexuality (the blood-drive AIDS terrorism tract was both horrifying and amusing), roleplaying games, Christian rock (I agree with him here, except I think that it is a conspiracy to make the awful Haugen-Haas hymns you guys sing in church sound good by comparison), and pretty much everything else, possibly including himself
• is very likely sincere, committed, and believes he is doing God’s will, a hat trick that often leads to disastrous results but here fortunately led only to annoying cartoons
• sorry Gottle, he’s a bigot, bigotry does not imply knowledge (it usually walks hand-in-hand with its opposite)

The good stuff:

• without Jack Chick we would not have ‘Who Will Be Eaten First?’
• that’s pretty much it, I think

 

[cathopologist]

Our government’s internet police has blocked J.C’s website (although its easy to access via proxy).

Don’t feel bad though. Jack attacks nearly everyone (Jews, Protestants, Hindus, etc). At most, i’d label him as an ignorant bigot.

 

[Chris_LaRock]

Jack Chick says…

• The Jesuits killed Lincoln
• Castro is a Jesuit undercover
• The RCC is planning a mass extermination against non-Catholic Christians

 

[historyb]

Well that’s good to know we can get ready. Oh wait I’ll be part of the last one since I’m RCC

 

[strngrnrth]

Funnily enough, that exact sentiment appears in basically every one of his tracts that doesn’t have the happy-hallelujah-sinner’s-prayer ending (and some that do!). Talk like that, and you’ve just bungie-jumped off the moral high ground without a rope :tsktsk:

Why? Part of every moral argument is the implication that whoever is wrong should repent.

• inane plots that appear to be resolved with a coin-flip deciding whether the protagonist says the sinner’s prayer or spends eternity getting pitchforked in the bum

That’s the point – it’s a summary of a very prevalent theology. It’s helpful to learn what different people believe. For one thing, it helps you understand the people who run up and offer you a dinner invitation in a parking lot and if you refuse they laugh and say, “Whatever, you’re going to hell, I love you.” Once you see that they don’t expect the afterlife to hinge on a person’s behavior or motives or reflect a person’s value in any way, it makes a kind of sense that they can condemn you and like you at the same time

.- can sound more like Robert Anton Wilson than not the moment someone brings up sex, drugs, rock’n’roll, Jesuits, supercomputers, Communists, Islam, homosexuality (the blood-drive AIDS terrorism tract was both horrifying and amusing), roleplaying games, Christian rock

I used to know some people who thought WIlson knew everthing. One said I needed to wake up and start seeing the fnords.

(I agree with him here, except I think that it is a conspiracy to make the awful Haugen-Haas hymns you guys sing in church sound good by comparison),

No, it’s a conspiracy to make secular pop music sound unrepetitious, I believe

.- is very likely sincere, committed, and believes he is doing God’s will,

Probably. Could any other motive make someone embarrass himself, live in hiding and do the same job for what, about 50 years?

a hat trick

so someone’s following hockey around here.

that often leads to disastrous results but here fortunately led only to annoying cartoons

The thing is, disaster follows when people believe them. They think all they have to do is say one prayer and they will go to heaven and also be wise and healthy and everything right away. They feel they can stop thinking. When people believe they are under no further responsibility to think about what is right and wrong, they will be likely to do wrong things without knowing it a lot.

The good stuff:

• without Jack Chick we would not have ‘Who Will Be Eaten First?’
• that’s pretty much it, I think

No, there are other hysterical parodies out there. And fansites with hysterical reviews.