SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION OF DOMINIONISM AND RECONSTRUCTIONISM The two terms 'dominion theology' and 'reconstructionism' denote highly controversial religious and theological movements within Protestant Christianity. Their primary tenets demand a Taliban-like government, referred to as either a theocracy or theonomy, in which all spheres of social life are under the dominion of the Old Testament law. Proponents of the movement advocate reinstating the death penalty for crimes such as murder, rape, homosexuality, spreading alternative philosophies, and breaking the Sabbath as well as replacing the penal system with slavery as a means of punishing those who commit lesser crimes. In order to understand the dominionist/reconstructivist perspective, it is important to consider the primary beliefs that underlay their theological structures. Dominists are descendents of the immigrant Puritans that first arrived in America. These ancestors believed that they were on a divine mission to build the âcity on a hillâ in the new America. They perceived themselves as Godâs special people who inherited the covenants God made to Israel because of his permanently excommunicating Israel for its apostasy and many Native Americans were slaughtered as a result of this belief. Dominionists view themselves as the new Puritans who have a mandate from God to reconstruct American society and establish a theocracy under the Law of Moses. Furthermore Dominionists are both preterist and post-millennial. Pretarist in that they view the prophesies of Revelation as already happening and interpret them not as Christâs second coming but as describing periodic comings of divine judgment upon people and nations during this particular age; Post millennial in that they maintain that Christ cannot make an appearance until a certain amount of achievements have been made by the church in terms of promulgating the gospel as well as converting as many as possible. When one considers the combination of these two hermeneutic stems, one can clearly see how the dominion civil agenda plays out. Since the Kingdom on Earth is now, based on their interpretation of Revelation, and the dominionists are the new chosen people, then they should have dominion now. Additionally, if Christ can not and will not return until the church has made successful efforts to combat heathen, secular, humanist society, then the chosen people of God should do everything in their power to bring society under the law of the Old Testament. Consequently, we can see this mentally manifesting itself in the civil liberties debate taking place in the American political sphere as we speak. Should this perspective succeed in subverting our politicians, who are already untrustworthy, to say the least, America will become a brutal and intolerant theocracy comparable to the Taliban-like government that it now fights to dismantle. While all of this is very terrifying, whatâs more sinister is the agenda that is not open to public scrutiny or awareness. Dominionists derive a significant amount of their ideals from very specific passages within the Old Testament. One of the most important is Genesis 1:26 in which God gives dominion over fish, fowl, cattle, and over all the Earth. It is this passage that adherents derived not only their moniker but also many of their backbone positions. But what, specifically, does this passage mean and what constitutes dominion? Dominion, according to the leaders of the movement, is a divine mandate issued at creation for Adam to subdue the Earth on behalf of God. Since Adam failed, it now falls on the shoulders of present day man to play this mandate out. But how should this mandate play out into a civil agenda for those concerned with being consistent Domininists? Understanding how this perspective spreads into a social agenda requires an additional consideration and when we turn our attention to their economic perspective, their intentions become explicitly clear. Gary North, a current and militant figurehead of the movement, is the founder of the Institute for Christian Economics and spokesperson on Dominionist economics. The movement promotes the rights of private property and a libertarian economic view, amongst other things. Libertarianism, briefly, holds that government should not engage in economic interventionism and advocates that all means of production should be privately owned, that economic and financial decisions should be made entirely private and that there should be little or no positive state intervention in the economy. So, given these two considerations, we can infer how Dominionists intend on treating the Earth. Since we have been given divine orders to subdue the Earth, then nothing is sacred and given Adamâs failure, the Earth is cursed and it is now up to us fulfill the covenants made with Israel. If we combine these two tenets with the Dominionist economics, a startling revelation will follow. Private property is in direct opposition to protecting the public environment as well as ensuring its maintenance and sustainability. Furthermore, since the Earth was cursed as a result of Adam and Eveâs failure, there is no reason to protect the environment. In fact this view seems to be advocating its destruction. And when we follow this line of reasoning and consider the libertarian approach to economics it is revealed that destroying the environment is not only necessary for salvation but an excellent way for a small group to become rich in the process. As a matter of fact, this is exactly what is happening. This economic and environmental perspective saturates the political and religious right. Dominionist Political leaders and other millionaires who are either dominionists themselves or are, at least, affiliated with dominionists are paving and paying their way into influential positions within government. Examples of such people include: Gary North, Howard Fieldstead Ahmanson, Jr., James Watt, Gale Norton, Lynn Scarlett, Ann M. Gorsuch, Edwin Meese, and Marvin Olasky, however, this list excludes many, many others. Summing these considerations up, Dominionists hold that there is nothing wrong with destroying the environment because the right to private property is more important and, furthermore, this treatment of the environment is consistent with libertarian economics since all economic and production decisions should only be made privately without any external limitations, such as wetland protection or regulations on pollutant byproducts of manufacturing. This perspective also falls in line with postmillennial eschatology because we have dominion, the earth was cursed at the fall of Adam and now it is our responsibility to destroy the cursed Earth to provide means to reconstruct society into a theocracy to ensure the return of Jesus. It is very suspicious that the extreme theological justification Dominionism provides for deregulatory environmental policy is as appealing to today's federal agencies and lawmakers, many of which are former employees of industrial corperations.
Environmentalists believe that the earth is being harmed by humans. Take global warming, for instance. Therefore, we can infer from this that environmentalists wish for mankind to be completely wiped out, destroyed, and disposed of in order to insure that the earth be completely protected. I choose the dominionists.
i know... thats why their not much of a threat really... just a nice punching ball to have for a rainy day...
What a preposterous and ridiculous article. It had zero to do with anything but psychotic, trollworthy psuedo religio babble. I may print it out, so i can spit on it and burn it, it was that good. Except for one thing-it isnt even worth my spit.