2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumDo we all agree that Jeffrey Sachs...
... arranged to have the bishop (I forget his name) invite Sanders to the conference?
I'm not trying to push any buttons here. It's just that this is the most recent piece of info in a rapidly evolving story and I'd like to get it as straight as I can.
tia
las
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)It's a conditioned response, of course.
daleanime
(17,796 posts)m-lekktor
(3,675 posts)Bobbie Jo
(14,341 posts)Conditioned much the same way.
GeorgiaPeanuts
(2,353 posts)Sorondo is the aide to the Pope, so the Pope likely knew of Sanders being invited; Whether the Pope had any ownership over inviting Sanders is unclear.
brush
(53,787 posts)A Vatican spokesman explains that Bernie has always been interested in the particular encyclical and that someone from his campaign had expressed Sanders' interest and that he would like to attend the conference.
The Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi told The Daily Beast that it wasnt the pope who personally invited the politician. The invitation was made on behalf of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, not by Pope Francis, he said. There is no expectation that the pope will meet Mr. Sanders. He then added that he could not completely exclude the possibility, but that nothing was on the agenda at the moment.
Here's the link with the rest of it:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511698117
And yes you are trying to push buttons.
The Velveteen Ocelot
(115,733 posts)I doubt Jeffrey Sachs could have twisted Msgr. Sorondo's arm hard enough to compel him to invite Bernie; the invitation was clearly voluntary and with enthusiasm on the part of the Vatican agency. They want him to come. Here's their press release:
Note that he's listed first as among "world leaders." Whether actually he can or does go is less important than the fact that being invited was an honor, no matter how repeatedly the Hillaroids spitefully crap in the cornflakes.
And now can we please stop beating this dead horse?
beam me up scottie
(57,349 posts)Armstead
(47,803 posts)guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)And no, we do not agree. Perhaps you should have posted in the Clinton Group. But if you are truly unsure, here are a few sources:
The BBC says:
US election: Bernie Sanders invited to Vatican by Pope
8 April 2016
http://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-35999269
So does NPR:
Bernie Sanders Accepts An Invitation From The Vatican
http://www.npr.org/2016/04/08/473495847/bernie-sanders-accepts-an-invitation-from-the-pope
So does Reuters:
Politics | Fri Apr 8, 2016 2:42pm EDT
Related: Election 2016, Politics, Pope
So does the Vatican:
Papal official denies report Sanders invited himself to Vatican
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-vatican-idUSKCN0X5257
Quite a silly controversy
that deflects from the real differences between the two candidates.
brush
(53,787 posts)Bernie's campaign wrangled the invite.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511698117
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)brush
(53,787 posts)That's not in dispute. What is is whether the Pope invited him (not) or someone else.
It was someone else and it was revealed this morning that Sanders has been squeezed in to speak for ten minutes in late afternoon on the first day of the conference. No audience with Pope was scheduled.
Downwinder
(12,869 posts)seabeyond
(110,159 posts)LAS14
(13,783 posts)seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Iliyah
(25,111 posts)Fact, BS' advisor Sachs pursued the invitation.
Fact, both Sachs and Sorondo knew it would create a headache for the Vatican.
fact, the Vatican is very pissed.
GeorgiaPeanuts
(2,353 posts)Why would the Vatican extend an invitation to someone if they knew it would cause them a headache and make them pissed?
God, y'all are so butthurt over this. Get over it Sanders is going to the Vatican and will likely meet the Pope. These conferences tend to have meet and greets. I'm sure Sanders will get a photo-op with the Pope.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)Intellectual dishonesty doesn't get a free pass.
brush
(53,787 posts)DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)brush
(53,787 posts)Bernie's campaign wrangled the invite and it wasn't from the Vatican, much less the Pope.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)You and I will not be discussing anything else unless and until you adequately back your claims or withdraw them.
brush
(53,787 posts)Try to keep up.
everything you stated as fact is speculation on your part.
PufPuf23
(8,789 posts)embarrass as many as possible.
The Clinton echo chamber in media and at DU is mean and pathetic.
None of your "facts" are weak and #2 and #3 obvious lies.
Shameful.
The Velveteen Ocelot
(115,733 posts)If he goes, he'll be talking about "the idolatry of money" while Hillary is idolizing money at a $353,000 fund-raiser with George Clooney and other rich, famous 1%-ers.
LAS14
(13,783 posts)TheSarcastinator
(854 posts)Funny.
frylock
(34,825 posts)FACT: You pulled that outta your ass.
FACT: Hillary Supporter is very pissed. So pissed, that they've obsessed for 3 days over this.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Jeffrey Sachs, a Columbia University professor who is presenting at the event, said in a phone interview that he helped the Vatican reach out to Bernie Sanders in March, and he doesnt know why Archer alleged that the Sanders campaign initiated the gig. The academy sent the invitation, its pure and simple, he said. A lot of people in the Vatican respect him a lot. He is speaking in the same kind of moral themes that Pope Francis, and the social teachings of the Church, promote, which is a moral economy. A representative who works with Sachs also passed along an official invitation from Sanchez Sorondo to Sanders dated on March 30.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/bernie-heads-to-the-vatican/477471/
brush
(53,787 posts)riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Which Jeffrey Sachs backs up by saying he did NOT suggest an invite for Bernie.
brush
(53,787 posts)in the Vatican.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Iliyah
(25,111 posts)Therefore, some justification for Ms. Archer. Again, the Vatican is not pleased.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Tsk, tsk, not very Christian. Then comes clean the next day.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)So you have Sorondo and Sachs saying they reached out to Bernie, not the other way around.
Now Sorondo walks it back?
I agree with brush that today theres some CYA by Sorondo. ..
Sachs is still sticking with his story though.
Hi sea!!
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1251&pid=1699531
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Iliyah
(25,111 posts)riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)I'm always willing to be educated.
The OP is about Sachs, not Sorondo.
Iliyah
(25,111 posts)Some already knew Sachs' involvement, my point was the was Sorondo's half truth.
It has been confirmed.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Sachs has not.
Response to riderinthestorm (Reply #51)
seabeyond This message was self-deleted by its author.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Unlike Sachs, lol.
I get what you are saying now. My bad
and riderinthestorm.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)It's all cool!
LAS14
(13,783 posts)... the conference for an invite. Millions of people have expressed interest in the encyclical.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Words are pretty simple to interpret.
LAS14
(13,783 posts)seabeyond
(110,159 posts)LAS14
(13,783 posts)... in encouraging civil, rational discourse. (Not that I think you're being un-civil). Anyway, at the risk of beating a dead horse, "expressing interest" in an encyclical that has a connection with the conference does not constitute reaching out for an invite to that conference.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Of course it is ok, and political. Clinton and the others can do political stunts because they d o not hold themselves as anything but politicians. Sanders too is a politician, his problem is he pretends he is not. That holds him to a certain disadvantage. There was nothing wrong with getting the invite and even booking it as a visit to Vatican, or pumping the scholarly conference. Yea!!
But, he could not leave it at that. Had to escalate it to a summons from the Pope.
Political stunt gone bad. But he could have easily, ... EASILY deflated the issue. He didn't. He does what he always does.... dug heels in and expected people to allow.
Not gonna happen.
This is on his shoulders. Most of us just wanted the truth and really didn't want to have to spend the time to dig the truth out.
LAS14
(13,783 posts)... familiar enough with the structure of the Vatican not to realize that an invite from this conference did not mean an invite from the Pope. He couldn't be stupid enough to claim it if he knew it wasn't true.
LAS14, a Hillary supporter who wants to depend on the truth, not the kind of innuendo she's constantly subjected to.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Clinton is responsible for the deaths in Iraq, .... just teasing.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Everyone had to dig out the information, person by person. If someone lied to him he should have the guts to stand up and tell that he really thought he was meeting the Pope. Fool him for not researching it enough to know the facts? Ya. The alternative is he lied.
LAS14
(13,783 posts)LAS14
(13,783 posts)99Forever
(14,524 posts)Hillary didn't get invited. Hillary isn't going to get invited. Deal with it.
You need to get over your sadz.
Start by not whining about it again.
LAS14
(13,783 posts)... mind beyond what I've posted?
99Forever
(14,524 posts)Last edited Sun Apr 10, 2016, 10:52 PM - Edit history (1)
That's "how."
LAS14
(13,783 posts)99Forever
(14,524 posts)I mean you being a fucking expert and all.
BillZBubb
(10,650 posts)You Hillarybots are sifting through the sand of this like republicans going through Benghazi memos. In both cases it is just fanatics trying to create a controversy. Feel proud about that?
Bernie got invited. Hillary didn't. Deal with it.
Armstead
(47,803 posts)In saner times, pre primary crap, Sachs would be an admired figure here.
But I don't think he held a gun to anyone's head. And I'm sure at the Vatican they knew who Sanders is.
His bio (public domain)
Jeffrey D. Sachs is a world-renowned professor of economics, leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist whose monthly newspaper columns appear in more than 100 countries. He is the co-recipient of the 2015 Blue Planet Prize, the leading global prize for environmental leadership. He has twice been named among Time Magazines 100 most influential world leaders. He was called by the New York Times, probably the most important economist in the world, and by Time Magazine the worlds best known economist. A recent survey by The Economist Magazine ranked Professor Sachs as among the worlds three most influential living economists of the past decade.
Professor Sachs serves as the Director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University. He is Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on the Sustainable Development Goals, and previously advised both UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on the Millennium Development Goals. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis in Laxenburg, Austria. Sachs is Director of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network under the auspices of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
Sachs is co-founder and Chief Strategist of Millennium Promise Alliance, and is director of the Millennium Villages Project. Sachs is also one of the Secretary-Generals MDG Advocates, and a Commissioner of the ITU/UNESCO Broadband Commission for Development. He has authored five books, including three New York Times bestsellers (*), in the past decade years: The End of Poverty (2005*), Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet (2008*), The Price of Civilization (2011*), To Move the World: JFKs Quest for Peace (2013) and The Age of Sustainable Development (2015).
Professor Sachs is widely considered to be one of the worlds leading experts on economic development, global macroeconomics, and the fight against poverty. His work on ending poverty, overcoming macroeconomic instability, promoting economic growth, fighting hunger and disease, and promoting sustainable environmental practices, has taken him to more than 125 countries with more than 90 percent of the worlds population. For more than thirty years he has advised dozens of heads of state and governments on economic strategy, in the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. He was among the outside advisors to Pope John Paul II on the encyclical Centesimus Annus and in recent years has worked closely with the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences on the issues of sustainable development.
Sachs works closely with many international organizations, including the African Union, the Asian Development Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the African Development Bank, the Islamic Development Bank, the World Health Organization, the United Nations Development Programme, the World Food Programme, UNAIDS, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria, among others.
Professor Sachs work has been pivotal in many of the key junctures of globalization during the past thirty years. In the 1980s he helped several Latin American countries including Bolivia, Brazil, and Peru to end hyperinflations and renegotiate their external debts. He was the leading academic advocate in the United States for reducing the debt overhang of the developing countries and his ideas were incorporated in the global debt-reduction plans undertaken from the mid-1980s onward, including the Brady Plan and the HIPC Program.
In 1989, Professor Sachs advised Polands anti-communist Solidarity movement and the first post-communist Government of Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki. He wrote the first-ever comprehensive plan for the transition from central planning to a market democracy, which became incorporated into Polands highly successful reform program led by Finance Minister Leszek Balcerowicz. Professor Sachs was the main architect of Polands successful debt reduction operation. The Government of Poland awarded Sachs with one of its highest honors in 1999, the Commanders Cross of the Order of Merit. He also received an honorary doctorate from the Cracow University of Economics.
Sachss ideas and methods of transition from central planning were successfully adopted throughout the transition economies. He helped Slovenia (1991) and Estonia (1992) to introduce new stable and convertible currencies. Based on Polands success, he was invited first by Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and then by Russian President Boris Yeltsin on the transition to a market economy. He served as advisor to Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar and Finance Minister Boris Federov during 1991-93 on macroeconomic policies. He received the Leontief Medal of the Leontief Centre, St. Petersburg, for his contributions to Russias economic reforms.
From the mid-1990s till today, Prof. Sachs has been involved with economic reforms in many parts of Asia, including India and China. He has been a senior advisor to the Indian Government, most recently on the scaling up of primary health care in rural areas (the National Rural Health Mission), a policy that he recommended and helped to promote through the Indian Commission on Macroeconomics and Health. For his broad-based support of Indias economic reforms he was awarded the Padma Bhushan, one of Indias highest honors.
He has similarly engaged with the Chinese Government on many issues of sustainable development, and during 2001-3 worked with senior government officials on Chinas Western Development Strategy. He has authored many scholarly and policy papers on Indias and Chinas economic reforms. Sachs has also worked in other parts of Asia on a number of development and research projects, including in Malaysia, Indonesia, Timor-Leste, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and others. He actively supports Bhutans innovative strategy of Gross National Happiness. He works with the Government of Jordan on a national program of poverty reduction and with the Government of Qatar on education and ICT initiatives throughout the Arab region.
Since 1995, Professor Sachs has been deeply engaged in Africas escape from poverty. He has worked in more than two-dozen African countries, and has advised the African leadership at several African Union summits. In the mid-1990s he worked with senior officials of the Clinton Administration to develop the concept of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA). He has engaged with dozens of African leaders to promote smallholder agriculture and to fight high disease burdens through strengthened primary health systems. His pioneering ideas on investing in health to break the poverty trap have been widely applied throughout the continent. He currently serves as an advisor to several African governments, including Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda, among others.
The Millennium Villages Project, which he directs, operates in ten African countries, and covers more than 500,000 people. The MVP has achieved notable successes in raising agricultural production, reducing childrens stunting, and cutting child mortality rates, with the results described in several peer-reviewed publications. Its key concepts of integrated rural development to achieve the MDGs are now being applied at national scale in Nigeria and Mali, and are being used by many other countries to help support national anti-poverty programs. He works very closely with the Islamic Development Bank to scale up programs of integrated rural development and sustainable agriculture among the Banks member countries. One such project supports pastoralist communities in the Horn of Africa, with six participating nations: Djibouti, Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, Uganda, and South Sudan.
Since the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in 2000, Professor Sachs has been widely considered to be the leading academic scholar and practitioner on the MDGs. He chaired the WHO Commission on Macroeconomics and Health (2000-1), which played a pivotal role in scaling up the financing of health care and disease control in the low-income countries to support MDGs 4, 5, and 6. He worked with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 2000-1 to design and launch the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria. He worked closely with senior officials of the administration of George W. Bush to develop the PEPFAR program to fight HIV/AIDS, and the PMI to fight malaria. On behalf of Secretary-General Kofi Annan, from 2002-2006 he chaired the UN Millennium Project, which was tasked with developing a concrete action plan to achieve the MDGs. The UN General Assembly adopted the key recommendations of the UN Millennium Project at a special session in September 2005. The recommendations for rural Africa are currently being implemented and documented in the Millennium Villages, and in several national scale-up efforts such as in Nigeria.
Professor Sachs has been the Director of the Earth Institute of Columbia University since 2002. In that capacity, he leads a university-wide organization of more than 850 professionals from natural-science and social-science disciplines, in support of sustainable development. Sachs has consistently advocated for the expansion of University education on sustainable development, and helped to introduce the PhD in Sustainable Development at Columbia University, one of the first PhD programs of its kind in the U.S. He championed the new Masters of Development Practice (MDP), which has led to a consortium of major universities around the world offering the new degree. The Earth Institute has also guided the adoption of sustainable development as a new major at Columbia College. The Earth Institute is home to cutting-edge research on all aspects of earth systems and sustainable development.
In August 2012, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced the launch of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), with Sachs as the Director. The SDSN will mobilize scientific and technical expertise from academia, civil society, and the private sector in support of sustainable-development problem solving at local, national, and global scales. This Solutions Network will accelerate joint learning and help to overcome the compartmentalization of technical and policy work by promoting integrated approaches to the interconnected economic, social, and environmental challenges confronting the world. The Network convenes 12 global expert Thematic Groups on key sustainable development challenges that will identify common solutions and highlight best practices. Over time the SDSN will launch projects to pilot or roll-out solutions to sustainable development challenges and assist countries in developing sustainable long-term development pathways.
Sachs is the recipient of many awards and honors, including the Blue Planet Prize, membership in the Institute of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Harvard Society of Fellows, and the Fellows of the World Econometric Society. His conversation with Tyler Cowen won the Quartz Podcast Award for best business/economics podcast of 2015. He has received more than 20 honorary degrees, and many awards and honors around the world. His syndicated newspaper column appears in more than 80 countries around the world, and he is a frequent contributor to major publications such as the Financial Times of London, the International Herald Tribune, Scientific American, and Time magazine.
Sachs policy and academic works span the challenges of globalization, and include: the relationship of international trade and economic growth; the resource curse and extractive industries; public health; the history of economic development; economic geography; strategies of economic reform; international financial markets; macroeconomic policy; global competitiveness; climate change; the role of universities in economic development; and the end of poverty. He has authored or co-authored hundreds of scholarly articles and several books, including three bestsellers, a textbook on macroeconomics that is widely used around the world, and a highly regarded new text on sustainable development.
Prior to his arrival at Columbia University in July 2002, Sachs spent over twenty years as a professor at Harvard University, most recently as Director of the Center for International Development and the Galen L. Stone Professor of International Trade.
Sachs was born in Detroit, Michigan, in 1954. He received his B.A., summa cum laude, from Harvard College in 1976, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1978 and 1980 respectively. He joined the Harvard faculty as an Assistant Professor in 1980, and was promoted to Associate Professor in 1982 and Full Professor in the fall of 1983, at the age of 28.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)the conference.
It is all about getting thru the lies to the true story. If they had started with the truth, there would not be this mess. It is on them for playing a game.
Armstead
(47,803 posts)seabeyond
(110,159 posts)That would be a lie.
Amaril
(1,267 posts)....by the people who arranged his attendance. Maybe he was told the Pope would be there, maybe he wasn't. I don't know AND YOU DON'T KNOW.
This is so NOT the smoking gun that you think it is.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)and people had to spend time trying to piece shit together.
Amaril
(1,267 posts)So your complaint now is that because he didn't issue a mea culpa over a stupid "Yup" in response to one question, in one interview out of hundreds, YOU were forced to "piece shit together".
Like I said -- YOU DON'T KNOW what he has been told and neither does anyone else. Maybe he WILL meet the Pope, but they (the Vatican AND / OR Sanders' campaign) DON'T want a thousand reporters swarming around like vultures on a carcass. The fact remains that NONE of us know -- only those involved who have a REASON to be involved know what the plan is and what has been said to who.
And what does it flipping matter? Why this obsessive need to shit on something nice? Why can't you be proud that the Vatican has been able to set aside its inherent conservative bend and invite a pro-pretty-much-everything-the-Vatican-is-against liberal to a discussion of a topic where their positions align? Why is that such a horrible, earth-shattering thing that it has to be picked apart? Why can't this be seen as a good thing for Everybody and something that should be celebrated? Would you rather they had invited Cruz or Trump? The Vatican definitely has more in common with both of them -- in terms of human rights philosophies -- than they do with Bernie Sanders.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Amaril
(1,267 posts)seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Amaril
(1,267 posts)Unless you are an insider in the Sanders' campaign, you don't know what he was told. You just don't. Doesn't matter how many times you repeat this talking point, YOU DON'T KNOW.
Prove he lied, and I don't mean by posting that video bit again. Post proof that he was explicitly told -- by any of the parties that arranged this -- that he absolutely, positively would NOT meet the Pope under any circumstances, and that he intentionally disregarded that information and LIED about it during that interview......because that is what you are accusing him of doing. Not mis-speaking, or answering too quickly & failing to clear it up. You are pushing the agenda that he flat-out, knowingly LIED.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Amaril
(1,267 posts)Simply stressing a point that you refuse to understand.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)Looks like yelling to me.
frylock
(34,825 posts)You elected to spend your weekend obsessing on this. That's entirely on you.
seabeyond
(110,159 posts)RufusTFirefly
(8,812 posts)... how is this relevant?
840high
(17,196 posts)Dragonfli
(10,622 posts)are Wasps, quite frankly I have not seen such nasty, off topic ant-Catholic hatred in a campaign since Kennedy ran (many hated him because he was a Catholic and implied the Vatican would be running the White House) as many here are old enough to remember.
Then there is the anti-Semitic part which has been directly stated by one poster here (not even the usual dog-whistle, but clearly stated Jew hatred), that same poster is closely allied with most of those now spouting this divisive drivel. Since it is a miracle that poster was not PPR'd over her overtly stated hatred of Jews, they will try to slander him in other ways, that is when they aren't actually carefully using ant-Semitic dog whistles that are very subtle to avoid getting banned.
Part of it is division, for divisions sake.
And a great deal of it (most probably nearly most) is that Conservatives of all parties hate the topics that are to be discussed regarding the idolatry of money and money IS their religion and it assaults their personal deity and Idol.
PICTURED HERE
Combine the Money Lovers and the Catholic hating protestants and you get this:
Hillary Clinton's Christian faith is based on a cult called "The Family" and her "pope" Doug Coe teaches a very different message regarding the poor
What that cult teaches is antithetical to what the discussion Sen. Sanders was invited to is about. They believe the Rich are Ordained by God to Rule. Hardly the type of advocate that would welcome such an event discussing such topics.
Sen. Hillary Clinton has been involved with the Family since 1993 when, as first lady, she joined a White House prayer circle for political wives. Clinton has also sought spiritual counseling from the current head of the Family, Doug Coe. Sharlet argues that Clinton's longtime association with the Family has helped her forge working relationships with powerful religious conservatives such as Family member and anti-abortion crusader Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas.
The Family nurtures the next generation of prayer warriors in suburban dormitories. Sharlet spent nearly a month living at Ivanwald, a dormitory in Virginia where sons of the Family are sent to immerse themselves in Jesus and clean the toilets of congressmen and senators.
The Family also runs a house on C Street in Washington, D.C. The C Street Center has housed a number of federal legislators, including Sen. John Ensign of Nevada. Residents allege that the center is just a cheap place to live, but as an Ivanwald brother, Sharlet saw firsthand that the center is a religious community. As far as the IRS is concerned, the C Street Center is a church.
Members will tell you that the Family is just a group of friends. As Sharlet discovered, 600 boxes of documents at the Billy Graham Center Archives tell a different story.
AlterNet writer Lindsay Beyerstein recently sat down with Jeff Sharlet at a Brooklyn coffee shop to discuss the Family.
Lindsay Beyerstein What is the Family?
Jeff Sharlet: It's an international network of evangelical activists in government, military and business. The Family is dedicated to this idea that Christianity has gotten it all wrong for two thousand years by focusing on the poor, the suffering and the weak.
The Family says that instead, what Christians should do is minister to the up-and-out -- as opposed to the down-and-out -- to those that are already powerful. Because if they can win those people for Christ, they win the whole deal. That's what this network is dedicated to. It includes nonprofit organizations, it includes think tanks, it includes various ministries.
Lindsay Beyerstein: Where did they get the idea that they should be ministering to the up-and-out? There doesn't seem to be a lot basis in Christianity for that view.
Jeff Sharlet: Two places. The founder of the Family, Abraham Vereide, would describe it as his "new revelation" that came to him in the middle of the night, very literally: in a vision from God in 1935 in response to the Great Depression and, more particularly, to a series of very successful labor strikes that he saw as challenging God's sovereignty. So, God comes and gives him this new revelation to say, "This is what I really meant"...
More
So none of this surprises me.
I wouldn't agree about anything without complete information. I don't have that. Partly because this is a non-issue and a waste of my time. I DON'T GIVE A FLYING FUCK ABOUT THIS MANUFACTURED ISSUE. I have real issues to be concerned about. You know: social and economic justice, to begin with. A rapidly heating planet. Overpopulation. An oligarchy to defeat.
lostnfound
(16,180 posts)Is economic justice an important topic?yes.
Has Bernie been focused on it throughout his life? Yes.
Has he generally voted as a democrat throughout his congressional career and therefore been helpful to our shared causes? Yes.
So be happy for him and MOVE ON. God.
Avalux
(35,015 posts)Jeffrey Sachs helped the Vatican reach out to Bernie. It's in print if you look for it. Whether you choose to believe it or not is up to you.
snowy owl
(2,145 posts)CentralMass
(15,265 posts)PeaceNikki
(27,985 posts)Lack of reproductive choice and lack of access to reproductive services are major contributing factors to poverty.
Oh, plus they sit on a mountain of wealth.
katsy
(4,246 posts)Conference and not a pay for play gig for Wall Street.
pangaia
(24,324 posts)Of course you intend to push buttons.
DrDan
(20,411 posts)frylock
(34,825 posts)then sure, why not?
BirdieSanders
(26 posts)and only distracts from petite concerns like global poverty and ecocide