Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Roberta Ahmanson on theocracy: "what would be so bad about it?"

theocracy ~ a system of government in which priests rule in the name of God.

     Dissent the Blog readers will be familiar with Mr. Howard Ahmanson, Jr.—a quiet but important player in Orange County politics of the right wing variety. He’s one the country’s chief funders of religious right causes. Ahmanson and his wife, Roberta, have been crucial benefactors of Tustin's Education Alliance.
     A month or so ago, Gustavo Arellano mentioned that the upcoming edition of Christianity Today would feature a piece about Roberta, a former OC Reg religion reporter and patron of the arts. Gustavo seemed to think it would be worth reading.
     Well, it’s now available, and it is indeed fascinating:

Connoisseur for Christ: Roberta Green Ahmanson, by Christine A. Scheller

     Below are some excerpts:

     …The Ahmansons' critics focus on their support for conservative causes like Proposition 8 (their donations totaled approximately $1.4 million in 2007-2008), and for conservative thinkers like the late and much reviled Christian Reconstructionist Rousas John Rushdoony. [Re Rushdoony, see here.] The secular media especially have made and repeated these criticisms over the past decade.
     For example, in a scathing 2004 Salon profile of Howard, "Avenging Angel of the Religious Right," Max Blumenthal took pains to show that the Ahmansons' ultimate goals are theocratic, a charge that has been widely disseminated. Roberta at once denies and defends the claim: "I never was, and I don't know if Howard ever was either. I'm afraid to say this, but also, what would be so bad about it?"
     Blumenthal wrote, "[Howard's] money has made possible some of the most pivotal conservative movements in America's recent history, including the 1994 gop takeover of the California Assembly, a ban on gay marriage and affirmative action in California, and the mounting nationwide campaign to prove Darwin wrong about evolution …. And besides contributing cash to George W. Bush's 2000 presidential campaign, Ahmanson has played an important role in driving Bush's domestic agenda by financing the career of Marvin Olasky, a conservative intellectual whose ideas inspired the creation of the new White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives."
. . .

     …Her life's primary animating force was found in her strict Regular Baptist upbringing: her desire "to know if there was a God and if it mattered."
     She found the answer "painfully" at Calvin College, from which she graduated in 1972 before earning an M.A. in English at the University of Michigan in 1974. "When I was 21, I admitted that there was a God and that I believed Christianity was true, that it was the best description of reality. That's how I think of it, and if there were a better description of reality, I hope, with C. S. Lewis, that I would embrace it. But it keeps proving itself to fit.
. . .
     As Blumenthal noted, Howard and Roberta also have strong ties to intelligent design, which purports that life on earth is best explained by reference to a creator. "We are probably the single largest supporter of the intelligent design movement, and have been since the beginning," said Roberta. Her perspective on theistic evolution is unflinching: She rejects it because it "legitimates naturalism as the mode of understanding reality." Even so, she is not a seven-day creationist, and Fieldstead funds projects at institutions that promote evolution.
     Ahmanson is equally unflinching in her defense of Rushdoony, controversial in part for his belief that the Levitical laws should be applied in modern society [including Draconian punishments for homosexuality]. Roberta claims he wasn't "the ogre" he was made out to be and explains his theodicy as a response to his family's flight from the Armenian genocide in Turkey. "His whole life project was to try to figure out what could protect you. In the end, he came down to the only thing that is solid is God's law. Well, you say the word law in the 20th or 21st century, and people break out in a rash."….

• Living Peace Series: Richard Branson at UC Irvine 25-Jan-11 (Jason)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Isn't her husband, Howard, one of Fuentes' pals?

Roy's obituary in LA Times and Register: "we were lucky to have you while we did"

  This ran in the Sunday December 24, 2023 edition of the Los Angeles Times and the Orange County Register : July 14, 1955 - November 20, 2...