Senator Bill Heffernan, quoted in Katharine Murphy, ‘Bill of the dead’, Melbourne Age, 29 Mar. 2007:

When I was a kid at boarding school, I told on a teacher for saying ‘bloody’.

[Well, you certainly were a precious little nark, weren't you, Bill?]

Anonymous letter to editor (headlined ‘Encouraging Letters’), Creation News, (John Mackay’s Creation Research), Mar. 2007, 2:

Just watched your … new DVD speaking to the UK parliamentarians. And (in my humble opinion) this is the best DVD you’ve done in regard to clearly explaining the philosophy behind these issues. The only down side was we couldn’t see the face of the politician who was ‘aghast’ that someone might mention that the Bible teaches that homosexuals should be stoned to death.

[Straight out of the Christian Reconstructionist handbook. Thanks for sharing.]

John Mackay, ibid., 1:

The Christian Gospel does have political implication and application, but these are exclusively based on Creator and creation. Political systems including democracies which are rejecting Christianity are almost totally evolutionary-based … Where the Christian gospel succeeds, evolution and millions of years will be exposed for the fables they are, with one major consequence - all political applications derived from evolution will be challenged and replaced.

[And I guess that includes democracy. Thanks, John, we can't say we weren't warned.]

More Mackay, ibid., 3:

The [crypto-creationist Intelligent Design - ID] movement has made leaps and bounds in some ex-communist countries, but the fact that it is not a Christian movement shows in its embracement by groups such as the Krishnas … Intelligent Design - without any reference to the person of the God who did the creating - fits well [with] the whole religion of Krishna. ID gives you fuzzy gods whom you get to define, thus making yourself a god also … Again we warn people that Intelligent Design is actually an enemy of Christianity until it gets around to humbling itself before the Creator, who is the Christ, the Lord Jehovah, Elohim, Jesus, Saviour, Redeemer and God.

[Don't ever think that dyed-in-the-wool Young Earth Creationists (YECs) like John Mackay have a soft spot for ID. They utterly despise it. It's only the pussy-footing, one-foot-in-both-camps types like Bill Muehlenberg who give it any air-time in the YEC wonderland.]

Australian Prayer Network, ‘Strong Discipline Strengthens Character and Produces Successful Individuals’, International News, 26 Mar. 2007:

‘The debate over whether Chief Executive Officers are born or made remains unresolved, but there is one thing they overwhelmingly have in common. As children, they were paddled, belted, switched or swatted’ [USA Today] … The 20 CEOs who were interviewed were quick to say however that they were never abused.

[Conservative Christian newsletters and blogs often carry little items like this. Kind of makes you wonder, doesn't it?]

Mrs Lorraine Hogan, Nalkaba NSW, letter in Family World News, Mar. 2007, 3:

Dear Rev. Nile,… Australians need to wake up before it is too late and I urge anyone to look online at [a particular website] as it explains it all and what the MUSLIMS are up to. Once I was a proud Australian but not any more thanks to our Government as they let them into our country. They are here and are slowly taking over in every city and I live in country NSW and they are most likely here also.

[That's right, Lorraine. First it was the little green men, then the Communists and now the Muslims, all weevilling away at our precious Christian heritage. Bob Menzies would have fixed 'em right up.]

Fred Nile, Christian Democratic Party, ibid., 7:

The following three population charts reveal an alarming future for Australia, that Australia will become a Muslim nation like Saudi Arabia within four generations.

[Well, so long as we get the oil.]

Fred Nile, ‘Fred Nile - Record Breaker’, ibid., (CDP NSW Election Liftout, Feb. 2007, 3):

[Fred] broke the record at the Theological College when he was forced to spend an extra sixth year in study because the Principal said, ‘Fred Nile still believed the Bible was true.’

[I believe you, Fred, though thousands might have a bit of a problem.]

Warwick Marsh, Fatherhood Foundation email newsletter, 19 Mar. 2007:

Dr Koenig from his six-year study said that: ‘People who attended a religious service at least once a week were 46% less likely to die.’

[Now that's what I call a statistic! But how will the poor blighters ever get to heaven?]

More breaking news from the Fatherhood Foundation, ibid.:

[Fathers' rights group] Dads in Distress support mandatory DNA at birth.

[I didn't realise it was optional.]

Bill Muehlenberg, ‘Why We Are Losing to the Terrorists‘, CultureWatch, 17 Mar. 2007, regarding the ‘Khalid confessions’:

I am not an authority on this particular issue.

[Bill, as you well know, you're not an authority on any issue at all. Stop giving yourself airs.]

David Demick, ‘Who’s inheriting the wind now?’, Creation magazine (Creation Ministries International), Mar.-May 2007, 36):

Nietzsche suffered from insanity at the end of his life - a condition some commentators link to his godless philosophies.

[Hmm, not a bad slogan: 'Be an atheist: go nuts!']

Jack Sonnemann, Australian Federation for the Family, letter in New Life, 15 Mar. 2007:

The [Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development] in March 2006 reported that Australia leads the world in sexual assault, including rape.

[Yup. And the moon's made of green cheese.]

Fred Nile, Christian Democratic Party, Family World News, Mar. 2007, 2:

There are still doubts over the health safety of recycled sewage, especially as Sydney has the highest level of HIV/AIDS because of the large homosexual community. HIV/AIDS virus is difficult to remove from blood, how much more difficult from recycled sewage?

[Good on you, Fred. Another Nobel Prize looming?]

Senator Steve Fielding, Family First Party, No One in Government is Responsible for TV Ads (media release), 14 Feb. 2007:

Raunchy evening TV ads promote phone sex, dating services and lewd mobile screensavers and FAMILY FIRST wants to know how such smut and filth is allowed … Is anyone in the Howard Government responsible for what our kids see on TV, for ensuring that sex, smut and sleaze is not used to pollute our kids’ minds?

[What's the difference between 'filth', 'smut' and 'sleaze'? Maybe I should ask an expert like Steve.]

Jim Wallace, Australian Christian Lobby (ACL), National Newsletter, Mar. 2007:

The ‘helicopter view’ that ACL and others maintain of politics and government allows us to identify opportunities and threats to which we need a Christian response.

['Helicopter view', eh? Well, their minds are certainly in a spin, and their views are always over the top. And some of them seem to hover on the edge of sanity. Perhaps I should stop.]

Brian Houston, Hillsong (Pentecostal megachurch) supremo, as quoted in Tanya Levin, ‘Book of Revelations’, Bulletin, 13 Mar. 2007, 31:

It’s true! MONEY is inevitably the bottom line of everything.

[And they call us materialists!]

And from the same article, 33:

Christianese … [A] language that is harder to learn than most people realise:‘Frozen Chosen’ - Congregants who won’t follow instructions quickly enough …

‘Manifest’ - To behave as if demons are controlling you - ‘I showed my parents my bad report card and they started manifesting’.

[My parents often manifested. But then they really were demons.]

And one more, 34:

Hillsong publishes its accounts and says that its books are open. But people who have asked to see the books describe being looked at up and down, and being told they had an attitude problem.

[Quelle surprise!]

Peter Stokes, Salt Shakers, Briefing Notes and Prayer Overheads, Mar. 2007:

Constant steady rain is needed to replenish the earth and the dams. It is forecast for March - let us pray it down!

[Thousands of worthy souls have been 'praying it down' for six weeks, culminating in last weekend's National Solemn Assembly in Canberra. Apart from Cyclone George, looks like El Nino 1, God 0.]

Jonathan Sarfati, Creation Ministries International, Disembowelling the Christian faith, CultureWatch discussion, 1 Mar. 2007:

[Melbourne 'Age' columnist, Catherine] Deveny is yet another silly bint hired by a leftist rag for no other reason than [that] she is an embittered apostate (being an unmarried mother undoubtedly helps too).

[Front-runner for Fundamentalist Quote of the Year. And don't forget that this quote was approved for inclusion on the CultureWatch site by Bill Muehlenberg himself. Sarfati and Muehlenberg should both be reminded of this gem loudly and often.]

Pastor Becky Fischer, Kids in Ministry (US), as quoted in Mick Brown ‘Kindergarten of Christ’, Melbourne Age Good Weekend, 10 Feb. 2007:

You want to screw up a kid’s life, Fischer [says], send them to university. ‘They’ll turn his head so inside out and upside down he won’t even know which end he’s supposed to wipe.’

[How genteel!]

Warwick Marsh, Fatherhood Foundation, email to supporters, 26 Feb. 2007:

Most lesbian women have been betrayed or neglected by the patriarch of their life.

[One question, Warwick. Did you pull this information out of the hat before or after the rabbit?]

Kathleen Melonakos, Delaware Family Foundation, as quoted in Babette Francis, Endeavour Forum, ‘Dangers of a “same-sex” register’, News Weekly, 3 Mar. 2007:

… [W]e know that homosexuality can be prevented, in many cases, or substantially healed in adulthood when there is sufficient motivation and help.

[Just like a lot of other loathsome diseases, eh, Kathleen?]

Robert Bom, Rockhampton Qld., letter in News Weekly, 3 Mar. 2007:

Governments could consider introducing similar types of warning notices and advertising for abortion as … applies to smoking. Consideration could be given for mandatory warning notices about the dangers of abortion to be placed in clinics and on application forms for terminations of pregnancies.

[Why stop there, Robert? Maybe women who need abortions because they've committed adultery could be made to wear a big, scarlet letter 'A' round their necks, just like in the good old days.]

Cliff Wilson, co-editor New Life, 1 Mar. 2007:

People have difficulty in believing the story of Jonah being swallowed by a great fish but would have no trouble in believing [a recent news story] where a diver fought off a huge white pointer to escape the jaws of death.

[Speaking for myself, Cliff, I have no trouble accepting the latter story, but have enormous difficulty with the former, especially Jonah's 'three days and nights in the belly of the fish'. This clearly doesn't worry you at all. And that's what worries me.]

Filed in: Their Own Mouths