The scenario was the same at Mount Berry Square mall where Romans were lined around the food court to show support for the restaurant chain, which inadvertently found itself in the middle of a firestorm following Cathy’s comments.
“I think we are inviting God’s judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at him and say, ‘We know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage,’ and I pray God’s mercy on our generation that has such a prideful, arrogant attitude to think that we have the audacity to try to redefine what marriage is about,” Cathy said in an appearance on the Ken Coleman show.
City officials in Boston, Chicago and Washington, D.C., immediately assailed Cathy for what they termed “anti-gay” comments.
Janice Duncan was with a group of four Harbin Clinic employees who waited through the long line at the mall for lunch.
“We believe that it’s a man and woman’s marriage, and that’s our right and we’re here in support of (Dan Cathy),” Duncan said.
“When freedom of speech of an individual is encroached upon, especially because they promote a traditional family value, people of a same mind set need to take a stand, and this is a small way to do that,” said David Kenemer as he waited through a 30-minute line to get lunch at the Dwarf House.
Jim Arp said he felt that anyone who owns a business has a right to their opinion. “Their business shouldn’t be held responsible by an intolerant group of people who want tolerance,” Arp said.
Dwarf House manager Greg Major said he was expecting a large crowd Wednesday. “We’re just trying our best to keep up. It’s a little bit overwhelmed, but it’s a great day,” Major said.
While I am not voting for Obama this time, at least I know he didn't create this mess on his own. George W had a big hand in it. Running up huge debts fighting the war in Iraq looking for Weapons of Mass Destruction, cutting taxes but not cutting spending, supporting a credit/housing bubble until it became woefully over-inflated. Let's be honest, both parties share the blame for this.
Has this President fixed it? No. He has done a lot wrong. But, at the same time, have I heard definitive plans from Romney for specific changes that will? He will cut my taxes though, and, I guess, for many of us that is all that really matters. We aren't in this country for the long-run.
As for as healthcare--no person other than the VERY wealthy can truly believe the status quo works. Ever go into an emergency room and wait behind all the people who don't have insurance and use the ER as a doctors office? Want to end up like Greece because of ballooning healthcare costs. Something has to be done.
Hilarious all the very poor old people in places like Lindale Georgia who would benefit greatly from the new healthcare plan but hate that "ObamaCare". Wonder if a white Republican had passed exactly the same legislation how they would feel about it?
Unfortunately, making fact based decisions requires critical thinking and the Republican policies of under-funding public schools (keep em dumb) and whipping up people with bogus social issues (hate them gays) has limited the Lindales of the U.S. ability to think critically (or sometimes even think).
But, fortunately, a great (and hateful) generation will die out over the next 20 years and hopefully a better America will emerge. Although, based upon the local stories in RNT, the younger generation often seems a bit of a chip off the old block.
I hope some of you will take a look. And keep up with the conversation at baptistlife.com/forums Faith and Practice. It has taken on added steam with a look at the Drescher column compared to Berry Grad's John Pierce.
It's not Rahm Emanual and Chicago values at stake. It's CFA in dinstinction and defintion to the best tradition of Baptists on Church and State and liberal arts higher education.
Atlantic Station has no Chick fil A though:
http://projectqatlanta.com/news_articles/view/couple_assaulted_in_atlantic_station_gay_bashing
Chick-fil-a is an honorable and charitable corporation. When the tornado passed through Rome last year, Chick-fil-a was on the scene early the next morning going through neighborhoods giving free chicken sandwiches, biscuits, half gallons of iced tea, etc. Not once did they ask if the recipient was heterosexual or gay. The manager of the Dwarf House saw a community in need amid the disaster and responded in an appropriate manner. We need more businesses that are this charitable.
EAT-MOR CHIKIN!!!!!!!!!
Who do you fanatical "Christians" (and I am referring to hate mongering, divisive people using the Bible as their justification--not loving charitable Christians that focus on living a moral life) think you are to impose your interpretation of a few sentences in a very long book (which was not written by God, but by humans and over a long span of time) on everyone who doesn't share your exact interpretation.
Gays and Lesbians are U.S. Citizens, they pay taxes, they fight and die for this country. They deserve to have the SAME legal rights as everyone else--whether or not you think they are sinners. Who care what you think, its irrelevant. Once someone's actions actually IMPACT you, it becomes relevant. So these nut jobs who equate it to pedophilia are the worst of the lot of you. Pedophilia negatively impacts innocent people. What two consenting adults do is none of your business so butt out.
So, bottom line, F Off and join the future of the U.S. Gay rights are here and Gay Marriage is coming, so you better get used to it you BIGOTS (and yes, you are BIGOTS). Bigots judge people based upon characteristics they can not control (race, gender, sexual orientation). And yes, I admit it, I am bigoted against fanatical Christians (not all Christians, but its based upon their ACTIONS because I can not believe people are born so stupid and full of hate--it has to be learned.
This community should be embarrassed. When will we learn. Hate, Hate, Hate. Jesus taught love.
50% 1 gained by a conglomeration of fringe groups and lazy people.
Nut jobs like you result in people believing its justified to walk into a Sikh temple and shoot them down.
99.9999% of the Bible deals with topics other than Gays. Think you might want to allocate your time accordingly?
http://blogs.ajc.com/mike-luckovich/2012/08/03/85-mike-luckovich-cartoon-protests/
Charity has a different meaning to people and your political bent is a clue as to how you define it. For you, teaching "a man to fish" involves teaching them how to fill out the welfare or disability forms. To you, if you vote for Obama, and then Obama steals money from an earner and gives it to those who spend their days playing basketball on Maple Street, you somehow become More Charitable.
If they would do the same as their supporters did and organize a day when they would go in large groups to their local Chick-Fil-A and order nothing but either a free water or the lowest costing item on the menu and then proceed to drink/eat that porduct there taking as much time as possible it would show up in the stores profits. No need to picket, kiss or march with signs. Hit them where they will notice it the most, their porfits.
The local Drawf House here in Rome is usually packed on Sat mornings with people eating their breakfast buffett. If a group of pro gay marriage supporters were to fill the store for most of sat morning it would surely cut into their profits. Something like this would have to be done peacefully and without incident though. Go into the store and wait to be seated like any other customer, when the server comes to take your order take as much time as u can before placing your order. Then as i said, only order the cheapest things on the menu such as a soda, cup of coffee etc... Then take as much time as you normally would to eat a meal to consume whatever it is that you ordered. By doing this will u "tie up" the tables. Your average person or group of people doesnt like having to wait a long time to be seated when they go somewhere to eat and most will go somewhere else when faced with a long wait time to be seated. So instead of them having 300 -400 people spending an average of $7.00 to $10.00 they would have that many only spending a faction of that. One thing to remember though is that the servers work mostly off from tips so you would need to be fair to them and leave them the same amount they would have normally got had you ordered a regular meal. By leaving them cash the money would be going directly into their pockets and not into the companys.
Another thing would be not to argue if asked to leave or cause any other kind of problem. I'm sure at some point the managers will get frustrated and start asking people to leave which will then show their true colors about serving GBLT supporters. If confronted by someone just tell them you are exercising your 1st amendment rights.
At the stores that do not have a large dinning area the same could be done at the drive thru. "Tie up" the drive thru by placing orders for the cheapest things on the menu and take your time getting thru the line. There again people will choose to go elsewhere if faced with a long line.
The only way for something like this to work is for everyone to be respectful and peaceful. But you also would need to be a "paying" customers just like anyone else, just one who is spending a lot less than the supporters.
And yet, good and decent people are everywhere. Don't let only the media form your opinion for you. Not all gay people were involved in the "same sex kiss day" at chik-fil-a. Screw your head on right and get informed information and then you will have a truthful opinion everyone will listen to and not just fight about on the Roman chat. We are all living together....it's time we learn to love each other.
You know, NAMBLA (North American Man Boy Love Association) is a group that advocates sexual relationships between children and adults. It's perfectly acceptable to the "mainstream" and they are actually on the list of the combined federal campaign, meaning that those who work in the military or the federal government who give a portion of their salary to charity and ask that it be distributed equally amongst "approved" charities, end up giving a portion of their salary to pedophiles.
No one complains, no one is outraged, and most of us just yawn and say "those crazy pedophiles". It's not that I'm comparing homosexuality with pedophilia, rather it's to show how REALLY outrageous beliefs are ignored, and beliefs such as marriage should be reserved for a man and a woman, means we should take off the gloves and break out the gasoline, it's time to burn something down.
Because of that, the silent people, those who think God exists even though they can't see her, those who think marriage is between a man and a woman, and those who think that sexual relationships should be reserved for adults, do not have parades through San Francisco, a president who agrees with them, and the ACLU is not coming to help them. So, when those crazy "traditionalists" get the chance to quietly voice their opinion, they JUMP at it. Even if it's nothing more than waiting two hours to buy a chicken sandwich.
Long story short, the REAL reason people went to Chic-Fil-a was to drive crazy those people who shrug at pedophilia, but grit their teeth at everything traditional.
When was the last time you protested someone who supports traditional marriage? Today.
Your priorities are the priorities of most Americans, which is my point. Sinking in yet, or are you still going to respond with "I ain't fer Pederphilier"?
Mmmkay?
There is a group that supports pedophilia. The federal government gives them legitimate status. They are called NAMBLA and support sexual relationships between 8 years and 38 year olds. How often do you hear about them on the news? NEVER. How many times have you protested against them? NEVER.
There is a man who believes marriage should be between a man and a woman. How many times has he been in the news simply because of that "outrageous personal belief" ? Many time. How many protests have there been against him and his company? MANY.
Do you now see the problem? If you don't or your response is "Gays aren't pedophiles" please just reserve your stupidity for your own children. Thanks.
I have made it clear like Pierre Noth made it clear in regard Shorter College it is the matter of obfuscation of the Best of the Baptist tradition of higher education that I think is at stake in the fallout of this recent Mike Huckabee combusted Chick Fil A media firestorm.
My challenge to the Cathy family as they hopefully reconsider their contributions to Focus on the Family and Family Research Council is this fall as they engage conversations certain to come nationally, bone up on some of the following.
1) Jeff Rogers lecture at Furman in the mid 90's on Baptist Higher Education What in the Smyth and Helwys Collection What Really Matters.
2) Jane Mayer's New Yorker article on Fischer of the FRC in recent issue
3) Giberson and Stephens The Anointed about the parallel universe Shorter is now floundering in.
4)Keith Durso's recent biography of George W. Truett. Truett Cathy is named for George W. Truett as I understand it.
5)Rachel Held Evans Evolving in Monkeytown. Go to Evans Blog and read her gracious post on Chick Fil A
6)Newt Gingrich's former West Ga. Read Dan Williams book God's Own Party.
7)And finally for you esoterics out there which most likely rules Trelicious out; the concluding 150 pages of Diarmaid McCulloch's magisterial History of Christianity.
In conclusion Trelicious and like minded; I make no apology for joining President Clinton's Rhodes Scholar Roomate, Strobe Talbott; and Sewanee Grad and former Editor of Newsweek Jon Meacham(biographer of Andrew Jackson) as a reader of MacCulloch's History.
You have a nice day and pray without ceasing.
Oh I forgot, I commend you and the Cathy's for honoring the Sabbath Day. All in good company there with Pulitzer Prize Winner Marilynne Robinson whose alma mater Samford helped sponsor in a visit to Birmingham a few years ago and I had the grand opportunity to get her to autograph my copy of her essays The Death of Adam, with particular reference to the one on Puritans and Prigs.
That's...amazing. I am literally in awe of this.
I don't think anyone here is shrugging at pedophilia and to suggest so is a disingenuous straw man argument at best.
Here is a comment I submitted to Pierce's blog
Click on my name and over to my blog to see some of my thoughts on CFA. As I report there I sat beside Dan Cathy in Bob Crapps Religion Class at Furman in 71. And I appreciate Truett standing by Kirby Godsey when the fundamentalists had him on the hot seat at Mercer not long ago.
Even so there are mixxed signals in the Cathy witness. I agree with the substance and tone of what John Pierce has said here. As an alum of Berry he knows first hand the good the Cathy's have done there.
But the Cathy's have a foggy public witness when it comes down to where they are on the church state spectrum between Charles Pickering's Alliance Defending Freedom and the BJC for Public affairs. Their substantial contributions to Focus on the Family and Family Research Council are disturbing to say the least.
At a minimum given their public witness now and the fact they are championed by Mike Huckabee and Fox News raises the conversation to a higher level. Reputedly couple days ago CNN compared their inlfuence to the Koch Brothers. And I understand them to have also reported Truett, Dan and Bubba, each are worth 1.5 Billion with a B dollars; 4.5 billion total.
So if that number is correct they have Koch brothers means.
As a brother in Christ Jesus, who accepted Jesus as his Saviour at Truett Memorial BC; I ask John Pierce through President Carter or whatever connection he has to have the Cathy's meet with Mercer President Underwood, Melissa Rogers, President Carter whomever in a retreat before the Presidential election to look closely at Giberson and Stephens The Anointed; and Paul Harvey's religion dispatches essay on David Barton.
I think the ghost of George W. Truett and the upheaval in the SBC of the last 30 years calls for no less than that
“We are very grateful and humbled by the incredible turnout of loyal Chick-fil-A customers on August 1 at Chick-fil-A restaurants around the country. Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day was not a company promotion; it was initiated by others. We congratulate local Chick-fil-A Owner/Operators and their team members for striving to serve each and every customer with genuine hospitality. While we don’t release exact sales numbers, it was an unprecedented day.
The Chick-fil-A culture and 66-year-old service tradition in our restaurants is to treat every person with honor, dignity and respect – regardless of their belief, race, creed, sexual orientation or gender. Our goal is simple: to serve great food, provide genuine hospitality and have a positive influence on all who come in contact with Chick-fil-A.”
And It is my understanding CNN reported Truett, Dan, and Bubba Cathy each are worth 1.5 billion dollars. So surely they have done something right.
But again their gifts to Focus on the Family and Family Research Council are disturbing. That places them in a fog in regard the bogus religious history of David Barton which has now become a concern for Public Television in Alabama entangled in Ten Commandments Judge Roy Moore camp.
Truett Cathy was named for George W Truett, most likely the greatest Baptist of the first half of the 20th Century.
In that realm, when you compare the Cathy's to Baptist greats in the public square like SCOTUS Justice Hugo Black, Alabama Republican Judge Frank Johnson, Martin Luther King, Jr and the work of the Baptist Joint Committee, the Cathy's are weighed in the balance and found wanting.
It will be interesting to see how they navigate the mess at Shorter College, how they come down on that matter.
I hope forces in Rome who have direct communication with them will bring Paul Harvey's essay on David Barton; and the Giberson and Stephens book to their attention.
The Cathy's have done great work and been blessed and I commend them for it. It is the standard in the recommendations above, and the Jeff Rogers work on the best of the Baptist tradition in Higher Education that I recommend to them in this moment when Mike Huckabee, Fox News and the whole world is watching.
Put it before the Supremes and let the chips fall.
BTW-Bullet-What do you stand for and what's your solution..
Are you in Rahm Emanuel's camp?..About 19-20 murders a day in his town and he wants to ban "Chickn" sandwiches..Doesn't fit his values..
Maybe you should have to fight to the death for a Good chicken sandwich.
Withholding rights from minorities is all some people in Rome have to live for... It's been a long tradition of the city. Whether their views are moral or not, they should be allowed to cling to their antiquated values. It won't matter soon anyways as they're losing the battle.
Eating a chicken sandwich doesn't mean you're anti-gay... It just means you don't mind indirectly throwing a few pennies toward anti-gay causes...
What decade are you living in SillyRoman? I know you are not living in 2012 based on that comment. I am curious what rights do gays not have? They can marry in certain states, serve openly in the military, adopt and raise children. Depending on where you live gay couples can get death, and health benefits as well. So what am I missing? You are upset that most states ban gay marriage. California the capital state of Liberals doesn't even reconize it.
The "antiquated values" that you refer to is in a large part what this country was founded on. Those values are what most of us believe in. Those values DO MATTER. Gay marriage will not be the law of the land. It may be the law in some states, but not most. The government is not allowed to interfere with religion. The reason is the 1st Amendment to the Constitution. It states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.:
Gay marriage goes against most of the major religions. I know, "It won't matter soon anyways as they're losing the battle." Sorry I do not think so.
And those rights I'm talking about... I want to marry my British boyfriend before his visa runs out... Otherwise the government is going to forcefully separate us. If we were legally married this wouldn't be a problem....
How would you like it if government officials came and took your wife/husband to a different country and banned them from returning?
And you say you're not withholding rights? What country do you live in? I will marry my partner in ROME - GEORGIA... it WILL happen and you can't stop it.
These people who believe inequality is the right thing to do and who believe that their religion applies to everyone will not be looked fondly upon by future generations, just as we do not look fondly on the inequalities of the past. You guys who use "pro-family" as a nice way of saying "anti-gay".. you've lined up to be on the wrong side of history. It's not too late.