Hello All. I know I posted a lot of videos today. I wear headphones when doing things out of my Pink Palace office and because I like what I am hearing I post them. I do that while in my office also. I am having crackers and sharp cheese as I write this because of my recent steroid shot I get hungry quickly. I was down to 168. Every time I have steroids my weight goes up a bit because I get so hungry. But to this video and why I am posting it. I hate abuse of children as you can imagine, that includes beatings which I got frequently. Please tell me how a 6 year old 40 pound child can stand up to a 200 pound barroom brawler who can put three chimney blocks over one arm and go up a ladder. I soon learned that to complain would get me told that parents have the right to discipline their children, it was in the bible. I am not sure that included the black eyes, broken bones, or seeming all over me bruises. I would gladly take the hits rather than the belts that left welts that would take weeks to stop hurting, and if on my butt made sitting still in class to learn impossible. So to hear a man of the cloth stand up and say that hitting a child is not that passage meant is very important to me. Thank you all for reading and watching. Hugs
I like what he says about the idea that you have to earn god’s love, you have to earn salvation. This is in relation to the maga in congress not wanting to give aid to California for the fire assistance. He points out that if you have to earn your salvation then you did it not Jesus. And if you can do it on your own why need god? He points out that the Jesus never required people to prove they were worth before he helped them. Hugs
I keep saying these people won’t stop ever until they get their way. They believe they are on a mission from their god to turn the entire country Christian. But not just Christian, the kind of Christian they themselves are. They want to force everyone to live according to their church doctrines. Why? I don’t understand it, but they think taking away the public’s freewill will make their god so happy he will return to give them their reward of a paradise on earth. But I thought god’s kingdom was in heaven, not on earth? But this idea that they and they alone know what god wants, that they and they alone have the right to tell others how to live, how to think, how to have sex, who to have sex with, what they can watch or listen to, even what god they can believe in, and how they are to pray to that god. As they demand. I do not get or understand what makes these people think they can rule other people, rule others lives, do all to others I have written above. Why can they not give others the same rights they demand for themselves, the right to live their lives and worship as they please? But please notice the wealthy person bankrolling so much of the effort to turn Texas in to a theocracy. Think about his actions when others try to stop him to protect democracy? He smears them to try to destroy them. This is the type of Christian warrior he is and they are. Do as I say not as I do, or the big one, it is OK to do bad things in the name of Jesus. Hugs.
AFPI has provided money, an institutional home, and political platforms to many of the people Trump has nominated to run the country; quite a few high-level Trump nominees have AFPI connections, including:
Pam Bondi, Attorney General (Chair, AFPI Center for Litigation; co-chair Center for Law and Justice)
Kash Patel, FBI (Senior Fellow, AFPI Center for American Security)
Linda McMahon, Education (Board chair; chair, Center for the American Worker)
Lee Zeldin, Environmental Protection Agency (Chair, China Policy Initiative & Pathway to 2025)
John Ratcliffe, Central Intelligence Agency (C-chair Center for National Security)
Doug Collins, Veterans Affairs (head of Georgia AFPI Chapter)
Brooke Rollins, Agriculture (Co-founder, President and CEO)
Kevin Hassett, National Economic Council (Chair, Board of Academic Advisors)
Matthew Whitaker, NATO (Co-chair, Center for Law & Justice)
Casey Mulligan, Small Business Administration, chief counsel (Board of Academic Advisors)
Trump’s first public speech after winning the 2024 election was at an AFPI gala at Mar-a-Lago, where he was joined by other MAGA luminaries, including HHS nominee Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and “Department of Government Efficiency” leaders Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.
AFPI founder Rollins has bragged about the group’s “revolutionary” plans to seize control of the “administrative state.” The group’s agenda for the incoming administration—its “transition project”—is in some ways even more radical than the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. AFPI believes Trump should be allowed to fire and replace any federal employee at will – potentially converting the entire federal workforce into a massive and corrupt political patronage system. AFPI has reportedly prepared 300 executive orders for Trump.
As an officer at the America First Policy Institute, Bondi tried to undermine special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation of Trump by arguing that his appointment was unconstitutional. She oversaw what the Brennan Center has called “a number of troubling voting rights and election lawsuits,” leading the pro-democracy organization to conclude, “Her record on voting and elections raises questions about her ability to be the attorney general the American public deserves.”
In a case in which AFPI sought to empower local election officials to delay or block certification of elections, AFPI’s arguments were “meritless and radical,” according to the Brennan Center. In another case filed shortly before, even notorious pro-Trump Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk rejected AFPI’s “emergency” request to block a Biden executive order on voter registration that had been in place for several years. Kacsmaryk wrote that AFPI’s request provided “no direct evidence” to support its claims. The Brennan Center noted that the lawsuit “served to amplify baseless conspiracy theories about noncitizen voting.”
AFPI is funded in part by Tim Dunn, who the Texas Monthly has called “the billionaire bully who wants to turn Texas into a Christian theocracy.” Dunn is notorious for funding smear campaigns against Texas Republicans who don’t fall in line with his demands. Dunn poured millions of dollars into the effort to elect Trump to a second term, and supports other right-wing causes, like the Convention of States’ efforts to rewrite the U.S. Constitution. In a 2019 speech to Convention of States, Dunn argued that the Bible is “mainly about politics” and said that COS is triggering a Great Awakening.
Not so surprisingly, AFPI promotes Christian nationalist rhetoric; AFPI leaders have described their efforts as part of a “spiritual war.” AFPI’s political arm, which is chaired by Dunn, partnered with dominionist Lance Wallnau—who believes right-wing Christians are meant to control the government and every other sphere of influence in society–to help Trump return to power. Dunn himself reportedly told former Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, who is Jewish, that only Christians should be in leadership positions in the legislature.
Also in leadership at AFPI is Trump spiritual and political adviser Paula White, who has repeatedly called Trump’s opponents demonic and kicked off his pre-insurrection rally with a prayer for “holy boldness.” White chairs AFPI’s Center for American Values.
AFPI’s faith director RichardRogers, who took part in Wallnau’s “Courage Tour,” appeared on The Jim Bakker show this week, where he said there will be a “faith director” in every government agency in the new administration. He predicted that the “prayer warriors” who “rose up” on Trump’s behalf in 2024 will “have more power than Elon Musk.” He described AFPI as a “data-driven machine” that worked “hand-in-hand” with the RNC to boost turnout among low-propensity voters.
AFPI claims “biblical foundations” for each of the ten “pillars” of its right-wing policy agenda, which it calls “10 Pillars for Restoring a Nation Under God.” It asserts, “The Ten Commandments and Christian teachings have been the foundation that created the American legal system.” AFPI’s website declares, “This fight is not just about the culture of America; it’s about the kingdom of God and the Church’s divine mission to be the salt and light of our day in an era of increasing darkness.”
Richard Rogers of the AFPI says that under Trump, there will be a "faith director in every single agency" tasked with ensuring that anti-Christian policies are not enacted. https://t.co/RPLmEAlAJEpic.twitter.com/GaZv2yE9iP
These people are driven and a serious threat to democracy. They demand a theocracy of their god and a government enforcing their church doctrines. No non-Christians may be tolerated. Look at what they say, we don’t want government in our churches but we should be in government, and there is no separation of church and state. Plus how would these people react if a Muslim group did this, a Hindu church, or even a Jewish temple? They would lose their minds. Somewhere in the past the atheist stopped fighting these people and let them use their endless supply of church members contributions to push their goals ever closer to taking over. We must again fight back, get the people to understand the risk and what is true in history. These people will rewrite every thing to prove their lies. Hugs.
“There is no separation between church and state,” Republican Party of Texas Chair Abraham George said at a small rally with clergy and GOP lawmakers. “We don’t want the government in our churches, but we should be in the government.”
Polling from the Public Religion Research Institute found that more than half of Republicans adhere to or sympathize with pillars of Christian nationalism, including that the U.S. should be a strictly Christian nation. Of those respondents, roughly half supported having an authoritarian leader who maintains Christian dominance in society. Experts have also found strong correlations between Christian nationalist beliefs and opposition to immigration, racial justice and religious diversity.
One of his movement’s ultimate goals, he said Tuesday, is to draw a lawsuit that they can eventually take to the U.S. Supreme Court, which they believe will ultimately overturn the prohibition and unleash a new wave of conservative, Christian activism.
One Christian nationalism expert said Tuesday’s events showed how normalized the ideology has become among broad swaths of the Republican Party. “I’ve argued for years that, in the Trump era, charismatic evangelicals have displaced the old guard of the (Religious Right) and brought in a new, more aggressive evangelical politics,” Matthew Taylor, a senior scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian, & Jewish Studies, wrote on social media. “That was on vivid display in (Texas) today.”
Taylor has spent much of his career focused on the New Apostolic Reformation, a movement of “charismatic” Christians who often weave prophecy, “spiritual warfare” and demonology into their calls for Christians to take control over all spheres of society.
Abraham George’s comments are the latest sign of the state GOP’s embrace of fundamentalist ideologies that seek to center public life around their faith.
Landon Schott, pastor of Mercy Culture, leads a worship service in the state Capitol extension auditorium on the first day of the 2025 state legislative session in Austin on Tuesday, Jan. 14, 2025. Credit: Eli Hartman/The Texas Tribune
Two hours after Rep. Dustin Burrows of Lubbock was elected Texas House speaker on Tuesday, Christian worshippers gathered in a Capitol meeting room to prepare for “spiritual war” and protect lawmakers from demonic forces.
“Pray for the fear of the Lord to come into this place,” Landon Schott intoned from the stage as a small band played acoustic hymns and 100 or so faithful laid their hands on walls, hoping to bless the room and ward off evil spirits. “Let the fear of the Lord return to Austin. In Jesus’ name.”
Schott is the pastor of Mercy Culture Church in Fort Worth, and was among the Christian leaders who spent Tuesday rallying fellow believers ahead of a legislative session that they hope will further codify their conservative religious views into law. He was joined in those efforts by a throng of pastors and Republican leaders, who throughout the day claimed that church-state separation isn’t real, called progressive Christians heretics, or vowed to weed out “cowardly” clergy who refuse to politick from the pulpit.
“There is no separation between church and state,” Republican Party of Texas Chair Abraham George said at a small rally with clergy and GOP lawmakers. “We don’t want the government in our churches, but we should be in the government.”
George’s comments — delivered some-50 yards from another rally that focused on interfaith unity — are the latest sign of the Texas GOP’s embrace of fundamentalist ideologies that seek to center public life around their faith by claiming church-state separation is a myth or that America’s founding was God-ordained, and its laws should thus favor conservative Christianity.
Polling from the Public Religion Research Institute found that more than half of Republicans adhere to or sympathize with pillars of Christian nationalism, including that the U.S. should be a strictly Christian nation. Of those respondents, roughly half supported having an authoritarian leader who maintains Christian dominance in society. Experts have also found strong correlations between Christian nationalist beliefs and opposition to immigration, racial justice and religious diversity.
Worshippers link hands in prayer while attending a worship service led by a variety of religious groups from across Texas, including My God Votes, in the Capitol extension auditorium. Credit: Eli Hartman/The Texas Tribune
The party’s embrace of those separate-but-overlapping ideologies has come as it has increasingly aligned with far-right megadonors Tim Dunn and Farris Wilks, two West Texas oil billionaires who have sought to cleanse the Texas GOP of moderate voices and push their hardline religious views. At the same time, some Republican lawmakers have adopted an increasingly existential view of politics that paints opponents — unwitting or not — as part of a concerted effort to destroy Christianity, including by normalizing LGBTQ+ acceptance or undermining “traditional” family structures.
Such claims have been used as the pretext for a litany of bills and reforms that would further infuse Christianity into public life. During the 2023 legislative session, lawmakers passed a law allowing unlicensed chaplains to supplant counselors in public schools; sought to weaken Texas’ constitutional ban on providing taxpayer money to religious institutions, a core plank of the school voucher movement; and almost passed a bill that would require the Ten Commandments to be posted in public school classrooms.
Lawmakers are expected to continue that trend during this year’s legislative session (the Ten Commandments bill already has been refiled). And pastors, emboldened by President Donald Trump’s reelection and the ultraconservative U.S. Supreme Court, said Tuesday that they believe they have their best shot yet to topple the church-state wall and the Johnson Amendment, a federal rule that prohibits churches from engaging in overt political activity.
Rick Scarborough has spent decades working to do exactly that. A former Southern Baptist pastor in Pearland, he has become a leader in a movement that seeks to mobilize pastors and undermine the Johnson Amendment, which he says is toothless but has been used by “cowardly” pastors who don’t want to engage in politics. The result, he said, has been an ineffectual Texas Legislature that has often cowered to the LGBTQ+ community and their heretical, progressive Christian allies. (Texas lawmakers have passed dozens of anti-LGBTQ+ bills in recent years, overriding opposition from a large majority of Democrats).
One of his movement’s ultimate goals, he said Tuesday, is to draw a lawsuit that they can eventually take to the U.S. Supreme Court, which they believe will ultimately overturn the prohibition and unleash a new wave of conservative, Christian activism.
“The Johnson Amendment is nothing but a fig leaf to cover the fear that pastors already have,” he said in an interview after praying over GOP lawmakers on the Capitol lawn. “Most pastors are so fearful of their reputation that they won’t stand, and they don’t know how much God will defend them if they get out there and stand up and speak fearlessly.”
Few congregations have taken up Scarborough’s mantle like Mercy Culture Church, the Fort Worth congregation that Schott pastors. In recent years, Mercy Culture has become an epicenter of Texas’ fundamentalist Christian movement, helping push the state and local GOP further right, demonizing their detractors — Schott has called critics of the church “warlocks” and “witches,” and claimed Christians can’t vote for Democrats — and rallying voters behind church leaders as they campaign for public office. Among the church’s pastors is Rep. Nate Schatzline, who was elected to the Texas House in 2022 and has since continued to frame his political life as part of broader, spiritual struggle.
“This isn’t a physical battle,” Schatzline said in a Tuesday interview. “It’s not a political battle we’re in. We really believe this is a spiritual battle.”
Hours later, Schatzline kicked off the worship session at the Capitol with a bold promise.
“We’re going to give this space back to the Holy Spirit,” he said. “We give You this room. … The 89th Legislative session is Yours, Lord. The members of this body are Yours, Lord. This building belongs to You, Jesus.”
One Christian nationalism expert said Tuesday’s events showed how normalized the ideology has become among broad swaths of the Republican Party. “I’ve argued for years that, in the Trump era, charismatic evangelicals have displaced the old guard of the (Religious Right) and brought in a new, more aggressive evangelical politics,” Matthew Taylor, a senior scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian, & Jewish Studies, wrote on social media. “That was on vivid display in (Texas) today.”
Taylor has spent much of his career focused on the New Apostolic Reformation, a movement of “charismatic” Christians who often weave prophecy, “spiritual warfare” and demonology into their calls for Christians to take control over all spheres of society.
Members of that movement played central roles in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection, and were well-represented at the Texas Capitol on Tuesday: Schatzline and Mercy Culture have deep ties to the New Apostolic Reformation, as does Brandon Burden, a Frisco pastor who led a caravan of buses and activists to pressure lawmakers ahead of the House speaker vote. In January 2021, he told his congregants to keep weapons loaded for what he prophesied would be a national blackout orchestrated to keep Trump out of office.
Burden repeatedly appeared alongside Republican officials on Tuesday. Minutes after George, the Texas GOP chair, claimed that church-state separation doesn’t exist, Burden led a group of pastors and activists as they prayed over a small group of GOP lawmakers. “We take charge and authority of the 89th legislative session,” he prayed. “We, the people of God, called by the name of Jesus and covered in the blood of the lamb, have been given spiritual jurisdiction over the affairs of men.”
At the Texas Capitol, Christian worshippers are blessing the walls of a hearing room to protect lawmakers from spiritual forces and the “Jezebel” spirit.
“Pray for the fear of the Lord to come into this place,” says MercyCulture pastor Landon Schott. pic.twitter.com/1NAIOYkRtC
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