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The enemy is not Mormonism but the antireligious movies and books, such as Bill Maher’s new movie ‘Religulous’:
nypost.com/seven/10012008/entertainment/movies/omigod__131506.htm
WE know there is no God because Bill Maher is not immediately struck dead when he opines in his atheist documentary “Religulous” that he’d no sooner swear on the King James Bible than the Rick James Bible.
A just God would never let such a tragic joke stand.
Talking to such lotus eaters as North Carolina truckers, an Orthodox Jew demonstrating gadgets built to get around Sabbath restrictions, an actor playing Jesus in a theme park, and Muslims in Amsterdam and Jerusalem, Maher finds them all pretty much the same. They are disciples of “nonsense and fantasy,” a point underlined by “Borat” director Larry Charles with pop songs, funny stock footage, biblical cartoons and a shot of magical Mormon undies.
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No defender of any religion could withstand five minutes of cross-examination from a junior varsity debater, but Maher at least seeks out some worthy targets. Dr. Francis Collins, the Christian who heads the human genome project, claims that the Gospels were written by eyewitnesses. When pressed, he admits they were “within a couple of decades of eyewitnesses.”
In one funny segment, Maher grills Jeremiah Cummings - once a member of Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, now a guy who preaches a gospel that includes instructions to buy his DVDs. Which he sells wearing lizard-skin boots and golden bling. “Just call me Doctor,” says Cummings. A title informs us that he has no degree of any kind. Defending his wardrobe, Cummings says, “Jesus dressed very well!” Maher is skeptical that the Savior’s garments were as fashionable as the fall line of Imitation of Christ, but Cummings replies, “It was linen! It was fine linen!”
A formerly gay guy who says he got straight when he got straight with the Lord, claims “Nobody is born gay.” “Really?” says Maher. “Have you ever met Little Richard?” The ex-gay thinks all gays are unhappy. Maher corrects him (cue footage of Gay Pride saturnalia): “Some of them seem absolutely thrilled.”
When religion is the subject, everything seems extra weird: Maher is interviewing a Muslim leader when the guy’s cellphone rings. The ringtone is the guitar riff from Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir.”
Though Maher takes a few pokes at President Bush and John McCain, he doesn’t miss an opportunity to take apart a Jesus-loving Democrat, Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas, who says that on evolution, “the scientific community is a little divided,” and later adds - not irrelevantly - “You don’t have to pass an IQ test to be in the Senate.”
Maher isn’t unfair. Simply restating religious tenets to believers amounts to ridiculing them, but so be it. Often his subjects can’t or won’t answer a reasonable question. Charged with stupidity in the court of intellectual inquiry, they plead the Fifth.
The average believer may stiffen and think: I’m not one of these Armageddon nuts, these turbaned freaks who kill cartoonists. But that’s only because most sophisticated people help themselves to the moral teachings of religion while discarding the blather about Adam’s rib or the Earth being only 5,000 years old. And if you think Scientology and Mormonism are crazy, you shouldn’t suspend your disbelief when a priest tells you you’re drinking the blood of a guy who’s been dead for 2,000 years.
Maher’s sense of humor deserts him in the end, though, when in an apocalyptic montage of fire and hate (bin Laden, Pat Robertson), he suggests all religions are equally bent on destruction of the Earth. It’s fatuous to suggest that the Iraq war was launched because of religion or that belief in the Book of Revelation is the same as organizing terrorist attacks. There is an urgent plea here, also: That those of us who know better but go along with religion anyway are enablers. “Why,” Maher wants to know, “is believing things without evidence good?”
RELIGULOUS
Hell’s angel.
It is such movies that show no respect for others and their beliefs.
nypost.com/seven/10012008/entertainment/movies/omigod__131506.htm
WE know there is no God because Bill Maher is not immediately struck dead when he opines in his atheist documentary “Religulous” that he’d no sooner swear on the King James Bible than the Rick James Bible.
A just God would never let such a tragic joke stand.
Talking to such lotus eaters as North Carolina truckers, an Orthodox Jew demonstrating gadgets built to get around Sabbath restrictions, an actor playing Jesus in a theme park, and Muslims in Amsterdam and Jerusalem, Maher finds them all pretty much the same. They are disciples of “nonsense and fantasy,” a point underlined by “Borat” director Larry Charles with pop songs, funny stock footage, biblical cartoons and a shot of magical Mormon undies.
Sitcom Kid Finds God
PHOTOS: Hollywood’s Most Religious Celebs
No defender of any religion could withstand five minutes of cross-examination from a junior varsity debater, but Maher at least seeks out some worthy targets. Dr. Francis Collins, the Christian who heads the human genome project, claims that the Gospels were written by eyewitnesses. When pressed, he admits they were “within a couple of decades of eyewitnesses.”
In one funny segment, Maher grills Jeremiah Cummings - once a member of Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, now a guy who preaches a gospel that includes instructions to buy his DVDs. Which he sells wearing lizard-skin boots and golden bling. “Just call me Doctor,” says Cummings. A title informs us that he has no degree of any kind. Defending his wardrobe, Cummings says, “Jesus dressed very well!” Maher is skeptical that the Savior’s garments were as fashionable as the fall line of Imitation of Christ, but Cummings replies, “It was linen! It was fine linen!”
A formerly gay guy who says he got straight when he got straight with the Lord, claims “Nobody is born gay.” “Really?” says Maher. “Have you ever met Little Richard?” The ex-gay thinks all gays are unhappy. Maher corrects him (cue footage of Gay Pride saturnalia): “Some of them seem absolutely thrilled.”
When religion is the subject, everything seems extra weird: Maher is interviewing a Muslim leader when the guy’s cellphone rings. The ringtone is the guitar riff from Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir.”
Though Maher takes a few pokes at President Bush and John McCain, he doesn’t miss an opportunity to take apart a Jesus-loving Democrat, Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas, who says that on evolution, “the scientific community is a little divided,” and later adds - not irrelevantly - “You don’t have to pass an IQ test to be in the Senate.”
Maher isn’t unfair. Simply restating religious tenets to believers amounts to ridiculing them, but so be it. Often his subjects can’t or won’t answer a reasonable question. Charged with stupidity in the court of intellectual inquiry, they plead the Fifth.
The average believer may stiffen and think: I’m not one of these Armageddon nuts, these turbaned freaks who kill cartoonists. But that’s only because most sophisticated people help themselves to the moral teachings of religion while discarding the blather about Adam’s rib or the Earth being only 5,000 years old. And if you think Scientology and Mormonism are crazy, you shouldn’t suspend your disbelief when a priest tells you you’re drinking the blood of a guy who’s been dead for 2,000 years.
Maher’s sense of humor deserts him in the end, though, when in an apocalyptic montage of fire and hate (bin Laden, Pat Robertson), he suggests all religions are equally bent on destruction of the Earth. It’s fatuous to suggest that the Iraq war was launched because of religion or that belief in the Book of Revelation is the same as organizing terrorist attacks. There is an urgent plea here, also: That those of us who know better but go along with religion anyway are enablers. “Why,” Maher wants to know, “is believing things without evidence good?”
RELIGULOUS
Hell’s angel.
It is such movies that show no respect for others and their beliefs.
Mormons are not the enemy, agreed one hundred percent.