I’ve never had much use for Jimmy Carter. I view him as in the running with James Buchanan for the title of worst President of the United States, and he has always struck me as a mean and spiteful little man. Now he adds the title of bigot to his list of dishonors. In an address to the World Parliament of Religions (You know that has to give God a good laugh!) the Solon of Plains is reported to have unloaded on both Southern Baptists and Catholics.
“Their continuing choice provides a foundation or justification for much of the pervasive persecution and abuse of women throughout the world,” said Carter. Carter goes on to list horrific violations against women such as rape, genital mutilation, abortion of female embryos and spousal battery.
It is an embarassment to this country that this ignorant bigot ever sat in the oval office. I would perhaps excuse his remarks on the grounds of senility, but Carter has made a career of being mean-spirited and self-righteous, and this wretched fact free diatribe is right in character.
It is an embarassment to this country that this ignorant bigot ever sat in the oval office.
As an American I don’t feel quite as embarrassed about that relatively unknown and empty suit[case] of a man having been elected president as those who lend him an ear should.
And what’s up with this?
Carter goes on to list horrific violations against women such as rape, genital mutilation, abortion of female embryos and spousal battery.
I didn’t know the Catholic Church supported such things. But worse is the inclusion of “abortion of female embryos”. I know he wants to mask the reality of what abortion is, and he thinks using the incorrect term of embryo makes a point as much as he intends to conceal, but it’s not indicative of the clearest of thinking, not to mention the inconsistency of his sense of morality. Any abortion is a grave act of injustice for whatever “reason”, but why does Jimmeh only have qualms about the aborting “female embryos”?
Age sure isn’t making Mr. Peanut any wiser. Well, Carter doesn’t have much use for Jews either:
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/09/jimmy_carter_the_jewhater_who.html
Personally, I am honored to be part of a group loathed by such a foolish and bitter old man. Back in 1976, Americans fell for the John Boy Walton, “Shucks, Ahm jes’ a humble, sweater-wearin’ peanut farmer” hokeum. Who realized then what a vindictive and bigoted and confused character he was and is?
Ironically, Carter decries Southern Baptists, while retaining the two of the less savory aspects of traditional southern fundamentalism – prejudice(especially anti-Catholic prejudice) and sanctimony. But since he backed Obama, he can kid himself that he’s an “enlightened” southerner.
So is this a sign that Carter is preparing to announce he is leaving the Southern Baptists for the 3rd time while doing no such thing?
Jimmy C is past ready for a padded cell, how about 1 next to Algore so they can exchange delusions?
A man who never was of any significance. His bitterness has never ceased since he was considered to be one of our worse choices and just perhaps the one he endorsed will also be in that same ilk.
Jimmy Carter is misinformed, and is of an age where it is difficult to look beyond one’s comfortable, accustomed sources of information to locate truth.
He’s increasingly like that cranky relative who goes on tirades at family gatherings, to which everybody listens, nodding vaguely, only to huddle up when he leaves the room and ask one another, wide-eyed, “Hey, what the heck are we gonna do about Uncle Jim? Is anybody checking up on him? Is he still taking his meds? Do we need to put him in a home? What?”
A Little Information About Baptists
By the way, Jimmy Carter is a Baptist and from the southern United States. But he is not a Southern Baptist (referring to the denominational convention) nor has he been one since 2000. (And prior to that, though his church had been affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, Carter was what Catholics might call a “loud dissenter” from the 1980’s onward.)
The “New Baptist Covenant” group Carter helped start up along with Bill Clinton and Mercer University president Bill Underwood is in fact intended as a counterweight against the more conservative Southern Baptist Convention.
To contrast them: The SBC defines social justice in terms of equal protection under law and strong advocacy of charitable assistance for the needy at the individual and church level (some local churches dedicate over half their operating budgets to charitable giving in the community, the nation, and overseas, and conservative Baptists tend to be among the most reliable tithers in the whole Christian sphere).
Carter’s alternative group, the NBC, adds to this a rejection of traditional gender roles, including a belief in ordination of women for all clergy roles. Local churches which ordain active homosexuals or conduct gay commitment ceremonies can participate in the NBC. The SBC is too theologically and practically traditional to allow for this.
So, oddly, while Catholics might think SBC Baptists sounded uncomfortably fundamentalist (and therefore liable to harbor those anti-Catholic myths of Mary-worship and salvation-by-works so common among American fundamentalists), they’d find rather more agreement with the SBC on matters of faith and practice than with the kinder-and-gentler-sounding NBC.
Put another way: SBC are the EWTN Catholics of Baptists, and NBC are the Episcopals of Baptists.
Finally, please keep in mind that Baptists are Congregationalists; each local congregation is independently governed, owns all its properties, and selects its own leaders. Local churches, if they opt to participate in a larger organization, decide which Conventions, Associations, and Fellowships they wish to participate in on the basis of being doctrinally simpatico. Their membership dues go into cooperative programs for needs ranging from organized support of overseas missionaries to printing of Sunday School lesson booklets.
My point is that it’s not like the SBC could excommunicate Jimmy Carter or replace the leaders of his local church. Authority among Baptists is bottom-up.
Like RC, I think your headline here is bilious and inaccurate. Not every critic of the Catholic Church is anti-. As for the lack of quality of his presidency, I think he has a fair way to go to beat the previous occupant of the White House, who showed a grave lack of concern about terrorism, and after the homeland was supposedly prepared for calamity, revealed himself and his government to be as ill-prepared as ever.
Mr Carter shows no depth of knowledge of Catholicism, but to refer to him as an “anti-Catholic bigot” seems to reveal more about the author than the target.
Todd, it comes as absolutely no surprise to me that you would rise in defense of both an anti-Catholic bigot and someone in the running for being the worst President to ever curse these United States. However, Carter can take comfort in this fact. The pro-abort you voted for last year for President may well save him from the title of worst President by the time he is done.
Donald, how charming to lock horns with you on a Sunday morning.
It is part of the blindness of conservatives such as yourself that you misinterpret as “defense” a mere disagreement with the headline on this thread. I don’t think Mr Carter was the strongest of American presidents, but he certainly isn’t accurately identified as an “anti-Catholic bigot.”
It isn’t, however, enough to agree than the man is wrong about Catholicism. In your eyes, one must also call names. Probably stick out one’s tongue and go “nyah, nyah, nyah” in the direction of Georgia, too.
Your objection is noted, counsellor, and overruled.
Todd, I didn’t call names. I accurately described Carter, and you reflexively came to his defense, which is only to be expected.
A man who is blaming the Church’s position on female ordination for violence against women around the world, or even seeking to relate them in some way, is an anti-Catholic bigot as far as I am concerned.
Donald, what is to be expected is that I will tweak the errors and oversights on AC. As Joe profoundly demonstrates, this post is more about a cheerleading session, “Jimmy, bigot, rah, rah rah!” than any serious commentary on how non-Catholics mischaracterize Catholicism.
Bishop Sheen had more the measure of situations like this than you.
I will offer that some of the above is de trop.
I think Mr. Carter had a mixed record in office, bedeviled by his own misunderstandings of his social world, by the misunderstandings within the subculture that was the elite of the Democratic Party, and by the crooked and refractory character of the Democratic Congressional Caucus. For all his policy failures, his quality was above the median in the matrix in which he was operating.
Still, you can see a good many of the man’s vices on display.
1. He is one of the more abrasively sanctimonious characters to have abided in American public life; Anthony Lewis and Ramsey Clark are among the few who have him beat.
2. He is at best ambivalent when confronted with the choice between the intuitions and arguments of historic protestant confessions and the kultursmog around him.
3. His conception of the sources of collective behavior is gratuitous and bizarre. It does show who some of his favorite bogeys are. It is sort of surprising that he did not figure out a way to blame female genital mutilation on the Government of Israel, though. I figure that’s coming up.
Todd you know as little about Joe as you obviously do about Carter. Joe Hargrave is no man’s cheerleader.
Todd,
I have lost all respect for you as a ‘Catholic’.
I had no idea you voted for the most pro-abortionist president in the history of the United States of America.
Pretty sad.
bigot: (n) a prejudiced person who is intolerant of any opinions differing from his own
I think this describes Carter well
Todd writes Sunday, December 13, 2009 A.D. at 9:25 am
“As for the lack of quality of his presidency, I think he has a fair way to go to beat the previous occupant of the White House…”.
Is there in rhetoric [debating] a term for the use of pointless comparisons? That X was better [or worse] than Y tells us nothing much about X. It is the kind of thing used in high school debates.
I have lost all respect for you as a ‘Catholic’.
Keeping in mind that equal respect is the abolition of respect, we might at least maintain a quantum in reserve. No need to send it all down the drain.
Is there in rhetoric [debating] a term for the use of pointless comparisons? That X was better [or worse] than Y tells us nothing much about X. It is the kind of thing used in high school debates.
Too true. Also, trying to do a generic comparison between different chief executives is difficult because the contexts and challenges can be quite dissimilar, and call for different talents and virtues.
AD,
I respect him as a human being and as a child of Christ.
Does that count?
I would say so, but you shoudn’t pay too much attention to a hoodlum like me.
[…] Now we once again hear from “church historian” Jimmy Carter. In opposition to the vast majority of authentic scholars and historians, Carter asserted: “It’s clear that during the early Christian era women served as deacons, priests, bishops, apostles, teachers and prophets.” He added: “It wasn’t until the 4th century or the 3rd at the earliest that dominant Christian leaders, all men, twisted and distorted Holy Scriptures to perpetuate their ascendant position within the religious hierarchy.” [reference] […]
Really? My short little post was a “profound” demonstration?
Art you are never a hoodlum. At worst sometimes a grouchy smart penguin. 🙂
Hey – it’s Jimmy Carter. Nothing more need be said
Carter was the first president I ever voted for… in an 8th grade mock election that is, though I can’t remember why exactly.
The one good thing I think Carter did in his presidency was facilitate peace between Egypt and Israel at Camp David. I don’t give him total credit for it, because it was Anwar Sadat’s and Menachem Begin’s idea to begin with, but Carter did at least help their talks along when they bogged down. In some ways I think THAT was the main reason God permitted someone like Jimmy Carter, who was otherwise mediocre if not incompetent, to be elected.
I also admire Carter for his commitment to Habitat for Humanity; the publicity he gave the organization helped put it on the map.
Unfortunately, ever since he left office, he has been “coasting” on the reputation for negotiating skills and charitable commitment he seems to have gained from those two things (Camp David and Habitat). As a result he gets a pass on many of his more outrageous claims and statements such as this one.
As bad as Carter was I still don’t know that I’d place him on the all-time worst list below James Buchanan, Franklin Pierce, or Warren Harding. I suspect, however, that Obama may yet claim the title of worst president in my lifetime.
Carter was the first president I voted against Elaine in 1976 at age 19. I had little enthusiasm for Ford, but I suspected that Carter was going to be bad news for the nation. As to the Camp David Accords, that was a solid achievement, and Carter deserves his share of the credit.
It seems to me that an important issue is going very much unmentioned. When politicians with some level of influence over public thought begin to discuss matters that are of theological question (such as suggesting the need for the ordination of women), they are overstepping their bounds as politicians. As Catholics, we ought to be doing something to clarify how this is different than a question of social justice, because to those outside the Church this is obviously very misunderstood. It probably stems from an unfortunate cultural belief that equal dignity of men and women necessitates equal opportunities, roles, abilities and so forth to the point of a culture losing the notion of “man and woman He created them.”
I think a worthwhile question in response to unfortunate public statements such as this must be: How can we as Catholics witness to the world that women are most respected according to their own unique vocation, and that the male nature of the priesthood is and will always be a theological matter?
If Carter was truly interested in decrying religious maltreatment of women, he ought to have mentioned honor killings. No one gets killed in upholding the all-male priesthood in Roman Catholicism.
Oh, wait….that’s Islam. Never mind.
The best thing about Carter that I can recall is the SNL skit where he tried to fix Three Mile Island.
Michael Medved refers to Carter simply as “T.W.O.” meaning “The Worthless One”. The current occupant of the White House seems to be working toward a similiar title.
[…] continues:(From The American Catholic) In opposition to the vast majority of authentic scholars and historians, Carter asserted: […]
I really love Jimmy Carter. He isn’t anti-Catholic he just has a different perspective. This article is what makes Catholics look bad.
I despise Carter but nonetheless agree with Bill on both counts. That said, Carter’s “perspective” is grounded in comfortable self-righteous ignorance.
Carter’s perspective is that the teaching of the Catholic Church that only males may be priests is misogynistic clap trap dreamed up by power hungry prelates. My perspective is that Carter is an anti-Catholic bigot as well as a fool.
Donald, I think we will have to agreeably disagree! Merry Christmas!
I’m with Donald.
Mr. Carter is an anti-Catholic bigot.
“Donald, I think we will have to agreeably disagree! Merry Christmas!”
Mike, any minor disagreements between us will always be agreeable! The Merriest of Christmases and the Happiest of New Years for you and your family!