“Fundamentalist” protestants advocate violent spanking, beat child to death

I really don’t like the term “fundamentalist,” because they are not.  Unless one considers people who obsess  over a few bible quotes taken radically out of context from the whole and from each other as somehow possessing a “fundamental” understanding of Sacred Scripture and Christianity in general.

A case on point.  Yes, the Bible does indicate in places – in the Old Testament – that parents should discipline their children, even severely.  This severity was prior to the New Covenant, which is based on love, not fear. So, these Old Testament dictums were obviated, or at least moderated to a point of reason, by St. Paul’s exhortation to parents and spouses in 1 Corinthians.  Unfortunately, some protestants have once again seized on a particular bit of Scripture and gone nuts with it, and now a little girl is dead. As the father of five daughters, this just makes me so sad.  I’m trying hard no to be mad.

I don’t have a problem with spanking. I have certainly spanked my kids.  But I pray God I would never take to using tricks like rubber hoses – the same technique the North Vietnamese used to torture our pilots in the Vietnam War – so I can hide the damage. That, right there, indicates shame and a knowledge that what one is doing is wrong.  There is a huge difference between applying one’s hand to a child’s bottom, and wailing on them with a plastic hose – to the point of death.

Yet another black eye for Christendom.  Just what we needed…….

I guess that does raise a question – are protestants part of Christendom?  Or are they so heretical they are not?  Orthodox – I would say they are part of Christendom.  The five high church Anglicans that are left – maybe.  Fundies…..probably not.

h/t Christine Niles

PS – What is the Church’s ecumenical outreach to fundamentalists?  It seems those to the right of the current administration of the Church don’t get much ecumenical love.  Funny how that works……