MetaFilter posts tagged with baptists

A Big Cheese for a Big Cheese

jonp72 — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 13:39:52 -0800

The Mammoth Cheese of Cheshire was the most unusual gift ever given to a President of the United States. In the aftermath of the "Revolution of 1800", the eccentric Baptist preacher John Leland decided to celebrate the presidency of Thomas Jefferson by convincing the predominantly Baptist farmers of Cheshire, Massachusetts to create a giant 1,235-pound block of cheese as a monument to small-"r" republicanism and religious freedom. The cheese eventually reached Thomas Jefferson on New Years Day in 1802, the same day that Jefferson wrote his famous letter to the Danbury Baptists about the wall of separation between church and state. The Federalist Party, which opposed Jefferson's funding of scientific research during the Lewis & Clark expedition, ridiculed the cheese as a "mammoth," a reference to the recent exhumation of a mammoth by the painter and naturalist, Charles Willson Peale. The derision of the Federalists backfired, however, as the delivery of the cheese coincided with a huge "mammoth craze" that popularized the word "mammoth" as an adjective describing anything enormous, including a mammoth loaf of bread gifted to Jefferson in 1804. An experimental dairy station in Perth, Ontario eventually made a bigger mammoth cheese, but Jefferson's mammoth cheese has inspired a novel, a children's book, a monument protected by funds from the Department of Homeland Security, and a subplot on The West Wing. Last but not least, check out this research paper, which places the Mammoth Cheese of Cheshire in the context of Jeffersonian participatory democracy.

Attention Deficit

troutfishing — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 20:21:48 -0800

The death of Roe v. Wade from a thousand cuts "Two weeks ago Paul Pressler, the architect of the fundamentalist takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention, described how the Religious Right intended to deal with Roe v. Wade. After expressing his elation with the selection of John Roberts as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court he said, "Roe v. Wade won't be revoked, it will die the death of a thousand cuts and qualifications and regulations until it gradually disappears."
- Dr. Bruce Prescott, from the eyewall of America's religious wars (Executive Director of "Mainstream Oklahoma Baptists"), notes the culmination of long-laid plans.

Why I’m Raising Violent 4 Year-Olds

pandaharma — Thu, 14 Jul 2005 23:15:11 -0800

Why I’m Raising Violent 4 Year-Olds: Solving America's Boy Problem (via Mainstream Baptist)

Mainstream Baptists

Sixtieslibber — Fri, 12 Nov 2004 13:42:38 -0800

Mainstream Baptists is an organization which is very concerned about the takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) by right-wing fundamentalists. The site includes a daily blog. One post-election entry: "SBC Hardwiring to GOP....There was a day when Baptist preachers and lay people would have been alarmed by and indignant about this egregious violation of the Baptist principle of separation of church and state. Today Southern Baptists are so cowed by and subservient to their denominational overlords that it will hardly raise an eyebrow."

'reconnaisance' from the culture war

4easypayments — Tue, 09 Mar 2004 15:51:41 -0800

How the Left views the Right, as viewed by the Southern Baptist Press. “I don't get it,” said the movie critic, “the people aren't listening to us... don't all those unwashed cretins out there in flyover country understand that we're the ones who tell them what they can watch?”