Daniel Lapin

Rabbi Daniel Lapin was the guest on "WallBuilders Live" today where he discussed "the health benefits of attending synagogues and churches." During the conversation with co-host Rick Green, Lapin made the case that God designed people to interact and thus social connections were integral to good health, which is why people ought to regularly attend religious services.

That prompted Green to complain that under President Obama's "socialized medicine," states where people frequently attend church and are therefore healthier will end up having to "foot the bill" for all the states where people don't attend church. 

That observation struck Lapin as quite insightful, who then offered his own bizarre theory that people who don't have children are "anti-social" because they are forcing other people's children to take care of them:

Green: If you are in a society and culture that has that connection and that places a high value on religion and affiliation there and you get the better health that results, it looks like now, the way that America is going with socialized medicine, those states that are like that are going to end up footing the bill for the states that choose the other path, which is less connection and less affiliation with religion and those things because they are going to have a higher health bill.  But now, with socialized medicine, we'll pay for it.

Lapin: Oh, absolutely.  And by the way, that is also true of Social Security.  It's all very well people choose not to have children; not only do they pay a health penalty for that but the truth is that your children and mine are going to have to pay for them. People say "it's not true, I have my investments to take care of me, I don't need children." Well, that may be true, however your investments depend on a growing market of customers because your investments are in company and what characterizes a profitable company is that it has customers; it's customer are my children.

Green: Yeah, that's a good point, I hadn't even thought about that. If you don't have children, first of all, they are not contributing to the overall marketplace but also the tax base and everything else.

Lapin: That is exactly right.  So I really do think that a claim of anti-social behavior can be lodged at the door of people who choose not to have children.

The US Embassy in the Czech Republic, as part of the State Department’s new LGBT rights initiative, is supporting a pride festival in Prague “to address discriminatory behavior based on sexual orientation and to promote a tolerant civil society and equal opportunities in the Czech Republic.” Already irate over Secretary Hillary Clinton’s speech on LGBT rights, American Religious Right activists joined their European, African and Latin American allies to denounce the Obama administration for “aggressively promoting the ‘gay’ agenda internationally” and leading a campaign of “cultural imperialism” [PDF]:

At the directive of the president of the United States, Washington is aggressively promoting the “gay’’ agenda internationally, including same-sex “marriage” and the stigmatization and marginalization of any who object to the same.

The Obama’s administration’s embrace of “same-sex marriage” has been overwhelmingly rejected by the American people. There have been 32 state referenda on marriage. In every one of them, voters endorsed the natural definition of marriage (a man and a woman). The North Carolina vote, on May 8, was 61% in favor of natural marriage.

…

It stands to reason, then, that anything which undermines the family – including changing the definition of marriage – is a breach of the State’s responsibility to protect this indispensable institution which precedes government and makes a stable and free society possible.

The Madrid Declaration of World Congress of Families VI (May 25-27, 2012) --which was unanimously adopted by more than 3,200 delegates from 72 countries --provides, in part: “We affirm the natural family to be the union of a man and a woman through marriage for the purposes of sharing love and joy, propagating children, providing their moral education, building a vital home economy, offering security in times of trouble, and binding the generations.”

Regarding “gay rights,” those caught up in this lifestyle have the same rights as other citizens. This does not include the “right” to force others to validate a lifestyle they find objectionable, for religious or other reasons. It also does not include the right of men to marry men and women to marry women.

The foregoing pseudo-rights do not advance human freedom and dignity but debase them.

We can not imagine a worse form of cultural imperialism than Washington trying to force approval of the “gay” agenda on societies with traditional values.

The list of signatories is mighty long, including former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay; Liberty Counsel’s Mat Staver and Matt Barber; American Family Association’s Tim Wildmon; Catholic League’s Bill Donohue; Vision America’s Rick Scarborough; Rabbi Daniel Lapin; American Civil Rights Union’s Robert Knight; Concerned Women for America’s Janice Shaw Crouse; Pastor Jim Garlow; WND’s David Kupelian; TFP’s C. Preston Noell III; conservative activist Richard Viguerie; World Congress of Families’ Don Feder; Media Research Center’s Brent Bozell; Traditional Values Coalition’s Louis Sheldon and Andrea Lafferty; and the Southern Baptist Convention’s Paige Peterson.

Other activists like Peter LaBarbera of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality, Scott Lively of Defend the Family International and Sharon Slater of Family Watch International are also among the signatories, as is Mission America’s Linda Harvey, who believes people should refuse care for themselves and their children from openly gay doctors and nurses:

Another signatory was Yehuda Levin has claimed that gay marriage caused last year’s D.C. earthquake and linked gay rights to the 9/11 attacks, Hurricane Katrina, the Tsunami and the 2010 Haiti earthquake:

The list even included former chaplain Gordon Klingenschmitt, who performs gay exorcisms:

Yesterday on Family Talk, James Dobson and Daniel Lapin came to the conclusion that ‘the pill’ paved the way for the destruction of civilization by increasing sexual promiscuity and reducing masculinity. Today, Dobson blamed Bill Clinton for the growing acceptance of “illicit sexuality” among politicians. Dobson, a prominent endorser of Rick Santorum, even lamented that the public isn’t having serious problems with supporting “an admitted womanizer,” Newt Gingrich. The Focus on the Family founder earlier claimed that he wouldn’t support Gingrich because he didn’t want the First Lady to be a former mistress.

Dobson: In the mid- to late-1990s, Bill Clinton, as president, had an affair with Monica Lewinsky. And the popular culture and the elites in media and in government rose to his defense and said that character really doesn’t matter, what matters is that a president is able to do his job properly, and the moral aspect was discounted. And something changed in our culture, not just about Bill Clinton, but about our attitudes toward our leaders being involved in illicit sexuality. And we’re seeing it right now on a number of fronts. I’m going to have to really come close to the limits here, but one of our candidates has been an admitted womanizer, and he has indicated, even to me, that he’s been forgive for that and that only God knows, and I accept that. But the attitude of the public toward that has changed. It is reflective of what happened in the 1990s.

Later in the program, Lapin argued that America is facing economic decline because of the removal of “religious restraints to rampant sexuality,” as men lose “self-discipline” and society is “effeminized.” Lapin then claimed that as “a more feminine society,” America has become more open to the “brutal and violent culture” of “fundamentalist Islam,” which he says is the only way “to explain the love affair that America’s leftwing and secularized elites have with Islam.”

So there you have it: feminism is responsible for the moral failings of men, economic decline and Islamic radicals.

Lapin: Once you remove the religious restraints to rampant sexuality, and all you got to do is relax those religious restraints and male nature will take care of the rest and bring about the decline of a civilization, one of the mechanisms is of course as we’ve discussed economic because in a sense it requires the same kind of control and self-discipline to get up every single morning and go to work whether you like it or not as it takes to restrain various appetites. So when you weaken one muscle you weaken everything else as well and not only do we have a tendency on the part of a society that has relaxed all form of sexual restraint to also go into free fall economically but what also happens is such a society tends towards becoming a more feminine society in a sense. Islam, fundamentalist Islam, which is essentially a brutal and violent culture is seducing a somewhat effeminized American culture because there is no other way to explain the love affair that America’s leftwing and secularized elites have with Islam.

During his speech at David Barton’s Pro-Family Legislators Conference, Daniel Lapin claimed that Islam and homosexuality are both cultures of “barbarism” that are diametrically opposed to civilization. Lapin, who has called for the quarantine of homosexuals to combat AIDS and claimed that men are becoming “hideous hermaphrodites” because of liberalism, tried to explain that while he doesn’t think gays or Muslims are themselves barbarians, he claims they participate in a “culture” of barbarism that “venerates death”:

Lapin: Civilization struggles to protect life, civilization struggles to feed life and generate life. Barbarism has no respect for life at all, actually, barbarism venerates death. Homosexuality, which side is that on? Civilization or barbarism? It’s got to be—see, please understand I’m speaking about the cultures and the ideas, I’m not saying that any particular Muslim is a barbarian, I’m not saying any particular homosexual is a barbarian, I’m saying the culture—and the answer is very simple, civilization has sex in the life-giving birth canal, and barbarism has sex in the canal through which dead, useless, waste material is excreted. It’s a fundamental difference, you can tell.

Daniel Lapin of Toward Tradition has emerged as the Religious Right’s favorite rabbi whose rants against government and gays have kept his image among conservatives untarnished despite his close ties to the Jack Abramoff scandal involving Indian gambling companies. Today on WallBuilders Live, Lapin not only tried to say that gay rights derived from the collapse of morality but also argued that it was “insane” that gays weren’t quarantined during the AIDS pandemic the 1980s.

Lapin told co-hosts Rick Green and David Barton, who has previously called for the government regulation of homosexuality, that health institutions should have tried to “impose quarantine” against the “homosexual-related disease” but “nobody had the moral will to do it simply because it reeked of bigotry and selective oppression and so on.”

Listen:

Lapin: Look, you’ll remember when the AIDS epidemic began, if that was anything other than a homosexual-related disease, which it obviously was, particularly at the outset, any public health organization that did not impose quarantine would have literally been tried before a court, it’s insane.

Green: So they ignored from what a health perspective they should have done.

Lapin: Yes, yes of course. If it was an outbreak of cholera or if it was an outbreak of the same severity as the early days of the AIDS epidemic in the ’80s, yes, yes of course they should have been quarantining but nobody had the moral will to do it simply because it reeked of bigotry and selective oppression and so on.

Daniel Lapin of Toward Tradition appeared on The 700 Club today with Pat Robertson, alleging that the Bible warned us of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the book of Zachariah. Lapin went on to say that the attacks were “based on a dream that Adolf Hitler had in 1943.” No word if Lapin ever intended to warn Americans about the attacks before 9/11, or if the Bible had anything to say about how People For the American Way and gays were responsible for the 9/11 attacks, another theory concocted on The 700 Club.

Watch:

Lapin: The Torah, in ancient Jewish wisdom the Bible, actually explains something which we have lived through which is one of the great mysteries: the plot of 9/11.

Robertson: Really!

Lapin: The plot of 9/11. Not only do we find references in Zachariah to four mysterious crafts that come through between two mountains made of metal, in biblical terminology mountains can be natural mountains or also anything tall that grows up like two buildings, also the idea that the plot was hatched not in Mecca or Medina or Riyadh or anywhere else in Saudi Arabia, that plot was hatched in Hamburg, Germany, and was based on a dream that Adolf Hitler had in 1943 which was to fly suicide Luftwaffe German air force bombers into the towers of Manhattan.

Robertson: Are you serious, that was Hitler’s dream?

Lapin: That was a Hitler dream described in a book called ‘Spandau Diary’ written by one of the Nazis who was captured after the war and who witnessed, and actually I’ve seen drawings, and I don’t doubt for a moment that the Muslim plotters, in the mosque in Hamburg who laid out the plans for 9/11, I don’t doubt for a moment that they encountered those same plans. I don’t think they thought of this themselves. This was the fulfillment of a dream that was really put in place early on in World War II.

Rabbi Daniel Lapin, a favorite figure on the Religious Right, really out-did himself on WallBuilders Live with David Barton yesterday. The topic of conversation was the suggestion that animals should be referred to as “companions” instead of “pets.” Lapin claimed that the elevation of animals in our society has lead to horrible things, from Nazi Germany to (gasp!) women’s rights:

The Bible provides guidance on certain fundamental principles of life. One of them is that there is a major difference between people and animals. Now this is so important that it’s covered right up in the beginning of the first few chapters of Genesis, we established that.

Look, it’s not an accident that some of the most brutal and cruel, demonic tyrants of history loved animals. It’s not an accident. It’s not an accident that Adolf Hitler was almost never seen without his dog, who he was petting constantly. Loved his dog! Well, what we understand is that there is a potential, it’s not going to happen to everybody, but there is a potential within a large society that if we obliterate the distinction between people and animals it’s not that people will start treating animals better, they’ll start treating people worse…

The reality is that the lives of most women are not as good today as they were years ago, they’re just not good. Now “oh they’ve got opportunities,” yeah they do, like they can get shot up and tortured in Iraq, and guess what-I’ve traveled, you’ve traveled. I mean how often does my heart break when I see a woman on a business trip frantically trying to calm her children over the telephone and tell them they should go to be with the sitter and she’ll be home after they’re asleep. That’s the woman who’d like to be with her kids if she could, but no--we really are making life tougher on people and all of this is of course consistent with the idea of promoting rights for animals

In my last post, I noted that the upcoming Muslim prayer rally has, over the last few days, suddenly become a full-fledged Religious Right crusade to save America from the Islam's "dark spiritual intent" and that activists are vowing to "storm the gates of hell to defeat the false god of Islam."

It seems that with every hour that passes, more and more Religious Right leaders are getting involved, to the point that this is now pretty much a full-blown holy war between the right-wing Christian activists and the organizers of this Muslim prayer rally.

The latest development is this press release highlighting a letter signed by a variety of Religious Right leaders under a newly formed group called The Ad Hoc Committee of Americans for Transparency and Honesty in Religion demanding that organizers of rally to denounce acts of terrorism:

Muslim Americans assure us that Islam categorically rejects terrorism and that the concept of "jihad" refers to a "spiritual struggle," and has nothing whatsoever to do with "holy war."

However, the Letter notes that, "Around the world, the overwhelming number of terrorist acts are carried out by Muslims, that many Muslim-American groups have terrorist ties and that justification for acts of violence against 'infidels' is found in the Koran."

Signers of the letter ask rally organizers to disavow the following acts of terrorism, "committed by Muslims, in the name of Islam":

• The 9/11 attacks (more than 3,000 dead)

• The 2002 bombing of a hotel in Netanya, Israel (30 killed)

• The 2002 Bali bombings (202 dead)

• The 2007 plot to murder soldiers at Ft. Dix

• The 2008 attacks in Mumbai, India (173 dead)

• The 2009 conspiracy to bomb a synagogue and Jewish community center in the Bronx

The letter asks recipients if they are "willing to join millions of other people of faith in America and denounce these and similar acts of terrorism?"

The letter can be found here [PDF] and appears to have been organized by Rick Scarborough of Vision America, as his is the only name listed on the above press release while the letter itself is hosted on his organization's website. Below is the list of signers:

Ted Baehr – Christian Film and Television Commission
Brian Camenker – President, Mass Resistance
Christopher Carmouche – Chairman, GrassTopsUSA
Joseph Farah – Editor and CEO, WorldNetDaily
Don Feder -- former syndicated columnist, Don Feder Associates
William J. Federer -- American Minute
Linda Harvey – President, Mission America
Bishop E.W. Jackson -- Exodus Faith Ministries
Phillip Jauregui – President, Judicial Action Group
Rabbi Daniel Lapin – President, American Alliance of Jews and Christians
William J. Murray – Chairman, Religious Freedom Coalition
C. Preston Noell – President, Tradition, Family and Property
Tony Perkins – President, Family Research Council
Dr. Kevin Roberts – Executive Director, Catholic Families of America
Rick Scarborough -- Vision America Action
Mat Staver – founder and Chairman, Liberty Counsel
Mike Valerio – Mike and Helen Valerio Foundation
Richard Viguerie – Conservative HQ.com
Herb Zweibon – Chairman, Americans for A Safe Israel

In fairness, I feel I ought to point out that not all Religious Right leaders are joining in this effort to wage a holy war against Islam, as earlier this week Rob Schenck and Patrick Mahoney issued a statement welcoming the prayer vigil:

Rev. Rob Schenck, President of the National Clergy Council, comments,

"With over 1.5 billion Muslims in the world, it is important that Christians have an open dialogue with the Islamic community. The church must never be timid in reaching out to peoples and groups with differing beliefs and traditions. Too much is at stake for future generations not to begin this historic conversation. This is an opportunity that we cannot afford to miss."

Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense Coalition, adds,

"The heart of Christ is to reach out and build bridges to all peoples regardless of what their faith traditions or beliefs might be. Several years ago the Christian Defense Coalition began reaching out to the Muslim world which resulted in a prayer delegation going to Baghdad to pray for the nation of Iraq and Prime Minister Maliki (see photo).

"Since then we have had many conversations and discussions with Islamic leaders in Washington, D.C. and around the world. This news conference gives us another chance to dialogue and share with our Islamic neighbors.

"It also gives us the platform to celebrate the greatness of America where everyone is allowed to practice their faith tradition in the public square free from government interference of harassment. The prayer vigil on the lawn of the Capitol this Friday highlights that timeless truth.

"Since 9/11, the church should not run from Muslims in America but begin reaching out with God's love."