good evening welcome to moral politics i'm your host valerie to rico and this is our monthly series on christianity in the public square tonight we're going to learn about a phenomenon called don't many unism dominionism is a form of christianity that believes they are these christians believe they are mandated by the bible to take control of the reins of power in this country and eventually around the world and rule the world according to biblical principles here with us tonight is leah burton the founder of valerie so we need to start for our audience by defining this term don't many unism it's a big word it's an unfamiliar word what the heck does it mean well essentially it's just it's a it's based on the word dominion which means to take control of have control over those who are chosen and those who are chosen in the terms of this discussion are people who have been born again their very specific criteria you have to have been born again except jesus christ as your personal lord and savior and have a personal relationship with jesus ok so you're born again you accept jesus christ as your personal lord and savior and you have a personal relationship with jesus does that make you a domain interest no it does not but what it does is it makes you a congregational member of churches that are absolutely movement it is a it is a christian political movement and a specific kind of christianity exactly exactly and it's all about control power and money it's about my gut is the only god there are no others in your god is basically your god is worthless and that is not only just to the extreme differences between christianity and the islamic face for example the really believe only clear but they believe  face not all face but many face so dominionism just means people who believe that their religion should trump exactly secular constitution national boundaries i'm not an american first and foremost i am this form of christian and i believe that everyone should be and if my beliefs come into conflict with the constitution or with the law then i have an obligation first and foremost to the set of beliefs absolutely because all those other things even including the constitution or titles those are those are all earthly manmade things that in their opinion really don't even hold water to you  held spiritual values whether they are secular spiritual values or religious values that that if your government says this is what you should do i want you to to kill these people i want you to kind of you know kind of not talk about these issues or whatever that that we have this kind of obligation to ourselves well what we're talking about is an extremism that's so deep that well let me give you an example what person who just recently retired from the military a fellow named lieutenant general boykin one of the things that he got hot water for in trouble for while he was an active military is that he made a reference to an islamic person and said  it's it takes it to a different level of extremism when they are absolutely and tolerant of anybody in that word is really really important it's an intolerance of any other viewpoint perspective but isn't so isn't the base problem this exclusive claim to truth yes i mean in the end i wonder if we're going to have to confront that right the idea that anybody mean there are these it sounds like they're polite kind of nice people who in their heart of hearts thinks my religion is the only true religion my way is the only way  my denomination is the only denomination my theology is the only theology and then you've got these people who also think that but they are very aggressive about proselytizing about reaching into our public institutions like like schools and the military and government and trying to control those institutions but in the end i mean they're both driven by this belief that they have somehow superior ability to determine what's real and who god is it's black and white for them either you're with them or you're against them and that really is the crux of it that's why if we're as complicated as this discussion can get in for as many areas the intent of calls as dominionism has within our society person of jewish faith buddhist atheist agnostic wiccan pagan it is that it is it has to be our way or no way and we're going to do whatever we have to do whatever we must do in order to take control of those secular institutions and in their insidious in their very very good at what they do their very well funded and in their in the whole concept of this is so frightening that most of us shut it out so you are saying someone who is a dominionist give us an example sarah palin is a perfect example of that sarah palin why is she an example of a dominionist she is the poster girl for this movement sarah palin has been she has been deeply involved in a dominionist church organization since she was very young she went to her first jesus camp at six years old did her conversion she claims that at six years old she became born again and accepted jesus christ as her lord and savior and she was actually part of this jesus camp like in the documentary movie jesus kill wasn't in that movie but she has participated in jesus camp there all over the united states all over the you know that was a terrifying documentary it is terrifying and in fact michael researcher and co author in the book that we're working on was born and raised in one of the most militant dominionist churches in the united states outside a little kentucky she is now in her mid thirty's it's horrific for she can't even watch jesus camp she said for where i was raised lutheran where i went to sunday school those were their sunday schools and these are these  militant indoctrination centers for children well i mean i remember in the jesus camp movie they actually had a paper cut out of george bush and the children were praying for him and that they had the children holding plastic fetuses or some kind of weeping over our dead babies and it's very very extreme and it honestly it borders right on child abuse i mean these children who really don't have any concept of you know when they say well i i was saved six what were they say from what do you even know it six these are other people placing fears into these children that that create this hysteria with them these poor children they're a mess but it is an indoctrination and then it really i hate to refer to it as christianity because i really believe it's more of a cult and then it's being run by some very very clever marketers and the people who are at the top of the heap of these dominionist organizations including franklin graham billy graham son  in this country that means are american indians alaskan natives huge push they go into cambodia into thailand they're all over the why like why are they so obsessed with having everybody believe what they believe they believe this is their commission believe and truly some of these members really truly believe this is this is bred out of their faith this is their belief this is what god is mandating them to do but the problem is is that there are some people at the very top like mr graham who are living very very well so franklin graham billy graham's son you think he's just a shyster i think that he has i think he's an opportunist i think he has profited very very well in this business of evangelizing yes how well to the tune of millions in addition to the money that his father had already created in the billy graham entire very well he's allowed access worldwide he has the funds to set up and in command the but part of the problem  is that it's not just commanding appeal appeasing their own egos and their own sense of power and control and their sense of of righteousness and look how good i am and how you know what we're doing for these poor lonely children in these foreign countries it also is a way for them to unfortunately right now the way our system is set up to be able to divert funds and contribute funds into campaign funding that creates still candidates in all parties not just the republican party ok so so let me there's all these pieces here that i'm hearing a little bit about shysters about people who make money off of dominionism this notion that christians should take control of the reins of power and rule the country and the world according to the bible franklin graham you mention is somebody who has made a lot of money off of it whether he's a true believer or not but then it sounds like there are all these people who actually are true believers who literally think that the center of their christianity is the great commission go into the world and make disciples of every creature and that that's more important than you know love your neighbor as yourself the great commandment even if you have to hurt people even if you have to be and now you're coming to this kind of stealthy candidate thing which sounds slippery and slighty it is hard it is very very difficult to discuss this without getting it because the fingers are just you know they're spread they're in there they're in every pipe and it is really difficult it in a short amount of time to train in and keep this with without wandering off into all the other eight can you give us some titles yes sarah damon spiritual warfare is one of the best books spiritual warfare spiritual warfare book by george well george called it can happen here fascism in america chris chris hedges a journalist and a theologian by education also wrote a great book american fascists those are just some of them and the problem is is that because this is so fantastic is that those it's see that much light of day they tend to end up sitting on shelves and collecting dust because it just seems like this is just too outrageous it is and that in and of itself is one of the things that allows this breeding ground for this movement to continue to grow because it is so outrageous and even the congregational numbers don't understand that the there is so much of this going on behind the scenes so you're saying not congregational church as per se but the members of congregations the people the kind of ordinary christians ordinary worshippers who who just are trying to go about their day to day lives they're kind of oblivious to this in large manner to take over the take control of the reins of power yes and they're not taught in these in these environments and these church environments in the dominionist churches they are not taught to reason and be critical they're not taught to sit down and really read the bible front to back they are fed verses that are cherry picked you know from all throughout are fed to them not in any particular order but to carry a message that they want that congregation to hear well we've had other guests on the show who have said it's two things on those those kinds of churches one is authority and often around kind of a very charismatic individual and then the second is what people call bill bibliolatry or text worship where they literally take words out of the bible make a golden calf out of them but selectively of course selective mentioned that their goals are not just to kind of get immersed embedded in government you mentioned the school system are there other places where to many nests feel this responsibility to make sure that things happen biblically well here's an example that's coming up right before us in this is media and entertainment or arts and entertainment is another area that they that they want to dominate and take control over and what are we seeing advertised on the television this new  this new apocalyptic movie two thousand and twelve and it's designed to destroy it's designed to instill fear it's designed to scare it's designed to make people uncomfortable and out of those elements they will get converts is that a christian apocalypse in that movie when you look down into the money sources of where that came from the words popped up out yes absolutely really but there insidious they have so much money that they can feed them money off  and accomplish these projects and but we don't know we just look at it as another you know action movie like earthquake was or you know a towering inferno  but the but there's a bigger message behind this then part of it is this whole notion of the two thousand and twelve apocalyptic and the end of the world yes it is amazing i have evangelical fundamentalist relatives and i did hear from one of them that there was all of this quote scientific evidence behind that movie but it did make me wonder what kind of it's propaganda she's reading well in how do you control how do you control populations you control populations by fear that's how you control look at what happened when we had the after nine eleven in the bush administration and the message that we consistently heard over and over and over again and i don't care if it's republican or democrat what did we hear it was fear they're going to get us are going to get us on our own ground again they're in now with what just happened for a hood with that horrific massacre down there by a clearly unstable person that the fear if for us right now is that that's going to turn into a the fear of other muslim americans that they're here to try and take us over from the inside movies like twenty twelve carry that message subtly or not and when people get fearful they turn to some answers give me an answer that i'm going to be ok do you think there's something about if they have this proselytizing mission right to take you know control of the reins of power make disciples of every creature so that they're always kind of on the like acting like a sales force that there's this assumption that other people must be on the make all the time to aside from their feelings in their in their disregard for other people of faith or no faith it is that you know for them it's a perspective of the big two it's christianity versus islam and that's what they're looking at that's that's i hear a lot of screaming about secular humanism too though you know you hear screaming about it but that's not what they see is the ultimate say tannic enemy it is it is the you know if it were an action movie it would be the christians versus you know islamic world and in many in the islamic world in the extremist side we have been stream christians you have mainstream islamic faith members playing out in the israel palestine conflict well it's very interesting because i just just read a snippet that came out of a barbara walters interview with sarah palin this week where she was asked about israel and development  palestine and she said that she doesn't agree with president obama's perspective of curtailing growth there because she says that they're basically what she's saying is there must be growth it must happen quickly there must be more housing because there's going to interview and that right there this is one of those just indicators that this is how they feel this is how rapidly they see this all coming down on us this isn't long term plan as much as i would love to see these extremist take and go off and form a third party in their perspective there's no time but don't they leave behind folks think that the jews all need to go there just so there can be a bloodbath what's the point of building housing for them yes and well except that there are going to be those  selected one hundred forty four thousand jewish people that are going to get to go up with you know and be saved when the rapture occurs who gets to like all those they haven't decided yet it all sounds so bizarre sometimes it does but look at the money spent by these evangelical intel televangelist organizations millions upon millions upon millions upon millions of dollars going into israel and why to have a presence there so that when the th time happens they're there and that solomon's temple will get rebuilt so that christ can come back i mean they just they have polgar midges in the spin billions of dollars getting in there and setting up and so they this is like christians united for israel john hay ideas of organization and you're talking about sarah palin and you really are talking about people who have access to the highest level of power in this country believing that they need to protect israel so that for the second coming for the second coming and here's why here's where it differentiates from what has been an understanding and a belief in mainstream christianity which was and i remember hearing this when i was a child growing up as a lutheran and being taught that would jesus message was you will not know the day you will not know the hour in a dominionist perspective they believe that it is their mandate to create the second coming bring it on how much influence of these guys have how much are they actually dictating american policy priorities well really good example just recently is a fellow named sharlet wrote a book called the family actually he wrote that book over a year and a half ago and it didn't see the day didn't see daylight what happened is in the past year we had two very notable members of this particular house in washington d c called the c street house and this is what jeff wrote about in this house you mean like a club yeah literally like a like an apartment building that was bought by one of the very notable dominionist organizations use we use with a mission and proclaim to be a church so it's been operating under the auspices of the church and as a nonprofit organization in a very secretive society but within that church have been these two know governor mark sanford had an affair with a woman from south america that he snuck up but when here's an example not only is this a frat house super turn of the house for these chosen congress members who can do no wrong but when governor sanford was asked at a press conference shortly after he was he was outed for this affair you know do you have any plans to resign and he even made a reference to himself in that news conference that no because he's like king david and if you know anything about king david in the bible king david was allowed basically to get away with murder but really and pillage and and they can and they've been told this in c street house these members of congress that include democrats as well as republicans that it doesn't matter what you do because you were chosen and you are part of a higher mission so so yes they do have influence in very high places and they have had for quite some time but it's done on a really really very secret quiet level how much are they dictating our israel policy i think that they have tremendous influence over israel policy i mean if you're you can do no wrong right i mean exactly as you said so if it israel now needs to be protected and defended by the united states then all of a sudden there's no such thing as an israeli war crime because they can do no wrong right right yes and some humanitarian a crime yeah and some of these people that i mean it's almost another topic entirely to get off into that policy because that gets so fractured in that so intense and deep sure but as far as influence in our system and do they really let's just take a look at the national prayer breakfast where that started how that got started and how much a part of ted haggard met every monday with george bush when he was president as part of his spiritual support network so ted haggard a dominionist who thinks we need to rule the world according to biblical principles reading every monday with the president yes he had access to him until until he lost it but it's over now with obama right well it's not over but i mean it's it's it's not over in terms of the national per breakfast is still going on and then obama actually was criticized shortly after he was elected for attending that it has become such a an established  obligation of the office to attend this prayer breakfast that you wouldn't not attend and part of that is because unfortunately there is so much money it's following the money i was amazed in washington state that there is something called breakfast it's not interfaith it's not ecumenical it's not about it's not inclusive at all in fact it's run by a an evangelical organization and the the footage from west bring the room was full of  elected including the governor and it's in every state it's in every state and it's all part of the national prayer breakfast and if you follow that you know how that got started and who organized that and who is behind that again we get back to that it's really not that complicated it is just it is more pervasive than we think it is that's the problem the concept is is very simple there group of people that have a lot of power a lot of money a lot of influence that prey on other people's fears and and  and so smart i mean i hate to say this but i kind of give him credit right you have organizations that call campus crusade for christ our youth with a mission they're going after young people young people are very open amenable to influence you can kind of shape the direction of their future their training them to be politicians and they're sending them in staffers and interns that's sad it's it's it's spread everywhere really is it's very deep and i have absolute faith in the fact that we can stem this tide that we can wake people up but we really need to open our eyes we need to think about it i know it's a lot to consider well we can do that in part by sending people to your blog god's god's own party  which talks about the ways in which some small subset of the republican party has gained undue influence absolute and about the secular republicans who would love to take their party back yes and this really hundred and the only state right now that has a preamble with verbiage in it right up front on their website that is that totally references biblical laws texas but that's going to change if we don't if we don't pay attention we have to well i am so glad you are and they're doing this research and fighting the good fight we're out of time for today but i very much appreciate you coming on the show to talk about this thank