The American Family Association has really topped themselves:
Let Your “Light” Shine For Christ This Christmas Season!
Looking for an effective way to express your Christian faith this Christmas season to honor our Lord Jesus? Now you can…. with the “Original Christmas Cross” yard decoration.
Yes, thanks to the AFA, Christians everywhere can have their very own burning cross in their front yard for a mere $81.85, plus shipping and handling. Oddly enough, this does not seem to be a big seller in African American communities.
In all seriousness, I guess you can’t expect people who reject evolution, who think the world was created 6,000 years ago, and who think Adam and Eve roamed the world with dinosaurs to know anything about basic American history, can you?
(via)
BC
Now that Obama has been elected, it is no longer in mode to actually burn a cross – Secret Service and all that. This gives those yahoos a way of burning a cross under cover of saying they’re celebrating Xmas – only thing is, they have to do it on their own property rather than on the target’s property. If you have to have a cover for what you are doing, it isn’t very Christ-like. But, in religious imagery, the cross is for Easter and the star is for Xmas.
JL
For $81.85 you could feed a family that has to live in a manger for a week. Just a thought.
Brian J
The obvious intent was not to, you know, resemble a burning cross in the sense of Klan rallies, that 1989 Maddona video, and the hysterical rants about persecution of Christianity, but that’s what happened. You’d think that someone, anyone, who saw this might look at this and think it didn’t look right, but I guess not.
The real question is, will B. Hussein Obama, Gay Mooooslim be too busy trying to bring about Sharia law to ban this and other lovely displays of suffering?
dahankster
Ah yes. And you too can defy a Commandment with this graven image from Ronco, er, the AFA.
Conservatively Liberal
Some wingnut called into C-SPAN this am and complained about all of the Jews that Obama is surrounding himself with. Then the nut said that he will be happy when there isn’t a Jewish holiday that the government recognizes. The moderator cut him off at that point.
Todays GOP; what ain’t fruit is nuts.
jon
Two pieces of wood: $3
Two strands of white lights: $5
A stand from a broken lamp: free
God’s markup: 1000%
Sometimes being an atheist just doesn’t make cents.
Keith
It’s an "Original Christmas Cross", too, so folks can feel closer to the biblical story about Jesus being crucified on a burning cross because he supported traditional marriage and a culture of life.
Leo
@Conservatively Liberal: So does that mean he doesn’t agree with Joe the Plumber that a vote for Obama is a vote for the death of Israel?
Comrade Stuck
So now the Maji followed a burning cross in the sky to see baby jeebus, while wearing white sheets and pointy hats no doubt. You can too, for an extra $9.95
Hurry up while supplies last and afore Comrade Obama levies his reparations tax.
PaulRay
OK, I’m no Christian, but.], we all know, Christmas is supposed to be the day Jesus was born. The Cross, represents his death (and ever so logical resurrection). Seeing this, I get the creepy image of a small baby, innocent, pure and facing the gruesome death he’ll experience when he grows up. As things to hang over a crib (or manger, if you like), I’m thinking duckies and elephants in pastel colors would be much more age appropriate.
PaulRay
Sorry about the odd punctuation, I missed it until I’d posted and there’s no edit function here. Curse these small keyboards! :oP
Dennis - SGMM
Original Christmas Cross: $81.85
Letting your neighbors know just how stupid you really are: Priceless.
dmsilev
Wait a minute, a Christmas cross? Check me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the cross from the other end of Jesus’s life?
-dms
Punchy
82 bones for two pieces of wood, a nail, and some cheap-ass lights? These must be of Nigerian origin.
Conservatively Liberal
@Leo:
Cognitive dissonance, a wingnuts best friend. Say no more… ;)
@dmsilev:
Yes, and they are celebrating his death because they are too chickenshit to take personal responsibility for their own sins. Just like any good christian, they get to dump all of their fuckups on someone else and walk away scott free.
Who needs to be responsible when you have a Get out of hell free card?
Dennis - SGMM
Everyone who’s complaining that the price of this is a ripoff is ignoring the time-honored Christian tradtion of selling made-up shit to the faithful at gargantuan markups.
Jennifer
They should run a web ad over at Secret Agent Flowbee’s place. They could do some brisk business over there.
Incertus
@dmsilev: That really is the dumbest part of all this. Set aside for a moment the really poor choice of symbology that the cross represents if you’re a Christian–you’re venerating a murder weapon as opposed to the sacrifice–the cross as a symbol has absolutely nothing to do with even the dubious Christian connection to the holiday.
T.Scheisskopf
This offers a commericial opportunity for an intrepid entrepreneur with basic engineering skills. He or she could take it one farther and make a propane- fired version of this. A few sales and you can sell the company to Coleman, Weber or whomever.
Profit!
The Grand Panjandrum
Watching others exercise First Amendment rights can be entertaining.
Shouldn’t this be over at I Can Haz … ? Title?
I Can Haz Krizmaz?
Warren Terra
Golly, how much for the optional accompanying flowing robes, just like the Magi might have worn, white to indicate, um, purity of spirit, topped off with a peaked hood that, hmmm, I guess, symbolizes an arrow pointing to the star leading them to Bethlehem?
P.S. Given what we learned about neo-Nazi numerology when those two would-be monsters plotted to go on two carefully enumerated killing sprees of African Americans before donning white tuxedos to go after Obama, is there any chance that this lovely reflection of the White Evangelical Id comes to $88 after sales tax, or after shipping and handling?
rob!
i bet the house in the picture is in a really beautiful gated community.
Jeff
I am looking forward to the first wingnut talking about discrimination of Christians displaying these crosses to an African American journalist.
clone12
That burning cross would go so well with those tiny little lynch victims on nooses you can buy as Christmas tree decorations!
Davis X. Machina
A little work with Ohm’s law suggests that the voltage drop on the big-ass extension cord required to place the cross across town, on the wrong side of the tracks, and the power supply in the gated subdivision on the right side of the tracks, means a fairly limited market for the product.
2×4′ lumber and gasoline remains the appropriate technology.
gregg
The more glaring irony is the evangelical right’s obvious misunderstanding of what the historical Jesus taught "light" to be.
To be a light in the world was to follow his example via bringing hope, love, and truth to people’s lives, especially the have-nots, the poor, the despised.
The confused religious right are the Pharisees of Jesus’ time…they are concerned with outer appearances while ignoring the inner transformation Jesus taught was necessary to be a light to the world.
If you have to rely upon a physical electrical light to symbolize your "spirituality" then you are seriously not a light in the sense Jesus taught. People were drawn to Jesus because he offered hope, kindness, tolerance, acceptance. He was a light in the darkness of intolerance, selfishness, brutality, etc.
Are there people more contradictory in their behavior than these people in their purported following of their "Lord" ????
MikeJ
I’m convinced that mockery was the original intent of the founders.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
The cross is a great idea. Now you will know exactly where the stupid crazy people are.
My advice to those people would be to leave the cross burning brightly year-round.
Dennis - SGMM
Wiat ’til you see the lighted hunting rifle that they’re bringing out for April 4th.
p.a.
Does it come with an adapter so they can strap their lawn jockeys to it?
BigHank53
On the bright side, you can leave the thing up until Easter with a clear conscience.
You’ll still be a dumbass, though.
No Blood for Hubris
Wow.
Comrade The Other Steve
It says suggested donation $81.85. But I only think it’s worth $50, and I can’t edit the shopping cart to give a lesser donation. However it does allow me to give a higher donation.
Why doesn’t it say "Minimum donation" then?
Semanticleo
Aside from the Klan issue, I have a couple of simple questions…….
Why is there worshipful reverence for the vehicle of torture, and death for Jesus?
Isn’t there condemnation in the Bible for making images, you know, idolatry?
I ask these questions, realizing those interested in decorating their homes in this Christmas celebration are not poster children for redemptive self-awareness……
I
eastriver
I think you are being deliberately too-kind, JC. I don’t think the folks selling these idiot-safe ‘burning’ crosses were ignorant of what these things represent. They are what they are.
You are giving these bigots the benefit of the doubt (faith?), which is remarkably fair considering that they would never do the same for you.
I can’t wait to see the neon icicles that good, Christian republicans can hang from their trees in the front yard that just-so-happen to look like nooses.
Garsh, who coulda guessed?
MattF
I think the wingers are untethered and are just going ahead to where they’ve been gazing longingly all along. They know very well what burning crosses are all about.
Atanarjuat
Notice how only Godless liberals are exceedingly annoyed by such a public display of the Christian cross?
This whole "burning cross" interpretation is a pathetic reach, of course. Context does matter, and unless that cross was shown "burning" ever so brightly with hooded Klansmen in attendance, or it was willfully planted on the property of an African American household, then the whole post (and predictably Christian-bashing comments that followed above) is just yet another divisive attack on anything not deemed sufficiently "enlightened" (meaning, lacking lockstep liberal values).
– Country First.
Semanticleo
"only Godless liberals are exceedingly annoyed by such a public display of the Christian cross?"
The poster child speaks………………………
MobiusKlein
They are that dumb: See http://www.crossfireministries.com/
No hint of racism, just ignorance.
Cassidy
@Semanticleo:
The crucifixtion is the sacrifice required to become closer to God, symbolizing the New Covenant. It is, essentially, the foundation of Christianity.
Graven images
Brick Oven Bill
“I think the wingers are untethered and are just going ahead to where they’ve been gazing longingly all along.”
I think that the left is projecting itself again. They were hoping for a reaction after the election that they didn’t get and are reduced to looking through Christmas catalogues, seeking to find racist hate in the form of a lighted cross.
Yes it is tacky, but the vast majority of people who would buy one of these are probably just trying to instill Christian values in their children at the holidays.
Cassidy
@Atanarjuat: Oh, we’re not annoyed. We’re highly amused and hope as many white Christians as possible buy this fine product and display it proudly.
Conservatively Liberal
How convenient, christian values you can buy. What a way to instill religious values in your kids.
Just buy them and Jeebus will save your ass.
As a former Catholic may I say that I am glad I am a former Catholic. If there really is a god, you can bet there are going to be a lot of christians burning in hell.
For their sake, they better hope they are wrong.
Loneoak
I did a Google Image search to see if I could find some creepy pictures of baby Jesus and crucifixes, and I ran across this. Some wingnugget from Ohio (Ohio seems to make the biggest assholes these days don’t they) claims to have seen Jesus on the cross in her frickin ultrasound! In other words, the baby in her own uterus has already been gruesomely murdered. Such a beautiful theology.
No word yet on how the cross got up there. Maybe it was an IUD?
Semanticleo
"The crucifixtion is the sacrifice"
Wrong.. Death is the only requirement for retribution……
The Old Law Covenant required animal sacrifices to presage the necessary sacrifice the Christ was preordained to make.
The animals need not be tortured in order to fulfill the maxim.
bago
K-K-K-KHRISTMAS BREAKER!!!!
Warren Terra
Bill, Atarndiot, the point isn’t that it’s a lighted cross, it’s that it’s a wooden cross with irregularly placed lights on it, possibly flickering, for placing on a lawn. The same thing placed in a window or affixed to the front wall or rooftop of a house would not be nearly so risible, nor would a lawn-mounted cross that was evenly and smoothly illuminated, especially if it weren’t made of wood (say, a brushed plexiglass cross lit from below, which you could sell for a similar amount, albeit at a much lower profit).
Hyperion
that’s certainly the position of the southern baptists, the biggest group of protestant crazies. this product will not be purchased by them.
D. Mason
Heh, yeah. The time honored Christian values of being low class in regards to your "faith", having an abysmal understanding of the teaching of your own "faith", and of course, annoying those around you with your "faith". This truly is an apt symbol for modern Christianity – a wasteful and garish graven image put proudly on display to announce your beliefs to the world like a neon sign.
Cassidy
@Semanticleo: Uh, no I’m not. The crucufixion of Jesus was the final sacrifice required.
Semanticleo
"The crucufixion of Jesus was the final sacrifice required."
Are you saying it diminishes the sacrifice he made, if he were not tortured all day long……………?
BTW;
What’s your scriptural basis for torture being the requirement for retribution?
canuckistani
I’ve always wondered how it was a sacrifice if 3 days later, Jesus came back to life and sat on the right hand of god. The Father and the Son don’t seem to have given up much, other than an afternoon of pain.
Do you think my wife would be impressed by my sacrifice if she told me to get rid of my mistress, and I did, and slapped her around while I got rid of her, and three days later, brought her to live in the house and gave her the family checkbook and the right to boss around my wife? Do you think my wife would be pleased if I reminded her of my sacrifice every Sunday, and told her to be grateful?
Brick Oven Bill
Re: Christianity
When I was invited to attend church services ten years ago, I mocked the invitee with the whole Jonah in the Whale reality check argument. After 9-11, I read the Bible, Qur’an, and Book of Mormon.
I now feel bad about how I treated my inviter ten years ago. The Bible has violent and hateful passages, but that is not the theme of the Scriptures. My reading of the texts has concluded that the Christian God allows freedom of thought, which is good. There is a lot of wisdom in the Bible if you take the time to read it with an open mind.
I say skip the lighted cross and turn your attentions instead to those writings that have played such a large part in shaping our civilization. Be they the word of God, or simply tales from a different time, passed down through the ages.
Ella in NM
Personally, I have come to love these kinds of displays. They clue me in on who in my neighborhood is a right wing, Limbaugh-letter subscribing, bigoted christianist who sees themselves as some sort of minority.
Currently, they can be identified where I live by the "Jesus is Welcome Here" signs on their front lawn. (Because, without a sign, Jesus won’t know he can stop by?)
Before that it was "God Bless the Troops and George W. Bush".
I also notice these are the same folks who tend to to have a F350 4WD Clubcab parked out front with a "For Sale" sign in the window.
p.a.
I guess there is a bit of a tradition of turning symbols of derision into symbols of pride. The Romans were certainly adept at many and various forms of human cruelty. Crucifixion implied not only criminality and torture onto death but public disgrace and humiliation; otherwise there were many other ways for them to execute undesirables. The pink triangle of gay pride has been adapted from the symbol homosexuals were forced to wear in Nazi concentration/extermination camps. (I don’t know if there is any previous history to it before that).
It’s revolting and sad when a symbol of pride in oppression overcome becomes a symbol of bigotry and oppression itself.
kommrade reproductive vigor
The AFA is in need of large amounts of scratch, I see.
Yah, because you know, despite what Jesus said, following his word isn’t sufficient. You have to cough up 80 bucks so your neighbors will be absolutely certain. They might have forgotten if your normal mode of expressing your faith involves more being an utter prick and hypocrite and less good works and minding your own fucking business.
bago
BoB: lolwut? The jealous god who makes almost 40% of his commandments about rizzpect is an open minded fellow?
Well, if by open minded you mean a head cracked open by a stone you might have a point.
I mean it’s all of that open mindedness about gays that has gotten all of the attention recently, amirite?
burnspbesq
@Atanarjuat:
Dude, are you actually stupid, or are you being deliberately obtuse?
And as far as that insipid crack about "Godless liberals" is concerned … I’ve been to Mass today, have you?
ThymeZoneThePlumber
Um, wassup with WV?
Looks like somebody needs a fresh shipment of crosses, get some Jesus going in there.
Looks like this is an area suffering from the Epic Republican syndrome?
ThymeZoneThePlumber
You are talking to a spoof.
kommrade reproductive vigor
Also, why isn’t the use of quotation marks to create emphasis punishable by flogging?
ThymeZoneThePlumber
t
Even for Atan, who tips his hand with every post, that’s about as obvious a spoof tell as you will find.
It’s just a matter of time before he starts using phrases like "you and your ilk."
The guy has degenerated from second-rate to third-rate spoof material now. He apparently has no respect at all for the integrity of the spoof class. He’s a rogue now, he’s become Palinesque.
Cassidy
@Semanticleo: You’re being deliberatley obtuse at this point. Go wank somewhere else. I have no tolerance self-important know nothings.
scarshapedstar
Just in time for the holiday – I mean, Christmas! – season, there’s a discount program! If you live in one of the counties marked red on this handy map, you get 20% off and a free noose!
Just Some Fuckhead
@kommrade reproductive vigor: It certainly should be.
Church Lady
A little off topic, but as the post reflects, Christmas is coming. I would like to take this opportunity to encourage those of you financially able to participate in the Salvation Army Adopt an Angel program. This is a very worthy charity, providing Christmas gifts for underpriveledged children who, without this program, would not receive gifts.
If you choose to participate, you will be given information on your child, including age, sizes and their wish list.
Given the current state of the economy, the Salvation Army is concerned that many deserving children will not be adopted this year. This year, I have adopted two. If you find it difficult to take on this expense, I would even suggest getting three or four friends (or more) together to take on the task of providing Christmas gifts for one child.
Semanticleo
"I have no tolerance self-important know nothings."
Holy Moly. I was just trying to understand your phenomenolgy.
But that requires that you understand it first.
I understand.
bago
Yeah, Brachiator failed a context change so I can be very sure that atanantucket is he.
Joshua Norton
A good Christian doesn’t have to tell anyone he is one.
demimondian
@Semanticleo: No. Actually, as crucifixions go, Christ’s was relatively benign; most people put to death by crucifixion lingered for a couple of days, and died, eventually, of thirst, exposure, or suffocation. By comparison, death cue to (apparent) heart failure after only lingering a few hours sounds almost humane.
[shudder]
The point of crucifixion was that it was the most humiliating death sentence that the Romans inflicted, reserved for slaves and common criminals. Citizens were allowed less humiliating sentences. The point of the horror, then, was not to torment the sacrifice, but to show that Christ had no pride, to demonstrate the extremes to which God would go to redeem the world.
Loneoak
I would like to take this opportunity to encourage those of you financially able to participate in the Salvation Army Adopt an Angel program.
Hey Church Lady: FUCK NO. I love poor children and all that, but Salvation, is as we might say, a bunch of pig ignorant anti-gay bigots. The can shove those stupid bells up their clenched rectums.
Instead, try Big Brothers Big Sisters, who support gays who want to help children. Or give money to an adoption charity that is supportive of gay children.
This is why atheists need some more organized public charity efforts, so assholes like the Salvation Army aren’t the only people out there ringing bells.
Semanticleo
"The point of crucifixion was that it was the most humiliating death sentence that the Romans inflicted, reserved for slaves and common criminals. Citizens were allowed less humiliating sentences. The point of the horror, then, was not to torment the sacrifice, but to show that Christ had no pride, to demonstrate the extremes to which God would go to redeem the world."
Good insight into the secular reasons for crucifixion, but I was attempting to unearth the scriptural focus of like minded
‘christians’ whose biblical reliance on truth is paramount.
hamletta
Also, they left the bodies up there for the scavengers so there was nothing left to bury. Allowing Christ’s body to be taken down from the cross and buried was an act of mercy.
The
Battleax… Ladies of the Altar Guild would beat me about the head and ears with their pocketbooks were I to display such a tacky an liturgically inappropriate…thing like that.Church Lady
@Loneoak – There is no religious test applied to the children participating in the program, only a financial means test. I am not contributing money to the Salvation Army, I am purchasing gifts directly for a child in need that they have identified. I have never regarded this program as a religious one, only as something to provide Christmas gifts to children who otherwise would receive nothing. While toys are always on their wish lists, the suggestion list is usually geared a little more towards needed clothing, especially winter needs such as coats, hats and gloves, that the children lack.
I’d even hazard a guess that some of these children might possibly be the children of gay parents. Does that make them more deserving, or less? My belief is that it doesn’t matter who or what their parents are, nor should it.
By the way, I do contribute to my local Girls Club, because I believe in the message of empowerment through education that they embody. However, they don’t run a program here that specifically provides Christmas gifts for underpriviledged kids, so I can’t contribute to them in that fashion.
Atanarjuat
Warren Terra said:
So?
As I said, context DOES matter. If you can actually find a real-world example of even ONE Christian family gathering around this lighted display in an unmistakably KKK manner — complete with white robes and peaked hoods — then Cole and everyone else who’s part of the all-wingnutz-are-racitsts liberal nodding crowd will have made a cogent point.
Otherwise, as someone else had said above, you leftist wretches are only projecting, BIG TIME.
– Country First.
J.
Oh.My.God. (Or someone’s God. Definitely not my God.)
What’s next, a swastika tree topper?
On a much lighter note, have you all seen the Puppy Cam yet?
LiberalTarian
@The Grand Panjandrum:
Heh, indeedy.
dick weathers
At least shipping is included.
dick weathers
Then how else is anyone going to know?
Persia
I wasn’t planning on commenting, but the Pine Ridge Reservation is a worthy cause.
Jesus’s sacrifice was of his humanity, IIRC; the human died and only the immortal was left.
Burning cross for your lawn. Holy hell.
Cassidy
Shorter SL: I want to try and impress people with my Roman knowledge i gleaned from the History Channel last night.
AnneLaurie
According to the nuns at the parochial school I attended for 12 years, the point of the cruxifixion is that Jesus *chose* to suffer & die for his followers’ sake, as a "perfected" version of the old-skole Mosaic (Jewish) animal sacrifice. An illuminated cross like this is 17 kinds of inapt & inappropriate at any time, but pretending it might have some connection to the celebration of the Birth of the Redeemer is beyond specious.
But then, all that sweetness-n-light crap about low-level service workers getting priority messaging on the birth of a "Messiah" to a pregnant teenager and her not-the-Baby’s-daddy father, squatters on someone else’s property looking for handouts? Those multi-culti "three kings" — more like ‘three queens’ in those get-ups — star-gazing elitists and their BS redistributionary "symbolic" gifts? (What every immigrant rug rat needs: stinky incense and bling!) And then the whole "defy Homeland Security and sneak across the border illegally to avoid lawful interrogation concerning the Holy Infant’s threats to the State!"—is this the kind of behavior we really want to encourage in the Heartland™?!?
kommrade reproductive vigor
Fxd.
LiberalTarian
@Cassidy:
I think SL’s interesting. The actual history of events is almost always more interesting than the simplified mythology that tends to replace the facts after many tellings.
You speak for yourself, eh?
AnneLaurie
Dang. That should be "her not-the-Baby’s-daddy husband", of course. What happened to my edit button?
D-Chance.
I guess you can’t expect people who reject evolution, who think the world was created 6,000 years ago, and who think Adam and Eve roamed the world with dinosaurs to know anything about basic American history, can you?
Theophobic bigotry is acceptable bigotry. Welcome to our new Democratic Overlords. Bible-burning begins at 10:00 pm. BYOB.
D-Chance.
A good Christian doesn’t have to tell anyone he is one.
A good theophobe doesn’t have to tell anyone he is one, either, my friend…
kommrade reproductive vigor
Theophobe … theophobe. Someone who is afraid of God.
…
What?
jenniebee
Or, apparently, the Christian religion. Crosses are for Easter, they are specifically not a Christmas symbol. Christmas is the feast on which Christians are supposed to focus on the miracle of the birth, not on the death and resurrection, of Jesus.
What I want to know is, when was it exactly that Christianity stopped being something its followers showed to the world through acts of love, mercy and self-sacrifice, and started being the province of the $90 lawn ornament?
Grendel72
I would’ve thought members of the AFA would already have ready access to burning crosses without having to spend their own money.
Delia
Yup. Christmas is for Advent candles, which come in a set of four and you modestly set in your window or your coffee table, lighting one more each week of Advent. But hey, no one ever made $81.00 a shot selling Advent candles over the internets. And they don’t show up that much. Though kids do seem to like them.
What I want to know is, when did you declare war on Christmas? Along with all the other people who apparently aren’t running up their credit cards this year? Love, mercy and self-sacrifice indeed!
j.a.m.
Seems to me that it is you who is the ignorant bigot.
Grendel72
There is nothing bigoted about judging people based on the associations they choose of their own free will to make. People who associate with hate groups like the AFA and the Mormon church deserve to be derided by all as the bigots they are.
John Cole
Lemme guess- you didn’t think about the history of burning crosses and their symbolism in America before you bought yours, and now you feel stupid and are lashing out.
Ed Marshall
The odd thing is I don’t give a damn about polygamy. I’d support them and their "untraditional marriage" ideas if they would ask for it instead of lashing out at the gays.
dick weathers
Finally all those bibles I stole from the Holiday Inn will come in handy. God bless the Gideons.
srv
It’s what we Uhmerica hating, flag burning, volvo-driving, Mooslim communist terrorist lieberal president supporting folk do.
scarshapedstar
Theophobia. I don’t think you can get any more projected than that. It’s like a one-word paean to wingnuttery.
"You only say my God is imaginary because you’re afraid of him!"
RS
When my great-grandparents immigrated from Italy in the early 20th century, they lived for awhile in West Virginia before settling in Detroit. I’ve heard stories from my grandma, as well as my aunts (two of them invaluable oral historians now in their 90s) about real burning cross incidents in WV.
Anyone have William Donahue’s email address? Or does he only recognize anti-Catholicism when he imagines it from the left?
TenguPhule
For shame!
Burning them causes pollution.
Your new Democratic overlords will recycle bibles into something useful…like basic economic primers for the people writing policy.
woody
Then how else is anyone going to know?
Their "Messiah" said "By their deeds shall you know them," iirc. But inconsistency is commonplace in that lot. I do NOT how they can so freely cherry-pick from both their "old" and "new" so-called ‘testaments,’ when the ‘new’ one explicitly says it REPLACES the "old" one…
woody
Btw: the paper in the gideon bibles is excellent for rolling blunts, if you have nothing else…
Dean
I don’t believe the Klan put it on their own lawns, for those of you who don’t believe we know our history.
Lights are connected with Christmas, the time when those of us who are Christians believe our Savior who died on a cross was born.
How would you suggest Christians who wish to connect these two holidays do?
Of course, I don’t expect to get anything but insults and derision in reply.
Blue Raven
Y’know, I thought the guy in Bakersfield a few years ago who erected a diorama of Calvary as his contribution to the local Christmas decorations was bad…
As for theophobia, speaking as a polytheist, I prefer to describe myself as having a healthy respect for my mental and spiritual health when I point up the folly of a god’s followers. I’m also judicious in who I work with. Just because I don’t pray to Kali or Ereshkigal is no reason to indulge in armchair psychoanalysis.
Dean
Oh, I get it. You don’t.
Very well.
AnneLaurie
Lights are connected with *all* the Solstice holidays, sweetheart. Tradtional Christian iconography involves the Star of Bethlehem, "signifying to all nations that a great king had been born". Here in small-d democratic America, you can mount your giant lighted S-of-B right across from the neon menorah, the flickering Yule log, and the brightly-shining reindeer nose representing the God of Modern Commercialism.
scarshapedstar
In all my life, I’ve never heard anyone propose a merger between Christmas and Easter. But if you must, I’d recommend you tell your kids that Jesus flies around the world in a sleigh pulled by rabbits, bringing all the good boys and girls back from the dead.
Conservatively Liberal
SS FTW! F’ing lol!
Zuzu's Petals
@Church Lady:
Hmm, just wondering, CL, if you’ve seen anything more about Obama claiming he was going to raise your corporate taxes?
‘Cause last we heard, it was just you sayin’ so.
Continuum
OK – I’m a lefty, far far far lefty, big ole liberal fag. I think that the idiots from Falwell to Haggard to the Mormons to the Catholic Bishops are destroying the freedoms of this country.
However, we just come across as very silly if we choose to rail against this illuminated cross. OK, maybe the Xtists have mixed up their holiday symbols, and maybe the Xtists religiosity is really annoying, but to read more into this cross just makes us appear ridiculuous.
Get over it, and worry about Prop 8 in California, or worry about the Bishops who spoke out against Democrats in the past election. Get serious.
John S.
Hillarious.
A bunch of Christianists proving how little they know about their own religion with their Egyptian-inspired false idol representing their Roman-inspired pagan holiday.
myiq2xu
Continuum:
This place passed silly a long time ago.
Comrade Stuck
@myiq2xu:
Yea, sure Myidiot2. President Elect Obama says hello. And he welcomes aboard all the fucked rats at Corrente. Yes, you can!
And Continuum. Maybe your idea of symbolic burning crosses at Christmas is low brow humor or forgetfulness by the Christian Right, but not everyone shares your dismissals. Or maybe racial hate symbols just doesn’t bother you much.
Observer
WTF. It’s not a mocked up burning cross. It’s holiday lighting.
I’m not a Christian, I occasionally donate to the AU, and I live in Texas.
I don’t see the outrage here. Mellow out folks.
Comrade Stuck
To the contrary, it is very obviously an attempt to mimic a burning cross. Someone made a special effort to give it that effect.
Doug H. (Comrade Fausto no more)
Which would explain its excellent sales at Prussian Blue concerts.
Doug H. (Comrade Fausto no more)
If you honestly believe this is a ‘harmless’ Christmas decoration, try this: Buy one of these, head over to your nearest African-American neighborhood, plug it in at a local park, and let me know what reactions you get.
Rick Moran
Congratulations John. You’ve found the crescent moon in the Flight 93 Memorial.
It really takes a special kind of idiocy to advance this meme. One must ignore history, the facts, and the nose on your face in order to believe – and I don’t for one second think that you do – that this organization (Godbotherers or not) would actually market a burning cross. Only those with "special needs" see a burning cross in the photo above. In fact, I would say that only those who want to see a burning cross see one. And that says a helluva lot about you and your friends, doesn’t it?
More likely, you want to act like the kewl kids and mindlessly bash conservative Christians. How low you have sunk, how truly vile you have become. The only people who take you seriously are people you were calling names 2 years ago. Well, you got your fame. Hope you can live with yourself
John Cole
Sure, Rick. Seeing an aerial photograph of a memorial and detecting the outline of a crescent moon and deciding it is a hidden tribute to the 9/11 perpetrators, and seeing a burning cross in a front yard as a… burning cross in the front yard are the same thing.
Lemme guess- when you fly a swastika in your front yard, it is just you worshipping an old Hindu God.
And I am not bashing Christians. I am bashing the lunatics at the AFA for selling burning crosses. How oblivious are they at the AFA? At any rate, I eagerly await your 10,000 word piece at the American Thinker. Think you can work the word pogrom in again?
Bill Jerome
If the hatred towards Obama from the "Frictian" right isn’t obvious to anyone that has read this article, then you must be a Frictian.
Comrade Stuck
What a cool word "pogrom" . That Moran, he’s such a brilliant fellow! And cute as a button when he gets outraged, but then aren’t all our wingnut friends.
scarshapedstar
Get a brain, Moran. We’re not seriously implying this cross was designed by and for Klansmen. We’re saying that anybody who uses it has to be completely oblivious to what it looks like. Kind of like if you saw an old lady with Jackhammer Jesus hanging around her neck.
Actually, you could draw a number of conclusions from that, but if you asked her and she said that she thought that it was "just a cross" and didn’t understand what the fuss was… that’s the kind of obliviousness we’re talking about here.
John Cole
@scarshapedstar: Better yet, how ’bout we send Rick the Rocket Scientist down his block in Chicago and have him ask random people what they think of when they see a burning cross in the front yard.
I bet the answer is not “The birth of the baby Jeebus!”
Or he could search google for burning + cross and see what he comes up with.
Marcus
In Hoc Signo Dumbass.
Cyrus
Hey, that’s completely unfair. Only a liberal liar would say that a cross covered by irregular flickering yellowish lights looks like it’s on fire…
Mr. Moran, do you think this cross will sell well in the African-American community? Why or why not?
dreamingkat
hey, let’s all link to the product page using the phrase "cross burning". then, when people google for the term, they’ll get this product.
Mnemosyne
As someone who was baptized and confirmed as a Catholic, I’d have to say you’re a heretic for trying to connect two events that should not be connected. The cross is a symbol of Easter, not of Christmas, which is supposed to be a joyful time as Easter is a time of repentance.
But, then, we Catholic are apparently the horrible idol-worshippers because we have statues of people in our yards and not burning crosses, so I guess YMMV.
oclib
Aside from the obvious negative connotation a burning cross projects, I’m going to go out on a limb and forecast that sales won’t be very high here in southern California….just something about that image of burning….at least, I would hope….
Cassidy
@LiberalTarian: Not really. A little critical thinking combined with rudimentary use of the google on the internet box, can show you the difference between Roman Crucifixion and the Christian concepts surrounding Jesus’s death. It isn’t that hard if you’re willing to use a little of brain power.
Quick hint, the crucifixion is a mode of execution and that’s about it.
scarshapedstar
@Mnemosyne:
Wait, whuh? Lent is a time of repentance, which is why it’s really convenient that Jesus decreed for it to start right after you peed in the street and bribed insecure women to expose their breasts during Mardi Gras. Easter should be, if anything, a more joyful holiday; Jesus’ birth wasn’t nearly as miraculous as his resurrection. That is to say, if you believe that any of that crap actually happened.
Bithead
Which of course means someone, somewhere’s gonna get pissed at all the burning pine trees… we’re being insenstive to our smokey bothers in SouCal.
Moran’s right, Cole. You’ve exceeded expecations.
Dave Williamson
I won’t waste time replying with a specific response to your statements. All you want to do is stir up controversy and anger Christians. In the say way the liberals have been lied to by the media, you have been lied to by people who don’t want to believe in God and need excuses. Sadly, none of the things you mentioned here have anything to do with Christian belief. They are all fables you have believed that Christianity teaches. Atheists’ no longer debate creationists because there is more intellectual credibility to creation than evolution.
Never mind that proof exists that validates the claims of Christianity. You seem bent on playing games who’s rules have been invented by fools. When you start to develop an appetite for truth and wisdom, you’ll see what a waste of time those games have been.