In an interview this week with the Christian Broadcasting Network, Palin was asked to “clear up exactly what you believe in” about her religious faith, including her involvement with Pentecostalism. Palin responded by speaking generally, but extensively, about how she counts on God for strength, guidance and wisdom. “My faith has always been pretty personal,” she said. She did not talk more specifically about her church affiliation or her beliefs, but I will.
I have two videos of her in my stash at her Pentecostal church. The first shows a visiting preacher from Kenya praying fervently over Palin asking God to favor her campaign for governor and protect her from “every form of witchcraft.”
The second one shows Palin at an event in June praising the African preacher’s prayer as “awesome” and “very, very powerful.” She is also seen nodding as her former pastor from Wasilla prays over her and declares that Alaska is “one of the refuge states in the Last Days,” a piece of prophecy popular in some prayer networks that predicts that as the “end times” approach, people will flock to Alaska for its abundant open space and natural resources.
Palin has had long associations with religious leaders who practice a particularly assertive and urgent brand of Pentecostalism known as “spiritual warfare.” Its adherents believe that demonic forces can colonize specific geographic areas and individuals, and that “spiritual warriors” must “battle” them to assert God’s control, using prayer and evangelism. The movement’s fixation on demons, its aggressiveness and its leaders’ claims to exalted spiritual authority have troubled even some Pentecostal Christians.
Palin delivered an enthusiastic graduation speech for a class of young spiritual warriors in June at the Wasilla Assembly of God. In one of her first acts as governor, Palin appointed Patrick Donelson, a pastor and fishing guide who helped found a spiritual warfare ministry, to the only seat reserved for members of the clergy on the state’s Suicide Prevention Council.
Bishop Thomas Muthee, the Kenyan preacher shown on the first video anointing her as she ran for governor, is celebrated internationally as an effective spiritual warrior who led a prayer movement that drove a witch out of his town in Kenya. The removal of the witch, Bishop Muthee says, "resulted in a drop in crime, alcoholism and traffic accidents." Ugh.. You gotta be fuckin' kidding me!
Religious leaders in Alaska, including Mr. Donelson have declined interviews, with several media outlets, saying they had been told by the McCain-Palin campaign not to talk to members of the news media.
However, Russell P. Spittler, provost emeritus at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif., and an eminent scholar of Pentecostalism, said, “Most Christians would accept the view that there are forces and powers in the world that oppose Christian virtues.” But, Mr. Spittler added, “Spiritual warfare makes a religion of identifying demons by names and ZIP codes.” The goal of the spiritual warfare movement is to "create a theocracy." “One of the imperatives of the movement is to achieve worldly power, including political control. Then you can more effectively drive out the demons. The ultimate goal is to purify the earth.”
Palin's relationships with practitioners of spiritual warfare goes back many years. Mary Glazier, an Alaska Native who helped bring together the prayer warrior networks in the state, told a prayer conference in June that Ms. Palin “became a part of our prayer group out in Wasilla” when she was 24, and that “God began to speak” to her about entering politics.
Of course Glazier is declining interviews as well, after she was told been told by the McCain-Palin campaign not to talk to members of the news media too.
The hypocrisy that prevails in everything Palin says is unbelievable. This woman is a demonstrable liar, a religous zealot/fruitcake and quite frankly, just scary as HELL
