PAT Robertson – one of the brightest stars in the firmament of US religious nutjobs – has been mouthing off on his 700 Club programme on the subject of Alzheimer’s disease.
Pat Robertson
Asked by a viewer how she should advise a friend who had begun dating another woman even though his wife was still alive but suffering from dementia brought on by Alzheimer’s, the dotty televangelist opined that ditching a spouse with Alzheimer’s is allowable since the partner “is gone.”
The imbecile, according to this report, said:
That is a terribly hard thing. I hate Alzheimer’s. It is one of the most awful things because here is a loved one – this is the woman or man that you have loved for 20, 30, 40 years. And suddenly that person is gone. They’re gone. They are gone … I know it sounds cruel, but if he’s going to do something he should divorce her and start all over again. But to make sure she has custodial care and somebody looking after her.
The 700 Club’s co-host Terry Meeuwsen gave Robertson an opportunity to reconsider the advice he had just offered, asking:
But isn’t that the vow that we take when we marry someone? That it’s for better or for worse. For richer or poorer?
Robertson responded that a spouse was obeying the “death till you part” vow because the disease is a “kind of death.”
Robertson’s response did not please fellow fundie Wiley Drake, President of the Congressional Prayer Conference of Washington DC. Drake is also pastor at the First Southern Baptist Church in Buena Park, California.
Drake, Â told The Christian Post that quite a few of his parishioners had varying stages of the disease and they were “very much alive”.
And Pastor David Wright, CEO of DOersTV, a free online Christian TV network, called Robertson’s reaction:
A perfect example of a Christian leader speaking from his flesh and not from the Spirit. Pat spoke from a ‘world’ perspective’ and not a ‘Word’ perspective.
He added that such comments made sense only:
From a carnal, selfish point of view.
Pastor Wiley Drake
Wright said of Christians:
Our standards are much higher, because they are standards set by God and not by society, especially when it comes to marriage.
Drake stated that there was “certainly” a need for companionship but argued the need:
Should be met by family members. Not another woman or another activity with a girlfriend. It is adultery, For a man to seek personal companionship with another woman is a violation of scripture…a violation of the Holy Word of God.
The compassionate Drake, by the way, has been praying for President Obama’s death since 2009, and in 2010 began praying for the death of 219 Democrat congress members. In 2007 he asked God to smite leaders of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
Hat Tip: Sister Talith and Agent Cormac
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
September 18th, 2011 at 10:58 am
Very christian.
September 18th, 2011 at 11:00 am
Can’t comment, too busy laughing.
BTW point of view on BBC website is interesting, re whther belief is important to religion..
September 18th, 2011 at 11:14 am
So much for love and compassion. Well, what else could we expect he is a ‘christian’ after all
September 18th, 2011 at 11:21 am
Many evangelicals now allow divorce on the grounds of adultery, even though their “Saviour” quite clearly states that that particular piece of legal chicanery only came about (according to the Bible) because of the “hardness of their hearts”:
Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so. (Matthew 19:8 KJV)
As with the fish on Friday question, the rules are there to be circumvented!
September 18th, 2011 at 12:07 pm
There seems to be a disconnection between what these vicious looneys say and what their flocks perceive. The words come spewing out like sewage out of a burst pipe but the flock seems to hear without perceiving. One the one hand they are the religion of turning the other cheek, gentle Jesus and so on. On the other that want to throw sick women, who have been with them for decades on the garbage heap or they want Obama killed.
Suppose Pat Robertson, with his head like a skull, has Alzeimhers? Would he expect to be abandoned by his wife, if such an unlucky person exists, or are there special rules for males and even more special rules for male preachers.
September 18th, 2011 at 12:31 pm
@ Broga
Always special rules for male preachers..
September 18th, 2011 at 12:50 pm
Broga: In response to a comment of yours regarding “answered prayer” on the Greek Government thread I posted another of my reminiscences. Did you read it? I wonder whether anyone bothers to return to previous threads nowadays!
September 18th, 2011 at 12:54 pm
That there last paragraph is a wonderful example of christian higher standards in action. You can just feel the love……
September 18th, 2011 at 1:10 pm
If only he’d just stopped there, it would’ve been a really compassionate description of how horrible Alzheimer’s is. And if he hadn’t been wedded (pun unintentional) to his morally-absolute Christian bullshit, he could’ve made a case for discreetly dating someone else whilst continuing to provide care. But nope, his morals don’t allow for grey-areas, so you have to divorce ’em. Which kinda turns it from a nuanced look at feeling and emotion into advice to run away and let somebody else look after them.
Oh, and here’s Terry Pratchett on a related subject.
September 18th, 2011 at 1:33 pm
So what about the “in sickness and health” bit of the marriage vow? Usual xtian double standards, make up and then change the rules to suit yourself bollocks.
My Mother has Alzheimer’s and even though my Father can no longer care for her at home, he sits with her – in a nursing home – for about 12 hours a day because in his words “I have a duty and a vow I made 56 years ago when your Mum and I were married”.
More wise words from my Dad “How can people believe in a god when diseases like Alzheimer’s happen”. Is my Dad a xtain – no, just a decent man.
September 18th, 2011 at 1:47 pm
If it were not a nutty fundie, there could be a case made for some realistic allowance in situations like this. Certainly if I were locked away in a hospital in such a permanent condition, I would not expect nor want my wife to surrender the rest of her life to the abstraction of a vow.
But in fundiworld, where everything is black and white and written in the book, such nuances present a problem.
September 18th, 2011 at 2:20 pm
@barriejohn: I just checked back and I had read your comments. I usually look back over three or four threads.
September 18th, 2011 at 2:21 pm
Hmmm, looks like Robertson’s given his own spouse permission to find someone else. He suffers not from dementia but obvious brain death – he’s been “gone” for years.
September 18th, 2011 at 2:36 pm
Thanks, Broga.
Here’s the fundie fool in full flow:
http://youtu.be/QZoDMGe5ffw
Maybe senile fundamentalists should be put put of their misery.
September 18th, 2011 at 2:49 pm
Well said, Angela.
September 18th, 2011 at 2:49 pm
Daz,
Cheers for the link.
As always, Pratchett is more eloquent and honest
than a room full of believers.
September 18th, 2011 at 4:12 pm
@barriejohn: Thanks. I note that some religionuts say he is “going against biblical teaching.” The implication being that, except for an aberrant preacher, the bible is a fount of kindness and wisdom. It’s amazing the amount of airtime these creatures get in the USA.
I suppose this being Sunday we cannot be too happy ourselves on that score. When I heard that some RC type was coming up on the Sunday programme, in discussion with a Rabbi (reverential comments about the pair of them), to talk about Ratzi’s effect here over the last year I had had enough. I reached for the off switch faster than a fast gun in a Western and did not return. Despite the rain my labrador waiting for his walk was the more attractive option.
September 18th, 2011 at 5:26 pm
I wonder if the church see Alzheimers as such a problem when the ill person is the shepherd, not one of the sheep.
Oddly enough, in recent years I’ve come across two instances of a cleric diagnosed with Alzheimers where ‘management’ have turned a blind eye.
In one they could plead compassion, as it was a well liked old buffer whose flock must have guessed the score, so he was moved to duties with little or no public contact and allowed to potter about harmlessly until close to the end.
The other was far odder. The cleric acted as a sort of ‘holiday relief’ pastor and, even more bizarrely, sat on a government advisory committee. That other committee members either failed to notice increasingly strange behaviour and comments or covered up the problem says a lot about church/state relations!
September 18th, 2011 at 5:53 pm
Well, America……….. it’s ok to ditch Pat Robertson. He’s been demented for many years!!!!!!!!!!
September 18th, 2011 at 6:52 pm
CriticalEyeYayeye: What about the possible next USA President, that airhead and Texas Governor Rick Perry? Rick is happy to have humans trotting about with dinosaurs, thinks evolution is “only an unproven theory” and is convinced that the Sky Fairy created everything. Anyone who believes (I can’t use the word “thinks” because Rick does not favour that mode of activity) that the planet came into existence 6,000 years ago has mental problems.
September 18th, 2011 at 8:01 pm
Belief in a cruel god makes a cruel man. — Thomas Paine
September 18th, 2011 at 8:32 pm
Shouldn’t Dean have chipped in with some wisdom by now?
September 18th, 2011 at 9:05 pm
^ Does Dean have any wisdom to chip in with? I think not.
I wish there was a hell, pat Robertson would soon be joining his pal Jerry fatarse shoveling the coals.
September 18th, 2011 at 9:06 pm
tony e
I reckon that speech is up there with Steven Fry’s one about the RCC. If it’s possible to have a favourite speech, those two are joint №1 on my list. Hats off to Tony Robinson for a great delivery, too.
September 18th, 2011 at 11:22 pm
Broga: You are aware, I suppose, that Robertson himself was running for President not so long ago, doing particularly well in Washington of all places!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P.....ential_bid
September 19th, 2011 at 12:01 am
How about this guy then? He doesn’t actually talk about his amazing powers, of course, because he doesn’t want to “end up like one of those people you see on TV”!
http://dwindlinginunbelief.blo.....-nsfw.html
September 19th, 2011 at 3:02 am
Good old implication is coming to the rescue! So, you’re a priest/minister/chaplain/mufti/rabbi/etc, you’re by implication a child molestor. So you’re a christian? By implication you’re an idiot, a liar, hateful, bigotted and plainly a nasty piece of work. We can see this and we need to publicise this.
September 19th, 2011 at 8:56 am
@robster
No, not exactly.
If you are a minister etc, you are accorded a lot of respect and power, by your congregation and also by others. This has led to terrible abuses (not just sexual).
I see a minister and do not immediately think ‘good person’ I think ‘mmmm. prove your goodness’. My experience is that often, the ones who are most active in their condemnation of anything (usually sexual) are most likely to be hiding something. But there is no automatic assumption of wrongdoing, just no automatic assumption of goodness.
Many christians, often the ones who shout the loudest, are hateful hideous and cruel. And these are the ones whose stories end up on this site. No assumption of stupidity etc, just analysis of what they say.
September 19th, 2011 at 9:27 am
Lucy
Does this mean Ian Paisley is Satan incarnate?
September 19th, 2011 at 9:43 am
http://www.airbornegamer.com/w.....-funny.jpg
September 19th, 2011 at 10:48 am
@barriejohn: Thanks for that. I didn’t realise Robertson had Presidential ambitions. If he made the right noises i.e. what passes for political debate, he might have done well.
September 19th, 2011 at 10:56 am
Broga: You mean like Reagan and Bush Jnr?
September 19th, 2011 at 12:15 pm
Robster:
I don’t know what you’re putting into the ‘website’ field on the reply-form, but when clicked, it produces a dialogue box asking if I want to sign into some site, using what I assume is your user-name. I distinctly remember you being informed of this several times.
Whatever it is, it has an at symbol in it—which has no place in a website URL.
September 19th, 2011 at 12:25 pm
@barriejohn: That’s it. These are the models. Although I have to say that Rick Perry, the repellent governor of Texas, sets a low that may be equalled but is unlikely to be exceeded. While whining about his christianity he is a slavering executioner. Bush was bad. He was said to have a party trick of mimicing someone on Death Row pleading for their life.
How do people become so disgustingly cruel? Oh, I remember. Through christianity.
September 19th, 2011 at 1:10 pm
Pat is merely following the Word of God.
“When a man hath taken a wife, and married her, and it come to pass that she find no favour in his eyes, because he hath found some uncleanness in her: then let him write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house. And when she is departed out of his house, she may go and be another man’s wife”. — Deuteronomy 24:1-2
September 19th, 2011 at 1:14 pm
@ Daz,
That Stephen Fry speech you linked to – it appears to be the unabridged version, unlike the shortened version that was broadcast on the BBC.
Apparently you have to be a paid member of Intelligence Squared web site to access the unabridged version of the debate.
Would be nice if we could find the whole thing on YouTube somewhere!
September 19th, 2011 at 1:16 pm
Sister Talitha: “Moses” goes on to say in the next verse “And if the latter husband hate her, and write her a bill of divorcement…and send her out of his house”, etc. No mention, of course, of the wife being free to divorce her husband!