Jim Wallis called for an apology from Focus on the Family founder James Dobson for the fictitious letter posted on Citizenlink.com.
Focus on the Family Action, the political arm of Focus on the Family, posted a letter that pretended to look back on an Obama administration. The writer suggested that certain events had happened, including terrorist attacks on four cities.
Jim Wallis responds:
“In a time of utter political incivility, it shows the kind of negative Christian leadership that has become so embarrassing to so many of your fellow Christians in America,” he writes. “Such outrageous predictions not only damage your credibility, they slander Barack Obama who, you should remember, is a brother in Christ, and they insult any Christian who might choose to vote for him.”
And Wallis isn’t the only one upset. There’s also a satire piece. The Matthew 25 Network calls it “blatant fearmongering,” and more than 2,000 people have joined a Facebook group called “A Christian Bipartisan Rejection of Focus on the Family’s Letter from 2012.”
“As you can see, Focus on the Family Action has abandoned reasonable appeals and resorted to shameless tactics of fear mongering. They have abandoned the belief that voters can make informed decisions and have instead appealed to fear as their fundamental motivator.
“As Christians, we stand appalled and ashamed at such tasteless demagoguery. We believe that civil, educated, and compassionate dialogue should and can occur with the active engagement of our faith, but believe that Focus on the Family Action has, in this letter, stepped far outside of reasonable boundaries into pure sensationalism. We believe that such thoughtless expressions coming from an organization that purports to represent Evangelicals continues to mar our legitimacy and voice in the public arena, and damages our basic Christian witness.”
The list of things proposed in the letter includes:
-Terrorist attacks on four cities
-Israel is hit by a nuclear bomb
-Euthanasia becomes commonplace
-The Supreme Court becomes liberal
-Churches lose their tax exempt status for not allowing gay marriages
-Pornography openly displayed
-Gun ownership restricted and inner-city crime rises,
-Home schooling becomes restricted and families move to Australia and New Zealand
-Conservative talk shows shut down
-Christian publishers forced out of business
-Power blackouts because of environmental restrictions
-Boy Scouts shut down
-Russia occupies four countries
-Bush officials jailed or bankrupt
Focus on the Family Action defended its letter yesterday after a CNN reporter described the organization as “religious extremists.”
Gary Schneeberger, vice president of media and public relations at Focus Action, has worked in the media for 25 years. He said Feyerick’s report “definitely signals a new level of marginalization by the mainstream media of groups like us that stand for biblical truth.”
“We can’t control what the media want to call us,” he said. “All we can do is continue to stand for the truth. The Bible makes it clear that when you stand for Jesus and His righteousness, those kinds of things will come.”
