Category Archives: Politics

Rebel Without a Pulse

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Another Arkansas politician has made headlines, and this time it’s not because of pro-slavery comments, like some Arkansas legislators! So that’s progress, right?

Charlie Fuqua (that’s his real name, and I’m guessing he doesn’t pronounce it fuhk-YOO-ay), is running for Congress and has written a book arguing that in order to have a civil society, parents must be able to threaten to kill their children. And not just threaten; occasionally it has to be carried out. “Even though this procedure would rarely be used,” he states in his book God’s Law, it would incentivize kids “to give proper respect to their parents.”

Oddly, respect is just the opposite of what Fuqua is receiving after his comments got national attention.

Undoubtedly, killing an obnoxious child once in a while would send a strong message and would help keep order in classrooms, result in a dramatic decrease in teenage tomfoolery and hijinx, and maybe, if we executed enough of them, we might even get kids to clean their rooms once in a while!

Now just where might he have gotten this clever idea from? If you answered, “The Bible,” I’d say what a good student of the Bible you are, and I wouldn’t have to threaten to kill you for about a week or two. Good job!

They shall say unto the elders of his city, “This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice. He is a glutton, and a drunkard.” And all the men of his city shall stone him to death with stones. So shalt thou put away the evil from the midst of thee, and all Israel shall hear and fear. —Deuteronomy 21:20-21

The Bible has been held up as the pinnacle of moral authority, so when the Bible says, “Do not lie,” we don’t lie. When the Bible says, “Do not steal,” we don’t steal. So when the Bible says,”Kill your juvenile delinquents,” do we really have any other choice?

The Bible delivers many examples of bad parenting. Lot offers his daughters to the rapacious mob of Sodom, so that the mob would be okay with not having their way with his male house guests. Thoughtful host, worst parent ever.

This is the same Lot that impregnated two of his daughters, and according to Wikipedia, “Christians and Muslims revere Lot as a righteous man of God.”

In the famous story of the sacrifice of Isaac, God at the very last minute stops Abraham from killing his son Isaac.

And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son, and the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, “Abraham, lay not thine hand upon the lad, for now I know that thou fearest God.” —Genesis 22:10-12

Be afraid of God, and he might not make you kill your son! But he may not stop you from killing your daughter. In a less famous story, but far more horrific, Jephthah is NOT stopped from killing his daughter at the last minute. To show his faith in God, he goes ahead and kills her though she did absolutely nothing to deserve any punishment! (I get upset just thinking about this story, even though I believe it is fiction—horrifically bad fiction.)

And Jephthah took an oath to the Lord, and said, “If you will give the children of Ammon into my hands (in battle), then whoever comes out from the door of my house will be the Lord’s, and I will give him as a burned offering.” Then Jephthah came back to his house in Mizpah, and his daughter came out, and when he saw her he was overcome with grief, and said, “Ah! my daughter! I am crushed with sorrow, for I have made an oath to the Lord, and I may not take it back.” So he sent her away for two months and mourned her virginity. At the end of two months she went back to her father, who did with her as he had said in his oath, and she had never been touched by a man. —Excerpts from Judges 11:30-31,34-35,38-39

They seem much more concerned about her virginity than about that whole burning-her-alive-for-no-good-reason thing.

Congressional candidate Fuqua also recommends expelling Muslims to rid us of the “Muslim problem.” He certainly must be frightened of the possibility of Sharia law overtaking the U.S., yet he is more than eager to implement his Christian version of Sharia law, based on the worst parts of the Bible.

How bad does the Bible get? Let’s see who else it tells us to kill:

  • Witches —Exodus 22:18
  • Brides who turn out not to be virgins (though grooms are exempted from this law) —Deuteronomy 22:20-21
  • Anyone who disobeys a priest —Deuteronomy 17:12
  • Anyone engaged in bestiality —Leviticus 20:15-16
  • Anyone who touches a mountain that God is appearing on —Exodus 19:11-13
  • The owner of an ox that fatally gores someone when the owner knew it was likely to attack —Exodus 21:29
  • People who gathers sticks on the sabbath —Numbers 15:32-36

Capital punishment for stick gathering would certainly curtail the scourge of weekend stick collecting. It seems laughable, but given how these outlandish fundamentalist ideas keep popping up, I would not be surprised to hear in my lifetime a politician, from Arkansas or elsewhere, suggesting serious penalties for picking up sticks at the wrong time.

A new poll suggests that a growing number of Americans want neither Sharia nor Fuqua’s Bible-based laws. As tempting as it may be for parents of teenagers, few of us want to live in Fuqua’s wonderful world of obedience by death threat.

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.

A Slave to the Bible

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We could all use more help around the house. Most people’s first thought would be to get some hired help, and it wouldn’t occur to them to invoke Jesus’ name as they, in all seriousness, mention that slavery might not be such a bad idea.

I say most people, but not all people.

I never imagined that a modern human, let alone a state representative from Arkansas, would come to the following conclusion:

“If slavery were so God-awful, why didn’t Jesus or Paul condemn it, why was it in the Constitution, and why wasn’t there a war before 1861?”

That is an actual quote from Republican Representative Loy Mauch of Bismarck, Arkansas. To get a little better picture of Rep. Mauch, you would want to know that he considers the Confederate flag a symbol of Christianity. Evidently the Jesus image was rebranded in the 1860s with a flashy, new, full-color logo; the cross and the fish both being a little passé.

Clearly not a deep thinker, Mauch states that the lateness of the Civil War proves that slavery wasn’t so bad, while ironically also claiming that the Civil War wasn’t even about slavery.

So is Mauch right about the Bible NOT condemning slavery? Absolutely! Having read it cover to cover, there is never any indication that we should even have a discussion of whether slavery might be a bad idea. The Bible’s idea of having a discussion about slavery involves detailing how hard you can beat your slave.

If a man strikes his servant or his maid with a rod, and he dies under his hand, he shall surely be punished. Notwithstanding, if he gets up after a day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his property. —Exodus 21:20-21

or this from the New Testament:

Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters and show them complete respect. Obey not only those owners who are good and kind, but also those who are cruel. —1 Peter 2:18

Now is it true that Jesus and Paul didn’t condemn slavery? Yes. Jesus doesn’t mention it, and Paul thinks it’s the best thing since sliced manna.

Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything you do. Try to please them all the time, not just when they are watching you. Serve them sincerely because of your reverent fear of the Lord. —Colossians 3:22

Do we really want to live in a country that bases its laws on whether Jesus and Paul took a stand on the issue 2,000 years ago? Let’s take a look at a few other things that Jesus and Paul did NOT condemn.

  • gay marriage
  • abortion
  • spousal abuse
  • dog fighting
  • cock fighting
  • bear baiting
  • human cloning
  • smoking in preschools
  • those annoying drum circles that never seem to end on those days when I’m walking in the park, and I’m just not in the mood for a drum circle serenade. Don’t get me wrong sometimes I enjoy them: people having fun, going into a percussion trance, it’s all good, but other times the monotonous droning is interminable, and I just want to shout, “Hey can somebody play a melody for God’s sake? Nobody has a pan flute on them? A trombone, a kazoo even?” (but I digress).

Following Rep. Mauch’s logic, there’s tacit biblical support for each of these controversial activities, (though something tells me Rep. Mauch might actually enjoy a good bear baiting). According to the Bible, Jesus and Paul never flew kites, ate sushi, or went bobsledding, so therefore…?

You know your party is starting to get a reputation for backwards thinking when a Republican Party County Chairman has to go on record saying, “I support the Emancipation Proclamation.” What year is this?

I admit that sometimes I pity Bible literalists. The knots they tie themselves into in order to hold all kinds of bizarre, twisted and contradictory beliefs are worthy of a Cirque du Soleil contortionist. My brain could never handle all of that cognitive dissonance. My pity begins to wane though when there literalism takes them to the sorry place where Rep. Mauch ends up.

Lastly, and much to my surprise, a quick word in support of negative campaigning. The guy who ran against Mauch in the election chose NOT to run a negative campaign! In my part of the country, when your opponent calls Lincoln a war criminal and claims that Jesus condoned slavery, as Mauch did, that’s your campaign right there. Negative yes, but also the honest truth. And here is one more honest truth that I reluctantly admit that Rep. Mauch and I agree on:

“Nowhere in the Holy Bible have I found a word of condemnation for the operation of slavery, Old or New Testament.” —Rep. Loy Mauch (R-AR)

But unlike Rep. Mauch, I think the Bible actually got it WRONG on the slavery issue—no matter how much help I need when I’m out working in the yard.

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.

I’m Jesus, and I Approve This Message

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Celebrity endorsements can be tricky. Kid Rock endorsed his biggest fan, Mitt Romney. Gary Busey endorsed Donald Trump, before he endorsed Newt Gingrich, before he took back his endorsement of Newt Gingrich.  And now Jesus, a man who wants us to drink wine in his memory, is being used to endorse a pro-Prohibition ballot measure in Kentucky.

If you thought alcohol prohibition ended in 1933, you’d be right…and wrong. There are still 200 dry counties in the USA, and every year there are ballot measures to change counties from dry to wet. Not surprisingly, many of these dry areas are in the nation’s Bible Belt, and many pro-Prohibition proponents employ religious appeals: “Serve Jesus, not alcohol” reads an ad in a small Kentucky town’s newspaper.

And we find sentiments like this from Matthew Ratliffe of Williamsburg, Kentucky: “I do have a moral obligation as a follower of Jesus Christ to be against alcohol.”

But wait, isn’t this the same Jesus who had a reputation for excessively enjoying the fruit of the vine?

The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, “Behold, a gluttonous man and a drunkard!” —Matthew 11:19

This is also the guy who at the Last Supper urged his followers to drink wine as if it were his blood, and he was looking forward to drinking in heaven too:

But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom. —Matthew 26:29

Okay, Jesus seems to be cool with alcohol, but God never drank, right?

And the vine said to them, “Should I leave my wine, which cheereth God and man?” —Judges 9:13

It sounds like God not only drinks wine, but gets a little tipsy, if my interpretation is correct. And he helps his people do the same:

The Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine. —Isaiah 25:6

So Yahweh and Jesus seem to enjoy the occasional drink, but what does the rest of the Bible say on the matter. As usual, it is of two minds:

PRO

  • Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart. —Ecclesiastes 9:7
  • Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto the bitter of soul. —Proverbs 31:6
  • Take a little wine for the good of your stomach and because you are frequently ill. —1 Timothy 5:23


CON

  • Cursed are those who are strong to take wine and great in making mixed drinks! —Isaiah 5:22
  • Woe to him that giveth drink to his friend, and presenteth his gall, and maketh him drunk, that he may behold his nakedness…Drink thou also…and shameful vomiting shall be on thy glory.” —Habakkuk 2:15-16
  • Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. —Ephesians 5:18

The Bible’s coming down on both sides of the issue doesn’t help settle the case for or against Prohibition. But its ambivalence did give us one of the best oxymorons in the scriptures when it tells us that the one thing that “is health to soul and body” is

Sober drinking. —Sirach 31:37

I’m sure teetotaling advocates have their reasons for keeping Prohibition alive in their counties, but it may be time to find a new spokessavior. After all, if Jesus were really against alcohol, he would have chosen his first miracle ever performed to be turning wine into water instead of the other way around. That may have pleased some of his current day followers, but he would certainly have gone down in history, not just as a miracle worker, but also as one of the world’s worst wedding guests ever.

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.

Is There a Blessing for a Bain?

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Cherry-picking Bible verses is as easy as 10, 11, 12, 13.

God loves a good capitalist. Or so says Rabbi Aryeh Spero who gave Mitt Romney’s work at Bain Capital the Good Lord’s stamp of approval in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed. The only problem is that it was less of a divine imprimatur and more of a classic example of a pesky little thing called “confirmation bias.”

Choosing only evidence that vindicates your personal biases is an easy trap, and with its many contradictory and ambiguous passages, the Bible makes confirmation bias that much easier.

Like a desperate kid with a Magic 8 Ball, the Bible is likely to give you the answer you want as long as you just keep trying.

Rabbi Spero begins his commentary by calling President Obama a “redistributionist.” (What has this nation come to when Spero can’t even call the President what he seems to want to: a socialist.) Spero’s broad-brush caricature of liberal positions and his disinterest in the social ramifications of Bain’s tactics make his ideology fairly obvious. He then cherry-picked Bible passages to purportedly absolve Romney and Bain of any possible offenses in their private equity exploits.

Spero’s main contention is that any critique of Bain’s business practice amounts to envy, and envy is forbidden in the Bible. It’s quite an assumption in itself to claim that basically anyone who has a problem with income distribution in America is just jealous. Calling the 99% envious is a way of downplaying the real concern that many have expressed that there is not a level playing field in America today—that the game is rigged in favor of the rich and powerful. And Bain’s story of firing workers, bankrupting companies, and raiding pension funds in order to reward its wealthy investors is a prime example.

But let’s assume that the 60% of Americans that think income distribution is an important issue are all just jealous. If we use a different confirmation bias, we could say that their jealousy is actually making them more godlike:

The Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God. —Exodus 34:14

Now let’s see what else the Bible has to say about other views people have about Mitt Romney and Bain Capital.

Opinion 1: “Romney made his money honestly. We should all work to be as rich as he is.”

Bible’s Approval: The poor man is hated even by his neighbor, but the man of wealth has numbers of friends. —Proverbs 14:20

Bible’s Disapproval: Labor not to be rich. —Proverbs 23:4

Opinion 2: “In a capitalist system, it was Romney’s duty to seek the highest return on investment, regardless of societal implications.”

Bible’s Approval: “Why didn’t you deposit my money in the bank? At least I could have gotten some interest on it.” —Matthew 25:27

Bible’s Disapproval: And they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need. —Acts 2:45

Opinion 3: “Without lifting a finger, Mitt Romney’s blind trust earns in 16 hours what an average American worker earns in an entire year. It’s not fair.”

Bible’s Approval: It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” —Mark 10:25

Bible’s Disapproval: Wealth makes a great number of friends, but the poor man is parted from his friend. —Proverbs 19:4

Opinion 4: “Romney raided companies, walked away with massive wealth, and cared little about the impact on the people affected.”

Bible’s Approval: When Jehoshaphat and his people came to take the spoil of them, they found among them in abundance both riches and dead bodies, and precious jewels, which they stripped off for themselves, more than they could carry away. And they were three days in taking the spoil, it was so much. —2 Chronicles 20:25

Bible’s Disapproval:  They slew of their enemy 75,000, but on the spoil they laid not their hand. —Esther 9:16

Opinion 5: “Mitt ‘I’m Not Concerned About The Very Poor’ Romney isn’t concerned about the very poor.”

Bible’s Approval: You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me. —John 12:8

Bible’s Disapproval: He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God. —Proverbs 14:31

As a bit of an expert on the use and abuse of Bible quotes (at least the outlandish ones), I know confirmation bias when I see it. Rabbi Spero would do better by telling us what he thinks about Mitt Romney’s version of capitalism rather than trying to tell us God’s opinion. It’s hard to precisely pinpoint God’s position on any particular topic these days. God gave numerous and contradictory statements in the past, and for some strange reason he is no longer giving interviews.

Answering Newt’s Prayer for Open Marriage

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Newt GingrichProposing to your wife, that you would like to have an open marriage, is a shocking bit of news, according to Newt Gingrich’s second ex-wife. But surprisingly, one place where such concepts are definitely old news is in the Holy Bible.

In the laws of the Old Testament, polygamy is spoken of in very matter-of-fact terms, without any hint of disrepute:

If he take himself another wife… —Exodus 21:10

If a man have two wives… —Deuteronomy 21:15

A candidate who really believed the Bible would tell us that traditional marriage is between one man and one woman…and as many other wives and concubines as the man can attract and afford.

To get a sense of how commonplace polygamy is in the Bible, the following is a list of biblical characters who carried on with more than one woman, and it reads like one of those too-boring-to-read-out-loud genealogies from First Chronicles (seriously, do not try to read 1 Chronicles chapters 1-9 at your next Bible study group!): Abijah, Abraham, Ahab, Ahasuerus, Ashur, Belshazzar, Benhadad, Caleb, David, Eliphaz, Elkanah, Esau, Ezra, Gideon, Jacob, Jehoiachin, Jehoram, Jerahmeel, Joash, Lamech, Machir, Manasseh, Mered, Moses, Nahor, Rehoboam, Saul, Shaharaim, Simeon, Solomon, and Zedekiah.

In the scriptures, polygamy originated rather humbly with Noah’s father, Lamech:

And Lemech took two wives, one named Adah and the other Zillah. —Genesis 4:19

And it culminates in the harem of King Solomon:

Solomon had 700 wives of royal birth and 300 concubines, and his wives led him astray. — 1 Kings 11:3

A man with a reputation for wisdom couldn’t forsee any problem living with 1,000 women?

In the New Testament, or as Rev. Lovejoy calls it, “somewhere towards the back” of the Bible, polygamy is definitely downplayed, though it was evidently accepted enough to work its way into one of Jesus’ parables:

Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. —Matthew 25:1

Throughout most of the Bible, multiple wives pointed to a king’s increased social status. Perhaps a similar urge affected Gingrich and the most recent batch of America’s polyamorous politicians from both major parties, including John Edwards, John Ensign, Bill Clinton, Mark Sanford, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Eliot Spitzer, and David Vitter to name but a few.

Officially, it should be stated, Gingrich has denied calling for an open marriage, but his admission of the affair and his shoot-the-messenger reaction to the story has left some unconvinced of his innocence.

The Bible clearly treats polygamy as an allowable practice, and nowhere is it unequivocally forbidden by God. As the practice became socially unacceptable in the U.S., the religions that wanted to stay in business decided to go along with public sentiment, just like they did with other biblically supported issues like slavery, the killing of witches, and the prohibition of tattoos.

In making his open marriage request, maybe the old Newt was making a point that the newly devout Newt would appreciate: it’s not adultery if we can all just agree to call her a concubine. Sadly for him, even those who interpret the Bible literally are unlikely to follow what the Bible says on this issue.

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.

Boo! Unto Others

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Angry RepublicansWho could have predicted that a rousing chorus of boos would erupt at a Republican Presidential debate at the mere mention of an ethical principle championed by Jesus and, maybe more importantly, Ronald Reagan.

Some in the crowd, having just heard Newt Gingrich’s gung-ho endorsement of killing America’s enemies, were in no mood to embrace Ron Paul’s call for applying the Golden Rule to America’s foreign policy.

To hear a crowd of nominally-Christian conservatives shout down one of the world’s best loved social precepts was like having them jeer at Betty White singing “God Bless America” to a box of puppies.

So as a quick refresher (as some people evidently need), Jesus was a big fan of the Golden Rule. Repeatedly throughout the New Testament you find quotes like this:

Do to others as you would have them do to you. —Luke 6:31

Before you think Jesus was just a pushover, there is this contrasting quote:

Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword! —Matthew 10:34

Regarding Newt Gingrich’s call to kill your enemies, a different Bible quote comes to mind from the ever-warring book of Joshua. God is so eager to let the Israelites continue the slaughter of the Amorites that he decides to stop the sun from moving in the sky for a whole day! (It probably would have been less taxing to just invent some night vision goggles.)

So the sun stood still and the moon stayed in place until the nation of Israel had defeated its enemies. Is this event not recorded in the Book of Jashar? The sun stayed in the middle of the sky, and it did not set as on a normal day. —Joshua 10:13

By the way, It doesn’t help you prove that the 36 straight hours of daylight actually happened, when you tell people to look it up in a book that no longer exists.

Depending on his mood, God can clearly take either side in this foreign policy debate, but how do other world religions feel about the Golden Rule? It turns out that Jesus was in fact a late-comer to this superlative maxim. As can be seen below, it is the closest thing we have to a universally recommended principle of human conduct, for some 4,000 years running.

Baha’i: Choose thou for thy neighbor that which thou choosest for thyself. —Lawh’i ‘Ibn’i Dhib, “Epistle to the Son of the Wolf” 30

Brahmanism: This is the sum of duty: do naught unto others which would cause you pain if done to you. —Mahabharata 5:1517

Buddhism (560 BCE): Hurt not others with that which pains yourself. —Udana-Varga 5.18

Confucianism: Do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself. —Analects 15:23

Egypt (2000 BC): Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do. —The Eloquent Peasant

Greece (400 BCE): Do not do to others what would anger you if done to you by others. —Socrates

Hinduism (3200 BCE): One should always treat others as they themselves wish to be treated. —The Hitopadesa

Islam: Not one of you is a believer until you wish for others what you wish for yourself.” —Fortieth Hadith of an-Nawawi 13

Jainism: One should treat all creatures in the world as one would like to be treated.” —Sutrakritanga 1:11:33

Judaism (1300 BCE): Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. —Leviticus 19:18

Sikhism: Treat others as thou wouldst be treated thyself. —Adi Granth

Taoism: Regard your neighbor’s gain as our own gain, and your neighbor’s loss as your own loss. —T’ai Shang Kan Ying P’ien

Zoroastrianism (600 BCE): That nature alone is good which refrains from doing unto another whatsoever is not good for itself. —Dadistan-I-Dinik, 94:5

Is the Golden Rule the ideal military strategy? By itself, probably not, but it’s a reasonable start. I strongly believe in the Golden Rule, and I teach “Treat people the way you want to be treated” to my kids; however, I add my own corollary which is “But don’t let people walk all over you either.”

I’d like to take a second, before you think I’m just out to bash Republicans, to gIve credit where credit is due: a Republican candidate for President advocated we employ the Golden Rule in making foreign policy. Surprisingly, as it turns out, that was a pretty gutsy move. And after he wrapped up and had mentioned wanting to bring the troops home, many in the crowd applauded. So it’s likely that a small minority in the crowd that night were anti-Golden Rule.

But the issue still remains: why do some Christian conservatives, who like to claim this is a Christian nation, seem oblivious to certain sayings of Jesus? Several studies reveal that conservatives in general display less empathy than do other groups.* The Golden Rule is all about seeing things from the other person’s point of view and recognizing our common humanity. It could be that all Christians tend to avoid dwelling on the teachings of Jesus that don’t fit their worldview.

If they were paying attention, they would realize that Jesus’ version goes beyond some of the negatively-stated, do-no-harm-types of Golden Rules and is actually a positive, proactive version. But if they won’t listen to him, maybe they’ll listen to the words of someone they seem to love even more:

We might come closer to balancing the budget if all of us lived closer to the Commandments and the Golden Rule. —Ronald Reagan

* Pratto, Felicia; Sidanius, Jim; Stallworth, Lisa M.; Malle, Bertram F. (1994). “Social dominance orientation: A personality variable predicting social and political attitudes”. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.