I Would Be If I Were You

Still smiling from watching Ellen's excellent interview with Constance McMillen, the courageous but oh-so-shy girl who's fighting to go to her own high school prom, I happened across an amazing website this evening.  It's called Answers in Genesis and I'm not going to link to it and give them any juice.  (they're a dot org, so you can look them up)

AiG, as they refer to themselves, is an organization which, aside from having a pretty kick-ass graphics designer, is an apologetic Christian ministry that:

...desire[s] to bring people back to the authority of the Bible and provide biblical answers to the questions that cause many to doubt and disbelieve the Scriptures. Beyond that, we strive to edify, equip, and encourage believers through God’s Word. We challenge non-Christians concerning the truth of God’s Word and the message of the gospel, and train believers to defend their faith reasonably and biblically.

This is one of those groups that spends their time trying to overturn Roe v. Wade, pass Proposition 8 and generally reverse the course of human progress (they're behind the utterly absurd Creation Museum).

Their latest project is called 'I Am Not Ashamed' - again a dot org, if you're curious - which bills itself as a online video bible.  The hook is that each chapter and verse can be recorded and uploaded by anyone with a webcam and a copy of the good book.  It's actually a pretty excellent social media project, but that's beside the point I'm discussing now. 

Those who know me know how I feel about faith and people thereof.  Over the initial flush of ironic self-righteous indignation at what I considered the enemy of reason, I've mellowed to the point where I'm not about to take a crap on folks that draw a little comfort from scripture.

But Answers in Genesis and their ilk appear to be attempting to turn the good ol' USA into a Christian theocracy, which to me sounds plain un-American.

So I watched a few of these Scrip-clips.  First up was the soccer mom with a midwestern drawl reading about Moses purifying the alter with the consecrated blood and entrails of the slaughtered cow.  Next came the Abercrombie & Fitch'd 20-something, who, with a completely straight face, advised us that a woman who gives birth to a male child is unclean for seven days and has to remain in the blood of her purification for more than a month.

It seemed so much like a like a Louis CK comedy bit, this concern about what to do with all the blood, that I honestly wasn't sure if these people were taking the piss or what.  But Answers in Genesis claims to take the bible at it's word, so I can only assume they were being serious.

Now here's where you might think I'd come over all dismissive of the lunacy inherent in taking literally the lifestyle choices of Bronze Age sheep-herders.  On the contrary!  I decided that if these folks were going to try and get the entire bible on YouTube, the least I could do to help the I Am Not Ashamed folks was upload a video of my own.

Webcam on, I whipped out the trusty King James, and thumbing to one of my favourite passages, I recorded my lines.  And, I'm proud to say, I did it in one take.

Leviticus 11:9-12 talks about what you can and cannot eat in the way of seafood.  In a nutshell, as long as it has scales and fins you're cool - anything else, like shellfish, is an abomination.  So remember that when you're next settling down the Admiral's Feast at Red Lobster: Cheddar Bay biscuits are pleasing to the Lord, but the bottomless popcorn shrimp?  More like the bottomless pit of eternal damnation.
 
The problem, of course, is that another of the Holiness Codes, the famous and of-quoted Leviticus 18, forbids the lying of men with men and by extension, I presume, the wearing of tuxedos and the attending of proms for lesbians.  So while most Good Christians ignore the 11th chapter and rejoice at the melted butter running down their chins, too many others, including the assholes administrators at the Itawamba County School district in Mississipi, hold up the 18th as an acceptable guideline for social and educational policy.