In this Issue:

H4PJ Presents Valhalla: Tickets on sale for epic comedy
Sane Religion: Commentary by Rev. Michael Piazza
Monday Night with Mike: Dallas Mixer October 2
Christian Conservatives Look to Re-energize Base

H4PJ Presents Valhalla
Tickets on Sale for Epic Comedy
Sunday, October 15, 7 pm
Trinity River Arts Center | $35

Support Hope for Peace & Justice by attending a special performance of Uptown Players’ production of Paul Rudnick’s epic comedy Valhalla. By purchasing your tickets to Valhalla through H4PJ, you help us raise money for important programs, seminars and workshops that help people find peace and work for justice. Your $35 ticket includes an invitation to a post-show dessert reception.

Valhalla intertwines two stories: the life of Ludwig of Bavaria, the 1880s Mad King responsible for building a series of storybook castles inspired by Wagnerian operas, and the fictional adventures of James Avery, a wild Texas teenager of the 1940s. These two characters are tracked from childhood through their deaths, and while they embody separate eras, they are ultimately revealed as time-traveling soul mates.

The play explores questions of beauty and madness, as both Ludwig and James pursue lives of operatic passion, bringing them in contact with such diverse figures as a high-school quarterback, the prettiest girl in Dainsville, Texas, most of the characters of Lohengrin, and princess Sophie, who declares herself “the loneliest humpback in Europe.” Valhalla is an epic comic tale that cleverly reveals the price to be paid for getting what you most desire. If you love camp, or wacky spins on literary history or gay stories with heart and LOTS of laughs, you’re gonna love Valhalla.

Click here to purchase your tickets.

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Commentary: Sane Religion
by Rev. Michael S. Piazza

Two of my favorite preachers spoke powerfully to me recently. Bishop John Shelby Spong returned to the Cathedral for the third time to preach on Sunday, September 17. He and his wife Christine have become dear friends, and, while we don’t see eye-to-eye on every theological issue, I am so grateful to him for continuing to challenge me to think and pray and grow. By the time I had listened to his second sermon, which was different from the first, my head was light from all the issues he raised for me to re-examine. It is so frustrating to live in a culture where preachers mouth inane phrases and clichés without contemplating their implications. Jack Spong always makes me think about what my theology says about God. He reminds me that I have a brain and that it needs to be used at church as much as anywhere else. I was so sorry when he returned to New Jersey, because I wanted to sit at his feet and absorb more of his insights, knowledge and wisdom.

Then I picked up my copy of Christian Century. Barbara Brown Taylor has a regular column there. Now, we tease Rev. Hudson unmercifully for how she idolizes Barbara Brown Taylor and how often she quotes her in sermons, but the truth is I am no less of a fan. As I read her article in this month’s issue, I was a little surprised to find that she had written about chickens. Having grown up in rural South Georgia, I have seen chickens close-up, so I didn’t expect much insight from this particular offering from BBT. In fact, it took me two tries to read it. When I did, though, I found myself with tears in my eyes. If my favorite Bishop had touched my head, my favorite writing preacher touched my heart.

Both of them spoke to our image of God. Bishop Spong challenged our image of a God who requires the blood sacrifice of an innocent soul in order to be able to love us. When did we start believing God was morally inferior to many people we know? Time and again we see victims of crimes or neglect who are able to unconditionally forgive—to extend grace. Yet we seem to think that God required innocent blood before being willing/able to forgive us. Barbara Brown Taylor used mother hens to illustrate unconditional love in how a mother hen accepts chicks that are not her own and protects them with her very life. Having raised chickens, I know they are among the dumbest of God’s creatures, but what magnificent nobility we see in their love. How did we let preachers and Bible teachers make God less noble than the chicken we had for lunch today?

The mission of Hope for Peace & Justice is to bear witness to the image of God that Jesus came to teach. We are advocates for a sane faith that believes sane things about God. We are calling for a return to sanity in our country:

• Look into the eyes of the poor and ask yourself if a sane God favors tax cuts for the richest.
• Look into the eyes of the orphaned children of Iraq and ask yourself if sane Christians believe war is God’s will.
• Look at the destruction of creation and ask yourself if a sane human race would destroy the only planet we have.

So much of what is wrong in our world is rooted in the kind of God in which we believe. Sometimes I think God would rather us be atheists.

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Hope for Peace & Justice needs your support to continue to provide a progressive, religious response to the Religious Right. Donations, at any amount, are greatly appreciated. Click here to Donate to H4PJ.

Monday Night with Mike
Dallas Mixer October 2
5-7pm | Gloria’s Restaurant

Our next “Monday Night with Mike” will be October 2 at Gloria’s Restaurant, located at 4140 Lemmon Avenue, Dallas, TX 75219, at the intersection of Lemmon and Wycliff. The event will begin at 5pm and last until around 7pm. There will be a cash bar, with, of course, chips, salsa and Gloria’s famous black bean dip.

Monday Night with Mike is a free event, to which everyone is invited! This is a great way to meet other people who are passionate about peace and justice issues, and an excellent opportunity to introduce your friends to the work that we are doing. Rev. Michael Piazza, President of Hope for Peace & Justice, will speak about current issues and give an update on his new book, The Real antichrist. Please mark your calendar for this special event. Invite your friends and family and then stay for dinner to brainstorm what you can do to work for peace and justice.

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Christian Conservatives Look to Re-energize Base
by David Kirkpatrick
Originally published by The New York Times

WASHINGTON, Sept. 24 — Openly anxious about grass-roots disaffection from the Republican Party, conservative Christian organizers are reaching for ways to turn out voters this November, including arguing that recognizing same-sex marriage could also limit religious freedom.

Just two years after many conservative Christians exulted that their voter turnout efforts had pushed President Bush to re-election, organizers say their constituents are disengaged.

“There is disillusionment out there with Republicans,” said James C. Dobson, founder of the conservative Christian broadcaster Focus on the Family and the most influential voice in the movement. “That worries me greatly.”

At an election-season Values Voters Summit held here by the allied Family Research Council, some conservatives debated whether “maybe losing the Republican majority would teach us a lesson and get our movement back on track,” in the words of Representative Mike Pence, Republican of Indiana.

Mr. Pence argued that in the end, Republicans were still preferable to Democrats. Like many arguments, though, his was about picking the lesser of two evils.

“My first inclination was to sit this one out,” Dr. Dobson said in an interview, adding that he had changed his mind when he looked at who would become the leaders of Congressional committees if the Democrats took over.

Some were candidly gloomy.

“At the grass roots, among ordinary people, the enthusiasm is not there, and unless that changes in the next five or six weeks, the Republicans aren’t going to make it” to retain control of Congress, said Paul Weyrich, chairman of the Free Congress Foundation and a founder of the modern conservative movement.

In addition to voicing more general complaints, Christian conservatives say President Bush and Republicans in Congress have not lived up to their expectations about advancing new abortion restrictions or a proposed constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

Even in this crowd of nearly 2,000 Christian conservative activists, some balked at one tactic recommended to turn out church voters. In a workshop, Connie Marshner, a veteran organizer, distributed a step-by-step guide that recommended obtaining church directories and posing as a nonpartisan pollster to ask people how they planned to vote.

“Hello, I am with ABC polls,” a suggested script began.

Some attendees complained that the script seemed deceptive, Ms. Marshner said in an interview afterward. She said that such disguised calls were a common campaign tactic, that it was just a suggested script and that she never recommended answering a direct question with a lie.

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, who played host to the conference, said he was “upset” to learn of her instructions and condemned any deception.

The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of the liberal group Americans United for Separation of Church and State, called the tactic “disgraceful” and “a desecration of the church.”

Several organizers at the event lamented that opposition to same-sex marriage, a major catalyst for Christian conservative turnout two years ago, had lost some of its emotional resonance. Massachusetts remains the only state to recognize same-sex marriage. Sixteen states have passed constitutional amendments banning such unions, and eight courts have ruled against the idea.

“Sometimes success brings complacency,” Mr. Perkins said.

To revive some of the emotions around the issue, several organizers said they were taking up the argument that legal recognition of same-sex marriages would cramp the free expression of religious groups who consider such unions a sin — an idea much discussed at the conference.

“That is an issue that wasn’t around two years ago and one that is absolutely moving to the very forefront,” said the Rev. Donald Wildmon, founder of the American Family Association, a conservative Christian broadcaster and advocacy group.

Although that idea may seem far-fetched to many liberal or secular-minded voters, legal scholars across the political spectrum agree that authorizing same-sex marriages could present legal questions for some religious groups. A Roman Catholic group in Massachusetts, for example, recently stopped offering children for adoption rather than provide them to gay couples.

At the Values Voters conference, Mr. Perkins played a preview for an October telecast to Christian broadcasters that dramatized the conflicts in stark terms. He interviewed parents who are suing the town of Lexington, Mass., because its public school assigned their 7-year-old son a book called “King and King,” about two princes who marry.

“Get involved as the Lord leads before religious liberty is lost forever,” Mr. Perkins warned in the trailer.

Others looked abroad. In a pre-election letter to 2.5 million supporters, Dr. Dobson is breaking away from his traditional field of child psychology to argue that foreign terrorists are a threat to families.

The Rev. Jerry Falwell, founder of the Moral Majority, looked ahead to 2008 and the possibility that Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton might be the Democratic presidential candidate. Ms. Clinton’s nomination, Mr. Falwell said to laughs, would arouse even more evangelical opposition than Lucifer’s.

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