A steady chorus of right-wing amateur Biblical scholars have attacked Pope Francis for his criticism of capitalism. Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin, and a number of other armchair theologians have blasted the pope’s progressive positions on economic issues. Now, Jonathan Moseley, a member of the Northern Virginia Tea Party, and the executive director of American Border Control, has joined in to chastise the pope for not understanding the Bible. In a World Net Daily “exclusive” article titled “JESUS CHRIST IS A CAPITALIST”, Moseley claims to set the pope straight on the “Bibles’ condemnation of socialism”.
Moseley’s diatribe consists mostly of cutting and pasting selected portions of the Bible and then spinning them to fit his portrayal of Jesus as an investment capitalist, anti-government, hard right Libertarian. After taking the pope to task, Moseley concludes his piece by proclaiming:
Jesus Christ is weeping in heaven hearing Christians espouse a socialist philosophy that has created suffering and poverty around the world. It is impossible to love one’s neighbor as yourself without fighting against socialism, meaning government meddling in private lives.
Moseley roundly criticizes the pope, adding that:
Jesus spoke to the individual, never to government or government policy. Jesus was a capitalist, preaching personal responsibility, not a socialist.
The outspoken pope, intent on reminding Christians of the social gospel and their obligation to the less fortunate, has become inconvenient for the self-serving ideologues on the religious right. Right-wing Christians seem intent on transforming Jesus into an early Milton Friedman economist or the first Ayn Rand objectivist, but the pope just does not seem interested in embracing that characterization of Christ. He is not a Paul Ryan or Rick Santorum style Catholic. The Christian Right is uncomfortable with the pope’s calls to tackle poverty and other social ills. In the demented minds of the far right, the Bible is really just a capitalist manifesto. Their Jesus is a staunch believer in tax cuts for the wealthy and trickle down economics. How convenient it is, that his ideas invariably align so closely with theirs.
Edited/Published by: SB
