A week back the New York Times Magazine profiled the disturbingly (proudly) intolerant Evangelical Fundamentalists from Africa who have moved their "ministries" to the United States. Worth a read. But more worth a read is this Letter to the Editors:
Daniel Ajayi-Adeniran and Raphael Adebayo claim that the Redeemed are in America because it “has fallen into the thrall of wickedness.” If America is considered fallen, what does that say about the extreme poverty, disease, ethnic cleansing, tribal warfare and failed states of Africa where he and the Redeemed originated? In truth, the Redeemed came to America because this is where the money is, and because American freedoms allow all religions — even the most bizarre — not only to exist but to sustain their existence by exemption from taxes.
We chastised the leaders of the American automobile industry for flying to Washington on private jets, yet we subsidize by tax relief the purchase of a private jet for a religious group that prays for God to cancel debts supernaturally; believes text messages offer divine protection; prays for deliverance from curses, spells and sorcery, witchcraft, evil spirits, poverty and addiction due to demonic possession; petitions God to transform their followers into millionaires; and claims to perform miracles, see the future, raise the dead, avoid traffic jams, foresee coups, restore hair, cure kidney disease, depression and H.I.V.
How can we be so inconsistent?
STEPHEN T. MOSLEY
Newtown, Pa.
Indeed.