Rantings of a Black Polemicist

Blessings for Sale

Sunday, August 1st, 2004 | Free Thought | 42 Comments

I wouldn’t have believed this had I not seen it myself.

Evangelist Kerney Thomas will loan you a special hankie, put it in his special hope chest, pray for you and… Voila! Start expecting blessings. Oh. You send some money first though.

This is nothing more than elaborate superstition. Mr. Thomas is posing as some designated liaison between me and God, able to unlock my good fortune for the right price. Following Kerney’s ritual in order to fix my finances is no different than a baseball player turning his socks inside out before a game in order to hit a home run.

Evangelist Kerney Thomas has a paid telecast that airs on BET(Black Entertainment Television) during a specially designated block of programming, BET Inspiration. He offers to send out (free of charge) a “specially anointed Bible Red Blood of Jesus Handkerchief”. I couldn’t resist. I called, gave my information and received the special handkerchief a week or so later. After receiving the special hankie, I was instructed to:

1. Write down my name and the amount of money needed from God
2. Place the hankie on my wallet overnight (it’s very important that it only be one night)
3. Send the hankie back with my “biggest [cash] bill”, check or credit card information
4. Wait for him to mail out a “sealed envelope with 3 prophecies” about what’s coming my way

The “Anointed, Bible Red Blood of Jesus Handkerchief”. I was supposed to feel the “anointing” when I touched it, but I didn’t get anything.

The letter that came with the special hankie went right to work. Kerney claims: “Everything in your life will soon fit together, like a key in a lock of a door that’s about to be opened”. He shares with me gender-unspecific prayer that he’s already said on my behalf, with the right mail-merge fields populated from the info I’d already given him. For some reason, the letter was addressed to “Perry” instead of “Melvin”. I think one of the data entry people screwed up when they took down my info from the voice message I was asked to leave. Maybe that’s why I didn’t feel the “anointing”.

The ritual I must follow if I want to get my blessing.

There’s a hook. Supposedly God’s given him 3 different messages to pass on to me, and he’s written them down and sealed them in an envelope. I don’t get to see the prophecies unless I send back the hankie and a “sacrifice” or “seed” (read: payment). He’ll throw away my prophecies if I don’t get back to him, as he doesn’t want them to “fall into the wrong hands”. What? I don’t get it. Supposedly, he’s done all this praying on my behalf and went through the trouble of writing down these prophecies, but didn’t mail them out to me withthe special hankie? Why does he need to pray with my returned hankie (and deposit my check) if he’s heard what’s in store for me directly from God before he even mailed me the hankie and letter? And why doesn’t he just put my envelope in a safe place instead of throwing it away if he doesn’t hear back from me soon?

Pick desired blessing and send payment.

Most unconscionable of all, he promises me: “the greater [my] sacrifice, the greater [my] blessings”. So the more money I send him, the more I’ll be blessed. During his telecast, he showcases people who’ve prayed with the hankie, given money and then received unexpected money, or resolutions to problems.

The more I send, the more blessed I’ll be.

What’s worse here is that people buy into this concept and variations of it on a regular basis. BET takes money from these con-artists and broadcasts their deception without any regard to the claims they make. There are many forces working against blacks in America. Greedy, deceptive evangelists are just one of the many groups that prey on blind faith and the entitlement mentality that holds so many of us back.

To make positive change in your life, address issues directly. If you’re broke, giving money to your pastor and hoping that your bills will be paid isn’t going to change anything for the better. Waiting for checks to drop out of the sky or pre-approved credit cards to materialize won’t cut it. Give your money to a good accountant or financial planner instead.

The entire letter Kerney Thomas sent me (click to enlarge):
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Racism and the Mormon Faith

Wednesday, June 16th, 2004 | Free Thought | 29 Comments

One of my closest friends is a Mormon, a member of the Church of Latter Day Saints. He’s one of the most refreshingly warm and honest people I’ve ever met. We used to work together and I’ve kept in touch with him and his family ever since. Despite our great relationship, I sometimes wonder if he believes the stuff his church teaches him - about me.

During one of my Christian fundamentalist father’s signature theological rants, I was informed that, among other things, racism is deeply embedded in the church’s doctrines. After some investigation of my own, I was appalled at what I found.

Some Background

Latter Day Saints (LDS) believe that in 1827, their church’s founder, Joseph Smith, saw a vision of an angel who revealed a set of gold plates containing what is now the Book of Mormon. The book was written in “reformed Egyptian”, but by gazing into two stones Smith could translate the text into English. Smith allowed no one else to see the gold plates citing that instant death would befall them. After two-and-a-half years translating the 275,000-word document, Smith returned the gold plates to the angel that revealed them to him.

Dark-Skinned People Are Cursed by God

In the book of Mormon, it is made clear that dark skin is a curse from God, as darker-skinned people are descendants of Cain, who killed his brother Abel. Any children born from a union between a “fair and delightsome” white person and a dark-skinned person will be cursed just the same.:

2 NEPHI 5:21-24 (emphasis added)

And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them.

And thus saith the Lord God: I will cause that they shall be loathsome unto thy people, save they shall repent of their iniquities.

And cursed shall be the seed of him that mixeth with their seed; for they shall be cursed even with the same cursing. And the Lord spake it, and it was done.

And because of their cursing which was upon them they did become an idle people, full of mischief and subtlety, and did seek in the wilderness for beasts of prey.

According to Apostle Mark E. Peterson, blacks want more than just equal rights. They want to intermarry with whites absorb completely into the white race.

From “Race Problems - As They Affect The Church,” Address delivered at Brigham Young University, August 27, 1954 (emphasis added):

I think I have read enough to give you an idea of what the Negro is after. He is not just seeking the opportunity of sitting down in a cafe where white people eat. He isn’t just trying to ride on the same streetcar or the same Pullman car with white people. It isn’t that he just desires to go to the same theater as the white people. From this, and other interviews I have read, it appears that the Negro seeks absorption with the white race. He will not be satisfied until he achieves it by intermarriage. That is his objective and we must face it. We must not allow our feelings to carry us away, nor must we feel so sorry for Negroes that we will open our arms and embrace them with everything we have. Remember the little statement that we used to say about sin, “First we pity, then endure, then embrace”…

One of the great leaders of the Church, Joseph Fielding Smith (1876 - 1972) wrote in his Doctrines of Salvation, pp. 65-66 (emphasis added):

There were no neutrals in the war in heaven. All took sides either with Christ or with Satan. Every man had his agency there, and men receive rewards here based upon their actions there, just as they will receive rewards hereafter for deeds done in the body. The Negro, evidently, is receiving the reward he merits.

“Revelation” in 1978 Declares Blacks Can Have Full Equality

On March 6, 1978 a revelation was given to General Authority Spencer W. Kimball stating that blacks could become priests in the church. The change was incorporated into the Mormon book of scripture Doctrine and Covenants. Interestingly enough, although the practice of the church has changed here, the doctrine regarding blacks being cursed still remains.

Flock-fleecing pays well

Friday, May 28th, 2004 | Free Thought | 50 Comments

Christianity insists that people believe assertions that can’t be proven. By definition, the supernatural lies outside the natural realm - the sphere of man’s understanding. According to scripture, faith in the unseen and unknown is so important that nothing but damnation awaits even those that lived a virtuous life or were never fortunate enough to learn about the nature of God. No one is born with this knowledge, it is taught. Faith itself is virtue, and questioning dogma is taboo.

Dr. Creflo Dollar of World Changers Church International assures his flock that their financial blessing is on its way - as soon as they write out a check to his church

Some preachers exploit the blind faith of their followers to levels that boggle the mind. I was watching BET this morning and Creflo Dollar (that’s really his name) was preaching to his flock about how to unlock their financial blessings. This is the 4th time I’ve caught his show, and the technique he uses doesn’t change much:

#1: God Wants You to Be Rich:

He talks about how followers of God are entitled to financial prosperity, and that it is imminent for each one of them.

#2: Giving is the Key to Receiving:

He then quotes a string of vague scriptures out of context, assigning his own meaning to them.

I listened to him open his sermon by promising that he would show where God had revealed how to tell exactly when a financial “blessing” would come. Instead, he started rattling off a series of unrelated scriptures about rain. He then linked rain to financial giving with a neat little metaphor - comparing evaporation and condensation in the sky to giving money to God (through him, that is) and rain to “blessings” being showered on those who gave. He went on to talk about the rewards of not only giving consistently, but without any regard to one’s financial situation. He took it even further talking about “sacrificial giving”, which I could only take that to mean giving money one can’t really afford to give.

He went on to promise specifically that God would give multi-million dollar business ideas to people who faithfully gave. Then he instructed his flock to give not what they wanted to give, but what they heard God telling them to.

What’s most reprehensible (or brilliant) here is that faith is the driving force behind all of this. Not being blessed? It’s because you don’t have enough faith. How dare you question what God has planned for your life?

Dr. Dollar quite effectively removes his followers’ will to question his “teachings”, and has created quite a fortune by doing so. His church has over 20,000 members. He drives a black Rolls-Royce, flies to speaking engagements in his own $5 million Learjet and lives on a $1 million gated Atlanta estate. God is certainly blessing him more than some of his congregation, who catch public transportation to hear him speak. Dr. Dollar is an extreme example of the problem with blind faith.

This much is clear: any dogma demanding blind acceptance else suffer personal hardship or eternal damnation does so out of need. Only by removing reason and substituting faith can that doctrine be free to survive.