I’m all for religion, if the spirit moves you, and if it’s doesn’t heck, then just don’t go to meetings. That’s the beauty of freedom of religion–it also means freedom from religion.

But fundamentalists of any stripe–arrrg! Even fundie witches (yup they exist) get my garters in a gather. There’s only one real rule in witchery: North is where the priestess says it, and given lots of folks’ poor sense of direction, that makes things pretty flexible. Other faiths have their quirks too: No pork, no beef, no booze, no swearing, no coffee or tea, no extra/pre-marital sex, no R-rated movies. Whatever works. Just don’t tell me I can’t enjoy my salami and a cuppa something while watching America Beauty entre acts d’amour, because for me that’s a great way to find the Divine.

 In the end, fundamentalists–be they burkah enthusiasts, soul cabbies for Christ,  that weird cult that thinks there’s a better way to file paperwork and remove space cooties, or any sort of Group That Thinks They Are Truly The Only Correct Way, be they godless or god-filled–have the same agenda: Control. Thought control, financial control, political control, control of sexuality, of history, of literature, of art. Of you.

Yet here in US of A, where the Founders in their infinite wisdom declared that church and state should remain separate, we have a very large, very vocal, very wealthy and politically motivated group who is trying to shove their Mandated by Their God agenda down our throats.

These are the the people behind Yes on 8, a group that Muriel Kane at Raw Story calls the Christian Taliban, and their number includes reclusive billionaire Howard Ahmanson.

Ahmanson is a Christian Reconstructionist, a devout follower of the late R.J. Rushdoony, who advocated the replacement of the U.S. Constitution with the most extreme precepts of the Old Testament, including the execution — preferably by stoning — of homosexuals, adulterers, witches, blasphemers, and disobedient children.

Wow. Ahmanson’s views are, if you’ll pardon the pun, just a stone’s throw away from fundamentalist Pastor Rick Warren who says the Bible shows man and dinosaurs lived together and that spousal abuse is not a reason to divorce–because the Bible doesn’t say so. Pastor Rick also shares Ahmanson’s distaste of gays and support of Prop 8.

Sarah Palin and her Assembly of God gals like to punish witches, and they don’t like gays or disobedient children either–check out Teen Challenge. And then there’s this from Contextual Criticism:

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation is the co-plaintiff in a federal lawsuit which argues that the Christian religion is being promoted by the U.S. military.

Today, the MRFF, noting that the U.S. military is rife with Christian fundamentalists who try to force their religion on our troops, has taken an aggressive stance against such pressure, arguing that the line separating church and state in our military has not only been blurred but excised…

By the way, Rick Warren’s Purpose Driven Life, is next to the Bible, the most widely promoted religious book in our military–to and by our troops.

Onward Christian Taliban. The Prince of Peace would be proud. Not.