James Talarico’s pastor is pushing back against reports in The Daily Wire that attempt to smear the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Texas by criticizing his church.
The primary criticisms of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Austin, Texas, are that the church and its pastor have opposed the far-right agenda of Texas Republicans, do not embrace biblical inerrancy and welcome gay and transgender people.
“The woke church that molded (Talarico) uses Christ to justify support for abortion, transgender procedures on kids, and protesting immigration enforcement,” says a June 4 article written by Leif Le Mahieu. The article contends the church where Talarico’s parents were married and where he was raised has a “leftist conception of Christianity.”
What are The Daily Wire’s beefs with St. Andrews?
- Acceptance of transgender people
- Acceptance of gay people
- Highlighting “banned books … filled with sexually explicit material aimed at young people
- Donating to Planned Parenthood
- Not referring to the first person in the Trinity as God the Father
- Not referring to Jesus as “king”
- Sheltering undocumented immigrants
A June 1 article also by Le Mahieu claims that St. Andrew’s, “church funds are sent not only to abortion giant Planned Parenthood, but also to radical organizations that pay to help facilitate out-of-state travel for women to kill their unborn babies, and an organization that runs a summer camp for transgender-identifying kids as young as 11.”
The Daily Wire is a far-right online outlet co-founded in 2015 by political commentator Ben Shapiro and film director Jeremy Boreing.
Jim Rigby
On June 4, Jim Rigby, senior pastor at St. Andrew’s, published brief comments on Facebook responding to The Daily Wire’s accusations. He titled his comments “On Being Eaten by Cannibal Clowns.”
“I have to admit this is a fascinating time,” he began. “The Daily Wire is now claiming that our little church is funding abortions and having a summer camp for transgender youth. It’s an unpleasant time, but also fascinating — like being eaten by cannibal clowns.”
This experience is giving him perspective on “what it felt like to be a school nurse when MAGA claimed they were doing sex-change operations and putting cat boxes up for students who identify as feline; and on “how librarians may have felt to be accused of slipping racist and pornographic propaganda into the schools” or “what an American Muslim feels when accused of trying to impose Sharia Law on the nation,” he said.
While never mentioning Talarico by name, Rigby says: “America has definitely gone through the looking glass. Now it is considered unpatriotic to even attempt to limit presidential power by the Constitution. Now anyone may be called a heretic if they presume to anchor Christianity on the actual teachings of Jesus instead of the rantings of televangelists and political moralizers. Scientists and experts have been fired or run out of government positions and replaced with podcasters and talking heads from FOX News.”
As bad as this all seems, “Do not despair,” he concluded. “An old age is dying, and a new age is being born. Humankind has been through this chaos many times before. We are currently in a fog bank but hold on. As Saint Paul said in his final letter to his students, ‘Whatever is true, whatever is just, whatever is beautiful, think on these things.’”
Related:
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