đŸ’„The THREAD that needs to be written.

Roe v. Wade 1973. The date American Christian Nationalism was born.

That’s the myth. And the real story is far worse than the myth. First, it had little to do with abortion, but the movement SETTLED on abortion.
This movement set about actually changing the religion of many people to serve its political ambitions. It was about amassing political power. Penny Young Nance who is President of Concerned women for America who’s effort and resources was the appointment of Supreme Court
justices. These people believe that God, acting’s through the pro-life movement, put Trump in the White House. However, 50 years ago, Protestants and Republicans by and large didn’t oppose abortion. When this was stated to an activist at the 2018 March for Life, the woman gave
a blank stare and commented, “Christianity is pro-life and the Republicans are the party of life.” So what happened here? For Republicans politicians, abortion demagoguery is the path the power. Donald Trump jumped into this bandwagon. Pro-life activists believe it has always
been this way. Except that is was not. In the 1970’s, a combination of religious and political activists pondered a new strategy. These included Jerry Falwell, conservative activists Ed McAteer and Paul Weyrich; Nixon appointee Howard Phillips; attorney Alan Dye and Robert
J. Billings, an educator and organizer who would later serve as Ronald Reagan’s liaison to the Christian Right. This was an angry group of men. Paul Weyrich stated, “We are radicals who want to change the structure of power. We are not conservatives in the sense of accepting
the status quo, we want change, we will be the force of change.” They were angry at liberals, they were angry at establishment conservatives, they were angry about the rise of feminism, which they saw as a menace to social order, they were angry about the civil rights movement
that threatened the education. In no meetings, in no letters, was abortion rights ever mentioned. Weyrich was a Conservative and religious but had abandoned the Catholic Church believing it too liberal after the Second Vatican Council. But his politics was not concerned about
religion. It was about power. Weyrich was determined that Carter would be a one term President. Weyrich became known as the “evil genius” of the movement involved in the 1980 manifesto “The New Right: We’re Ready to Lead.” He was also described as the “Lenin of Conservatism.”
This New Right wanted radical change. They would establish themselves as “ first as the opposition, then the alternative, finally the government.” They would aim to weaken and destroy American institutions. To do this they would first maintain a constant barrage of criticism
Against the Left, attack the legitimacy of the Left. They stated, “ we will not give the Left a moments rest, we will use guerilla tactics to undermine their legitimacy.” Weyrich called for a constitutional convention I the hope of producing a form of government that satisfied
Conservatives only, not real conservatism, but their brand of conservatism. They particularly didn’t want everyone to vote. Their leverage went up when the voting populace goes down. Therefore, voter suppression would be a priority. The core of concern of the New Right was the
perception that Capitalism was under threat, internally and externally, particularly communist threats that they blamed in liberal national defense policies. But communism wasn’t the only threat. Feminism was a real domestic threat. Activist Phyllis Schlafly states that
the feminist movement was the “most destructive element in our society.” For Weyrich and his fellow operatives, the rise of the civil rights movement presented them with an historic opportunity to advance their agenda. From Reconstruction through the 60’s, southern whites had
been a critical part of the Democratic Party coalition. When Democrats took the lead in civil rights, the southern white population was suddenly in play. Nixon committed the Republican Party to the “Southern Strategy” that appealed to the southern, white, formally Democratic
Popular vote through populism, racism and nativism. This in turn created tensions with the a Republicans other base, the Rockefeller Republicans. But Weyrich had formulated an idea for election strategy that would take the New Right to power. He studied intensely the successes
Of the Left in the 1960’s and 1970’s and he discovered that the one thing the left had was religion, one thing the right lacked. The left had successfully appealed to religious feeling and organizations in forming the coalition that advanced the civil rights, promoted Great
Society programs and opposed the Vietnam War. Weyrich needed to access the religious vote, he believed to do that, power would be in their grasp. This required using electronic ministers of Jerry Falwell, Jim Robison and Pat Robertson, urging them to get involved in Conservative
politics. Weyrich would also be involved with founding right wing groups such as the Heritage Foundation, The American Legislative Exchange Council and the Free Congress Foundation. The most consequential was the Council for National Policy that eventually would have hundreds
of the most powerful conservatives in the country. There were other cofounders such as Tim LaHaye of the Moral Majority and billionaires. A leaked 2014 membership directory was leaked showing Steve Bannon, Kellyanne Conway, Christian Right leaders, the NRA as members.
So remember, at this stage, Roe v. Wade had occurred in 1973 and the aftermath did not result in pro-life movements. Weyrich was looking for religious conservative hot button issues. This lay in federal power, race and religion. Remember Jerry Falwell and his fellow white
southern conservative pastors were closely involved with segregated schools and universities. They feared their institutions would be deprived of lucrative tax advantages. What they feared the most was the Supreme Court ending tax exemptions for segregated Christian schools.
Falwell practiced segregation, particularly in his religion. When Black people attempted to pray at the Thomas Road Church, they were removed by the police. He even declared that “God was the author of segregation.” Weyrich knew that they couldn’t build a movement with the
burning issue of tax advantages of racist schools. Stop tax on segregation wasn’t going to cut it. What message would bring the movement together? They couldn’t actually attack the “women’s liberation” because of the Equal Rights Amendment. In 1979, six years after Roe they
decided on abortion. But here’s the biggy, it wasn’t morality, it was to deny Carter a second term. They decided on an anti-abortion crusade that was more palatable that the religious rights real motive: protecting segregated schools. Weyrich a decade later stated “the Religious
Right did not come together in response to Roe v. Wade, what got us going was the attempt on the part of the IRS to rescind the tax-exempt status of Bob Jones University because of its racially discriminatory policies. Abortion was cobbled into the agenda of the Religious Right
to maintain taxes. They realised that abortion helped them pull together a fringe Christians. Jerry Falwell could write books that stated abortion was “murder according to God.” Abortion would be the key to unlocking political power. They would use it to change the future.
However to do that, they would need to change the past. How would they deal with decades of past abortion.
The Catholic Church outlawed abortion in 1869. When abortion was outlawed in America in the late 19th Century, it had nothing to do with the Catholic Church. It was because
Protestant natives feared an onslaught on Catholic and immigrant babies. So abortion became a criminal offence to assure America continued to produce more “desirable” Americans. White male patriotism demanded that maternity be enforced in white Protestant women. It also had to
be against the education of girls, because “stimulating a girl’s brain during puberty is a loss to the state.” However, by the middle of the 20th Century, 1.2 million abortions were performed yearly, illegally and unsafe. But here’s what happened in America. Religious leaders
wanted safety. They came together to form the Clergy Consultation Service on Abortion, which assisted women to obtain safe abortions. It was this movement that pushed to decriminalize abortion. The political battle occurred between Catholic and Protestants, Republicans sided
with Protestants who wanted to end decriminalisation. Republicans supported it because of its party’s tradition of supporting the middle class on birth control. Billy Graham I. 1968 stated he believed in planned parenthood.
The most liberal abortion law was signed by Ronald Reagan in 1967. It’s also wrong to state that Catholics have always organised against abortion. Contrary to the myth, when Roe v. Wade passed, secular and religious conservatives responded with delight, stating “Religious liberty
, human equality, and justice are advanced by the Supreme Court abortion decision.”
However, later the Christian National Movement knew that to politically unite around abortion would mean changing American religion. The modern pro-life religion that dominates is a political
creation. One thing they knew would be a danger would be the liberal Christian thinkers. 2000 years of Christian apologetics provided ample material to argue that abortion rights are compatible with Christian belief and practice. Therefore it was necessary to purge theology
of any position inconsistent with the idea that all moral and religious attributes of human life are invested in the zygote at the moment of fertilization. This in turn meant making “life begins at conception” something close to a foundational doctrine. They created a religion
not based on Christian values, but purely on abortion. America through the 20th Century had already creating bastardised versions of Christianity that was based on Capitalism and the Prosperity Gospel so they knew it could be done again. But it is clear that the pro-life
religion is just a movement, a religious movement. It isn’t a Christian religion.
If you are interested in this then read “The Power Worshippers” by Katherine Stewart.
The last thing I want to add is that this power movement, the co-founding of the Council for National Policy is behind the nomination of #AmyConeyBarrett
This fake pro-life religion, for power only, using a bastardised religious movement that disguises a political movement.
So when you see Conservatives outraged that we are attacking her religious views and pro-life stance. You reply that this whole pro-life movement was made up by Paul Weyrich in the late 1970’s as a power grab and was motivated by not paying taxes on racist schools.
You can follow @SpockResists.
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