Occasionally you trip over some insanity that causes you to wonder what the heck folks were smoking when decisions were being made. The latest example of this is the news here in the New Zealand Herald that the goverment there is funding a homophobic cult to the tune of $860,000. These folks truly believe that being gay is wicked and evil, but that will not supposedly influence the services they are being funded to provide in any way … yea right.
The minister providing the funding claims:
Government funding decisions are not based on religious affiliation. Organisations are funded to deliver programmes based on merit, just as funding is declined where there is no discernible merit.
Seriously guys! … do you actually think that their anti-gay stance does not matter?
So what comes next? Well, since irrational beliefs are not part of the decision making process, then here are a couple of other suggestions they might like to also consider. How about …
- Scientologists running psychiatric programs
- Astrologers running the macro-economic data models
- Creationists teaching science
- Taliban Muslims running the legal system
And of course none of their beliefs will in any way pervert what happens …
As a New Zealander, I can assure you that this revelation has been going down like a cup of cold sick. We’re not impressed that our government is providing any funding at all to Destiny’s Church (a large number of us would rather they didn’t provide any funding at all to religious groups; separation of church and state).
For what it’s worth, there is a Facebook group protesting the funding: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Enough-is-enough-with-funding-Destiny-Church-and-its-anti-LGBT-agenda/214441921928948