Having said that, I am more than happy to step up on my personal soapbox and lend what insight I can to the city many see as a hotbed of fundamentalism.

by Irrevelations on Tue Dec 06, 2005 at 11:59:33 AM EST
[ Parent ]

(from the Harper's Soldiers of Christ article about New Life Church)

So Pastor Ted did. First, he started a church in his basement. The pulpit was three five-gallon buckets stacked one atop the other, and the pews were lawn chairs. A man who lived in a trailer came round if he remembered it was Sunday and played guitar. Another man got the Spirit and filled a five-gallon garden sprayer with cooking oil and began anointing nearby intersections, then streets and buildings all over town. Pastor Ted told his flock to focus their prayers on houses with FOR SALE signs so that more Christians would come and join him. Once Pastor Ted and another missionary accidentally set off an alarm and hid together in a field while the police investigated. It was for a good cause, Pastor Ted would say; they were praying for the building to be taken off the market so it could someday be purchased for a future ministry. (It was.)

He was always on the lookout for spies. At the time, Colorado Springs was a small city split between the Air Force and the New Age, and the latter, Pastor Ted believed, worked for the devil. Pastor Ted soon began upsetting the devil's plans. He staked out gay bars, inviting men to come to his church; his whole congregation pitched itself into invisible battles with demonic forces, sometimes in front of public buildings. One day, while he was working in his garage, a woman who said she'd been sent by a witches' coven tried to stab Pastor Ted with a five-inch knife she pulled from a leg sheath; Pastor Ted wrestled the blade out of her hand. He let that story get around. He called the evil forces that dominated Colorado Springs--and every other metropolitan area in the country--"Control."

Sometimes, he says, Control would call him late on Saturday night, threatening to kill him. "Any more impertinence out of you, Ted Haggard," he claims Control once told him, "and there will be unrelenting pandemonium in this city." No kidding! Pastor Ted hadn't come to Colorado Springs for his health; he had come to wage "spiritual war."

He moved the church to a strip mall. There was a bar, a liquor store, New Life Church, a massage parlor. His congregation spilled out and blocked the other businesses. He set up chairs in the alley. He strung up a banner: SIEGE THIS CITY FOR ME, signed JESUS. He assigned everyone in the church names from the phone book they were to pray for. He sent teams to pray in front of the homes of supposed witches--in one month, ten out of fifteen of his targets put their houses on the market. His congregation "prayer-walked" nearly every street of the city.

(from the Cape Argus (South Africa) newspaper

Controversial Christian evangelist and pro-gun campaigner Peter Hammond confirmed he has been charged with assault after what he said was an anti-Hallowe'en spree with a paintball gun.

...
He said his family - a wife and four children - did not approve of Hallowe'en, which they saw as an "occult holiday celebrating human sacrifice, witches and goblins".

His children had wanted to do a "counter Hallowe'en", and he had agreed to drive two of them around to "do paintballing" on trick or treating youngsters on October 31.

"It was meant to be a joke: nobody was meant to get hurt," he said.

"I laid down a few ground rules: we were just going for teenagers, no kids."

He said his 10-year-old son had initially paintballed youngsters who appeared to have just strewn rubbish across the road as a Halloween prank, shooting low and from a distance, and then called out to another child, asking whether he was a trick- or-treater.

The boy came over to the car, saw the paintball gun, swore at Hammond's son and tried to pull it out of his hands. The gun went off, and Hammond drove away.
...
Many fundamentalist Christians believe Hallowe'en, with its pagan origins, is a celebration of the "powers of darkness".

Some describe it as "an evil day of Satan", and say participation sends a message to children that witchcraft, demonism, Satanism, and the occult are fun, entertaining and harmless.

They also believe even normally well-behaved children are driven by "unseen forces" to destructive behaviour and vandalism at Hallowe'en.

Hammond is described on the Fellowship website as a missionary who has pioneered evangelistic outreaches in war zones of Mozambique, Angola and Sudan.

He has also been accused of gun- running for rebels in Sudan, and of assisting the Renamo movement when it was fighting a South African-backed civil war against Mozambique's Frelimo government in the apartheid years.

Hammond is known for his opposition to homosexuality, pornography, communism, militant Islam, and to what he says is "humanism" in state schools. - Sapa

When Katherine Kesler thinks of The Broom Closet, she thinks of peace. Her tidy midtown store is a supply center for the metaphysically minded, where glass cases hold herbs, candles, incense and spiritual stones. It's a soothing place where Tucson's often-misunderstood pagan community finds solace and like-minded thinkers.

But that peace was shattered on Aug. 7, when The Broom Closet was violently targeted by hateful half-wits. Sometime in the wee morning hours, they heaved heavy steel balls through the glass front door and completely trashed the front window.

Kesler learned of the vandalism a short time later. She guarded her business that night, peering nervously through broken glass shards that shimmered in the eerie glow of streetlights.

"It was a very traumatic experience," she says.

In fact, there's been a string of strange incidents plaguing The Broom Closet since it opened in April, petty but disturbing events: a customer's car ransacked; gang signs etched into the front window.
...
More troublesome, The Broom Closet was the only store targeted in this nondescript strip mall near Grant Road and Stone Avenue, and Kesler has no doubt it was sheer, mean-spirited vandalism.

"They broke the window only inches from display shelves, where I had expensive things like hand-etched tarot card boxes," she says. Nearby, the cash register was wide-open, "and it wasn't touched."

The police have called this a case of criminal damage. But to Kesler, it's a hate crime. "Why else would someone cause that much damage?" she says, adding that her customers "are outraged."

That outrage has fired-up a normally low-key community. Like gay Americans, witches and other pagans often keep their beliefs private for fear of losing their jobs or being attacked by Christian right-wingers. In other words, they exist in the "broom closet."

Many pagan beliefs center around a religious reverence for nature, and date back to the ancients Druids. But thanks in part to Hollywood stereotyping, practitioners have long been lumped with devil worshippers.

"If the public were better informed, we could live in peace," Kesler says. "But people believe that the practice of Wicca and paganism is devil worship. How could it be? Our religion even predates Christianity, and the whole Christian concept of a devil."

This is hardly the first time that Wiccans and pagans have faced harassment. In Iraq, Wiccan members of the military were recently pelted with rocks and bottles by fellow soldiers as they worshipped in a sacred circle. To preclude further incidents, military officials called in chaplain and Wicca expert Patrick McCollum. And immediately, the chaplain set about dispelling misconceptions about paganism.

Speaking to a reporter from the Contra Costa Times, McCollum noted that too many people get their ideas of paganism from television shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Charmed. And that translates into plenty of ignorance.

"Education is the single most powerful tool," in dealing with misunderstandings in the armed forces, he said.

And Darla Kaye Wynne, a pagan in Great Falls, S.C., recently garnered the scorn of townspeople when she asked that the City Council not mention Jesus Christ in opening prayers. During a public hearing on the matter, scores of townspeople turned out to oppose her, amidst cries of "Hallelujah!"

Wynne stuck to her guns. With backing from the American Civil Liberties Union, she sued--and won--in federal court. For her trouble, Wynne's home has been vandalized nine times; someone killed and gutted her cat, then hanged it; her truck's gas tank has been filled with sand; and she's been largely ostracized by the good Christians of Great Falls.

Pagan Sign Vandalized in Penn. Adopt a Highway Program

* On December 12, 2003 The Pottsville Republican and Evening Herald published a letter to the editor from a faith-based group called the Schuylkill Pagans. The group, whose stated purpose is to "provide support and socialization to people of pagan faiths in the Schuylkill County area," recently adopted a two-mile stretch of highway on Route 61 through PennDOT's Adopt-A-Highway program. The sign marking their adopted stretch was recently vandalized. The letter calls for the community to refrain from targeting the group in the future.
(December 12, 2003, The Pottsville Republican and Evening Herald)

I woke up the morning of April 30th, 2004, to see my van vandalized. I have a bumper sticker that says, "Hatred is NOT a family value". Guess I was wrong. Below are pictures of the vandalism. This is the first time these people have made it obvious why I was being vandalized. My house and van have been egged. Garbage is regularly thrown in my yard. I walk through the park where I live and hear people making rude comments- like the "witch bitch" written on my windshield. Neighbors walk by and flick cigarettes or spit in my yard... They also write letters to the park owner telling him that my family is doing things that we are not.

Please keep in mind that we live quietly and keep to ourselves. I don't even let my kids go outside unless I am with them, because I am afraid something will happen. I send my kids away to grandparents, their dad's house and friends houses often- so they are not here.

I called the police, they took pictures but said there is not much they can do.

Here are the pictures.

My windshield (warning: graphic language)

In this picture of my back window is a pentacle with a line through it- like a "no smoking sign" right under my "Hatred is NOT a family value" sticker. Back window

Not long after settling into the town -- population 2,194 according to the 2000 Census -- Wynne started having problems with crack dealing in her neighborhood. She first sought relief from local law enforcement. Then, when that didn't help, she did what any civic-minded American might do -- she turned to her elected officials.

That's when the trouble began.

Attending Town Council meetings to inform about her problem, Wynne was taken aback to discover that the council opened its meetings with a Christian prayer. After all, she was, and still is, proudly pagan. Wynne is a "high priestess" (the equivalent of a pastor in Christianity) in the earth-based religion Wicca. Inspired by Western European beliefs that predate Christianity, Wicca incorporates the use of herbal magic and benign witchcraft, according to dictionary.com.

At first Wynne employed the art of persuasion in trying to convince the council to go with a more universal, nonsectarian prayer. But the council would have nothing to do with it, so in 2001 Wynne sued with help from the state ACLU.

Two years later, in a case that has gained national attention, her lawsuit began in U.S. District Court in South Carolina, with Wynne prevailing. But backed by state Attorney General Henry McMaster, the town took the case to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Initially, a three-judge panel of the 4th Circuit sided with Wynne also. Undaunted, the town pleaded to the full 4th Circuit, and lost again.

Now, with McMaster still at its side, the Town Council is pursuing a final appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. A decision by the high court on whether to take the case could come any day.

For Wynne, what began as a principled stand quickly took on the characteristics of a living nightmare.

In one incident after another, residents of Great Falls lashed out at her with the vehemence of a crazed mob. They killed her 8-year-old parrot, an African gray that could have lived to be 100 or older, Wynne says. "She was beheaded and her heart was cut out."

They repeatedly vandalized her home. "And I mean, literally where they come in and flipped over the refrigerator, pulled up my heater, spray painted."

They visited abuse upon her animals. "I've had cats poisoned," she says. "I had one cat gutted and hung from a planter thing in my house." Her 14-year-old Yorkshire terrier was blinded in one eye. Named after Wynne's affection for a certain motorcycle line, Harley encountered many a threat in Alaska from owls, eagles, foxes and the like. But the dog was never the worse for wear over it. Says Wynne, "And I gotta come down to some redneck town, and some jackass, they're not satisfied just killing my birds, almost killing my horses, but they've gotta pick on such a small old dog."

Prior to PPD of 2003, the problems were as I stated above, just starting, but then we were originally going to hold PPD in this town and one of the Council members, Glenn Ross began to collect signatures to stop it and writing letters to the editor to me and my God from him and his and also began to preach at me at the council meetings, which seemed to really inflame the public with me. We had a race riot on the 4th of July weekend, where Juicy Brown was murdered and an elderly man shot when he stepped out on his front porch and we cancelled the event and I went to the Council meeting to let them know that and Glenn Ross, claimed "that God was looking over the balcony and didn't like what he saw, so he spite the evil pagans down and that this was a great day for the residents of Great Falls and that every citizen should rejoice in God's glory, " or something to that affect.

I went to PPD in Charlotte with a friend's husband and my Goddaughter and when I arrived back home after a wonderful day with friends and family, I walked into a home, that a front door and windows were broken and spray painted, cabinets tore down, poop in microwave, cat box dumped in my bed, spray paint on the walls that said, " die witch, " refrigerator and stove flipped over and everything out of the drawers and it was totally demolished. I called the Chief and then I went to the police station only to be given a security catalog and told he would be jeopardizing his job. I went home and attempted to clean up and from that day forward until August 11, 2004, my house was vandalized a total of 9 times. I have redone my home 5 times and am working on the 6th now. During that time, everything except one piece of furniture survived in its entirety, which is a dresser from a beautiful bedroom suit. How it survived I don't have a clue, but one of my friend's reminds that he feels it is because when he came over and saw it flipped on the floor and offered to turn it back up, I told him to leave it that it would only end up there again and he said he thinks that saved it.

During this time, I did try to get, as much of my stuff that wasn't broken or broken too badly outside in the shed or on the front porch, but it didn't save my animals.

I walked in once to find a cat gutted and hung from a planter in the back bedroom, my African Grey, Little One beheaded and her heart cut out, with a note attached saying I was next, cats poisoned, murdered, my horses almost killed, my oldest Yorkie was blinded when she was 14 and then attacked again this year, which now she is completely blinded and just recently had to under go surgery which they didn't think she would survive due to her age. I have been pulled over my fence and beaten. Even my male raccoon was taken and I think they were going to kill him, but possibly attempted to torture him first by shaving him, which was their mistake, because he got away and came home. They killed my iguana, Sammie, which she was 6 feet long, my black shark and due to the attacks I had to give my horses away because I couldn't be in 2 places at once, my 9 foot Burmese as well.

This can happen anywhere there's a "critical mass" of dominionists, not just Colorado Springs :(

by dogemperor on Tue Dec 06, 2005 at 07:15:52 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Anyways:

(from the thread "Have You Ever Been Rebuked?" on the Ex-Pentecostals forums)

I remember some pentecostals from MULTIPLE churches were going to get together to publicly protest a witch doing a spell in his backyard. They spread the word all around and said that they couldnt put up with such garbage. I was a Pentecostal then but it really hit me that WAIT A SECOND you want to prevent this guy from doing this ONCE on his own property when each of you goes to churches that are rentals of state property and rented units and yet you want the right to practice YOUR religion every week and take up half the parking on the street and do this without any infringement? Double standard.

The horrible things I know people did. They would go to this guys house when he was gone and "anoint" his house with oil and they would anoint his car and pray to break curses (or bring them) They spread that he lived at 666 Kempton Street when in reality there WAS NO 666 Kempton Street. The witches kept complaining that they were sick of coming home to tracks and letters and incense and prayer oil sometimes NAILED to their door. And Pentecostals think that is ok? I am pretty imaginitive. I could think of a lot of think we could nail to some Pentecostals doors. But we never would and isnt it wierd how society tolerates extremes in Christianity but Christianity doesnt? I have lost count of the times those losers have tried to "force" tracts on me. Yet if a witch forced something on a person the cops would be called.