[Vision2020] Appraise the Lord

[g. crabtree]

Joan, pleasure to have you back on the V. I guess running your own vanity 
web forum isn't filling your time the way you might have hoped. To bad about 
that.

Many of your passionate, foam flecked assertions,couched in the form of a 
question,  have been answered by myself and others, on this forum and 
elsewhere, but I'll take one more stab at a few of the more ridiculous.

You breathlessly inquire:

> To begin, which of the religious groups you name, Gary, apart from Christ
> Church, have launched concerted, organized, and frequently successful
> attacks against gays and lesbians, local historians and philosophers, the
> University of Idaho, the Moscow City Council, the Latah Economic
> Development Council, city and county zoning code and individual critics?

So where do I go to view the piles of the broken and the battered? Where is 
the memorial to all the fallen philosophers and historians who gave all for 
the cause? The monument to those who gave their last full measure? I am 
fairly certain that evangelizing the homosexual's and responding to remarks 
made by others mentioned in your little screed rises to the level of 
"attack." Should I be wrong perhaps you should have a word with the 
prosecutor and quit wasting time trying to convince me of this groups 
atrocities.

You earnestly ask:

> Further, can you point to some instance in which Moscow's Catholics have
> gone hammer and tongs after Moscow's Protestants?  What about vice-
> versa?  Do we have a hitherto hidden problem here with the Orange and the
> Green?

Can you? Can you point out another congregation in Moscow that is covered in 
hammer and tong marks? I sure haven't seen any letters to the editor 
denouncing Unitarians. No handbills excoriating Catholics and nobody 
standing on soapbox's in friendship square preaching the damnation of 
Christian Scientists. Open warfare does not seem to have broken out between 
the sects.

You legitimately query:

> Have any of our local Latter-Day Saints called for the exile or stoning
> of gays and lesbians?

OK. I admit that I have big problems with this, but the individual who made 
this comment is not Wilson and the matter has been addressed thoroughly in 
the C/A as well as on Wilson's blog. I am satisfied that stones are not 
being stockpiled and that the gay community is in no danger. I do hope at 
some point to be able to talk directly to Mr. Dickison and ask him face to 
face what the heck he had in mind with this dumb ass comment.

In closing, please allow me to point out that just because you make bold 
pronouncements and assertions with regard to what Christ Church is and is 
not does not make them revealed truth. Unless you can bring verifiable facts 
to the discussion all you spout is your own jaundiced opinion. I am only too 
willing to concede that you do a masterful job of taking a minute molehill 
and reshape it into a mighty mountain. Perhaps you could apply this skill to 
your "liberal moscow" website. It's clear that you desperately need a hobby.

Yours for a shiny new day,
G. Crabtree


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joan Opyr" <joanopyr at moscow.com>
To: <vision2020 at moscow.com>
Sent: Sunday, June 25, 2006 4:54 PM
Subject: [Vision2020] Appraise the Lord


> Gary Crabtree asks (disingenuously because he already has his answer):
>
> "What specifically is it about this group of people [Christ Church] that
> elicits the level of criticism displayed here . . . Why is Christ Church
> solely taken to task for philosophy's that could be laid equally at the
> doors of any number of other denominations? . . . I do feel a small need
> to challenge the blind assertions that this group is somehow evil . . .
> In your explanation, please include for us why any point that you care to
> make can be only said of C.C. and not leveled against the Roman
> Catholics, the Latter-Day Saints, the Christian Scientists, the Baptists
> or any other of a  number of other religious groups in the area. If you
> can't come up with something totally unique to Pastor Wilson and Co.,
> please explain why you don't attack these other groups with the same
> fervor and ferocity that you reserve for them. I anxiously await your
> explanation."
>
> Gary has long since decided that 1) Doug Wilson and the members of Christ
> Church are one and the same and, therefore, that 2) any criticism of Doug
> Wilson is of necessity a criticism of the Christ Church rank and file.
> Christ Church members who try to answer Gary are dismissed as
> disgruntled.  Non-church members are just dull-witted, feckless,
> hypocritical cranks.  In short, Gary is not asking his questions in good
> faith, and it would do us all well as we attempt to answer them to bear
> this in mind.  Nevertheless, perhaps we might further the conversation
> (such as it is) by asking Gary a few questions in return.
>
> To begin, which of the religious groups you name, Gary, apart from Christ
> Church, have launched concerted, organized, and frequently successful
> attacks against gays and lesbians, local historians and philosophers, the
> University of Idaho, the Moscow City Council, the Latah Economic
> Development Council, city and county zoning code and individual critics?
>
> Further, can you point to some instance in which Moscow's Catholics have
> gone hammer and tongs after Moscow's Protestants?  What about vice-
> versa?  Do we have a hitherto hidden problem here with the Orange and the
> Green?
>
> Have any of our local Latter-Day Saints called for the exile or stoning
> of gays and lesbians?  Have any of our Baptists -- Southern, American,
> Freewill or Primitive --  insisted that our Central Business District be
> spot-zoned to accommodate an illegally-located downtown college?  Have
> any of our Lutheran brethren --  Wisconsin Synod, Missouri Synod, or
> mainline evangelical - ever espoused a "strategic vision" of Moscow as a
> Calvinist theocracy and then launched a visible effort to make that
> vision so?
>
> During the great debate over Moscow's idiotic breast and butt crack
> ordinance, Doug Wilson stood before the city council and declared, "I
> speak for 850 people."  Is there any other pastor, minister, or priest in
> town who would or could make that sort of all-encompassing truth claim?
> Do any of Moscow's other religious leaders speak for their congregations
> in a single gathered "I contain multitudes" voice, or do they speak only
> for themselves and their own personal understandings of their respective
> church doctrines?  Remember, we are talking about individual ministers,
> here; we're not talking about the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, or
> the Dalai Lama.
>
> If we want to talk about freedom of religion within Christ Church, then
> why don't we look at we what has happened to those members who have
> openly sought to exercise it?  We might look at Michael Metzler, whom
> Gary dismisses as "disgruntled."  We might look at Duck Schuler, or Terry
> Morin, or the two men named Charles who filed the charges against the
> Morton Street casino.  Can anyone out there name a single Christ Church
> member who has risen up and spoken out in contradictory fashion to Doug
> Wilson who has not been slapped down?  Any who have spoken up, not backed
> down, and succeeded in remaining within the flock?  If Christ Church does
> practice freedom of religion, it is not free for the individual.  The
> individual's free religious thoughts are subject to the correction of
> Doug Wilson.  Is the freedom to keep your mouth, eyes, and ears shut
> really freedom?
>
> I don't use the word cult lightly.  Like Joe Campbell, I have had qualms
> in the past about applying it to Christ Church, but Doug Wilson is bright
> and charismatic, and what we have here, I believe, is a powerful cult of
> personality.  Doug has a strategic vision for his church and for the
> Palouse.  His vision is not my vision, and I am therefore in the way.  If
> his vision is not your vision, then you are also in the way.  Perhaps
> you're asking right now, "Well, who cares?  He'll never succeed in
> imposing his vision on all of us annoying freethinkers."  What I say to
> that is look around you, and look damned carefully.
>
> New St. Andrews College is located in the Central Business District.
> City zoning law expressly forbade this, but our last city council rewrote
> that law to suit Doug Wilson.  Planning and Zoning will soon be asked to
> rezone of the silo property south of town.  Why?  Ask Doug Wilson.  He
> has plans, big plans.  Anselm House and New St. Andrews are back off the
> tax rolls.  The tax-exempt coffee shop and bookstore in the NuArt is free
> to compete with the tax-paying coffee shops and bookstore directly across
> the street.  NSA students fill the Jackson Street parking lot, though
> that was specifically created for retail use.
>
> Doug Wilson has been remarkably successful in implementing his "stratgic
> vision" for Moscow and the Palouse.  If you can name another church with
> such a vision; one that has the political will and means to achieve that
> vision (and if the vision does not, in my opinion, bode well for me or my
> family) then I will happily do my homework, begin my critique, and help
> to organize the loyal opposition.  Until then, tag: Doug's it.
>
> Joan Opyr/Auntie Establishment
> www.joanopyr.com
>
>
> ---------------------------------------------
> This message was sent by First Step Internet.
>           http://www.fsr.com/
>
>
> =====================================================
> List services made available by First Step Internet,
> serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
>               http://www.fsr.net
>          mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
> ====================================================
>