Friday, June 8, 2018

#2025: Joe Morecraft

The Reformed Presbyterian Church in the United States (RPCUS) is a small Presbyterian denomination established in 1983. It subscribes to Biblical inerrancy and is firmly theocratic, even self-identifying as theonomic; that is, subscribing to the idea society should be ruled by divine law and that the judicial laws of the Old Testament should be observed by modern societies – politically and theologically closer to Boko Haram than to comparatively moderate groups like mainstream DAESH and the Taliban, in other words. The RPCUS was initially led by Joe Morecraft, but is currently pastored by one Tim Price – it appears that Morecraft might have been kicked out, and is now with another extremist group, the Hanover Presbytery; he also has a fan page on facebook. 

Morecraft has actually opposed the murder of non-Christians, advocating instead that in a Biblical society – which the US ought to be – non-Christians should rather be turned into slaves for Christians: the godly must own “the fool who despises God’s wisdom,” because it’s the only way to keep those with a “slave mentality” (non-Christians) from ruining other people’s families. Morecraft makes his case for Biblically justified enslavement of those who do not “trust in Christ” based on Proverbs 11:29, which suggests that slavery is the only way to “keep a fool under wraps.” In a just society, an unbeliever should therefore “lose his family, his property, and his freedom,” and “his energies, talents and life will not be used as he himself pleases, but in the service of wise people who work hard to benefit the community.” Methinks a policy that just stated that “fools” should be made into slaves for the “wise”, as Morecraft suggests, would not turn out the way Morecraft apparently expects.

Morecraft’s other views include advocating stoning for gay people and women who aren’t virgins on their wedding day. Lots of his sermons apparently also concern how to deal with demons. 

Diagnosis: No, seriously: The Boko Haram comparison is notan exaggeration. These people exist, and they have followers. 

3 comments:

  1. Because if you don't believe you're the property of a god then you need to be the property of a human.

    It's telling that these people can't imagine a society where no one is subjugated.

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  2. A body's either enslaved to his appetites (his sin) or to Jesus. Ain't no middle ground. This may be what Morecraft was building his arguments on. Interesting writeup, either way.

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  3. Who does Morecraft consider Christians? I strongly suspect that Catholics, Mainstream Protestants, Mormons and basically everyone who isn't a fundamentalist, evangelical, Biblical literalist would not make the cut.

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