To the Editor:
After reading all the election lamentations in the January-February issue, I am still baffled by two unanswered questions.
The first question is why we don’t attack the churches in the forefront of the political battle to deprive us of legal equality with others—particularly the Roman Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist Convention churches, and the Church of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons). It seems to me that these churches are in clear violation of the conditions pertaining to their tax-exempt status. Hitting them where it would hurt the most, in their pockets, would make a good start.
Also, the cardinals, archbishops, bishops, and possibly even the priests of the Catholic Church are all surely unregistered representatives and agents of a foreign power: the Vatican. We should be pursuing them in the courts.
The second question is why we so completely fail to point out the basic failure of the entire “religious” right to even pretend to the basic moral requirement of Christianity: to love one’s neighbor as oneself. After that, we should haul their churches over their own coals by pointing out how vociferously they bear false witness against us. To call themselves Christian at all is an affront to the teaching of Christ and a blasphemy against God.
We are entirely too unwilling to go on the attack against those who persecute us. Why we should lie down under so vicious and unchristian an attack against us because it is “politically incorrect” to attack a church entirely defeats me. These churches attack our political rights and our right to equality before the law in defiance of the Constitution, and seek to impose their religious dogma on all their fellow Americans whether their beliefs are shared or not. Their stance is both anti-Christian and anti-American and should be furiously attacked as such. Instead, we lie down passively and let them command the political stage.
by Andrew Trimingham, Bermuda
To the Editor,
I enjoyed Mark Morford’s guest opinion, “Attention, Liberal Shoppers,” and shared his distress upon learning that Amazon.com supported the GOP with sixty percent of its political contributions. In his last paragraph, Mr. Morford contemplates a switch to more liberal-friendly Barnes and Noble, but there exists a less corporate choice. Powell’s Books of Portland is America’s largest independent bookstore (I believe), and offers a terrific selection through its website, www.powellsbooks.com. The website is a readers’ paradise, with plenty of essays, interviews, and other features, and according to www.buyblue.org, Powell’s sent 100 percent of its 2005 political contributions to liberal candidates.
by Dave King, Brooklyn, NY
