Pharisee Nation

John Dear, a Jesuit priest and peace activist, speaks truth to power like the prophets of old when he points to the hypocracy inherent in claiming to be a Christian and follower of Jesus while "consciously siding with the culture of war, choosing the path of violence, supporting corporate greed, rampant militarism, and global domination. I see many others swept up in the raging current of patriotism. Since most of these people, beginning with the president, claim to be Christian, I am ashamed and appalled that they support war and systemic injustice, that they do it in the name of God, and that they feign fidelity to the nonviolent Jesus who gave his life resisting institutionalized injustice."

He likens them to the Pharisees who persecuted Jesus and reminds as that "...the early Christians had big words for such behavior, such lies. They were called “blasphemous, idolatrous, heretical, hypocritical and sinful.” Such words and actions were denounced as the betrayal, denial and execution of Jesus all over again in the world’s poor."

Yes. It has been typical throughout the ages for the moral majoritarians to be either the tool or the possessor of wealth and power and to manipulate the fear and self-righteousness of the populace. In order to keep the house divided against itself so that all eyes and wagging fingers are aimed away from the true source of all the misery in their lives.