Rick Warren
From Dickipedia - A Wiki of Dicks
Warren's influence, and thus his bigotry, has metastasized all over the country and the world through the sale of his best-selling books The Purpose Driven Church and The Purpose Driven Life. Because of this, he has sometimes been called "America's pastor," which he is, to the extent that Americans are bigoted, lying, anti-semitic, anti-science, gluttonous hate-mongers. For the increasing number of Americans who don't fall into that category, however, not so much.
In essence, Warren is just another far right-wing, Southern Baptist, evangelical bigot. What has made Warren different, however, and the reason why the cancer of Rick Warren is especially virulent, is how Warren has been able to sucker the media and political establishment into believing he somehow represents a qualitative break with his faggot-hatin' brethren.
In the past, Warren's spiritual heirs were more honest about their hatred of the Jews, the blacks and the gays. They made an alliance with the Republican party that was called "The Southern Strategy." The GOP ran the logistics, and the evangelicals whipped up the bigotry. It was very successful for almost 40 years.
But because of a few do-gooders and the evils of "political correctness," open bigotry gradually became unfashionable, confined mostly to white southern males, Fox News and your grandfather. If bigotry was going to have a future in the mainstream of politics, bigotry was going to have to be rebranded. Enter Rick Warren, and the Purpose for which is life is Driven.
Warren saved bigotry's place in the mainstream by coming up with the idea to repackage it inside a "concern" for poverty and aids. If you didn't know that Warren "cares" about poverty and aids, this means you've never heard him speak, because there is nothing he likes to do more than tell you about his "concern" for poverty and aids. In any case, now you've been told: Rick Warren is guy who really really "cares" about poverty. And aids. Seriously. He even talks about them! (Though not quick as much as he talks about the fact that he talks about them.)
What's that over there sneaking in the back door? Bigotry? Don't pay any attention to that! Look over here, at Pastor Rick's "concern" about poverty and aids.
There are some who are puzzled by this because, according to their reading of the New Testament, such concern should be taken as a given. Those people, however, simply don't know the Word Of God like Pastor Rick, who knows from his close reading of the text and his close relationship with Jesus, with whom he has "been a friend...for now over 40 years," that vanity and narcissism and bragging and preening and congratulating oneself about one's "concern" for the poor is at the heart of the teachings of Jesus.
Through the Christ-like genius of Pastor Rick, the poor and those with aids were finally able to make themselves useful for something: making bigotry taste a little bit sweeter. The plan was stunningly successful. Of course, that the media would be eager to continue the place of right-wing evangelical bigots at the table is not surprising. It is, after all, an institution that still employs David Broder and Cokie Roberts and Bill Kristol.
Warren's rebranding of redneck bigotry was so successful that he hosted a presidential debate called the The Ruse to Lure Yet Another Gullible Democrat Into Legitimizing Bigots Who Will Never Vote For Him Civil Forum on The Presidency.
Barack Obama later asked Warren to give the invocation at his Presidential inauguration on January 20, 2009. Fortunately for Obama, most his party, for the time being at least, apparently make a distinction between bigots and those who harbor bigots.
Biography
Warren was born in San Jose, California, in 1954, to Jimmy and Dot Warren. His father was a Baptist minister, his mother was, like Laura Bush, a librarian. What is it about librarians drawn to close-minded a-holes?
Warren received his Bachelor of Arts degree from California Baptist University in Riverside, an institution noted for...nothing.
According to Warren, his "call" to be a minister came as a 19-year-old student at California Baptist when Warren and a friend skipped out on classes and drove 350 miles to hear a preacher named W.A. Criswell. This is the sort of hijinks that goes on a school like California Baptist University.
Afterwards, Warren stood in line to shake hands with Criswell:
“When my turn finally arrived, something unexpected happened. Criswell looked at me with kind, loving eyes and said, quite emphatically, 'Young man, I feel led to lay hands on you and pray for you!'"
Usually when a minister says he's about to lay hands on a 19 year-old boy, the story doesn't end so happily. But in this case, Warren was only penetrated with the Spirit of the Lord:
"He placed his hands on my head and prayed: 'Father, I ask that you give this young preacher a double portion of snake oil your Spirit.'"
Warren certainly received a double portion of something, though exactly what is still being debated.
Six years later Warren started his Saddleback church at the Laguna Hills High School Theater. Like Warren's ego and waistline, the church grew rapidly. In 1995, the current 3,500 seat Worship Center was completed. Given that each successive generation is a little less bigoted and than the last, Warren realized that if didn't do something, his unique brand of jerkwater hate-mongering might die out. Accordingly, in 2008, a $20 million student ministry facility was completed called "the Refinery," intended to refine xenophobia, halfwit prejudice, sexual insecurity and redneck posturing into something resembling Christian theology.
Personal
In the late 20th Century, psychologists and medical researchers come up with a term to describe male right-wing religious bigots who are obsessed with combating homosexuality. That term is: "homosexual."
The only people that apparently still don't realize this are the male right-wing religious bigots themselves. And the sad women who are unfortunate enough to marry them. In Rick Warren's case, that would be poor Elizabeth K. (Kay) Warren.
As with many self-hating but socially ambitious homosexuals, Warren was able to summon enough nerve, and blood flow, to have sexual intercourse, to completion, with his "wife" at least three times, as they have three children. Perhaps it was the "double portion" of "the spirit" that helped him. Or perhaps it was a double portion of alcohol. Or, as in the case of another member of Warren's theological and psychosexual cohort, the former Reverend Ted Haggard, methamphetamine.
Financial
Warren claims to no longer takes a salary from Saddleback and claims to have repaid all of his salary from the last 25 years back to the church, due to the success of his purpose-driven book sales. Warren, being so naturally modest and humble, hates to talk about his financial generosity, but forces himself to only because of Jesus' command to his disciples to "be constantly bragging about thyself, and spareth no opportunity to proclaim to the world thy greatness. Especially if by doing so thou gainest an invitation to Davos."
In fact, it's even possible to get the humble Warren to mention that he and his sad wife "reverse tithe," meaning that they "give away" 90% of his income.
What Warren doesn't mention is that, in fact, anybody can reverse tithe. Let's say your salary is $100,000. If you tell your boss to "raise" your salary to $1 million, with the proviso that you will "tithe" 90 percent of your salary, you're still making the exact amount as before, but now you get to go on CNN and pat yourself on the back -- again and again and again -- for being such a generous spiritual leader because you "reverse tithe."
Bigot
Rick Warren just doesn't like the gays [ed. note: not incompatible to being one himself, as he likely is; see "Personal" section above]. But unlike less astute politically power-hungry bigots, Warren could see that demographics were not on his side. The proportion of the country going to college was going up each year. This meant that each generation was a little more worldly, a little more sophisticated than the last. Warren watched as the GOP's "Southern Strategy," premised on overt appeals to racism, began to fail, especially with younger people.
The country was becoming yuppified. Warren realized that a lot of the newly yuppified portion of the country still hated gays and Jews, but wanted to be feel good about it. Warren's genius was to create a new kind of bigotry that made this possible.
He was also hugely successful in playing off the self-loathing, guilt, and feelings of inadequacy of the mostly-Eastern media elite who would never actually socialize with a right-wing, homophobic evangelical creationist, or, even worse, have their own children educated by one, but feel driven to constantly lecture the Democrats about the need to "reach out" to this constituency, ironically in the name of tolerance and "openness."
Even more troubling is that Warren's church bans having blacks and Jews as members. Just kidding. The church only bans homosexuals, which is acceptable to the low level bigots of the sort who run Newsweek, which in 2006 called Warren one of the "15 People Who Make America Great." If only Warren had been more "purpose-driven" and had gone out and beat the shit out of a few fags, Newsweek might have bumped him up to the top five. But at least there's room for growth!
The policy was announced on Saddleback's website:
"Because membership in a church is an outgrowth of accepting the Lordship and leadership of Jesus in one's life, someone unwilling to repent of their homosexual lifestyle would not be accepted as a member at Saddleback Church."
After John Aravosis of Americablog, among others, noted this, Warren took the language down, though it's unclear whether homosexuals still need to "repent" to be members. In a sign of openness, however, Warren apparently doesn't require that blacks "repent" of their "black lifestyle" before being allowed into experience Warren's unique brand of christianity.
On the other hand, maybe Warren isn't a bigot, because, as he has said: "I have many gay friends. I've eaten dinner in gay homes." If this is true, the logic seems inescapable, since, as is generally known, if you have black friends and can prove you've eaten in a "black home," you cannot be a racist. Q.E.D.
What's more, Warren also once said "I'm no homophobic guy," and that "in the hierarchy of evil...homosexuality is not the worst sin."
Perhaps the fact that Warren allows that there are, in fact, greater sins than homosexuality is the reason why Barack Obama chose Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration.
Jews burning in hell
Warren believe they're going to burn in hell. In 2005, as part of the elites intellectual affirmative action program for evangelical dimwits, Rick Warren was invited to the Aspen Ideas Festival. In a question session, a woman stood up, said she was Jewish, and asked Warren if that meant she was going to burn in hell. Warren said yes, it did. Too bad for her -- she didn't get the "double portion" of the Spirit like Warren.
Bizarre sexual theories
In 2005, as proof that homosexuality is unnatural, Warren told a reporter at Fortune Magazine that "certain body parts are meant to fit together." This is known as the "Lego system proof" against homosexuality. Though since the advent of the Google Image Search it is no longer generally thought to be a powerful argument.
He also claims, in an interview with Larry King, to be "wired by God to like women."
Sophisticated Foreign Policy Ideas
On the Fox News show Hannity & Colmes, Warren, used his keen reading of the bible and came up with a nuanced solution to the problems in the Middle East: the state-sponsored assassination by the U.S. of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Warren said that "the Bible says God puts government on Earth to punish evildoers," and then agreed with Sean Hannity that "we need to take him out."
As any purpose-driven spiritual leader know, if Jesus was about anything, it was state-sponsored assassination.
But while some might worry that such an action might spread unrest throughout the Middle East, at least one country would be cool with it because, according to Warren Syria is "a moderate country, and the official government rule and position is to not allow any extremism of any kind."
Self-Described Difference Between Himself And James Dobson
"A matter of tone."
Typically Profound High School Football Coach-Level Theological Insight
"The middle letter of sin is 'I.'"
Low Intelligence
"If you’re asking me do I believe in evolution, the answer is no, I don’t." Rick Warren, 2007.
Compares Himself to Christ
In December of 2008, responding to criticism over Barack Obama's decision to have Rick Warren deliver the invocation at the inauguration, Warren said "It's what I would call 'Christophobia.'"
Scientist and theologians immediately hailed this new proof of God's existence. Previous explanations, the ontological, the teleological, and the cosmological had been widely seen to be inadequate. But the Dickological (called by some the "Warrenological") Proof has, thus far, not been disproved. A rough summary of it goes as follows:
A: Rick Warren exists.
B: Rick Warren has been criticized.
C: If you criticize Rick Warren, you are criticizing God.
D: Rick Warren = God.
E: God (Rick Warren) exists.
F: God is overweight and wears a goatee.
