{"id":709,"date":"2008-10-31T16:10:00","date_gmt":"2008-10-31T23:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.gajunkie.com\/?p=709"},"modified":"2008-10-31T16:10:00","modified_gmt":"2008-10-31T23:10:00","slug":"presbyterian-controversies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.gajunkie.com\/?p=709","title":{"rendered":"Presbyterian Controversies"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>These two controversies have hit the news, or at least the web, but I just wanted to fill in the Presbyterian angle.<\/p>\n<p>The first is in the campaign for the U.S. Senate seat from North Carolina.&nbsp; Incumbent Elizabeth Dole has raised an issue, if not eyebrows, with the charge that her challenger, state Senator Kay Hagan, attended an event which was a &#8220;secret fund raiser&#8221; put on by leaders of the political action committee <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/godlessamericans.org\/\">Godless Americans<\/a>.&nbsp; While the connection with Godless Americans is not necessarily denied, Ms. Hagan does deny that she herself is &#8220;godless&#8221; as the commercial says, and points out that she is a elder and Sunday school teacher at <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.fpcgreensboro.org\">First Presbyterian Church of Greensboro<\/a>, a <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.pcusa.org\">PC(USA)<\/a> congregation. (<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/news.bostonherald.com\/news\/politics\/general\/view\/2008_10_29_Dole_rival_cries_foul_over_%E2%80%98godless__charge__demands_TV_ad_pulled\/srvc=home&amp;position=recent\">Boston Herald article<\/a>)&nbsp; I do not see her name among the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.fpcgreensboro.org\/session\/currentElders.html\">elders currently serving on the Session<\/a>, but I do see a Chip Hagan listed among the trustees.&nbsp; And <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/classicalpresbyterian.blogspot.com\/2007\/09\/september-mission-presbyteryaustin.html\">some may point out<\/a> that just because you are at a PC(USA) church does not mean you are not godless, but we would expect that leadership in the church is a pretty good sign.<\/p>\n<p>The second controversy is more humorous and probably well know to many of my readers:&nbsp; The &#8220;All Dogs Go To Heaven&#8221; church sign battle.&nbsp; It is in many places around the web but it is a hoax, although an amusing one, and you can read the discussion and see the signs over on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.snopes.com\/photos\/signs\/dogheaven.asp\" target=\"_blank\">snopes.com<\/a>.&nbsp; It was done with the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.churchsigngenerator.com\/\">Church Sign Generator<\/a>. (an interesting piece of technology in its own right that has given my family several minutes of amusement)&nbsp; But one of the interesting aspects of this piece is how it reflects the modern take on religion and spirituality.<\/p>\n<p>There is an interesting additional piece, and that is the fact that in the pictures, the church taking it seriously is the Beulah Cumberland Presbyterian Church.&nbsp; This resulted in the national office of the CPC to <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.cpmag.org\/cpupdates.php?aid=629\">issue a statement<\/a> that the signs are a &#8220;prank&#8221; and &#8220;that this is not a true Cumberland Presbyterian church sign.&#8221;&nbsp; They don&#8217;t say if dogs do go to heaven.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>These two controversies have hit the news, or at least the web, but I just wanted to fill in the Presbyterian angle. The first is in the campaign for the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Presbyterian Controversies - The GA Junkie<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.gajunkie.com\/?p=709\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Presbyterian Controversies - The GA Junkie\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"These two controversies have hit the news, or at least the web, but I just wanted to fill in the Presbyterian angle. 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