It's all the rage! Christian rage

Here's part of my letter to Joshua Micah Marshell of Talking Points Memo regarding this post. He talks about the historical roots of this electorial split, the high murder rates in "red states" and offers this dark observation:

But in the Southern states, where murder rates are higher in small towns and rural areas, this isn’t the case. Rather than happening in the process of committing other crimes, these murders tend to be rooted in what are best described as violations of honor, personal slights that escalate into violence or in the simplest sense, rage.

Josh:

I found your post about murder in the south interesting. With all this talk about “moral values” when it comes right down to it the thing that got a lot of voters out was fear and hate. What no one really wants to talk about is just how much of the motivation for the evangelical Christians is based on hate. Think about the choices given to voters at the exit polls. There was no choice for “I hate gays.” Like so much of the Bush rhetoric this was about a false choice. “Good Christians” would not admit they really voted their hate. In a culture that kills over passion, yet wants to provide a façade of politeness, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that they are politically correct enough not to talk about their hate while pretending to be about love and life.

Why does no one bust them on this? Because like today’s comedians, you can’t tell black jokes unless you are black. They should be busted from inside. But they won’t be. They are given easy hate targets in terrorists and gays and uppity women. They used to have blacks to kick around (with biblical permission!) but not anymore. The church should have come out strongly against the war. For them to say that getting out the vote against gay marriage is their priority is a failure of leadership. The leaders allowed their fears to drive them which also allowed their followers to bring out the hate vote with impunity.

And regarding messed up priorities in the Churches, I'm looking at you Pastor Brian Lacroix, pastor at Aberdeen Wesleyan Church in South Dakota! I heard him on Talk of the Nation talking about his priorities: Against abortion, against gay marriage, for hate speech (although he said he was really for free speech so that he could talk about the hate in the bible without being busted.)

Oh and Pastor Brian, if you find this, and I'm sure you will (because you'll Goggle your name soon and find it.), isn't vanity a sin? And then ask yourself, "How do my political comments and activities match up with the NEW TESTAMENT, synoptic Gospels? Especially Mark 12:30-31 ("And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.' The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these.") or are you a "Leviticus-trumps-Jesus-Christian?