Tim Todd Ministries has recently distributed 48,000 New Testaments — altered to conform to religious-right political correctness — to public-school students in the United States.
These New Testaments come with numerous “powerful full-color comics” that (Todd claims) communicate the “absolute truth,” that are packed with “absolute truths regarding moral issues young people are faced with everyday.” Issues covered in the comics range from drugs, alcohol, and peer pressure to abortion, evolution, and rock music.
Unfortunately, none of these issues is mentioned in the Bible, and even if they were, the comics present them in the form of fictitious strawman arguments by imaginary liberal and conservative culture warriors.
There is a six-page full-color comic dedicated to homosexuality. What makes this comic interesting — apart from its presentation of imaginary violent gay activists and gay-bashers as “absolute truth” — is the way it is neatly wrapped up by the testimony of a fictitious ex-gay character, who says he left homosexuality 30 years ago. The comic concludes with an encouragement to teens needing “freedom from homosexuality” to contact Exodus International. A URL is provided for them to follow to Exodus.
The presentation of fiction and culture war to public-school youth as though they were literal Biblical truth should deeply disturb conservative evangelicals, and especially Biblical literalists.
Tim Todd Ministries’ program to insert politically contorted and exploited Bibles into public-school settings is endorsed not by true respecters of the Bible, but rather by leading partisan polemicists of our time: T.D. Jakes, Michael Reagan, and the late Jerry Falwell.
Unfortunately, Exodus’ political allies have demonstrated again that they are willing to commit sacrilege in order to give the “change is possible” mantra an implied Biblical imprimatur. Despite their claims to uphold the Bible, they violate Deuteronomy 12:32, Deuteronomy 4:2, and Revelation 22:18-19, which — according to conservative Christians — forbid additions and changes to Holy Scripture.
Why does Exodus silently tolerate modification and fictionalization of Christianity in its name? We call upon Exodus to publicly repudiate the hacking of Holy Scripture with fictitious materials and the trivialization of ex-gay struggle through culture-war comics.
Hat tip: XGW reader John and OneNewsNow.
I got one when this was first started. (Ordered a free one just to see what it was about.) It is grosser than you think and then some. You can see all the comics here. It’s right before the, you know, actual Bible part.
Oh, and there are brief testimonies! One is about a young girl who was “heavily involved in Witchcraft.” There is another, with a smiling young black boy in a sweater vest:
“This young man from Columbus, GA received a Truth For Youth Bible, read the comic on Rock Music, went home and threw all of his “Spice Girl” posters and CD’s in the trash!” No ex-gay testimonies, though, TTG.
It would be hilarious if it weren’t so sad.
I find this interesting. On the last page of the homosexuality comic, they quickly suggest the idea that there were “homosexuals in the Bible” who were changed? I wonder who they’re referring to. I’m pretty familiar with the Bible, and I don’t remember any such story.
Got it, Jarred. This particular passage is used a *lot* when trying to convince LGBT people to become ex-gays. Emphases are mine:
1 Corinthians 9-11: “9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites,
10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.”
So much from so little, isn’t it?
Thanks, Jayelle. Personally, I still think that’s quite a stretch. Especially knowing that the Greek words (now) rendered as “homosexuals” and “sodomites” are of uncertain meaning.
Hmm, my workplace Surfpatrol blocks Jayelle’s link to the actual comic because the material may be “tasteless and offensive.” Ironic that a supplement to the Bible is classed that way. Looks like Surfpatrol might be right for once.
Jayelle, I’m especially grateful to you for posting the testimony of the young man in the black sweater who “read the comic on Rock Music, went home and threw all of his “Spice Girl” posters and CD’s in the trash!”. It’s a sign that these comics do actually do a little bit of good.
These comics were discussed previously here. As I mentioned then:
In the comic about Homosexuality, there’s a young boy who thinks he might be gay. As best I can tell, there’s no reason to think he may have ever had a sexual encounter; he simply THINKS he might be gay.
The “advice” given him is “God can forgive you of the sin of homosexuality but you have to recognize and admit you’re guilty first”.
Yep, the big sin he needed forgiveness for was “thinking he was gay”. This is really really bad theology.
Don’t forget, half the battle for ex-gay organizations is convincing gay people that they have a problem, then they can bring out the solution. This is PFOX all over – they have to get into those schools because, heaven forbid, little Johnny doesn’t loathe himself for liking boys instead of girls.
This is outrageous. How about the part what it says, and I quote “Whether you are a homosexual, or have just been suckered into a few homosexual acts by some predators,” It’s hard to believe someone would print this in the name of Jesus Christ.
Some Bible publishers do the same with the word “homosexual” since that word wasn’t coined until the late 19th century. They liberally use it in certain passages of Scripture. And why would a Bible translater, according to Jayelle above add, ” nor homosexuals, nor sodomites,” if they both mean the same thing to most conservative Christians? Or was “homosexual” added to the Bible erroneously? Or intentionally as a bias against gay people?
Looking over 1 Corinthians (its actually 1 Corinthians 6:9 ) it says, “Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders 10. nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. “ Why would they add homosexual to offenders if the word was only coined a little over a century ago? Why does this Bible translation as well as some other translations take the liberty to add homosexual when that word wasn’t even around 2,000 years ago?
I would never read a Bible that had the word homosexual in it. Would make me think twice of what else they added to it to confirm their biases.
XGW previously covered a comic in this series using junk science on the subject of HIV transmission.
https://exgaywatch.com/2005/08/afa-promoting-b/
Timothy already beat you to it Daniel 😉
What bothers me about this exgaywatch posting is the tone of surprise it exhibits. The religious right in the US is all about “do as I say, not as I do”, and using the bible only as a tool to beat people over the head when it’s politically useful to do so. As loud as they scream about being Christian, they never actually pay attention to the teachings of Christ, since he said things to the effect that you should love people and not judge them, and that wouldn’t be politically convenient.
It’s long past time we just start pointing out liars and frauds using religion as cover and calling them liars and frauds, and not pretending they’re religious people who happen to be in error.
Yep, the big sin he needed forgiveness for was “thinking he was gay”. This is really really bad theology.
Is it? Doesn’t the bible prohibit coveting and lusting in your heart?
Mark,
Surely you aren’t trying to argue that thinking that one is gay is the same thing as either coveting or lusting. Because then thinking one is heterosexual would also be a sin.
So since that notion is ridiculous, I’m sure that isn’t what you meant.
Hey, now why don’t the public schools still allow books on ‘Lil Black Sambo”, and say that THOSE books are the truth, and listening to Ray Charles and Roberta Flack is ‘race music’.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
I liked what that minister said in the video about love and justice. If you can’t talk about love and justice, you’re not talking about God.
Can I get a amen?
So, Exodus has had at least two years to repudiate this desecration of holy scripture, and hasn’t done so.
Interesting.
Ironically, Little Black Sambo was actually a story about… a kid in India. He was written as “black” in the Victorian non-British sense, but the original illustrations did show a dark skinned child. This was changed over the years – the version I recall from my childhood had a beige child with asian eyes – presumedly Indian.
Other than being paternalistic in that veddy veddy British way, the story itself wasn’t necessarily intended as racist when it was written in 1899. It was about a little boy who outwits tigers until they end up running around a tree until they turned to butter. It probably would be in the same category as Kipling’s Kim or some other Victorian tale about people in far away exotic places.
And the Sambos restaurants, named for the owner but which used the tigers and pancakes theme of the books, was not intended to be racist either.
However, the term “sambo” became a racist slur and thus the story became known, after the fact, as being racist. And ultimately the restaurants closed or changed their names. (I think the original restaurant in Santa Barbara is still called Sambos).
Now I doubt many people would feel comfortable buying their kid a Little Black Sambo book.
The one here closed over the name issue in the early 80s, but was refurbished briefly for a scene in Edward Scissorhands, then demolished. All I remember is the dreadful orange vinyl and reasonably good breakfasts.
Revelation 22:18-19, this has to be my all time favorite. A warning — literally on the last page of the “inerrant” book — not to cause error to it.
Wouldn’t that be an error?
Thanks Timothy, you are correct. And neither should these parents feel comfortable buying this kind of ex gay book either.
This stuff offends me as a queer and as a cartoonist. What a poorly done style of drawing and writing!! Who the heck do they think they’re kidding?? Manga/Anime style is soooo overused as it is in the graphic and sequential arts community. You’d think that someone who’s so “blessed” would be better able to channel his artistic skills.
It all screams fundamentalism, from the artwork, to the writing, to the “plot,” to the exegesis. Everything is a simple absolute. Guy: “You need Christ!” Girl: “Oh, OK!” When you smoke pot (the drugs comic) you automatically segue into harder drugs within two panels. “Rock Music” is entirely made up of Marylin Mansons and screaming punk teenagers. (I dunno, guys like James Taylor and Billy Joel never
fit that mold to me…) People’s moods go from naively jovial to repentant and maudlin in the blink of an eye. The dialog is extremely contrived, juvenile, and condescending.
The worst part is when (in the homosexuality comic) these fundies make attempts at disguising their narrow views as some sort of centrist Christian worldview: The rednecks are those claiming to be Christian, condemning gays to hell, and the gays are activist lunatics bent on forcing the public to accept them at whatever cost – and the “real” Christians (the fundie heroes in the book) pretend they take a “loving” middle stance – Boy: “You want me to go to hell for being gay!” Woman: “It’s wrong to hate homosexuals. Hell is a choice, you are not automatically condemned.” Which is a circumvented, politically-correct way of saying exactly what the rednecks in the comic are saying: as long as you make the choice to go to hell – that is, make the choice to stay gay – you are condemned by God.
And “Smuggling bibles into America’s Public Schools”??? Wow.
Oh, and they have a little video using the founding fathers to defend their christocratic stance, too. And anybody who’s worth their salt in American History knows that the founding fathers were, for the most part, quite ambivalent about Christianity: most of them were Deists, which is almost like a kind of Unitarianism.
This is probably a good time to remind everyone that slurs like “fundie” are not appropriate at XGW. I realize that one can sometimes be used as an easy abbreviation, but it’s also decidedly negative to many and so we avoid it to keep the discussions safe and open to all. Thanks!
If you don’t like the art in these, you’ll hate Chick Tracks
And here and here and this little joy which seems not to be available in English.
When I was a kid Chick Tracks were popular for evangelizing at street meetings (don’t ask)
And Emily, here’s a Chick Track just for you called Where’s Rabbi Waxman.
Just one guess where Jack Chick thinks he is.
Ugh, bad memories. I never noticed before how much those things look like Mad Magazine copy, only Alfred E. Neuman was never so bizarre.
Ok Emily, just relax and step away from the keyboard…
Don’t worry guys, I’ve known about Chick since I was in 10th grade. He’s no threat. I love it when people do parodies of his comics. The one Chick Tract about “sodomites” is particularly offensive. I’ve even heard that some Christian bookstores refuse to carry his tracts because they’re offensive to many devout Christians. Chick must be a ghost-writer for Todd because they both have the same wooden, absolutist dialog in their creations.
And can someone please come up with a cogent abreviation for “fundamentalist” and “evangelical”??? It really does get tiring, even w/ my lightning quick typing speed.
Amen!!
Yes I hate it. And I am even not speaking about the speech baloons yet.
Do you guys how the homosexuals depicted in the comics here look SO SAD?
And the preacher in the first box looked SO TROUBLED marrying the two men?
And the frightened mother that covered the eyes of her child looking at the two ‘gays’, purposely drawn to LOOK SHAGGY, a stereotype created by bigotry?
And do you guys also notice how many depictions of homosexuals as VIOLENT PEOPLE in these strips?
These strips, even without the speech boxes, depicts homosexuals as having NO LIFE and only having a LIFESTYLE!
Aaaahhhh!
*faint*
Haha. I didn’t know what a big stir these comics had caused. I ran across them over the summer and I think I left the bookstore feeling slightly sick. It was the flippant tone of the whole thing that got to me. The ex-gay character simply says “back when I was a homosexual” and something along the lines of “change is possible.” It’s the same old disturbing message that changing orientation isn’t any harder than changing a light bulb and that to be a good Christian, you have to become a straight-acting, suit-wearing Republican.
Puh-lease…
Hey, David! Don’t insult Mad magazine like that! It’s a wonderful publication, and has gotten increasingly pro-gay in the past decade or so.