MAGA truly is a death cult, though it’s rare for anyone on that side to admit it outright. Enter The Federalist, which today published a piece by its executive editor with the utterly un-ironic headline “For Christians, Dying From COVID (Or Anything Else) Is A Good Thing.”
And she means it.
Dismissing those pushing vaccination as “pagans,” Joy Pullmann — not only an editor of The Federalist but also the proud mother of six — declares bluntly that “God Decides When We Die, Not COVID.” She continues:
life and death belong entirely to God. There is nothing we can do to make our days on earth one second longer or shorter: “all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be,” says the Psalmist.
If your death is preordained, then presumably everything else in your life is as well. If you’re not supposed to take the vaccine because, I guess, God wants you dead, why not just go hog wild and do whatever you want whenever you want because it’s all God’s will.
Then again, maybe Pullmann is wrong about the vaccines. Instead of being a challenge to God’s omnipotence, what if the vaccines are part of God’s plan? Couldn’t God have created the vaccines in order for us to use them to protect ourselves and others?
If we follow Pullmann’s logic and reject a vaccine that will almost certainly do us a great deal of good, why shouldn’t we adopt that reckless attitude when it comes to everything else in the world that can help keep us alive — like seat belts or bicycle helmets. I’m rather doubting that Pullman demands that her (six) kids eschew seatbelts or helmets. What makes vaccines different? Or are there other safety precautions that are, like the vaccines, an affront to God? Does Pullman tell her kids to go run and play in traffic because if one or more get hit by a bus, well, that’s the way God wanted it to be? (I doubt it, but it would be consistent with her logic if she did.)
Her take on COVID is certainly as reckless as telling children to play in traffic. Not only does she mock the vaccines as “pagan”; she’s also convinced that churches should reopen even if they have no way to enforce social distancing. Because God hates Zoom. (I mean, we all sort of do, but it’s safer than sitting in a packed church surrounded by people who think vaccines and masks are tools of the devil.)
But she, she suggests, if Jesus can die on the cross for us,
we can go to our safe [sic], air-conditioned churches and worship. We can even go to the hospital rooms and bedrooms of those dying with infectious diseases and love them to the end, like the imitations of our Master Christians have boldly shown themselves to be for centuries, putting pagans to shame.
I’m not sure what happened with that last sentence in the quote there; I think Satan might have been copyediting it.
Anyway, if Christ can make the ultimate sacrifice, so can we. And we’ll even be rewarded for it!
[F]or Christians, death is good. Yes, death is also an evil — its existence is a result of sin. But, thanks be to God, Jesus Christ has redeemed even death. In his resurrection, Christ has transformed death into a portal to eternal life for Christians.
So get out there and catch some COVID for Jesus, I guess.
The Christian faith makes it very clear that death, while sad to those left behind and a tragic consequence of human sin, is now good for all who believe in Christ. A Christian funeral is a cause for rejoicing, albeit understandably through tears from those of us temporarily left behind. …
This is not a small or unclear doctrine. It is repeated over and over again in scripture. It flatly rejects the heathen idea that death is to be avoided at any cost.
Damn those heathens and their attempts to not catch a deadly virus. Such a heathen thing to do.
Christians are explicitly called to spurn pagans’ approval, advice, and beliefs for the sake of our souls.
So go ahead and spurn the vaccine too; it’s guaranteed to trigger the heathens. And if you ultimately do die of COVID, you’ll get to hang out with Jesus in the afterlife, and the two of you will laugh and laugh at those misguided pagans who had the temerity to try to save their own lives and the lives of others.
It’s almost as if The Federalist is funded by Big Death.
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“Ma’am, if you are commanded to remain quiet in church, I am pretty sure you shouldn’t be making theological arguments in public.” /s
In all seriousness, one of my minister friends has a term for declaring that bad things are actually good because they are the will of God:
sucky theology
Truly a death cult indeed.
The first example of what the Federalist say here I have seen more than ten years ago, while discussing abortions (and specifically, abortions to avoid peril to the mother life). It was vile then, it’s vile now.
It also completely negate the concept of free will. If we don’t have free will because everything is preordained, then there is truly no reason for God to have created evil. (I mean, the usual “without evil there is no free will” is bullshit too, but at least it’s bullshit a number of people seem to find logical).
Basically not a fan. Will continue my life of sin and depredation*, since anyway I don’t choose what I do. So sad to be condemned to do what I like.
(* sins and depredations in theses people opinions. I won’t do anything that go against my moral, but my moral system don’t disaalow sex with consentant adults or excess as long as they do not harm others)
@ Alan
I gotta admit, watching Christopher Lee recite poetry is a special thrill all its own, especially because he reportedly learned that speech in a matter of minutes, just in time to shoot the scene. But I’m a fan of the movie as a whole – I owned it on VHS before the special collector DVD box set came out, with all the supplemental materials. Edward Woodward looked so happy to be revisiting the locations many years later.
If they’re so bent on dying of easily preventable causes, that’s their business, but I wish they wouldn’t insist on taking the rest of us down with them.
if God doesn’t want us to go around interfering with the natural course of diseases, why did so many of Jesus’ miracles involve healing the sick/dying? he shoulda just been like “I’ll meet up with you in a bit, see ya!”
Should I point out that the logical conclusion of this belief is that true believers should commit mass suicide to skip the wait and get to Heaven right now? This whole thing is going to go in a very Jim Jones-y direction very quickly, mark my words.
@Victorious:
Did you watch any of the Patrick Stewart “Sonnet a day” series? He decided to help others (and himself!) pass the time during COVID lockdown by making a video a day of him reading one of Shakespeare’s sonnets. It started out with popping around his favorites, but when it became obvious that the lockdown was going to last a lot longer (and when the series was so popular and when he realized that even if he was no longer on lockdown someone, somewhere in the world would be) he went back to the beginning and systematically recorded all the ones he hadn’t done during the initial “favorites” run.
Well, actually I’m just assuming he finished. I was paying attention long enough to see him go to the beginning and start doing them in numerical order, but not long enough to know he reached the end. In any case, I watched a number of them and really enjoyed them. PS isn’t CL, of course, but PS has his charms.
@ talonknife
I don’t know if it’s my geekery or pedantry but whenever anyone uses the ‘drink the Kool-aid’ analogy I feel compelled to point out that at Jonestown it was Flavor Aid.
I feel like it’s Darwin who’s taking the wheel here, not Jesus.
@ Crip Dyke
No, but I heard about it! Speaking of English actors reading poetry, I give you Edward Petherbridge, who reads and writes his own.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhduInt0Q3Q
Still the best Lord Peter Wimsey, IMO.
I’m not sure if the Bible specifically has a verse about God helping those that help themselves, but 1 Corinthians 12 talks about how all Christians are part of the body of Christ, and how if one member suffers, then so too does the rest of the body. So by harming yourself you are also harming your community. Christians are supposed to care for themselves and each other, and you’d think that would include not dying of a preventable illness, nor spreading it to others.
As for the “well, my lifespan is already determined so I shouldn’t try to extend it” bullcrap, it makes no bloody sense. Humans live in houses not created by God. Humans wear clothes not created by God. Humans eat food that isn’t manna rained down from heaven specifically for them. Humans drink water that’s been treated to not have e. coli and dystentry and all other manner of disease-causing bacteria. What makes meeting these basic needs more “natural” than a vaccine? Why are these actions, taken to extend and safeguard life, acceptable, but not medicine?
@Catalpa
It doesn’t, nor AFAICT does any holy text of any religion anywhere ever.
Close as you come is god helps those in this situation is probably Matthew 4:7
Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
@talonknife
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t the staunch suicide-condemning stance of the institutional church from early times onward a reaction to stop congregations from doing just that?
Christianity started out as a death cult, there’s no way around that.
On the other hand, I think the real reason for this Federalist article is not some Christian theology, but the logical conclusion of the “I will do literally anything to trigger the libs” stance of alt-righters. At least the author walked all the way on this one, I have to give her that.
And to think a few years ago people were saying “It would really trigger me if you [some self-inflicted misfortune]” thinking it was just a joke.
Another great version of Willow’s song
Although the video description mentions the song was in Hostel without mentioning it was a from Wicker Man. Someone needs to retake horror movies 101!
To quote King Arthur in MP&tHG: “Jesus Christ!”
I despise the Bible as anything but a literary reference, but this is literally Satanic temptation.
Matthew 4:5-7
5 Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6 and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written:
‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’
and,
‘In their hands they shall bear you up,
Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ ”
7 Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not [a]tempt the Lord your God.’ ”
These Republicans are truly now a death cult, but also a murder cult. They are a real life, unmagical, STUPID and warmed-over realization of Harry Potter’s Death Eaters.
Republican or “conservative”? Fuck. Off.
@ WWTH
Oh I love that version too. And the Sneaker Pimps generally. Well, til they took the fantastic decision “Let’s sack the person who made this band!”
But speaking of songs and COVID, I wonder if people might indulge me in an experiment?
The song below makes me blub like a Miss World winner. Seriously, like within two bars I’m an emotional wreck; but in a good way. Same with all my mates.
But what I’m curious to know is whether that’s innate to the song, or just because of the associations.
So, does this make you reach for the tissues, or is it “Eh, what’s all the fuss about?”. I’d love to hear people’s thoughts.
ETA: Just seeing that thumbnail is making me cry!
The Federalist: Making American Spectator look reasonable since 2013.
@Talonknife:
I guess that’s why they have that rule that suicide is a mortal sin. Though one then wonders: if you poisoned yourself with a fatal dose of something that took a while to act, but for which there was no antidote, then repented of all your sins including suicide before losing consciousness, would that get you into heaven, or is suicide an exception to the whole repentance thing?
@Alan Robertshaw:
To nitpick the nitpicker, the investigators found packets of both brands at the site, meaning it’s likely they drank a mixture.
@C. A. Collins:
Pretty much a frank admission that there is no empirical basis for any of the religious claims about any god. If it’s not testable, it’s “not even wrong”, as one physicist put it.
@Beyond Ocean:
All the way? Nah. The author will have walked all the way on this one if and when she sighs one final time as the nurse switches off her ventilator.
Of course, knowing the right-wing penchant for hypocrisy, grift, and graft, she’s probably had both doses of the vaccine and the whole thing is just performance in exchange for money.
@CrawlingKingSnake:
That’s fascism for you …
Meanwhile, one for the “weird insights” files: the early Star Trek:TNG episode “Where No One Has Gone Before” is The Wizard of Oz in space. Kozinsky is the fraudulent wizard, the Traveler is the good witch, the Enterprise is the house, and they even have to basically repeat to themselves “there’s no place like home” to get back.
The next episode to feature the Traveler even alludes to this when Beverly Crusher, trapped by a similar malfunction, asks herself “click my heels together three times and I’m back in Kansas; can it be that simple?”
I guess they’ll have plenty of chances, what with the latest research saying unvaxxed people can count on catching Covid on average every 16 months (range: 3 months to 5 years).
That’s a whooooole lot of tempting the Lord thy God. Who, I remind them, is big on smiting and eternal damnation.
I’m now picturing a cartoon of St. Peter at the Pearly Gates, with a big pull lever and a trap door for these types.
“God helps those who help themselves” goes back to Aesop, at least (where it was “the gods”).
As Ms. Pullman is not making an argument that Christians should avoid all life-saving measures, just this one, I assume she’s writing what Federalist readers want to hear. or maybe Federalist funders — I don’t know if that piece of drek has any readers at all.
@ gss ex noob
Not award winningly relevant to the discussion; but I love this cartoon.
I disavow any relation with this woman that might or might not exist.
I’m sure she has an explanation in her own mind for why this applies to the vaccine but not, for example, eating food, and I’m sure if I heard that explanation it would give me a headache.
Not as much as Webex! Friends don’t let friends use Webex.
Protestant theology considers suicide a sin. But why? Joy Pullmann is clearly right. If God wants you to die, you die, and if not, you won’t. You can’t end your life one second sooner than God wants. Go ahead and drink bleach, walk off of buildings, play russian roulette with an AK-47. It doesn’t matter. Nothing in life matters. Just believe in Jesus, and then die as soon as possible. If you can…