I disagree with your assertion that Falwell added nothing to the christian movement; because of him, christianity is no longer a religion, it is a political party. Even today many christians feel they have to defend their faith unnecessarily because of built in associations with the religious right. I personally question this newfound interest in social wellfare issues that conviently sprang up only after the GOP lost the 2006 elections. It seems more like a desperate attempt to continue to sound relevant in an era where gay bashing has long since lost social acceptance and there is a growing backlash to religious politics and an increase in libertarianism.

The death of Falwell may very well be symbolic of the state that the "old school" christian political movement. They are dying for lack of new leaders and new ideas. D. James Kennedy's Corral Ridge Ministries had to recently shut down two of it's centers for shaping public policy because, well, they hadn't shaped it all that much. The blind association with the republican party and it's ups and downs doesn't help matters either.

On other message boards, when I talk about how I fear the religoius right being as much a theat to my freedoms as the terrorists are, I get no one defending them. Every christian I talk to wants to distance themselves from the religious right. This could be a good sign for the future.

are all guilty of blasphemy because they all claim to speak for God. They are guilty of the sin of PRIDE, setting oneself equal to God. And the cure is the virtue of Humility, but they have none of that.

My only hope is that right wing religions off themselves before they off all of us.

Falwell is not alone or even among/in a small group of people. One can easily make a case that all of the 59 million who voted for Bush, on both ocassions, are in the Falwell/Robertson group of haters and/ or at least intolerants.

Lets start with Pat Robertson, Hagee, Dobson, Reed, Norquist, GWB, the entire Bush family, the next Bush president the awful Jeb Bush, Murdoch, O'Reilly, O'Hannity, Glenn Beck, Tucker Carlson, Joe Scarborough, Rick Santorum, Sam Brownback, Russert, Cheney, Wolfie, The Krystals, Krauthammer, Podhoretz, the Heritage Foundation, the AEI, the Carlyle Group, Jack Welch and crew(Charlie Rose), the present and previous popes, William Donohue, Tom Monoghan and his rancorous Ave Maria group, Georgetown U for hiring Feith and his cronies, Phyllis Schafly, Peggy Noonan, Laura Ingraham, Ann Coulter, Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Francis Fukuyama, Scalia, Thomas, Roberts and Alito, Michelle Malkin and all those who conflate Jesus/God and the B.V.M with the evils of politics, specifically their politics, the politics of hate.

How anyone in his right mind could ever do such a thing is totally unconsionable and an abomination. They are all of the Falwell genre/ilk. They are all goats who are leading the sheep to the slaughter, the abyss. They drag humanity down to the lowest levels as they are led by their baser instincts. And they try to force their baser instincts on to the other 241 million of us who do not support their mindset of hate and intolerance.

I'll take Pope Leo XIII, aka the working mans pope, and Thomas Merton. I'll follow Bishop Desmond Tutu, Fr. Michael Pfleger and his good friend Rev. Otis Moss, Jimmy and Rosalind Carter, Bill and Judith Moyers, Pastor Joel Osteen who three weeks ago in his sermon advocated for sharing with others by how we lead our lives as the best form of ministry.