"There Are Some Really Good People Out There..."

...Us. We...Normal People." - Michael Savage
Not them. Not the other. Not the stranger, the outcast, the sinner. Not the least of these. Or as Savage calls them, the "vermin."

On the February 26 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio show, after playing an audio clip of the beginning of singer Melissa Etheridge's acceptance speech at the Academy Awards in which she thanked her wife and four children, Michael Savage said: "I don't like a woman married to a woman raising children. It makes me want to puke. ... I want to vomit when I hear it. I think it's child abuse."

"27God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God." [1 Cor. 1]

Fear of 'the other' has rational roots in our physical nature. Ancient tribes seeking to survive needed to define and protect their religious, national, and cultural identity. The Israelites, for example, had been slaves in Egypt; they had wandered in the desert, subject to attacks from other tribes, starvation, and infectious diseases. They needed cohesiveness, separateness, and order in every aspect of their lives. Failure to form a tight-knit community could threaten their long-term survival.

Furthermore, connecting this example to the issue at hand, concern of productivity and separateness was made even more pertinent due to the exile of the Israelites at the time of their formulation. Since procreation was so vital to ancient Israel's survival, regulations that governed sexual relations in the biblical world were primarily intended to further biological productivity in all biblical periods, in view of the scarcity of population, demands created by the agricultural life-style, and the high mortality rate of women and children.

All of that to say, we are NOT there anymore. But even for ancient Israel, the command in the Torah was still one of love - love of God and love of the neighbor, love of the stranger. A perspective of justice with concern for the stranger is at the heart of the Torah, and God's judgment came when Israel strayed from this ethic. For the Christian the Torah is personified in Jesus, and there is no doubt that Jesus abolished the idea of the other and separateness under his banner. The poor and the outcast are closer to the Kingdom of God than the rich, the popular, the self-righteous, the Pharisee.

The message continues to be in every generation that certain people can be taken as less than full human beings. The same folks that have a fear or hatred of homosexuals are afraid of the angry black man, afraid of the immigrant, afraid of the Muslim, they're just afraid.

18There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. 19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother. [1 John 4]

That anyone calling themselves Christians ever got co-opted with right-wing hatemongerers like Savage or any of these other personalities is beyond me. There is no way to advocate the kinds of things they do and understand the gospel. The gospel that says,

"7Let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. 13We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. 16And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. 17In this way, love is made complete among us.

The Savage Nation reaches more than 8 to 10 million listeners each week, according to Talkers Magazine, making it the third most-listened-to talk radio show in the nation, behind only The Rush Limbaugh Show and The Sean Hannity Show. Savage declares himself to be "To the right of Rush and to the left of God."

Source: http://mediamatters.org/items/200702270015