Category: Articles

The Silver Goddess from 2010

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(Originally published in 2006 by The Chalcedon Foundation)

“I inhaled deeply the earthy scent of incense … From the basket of rosaries I took into my hand a strand of vibrantly-colored beads with a silver goddess icon in place of the traditional cross … Once gathered, we began to recite together the ‘Our Mother’ and ‘Hail Goddess’ prayers … some rang bells or sounded the Tibetan bowls.”

The above is a description of a worship service at the Ebenezer Lutheran Church, San Francisco, excerpted from an article on the church’s website (“Experiencing the Goddess Rosary” by Dalyn Cook, http://www.herchurch.org/id8.html). It comes with a picture of a “goddess rosary,” showing the stylized figurine of a nude, pot-bellied “goddess.”

Let it serve as the symbol of a neo-pagan movement that is corrupting America’s mainline Protestant churches — and spilling over into unexpected places.

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Living with Fantasy from 2010

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Fantasy writers are perceived as having lively imaginations. Who can deny it? But when it comes to actually putting over one’s fantasies, and making people believe in your fantasy and even order their lives around it–well, we just can’t compete with those folks in science, the government, and the news media.

Our fantasies are clearly labeled as such. No one would dream of introducing a bill in Congress to fund an expedition to Bell Mountain. That money is already spoken for by other fantasies. Here are two of the more outrageous examples.

“Man-made global warming is real–but big government can control it.”

“Life on earth arose spontaneously from non-living materials like mud and gravel, and by an infinite series of totally random mutations, went from bacteria to Beethoven.”

Those are big fantasies! Nothing ever cooked up by C.S. Lewis or J.R.R. Tolkien comes even close to these for sheer audacity of the imagination.

It’s staggering to realize that millions of people–who would never, never expect to see Mr. Toad in his motorcar passing them on the freeway–have actually been brought to believe in these colossal fantasies. You’d think they would just burst out laughing at a statement like, “Paying teachers’ union members higher salaries, and granting them tenure and fabulous pension packages, will improve your children’s education,” but they don’t. They don’t even crack a smile.

Maybe it’s saying too much, to say that anyone actually believes that particular fantasy. But people act like they believe it.

When it comes down to the serious business of telling whoppers, we fantasy writers are pretty small potatoes. But we like to believe that our fantasies, at least, are edifying: and never cost our readers anything beyond the price of a book.

What’s Wrong with Un-Christian Fantasy for Young Readers REPRINT aders?

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“Of course there must be lots of Magic in the world,” he said wisely one day, “but people don’t know what it is like or how to make it. Perhaps the beginning is just to say nice things are going to happen until you make them happen …”
—Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden (1911)1

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
James 1:17

Visit the young readers’ section of your local bookstore, and you’ll probably be amazed by the plethora of fantasies. There are still plenty of more or less “realistic” novels, mainly dealing with sexual issues and assorted teenage angst; but it certainly looks like fantasy is king in this market.

In this sea of fantasy, islands of Christianity are few and far between. This seems strange when you consider that among the most famous young readers’ fantasies are those written by C. S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia) and J. R. R. Tolkien (The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings), which are widely—we cannot say universally—recognized as “Christian fantasies” written by “Christian writers.”

But the bulk of it is anything but Christian. Whether the fantasy world described in a novel is openly antagonistic to God and His Word, or simply oblivious to Him, some of these books are bound to fall into young Christian readers’ hands. The booming popularity of fantasy practically guarantees it.

What’s wrong with un-Christian fantasy? How, if you deem it necessary, might you convince your twelve-year-old to stay away from it—or at least equip him to recognize its faults? And given the powerful allure of imaginative fiction, is it possible to offer your child “Christian fantasy” in its place?

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REPRINT Satanism for Young Readers: A Review of His Dark Materials

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Books in the trilogy:

—The Golden Compass (1995)
—The Subtle Knife (1997)
—The Amber Spyglass (2000) If you find that you inadvertently become a satanist, you can write to the publisher and get your money back. —Philip Pullman[1]

Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read. —Publisher’s Disclaimer

Showered with awards on both sides of the Atlantic; promoted enthusiastically within the public schools; hailed as the greatest children’s entertainment since Harry Potter first bestrode a broomstick; converted into a major Hollywood movie just in time for Christmas: you’ve got to admit Mr. Pullman’s trilogy suddenly has a lot going for it.

But before you run out and buy His Dark Materials as a Christmas present for your twelve-year-old, there’s something important you should know about it.

Philip Pullman has been anything but bashful about his atheism. He proudly proclaims it whenever he spots a microphone.

The message of his books, however, is not atheism.

It’s satanism.

We’re not talking about pop-culture satanism here, a bunch of dolts in black robes dancing around a pentagram. This is real satanism.

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My Favorite Authors

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I’ve always said that if you want to write, you’ve gotta read–a lot. And I’ve learned a lot from my favorite authors.

If I wanted to show off, I’d say they were Henry James, Proust, E.M. Forster, Alice Walker, and so on. But that would be a lie. Serious Mainstream Literature–phooey. But without further ado, here are my favorites (in no particular order).

1. Agatha Christie. Never mind the whole mystery aspect of her work, which is justly famed. I read Dame Agatha for her wonderful and pithy insights into character. Nobody understood human nature better. And she can say so much about a character in so few words, deftly employing dialogue. Not like Stephen King, say, who beats you over the head with the character’s whole life story.

2. Edgar Rice Burroughs. The creator of Tarzan has two things going for him. First, nobody, but nobody, ever did a better job of juggling a complicated plot. When it comes to interweaving a bunch of subplots and keeping the action going, he’s up there with Charles Dickens. And second, Burroughs was one of those rare writers who let his imagination rip. I mean, he came up with some very wild stuff! And he knew how to make you believe in it. His Mars/Barsoom novels are his finest work.

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The United Methodist Church: Weeping for Tammuz

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[God] said furthermore unto me, Son of man, seest thou what they do? even the great abominations that the house of Israel committeth here [in the Temple], that I should go far off from my sanctuary? but turn thee yet again, and thou shalt see greater abominations.

And he brought me to the door of the court; and when I looked, behold a hole in the wall …

And he said unto me, Go in, and behold the wicked abominations that they do here.

So I went in, and saw; and behold every form of creeping things, and abominable beasts, and all the idols of the house of Israel, pourtrayed upon the wall round about …

Then he brought me to the door of the gate of the Lord’s house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz [a pagan deity] …

Then he said unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man? Is it a light thing to the house of Judah that they commit the abominations which they commit here?…

Therefore will I also deal in fury.

Ezekiel 8:6–18 [T]here be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.

But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.

Galatians 1:7–8 Today Paul Woodall is the pastor of the fastest-growing church in the town of Gove, Kansas.

Three years ago, Pastor Woodall and his flock seceded from the United Methodist Church, lost their building, and had to transfer their worship services to a small, struggling Baptist church nearby. The UMC dismissed Woodall from its ministry, and he soon dropped out of a legal battle over possession of the church building.

Why did Woodall and his people leave the UMC?

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Fiddling with Fantasy while Rome Burns?

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The world’s on fire, and you’re writing fantasy?

Mobs have trashed London, and you’re writing about a couple of kids trying to climb a mountain to ring a legendary bell. We’ve got a Marxist in the White House, and you’re writing about imaginary kings of an imaginary country.

What good does that do?

These are questions that I sometimes ask myself. I suspect every fantasy writer since L. Frank Baum has done the same. (For the video-game generation, Baum’s the guy who wrote The Wizard of Oz. “The what?” Oh, never mind…)

In fairness, fantasy is not the only thing I write. I tackle the old burning issues all the time. But to this day I’m not sure of having changed one person’s mind with any of my columns. No one has ever written in to say, “Oh, now I see! Gee, I was totally wrong to be a socialist/atheist/Darwinist nudnick–thank you so much for setting me straight.” Nope, I’m afraid that doesn’t happen.

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No End In Sight REPRINT

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Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,

And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.

Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:

Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator …

For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections.

Romans 1:22–26

If you’re in Oakland, California, this spring, you can walk into the Lake Merritt United Methodist Church and enroll in “Wisdom University.”

The current menu of courses includes “Creation Spirituality,” with defrocked Roman Catholic priest Matthew Fox; “Journeying with the Chakras: Evolutionary Energy and Consciousness”; “Sacred Theater: Enacting the Myth of the Goddess”; and many others, including “Voices of the Dark Goddess.” (See http://wisdomuniversity.org/off-sitecourses.html.)

In a full description of this last course, we read: “Participants will explore the antinomian, relational, embodied, cyclical, and chthonic elements of the Divine Female force … By evoking and invoking the power of the Dark Goddess through embodied practice, theory and method, we will together help catalyze the motion of personal and planetary healing.”

A search of the Internet will show that events featuring goddess worship, witchcraft, and non-Christian worship practices may be found in churches representing every mainline Protestant denomination in America. This is in addition to splinter-group churches, unitarian and universalist sects, and overtly pagan groups.

Is it all just silliness to be dismissed with a laugh? Or is it something that all Christians should take seriously?

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The Rutgers Questionnaire

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This was an actual questionnaire received by Lee in 1978.  He had only been out of college 7 years.  I adjusted the salary amounts to what they would be today.

 

In a recent effort to chart the social and economic progress of the class of 1971, my college alumni magazine sent out a questionnaire which includes the following dilly:

Your current annual income is:

A more than $15,000.00     ($74,000.00)

B more than $25,000.00    ($124,000.00)

C more than $50,000.00   ($248,000.00)

D up to  +      $75000.00     ($372,000.00)

The questionnaire also wanted to find out whether I had been elected or appointed to any public office, how much professional or literary material had been published under my name and whether any public buildings, foundations, or geographical features had been named for me.

When  I finished laughing, I began to feel disappointed in myself for being unable to answer any of the questions.  Was I a failure? Was I one of those rare  members of my graduating class who hadn’t set the world on fire? (After all, it’s 1978 already; they gave me seven years).

The memory of my last high school reunion, however, brought me back on an even keel.

At a high school reunion everyone you meet is doing just fine.  You don’t hear anybody saying, “After several years of unemployment, I’m stuck in a dead end job with no future.  I can’t make my mortgage payments, the finance company is hounding me about my car, and my spouse hates my guts.  My kids are jerks.  I spend most of my time watching TV and I’ve forgotten virtually everything I learned in school.”

Instead it comes out like this: “I’ve got a steady job with a good company, my house is lovely, and I drive a new car.  I have a comfortable marriage and I’m proud of my kids.  I stay pretty active.”

I filled out my questionnaire to say I was a millionaire, had just been elected to the State Senate, and was happy to report that Mt. McKinley would appear as Mt. Duigon in the next issue of National Geographic.

But I never mailed the blooming thing.  Why bother to make up whoppers if thousands of other respondents are doing the same?

But they had me going for a second, and I still resent it.  They phrased the questionnaire to make it look like fame and fortune were the natural outcome of four years’ attendance at their silly college.  For a moment they made me ashamed because I didn’t measure up.

I imagine I would be very unhappy if I shifted gears on my life and tried to meet the alumni magazine’s criteria for success.

Not that these criteria are at all uncommon–far from it.  When we ask somebody what he’s worth, we expect the answer in dollars and cents.  When we wish we were someone else–and that’s another can of worms–it’s always someone rich and famous.

You can’t blame people for feeling that way.  If we’re told something often enough, we eventually believe it, no matter how ridiculous it may be.  After spending four years telling me how to strive for knowledge, growth and self-respect, college turned around and asked about my finances.

The alumni association, of course, is not the same thing as the liberal arts faculty.  But it’s still the end product of all that teaching, all that sermonizing, and all that two-faced quackery.  By their fruits you shall know them.

There’s something wrong with an educational process whose end product is shabby materialism.  Other factors play major roles, but the educational system is our fault.  We elect the school boards, we pay the taxes and the tuition, and we sit around like concrete lawn ornaments while the system continues to deteriorate.

If people are unhappy, it’s mostly because they judge themselves by false standards.  If you measure gold by it’s ability to float in water, you won’t consider it a very valuable commodity.

I wish I hadn’t thrown that questionnaire away.  I should have returned it with “None of the above” scrawled across the sheet with a note attached to describe my real progress:

Gentlemen, I edited the paper for the first time last week.  My pet lizards laid eggs.  I taught my wife how to play my favorite wargame.   For supper, we had fish we caught ourselves.  I finally figured out why Edgar Rice Burroughs was a better fantasy writer than Robert E. Howard.  I could go on, but I don’t like to brag.

Lee Duigon

The Inquisitor

1978

 

It’s Not Really a ‘Ban’ on Flag-Burning

Posted By: leeduigon(patty)Posted On:

[I have forgotten how to add an illustration to a post. That’s sleep deprivation for you.]

Is President Donald Trump purposefully trying to drive leftids crazy?

Sure looks that way! He has been accused of imposing a “ban” on (oh, for heaven’s sake) “flag desecration.”

Before you go flying off the handle, the supposed “speech restriction” is only to be applied to acts that are already illegal and which are likely to pose a threat to life and property (https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/09/trump-ends-flag-burning-liberals-explode/). They don’t just burst into your living room and haul you off to jail because you’ve got a Stars & Stripes pillow case.

Although there may be some as who deserves it.