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I was going to write a long-winded piece on Tim Tebow canceling his appearance at the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas due to controversy about the head of the church’s (Robert Jeffres) vicious comments about gays, Jews, Mormons, and Catholics. But in researching that post, something else caught my attention and I just had to make you aware of it.
Naturally, the American Family Association’s fake news publication One News Now (which the group now calls Instant Analysis) blistered Tebow on his decision to cancel:
Instead of standing with the Christian leader of their day, the disciples of Christ fled like panicked sheep when he came under direct attack. I had thought and hoped Tebow was made of sterner stuff. Tebow needs to clarify and expand on his remarks immediately, and undo this disastrous decision. Dr. Jeffress is a man of unconditional love and will gladly receive him back.
The publication even invites readers to either tweet their support of disappointment to Tebow by using the hashtags #tebowcaves or #tebowsupport.
But the AFA had better stop worrying about Tebow and worry about its readers.
In a huge surprise to me, the comments on Instant Analysis (formerly One News Now) favor Tebow and actually takes AFA to task for attacking him. Here are just a few:
- I am not disappointed in Tebow, but in you for setting up a hashtag and news headline “tebowcaves” to automate heckling of someone that has stood far beyond where most people, and probably yourself would stand. Why would you create a link to entice thousands of others to torment him? As believers we understand that your acts do not represent Christianity, However, non believers view these type of acts as a representation of “Christians”. Please consider your actions before recruiting thousands of people to turn against another believer. Thank you.
- My thoughts mirror most of the prior ones. How quickly we jump to conclusions w/o knowing the whole story. Tim Tebow has not suddenly become the bad guy here. We should be showing our love and support during what must be a difficult time for him. How can we “Christians” turning on him help the situation? It’s hardly acting the part of a Christian…
- Much as I have supported, sponsored and appreciated AFA for years, and as a large part of my pro-family, anti-tyranny activism is through them, I believe that the hashtags are a downright mean-spirited idea and I’m ashamed of AFA in that regard. From the whole world’s history with Tebow’s faithfulness to date in the face of the diseased liberal left, I think we can be certain he knows how to pray about his own decisions –and has the freedom to do so! Good GRIEF, AFA! Voice your disappointment if you wish, and raise questions that will draw accurate answers when the facts come in, but draw the line at bullying, please! You’ve got an apology to make, and I hope to see you somehow back off that foolish mob-gathering “Tebowcaves” hashtag. You are always ready for me to pop off pointed letters that register my disappointment with various offenders; well, here’s my letter to you.
- I couldn’t agree more, …. I will be looking a lot more closely at AFA activity and agenda in the future before I jump in and support. My antennae are up bigtime …
- What is wrong with the people that wrote this article?? You’re being judgemental! You are not God. Only Tim knows what is between him and God and the reasons he is not speaking at this church. Read the Bible and you will see many instances where people are persecuted for doing the very thing God has asked them to do. Several years ago (about 12 years), my family and our pastor’s family started a new church. We felt the Lord was calling for us to do that work. Wouldn’t you know it, the very people that made fun of us by calling us names (seriously!) were the supposed Christians we had attended church with earlier! Today, that church is alive and well. If God is in it, NO man can defeat it. Tim, you keep doing what the Lord tells you to do…………pay no mind to mere men who call themselves Christian.
- When a pastor chooses to take such a public stance on controversial issues – perhaps devoid of the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, I might add – then they will get the attention they want, but only serve to further separate people rather than helping people join together. Chasing homosexuals from your church is not what Jesus did. This pastor is a loudmouth who wanted attention…and he got it. clapclapclap But I do not applaud his clumsy attention-getting behavior. I do applaud Tebow distancing himself from this loudmouth attention seeker. While we all are guilty of all-too-Human behavior from time to time, pastors must hold themselves to a higher standard and not take advantage of the trust and sometimes blind faith congregations have in THEM, rather than in Jesus Christ. Just sayin’.
- I am no longer in receiving messages or participating in this judgmental site. I’m not perfect like the people who run it. I don’t deserve to associate with them.
I guess the American Family Association just learned the hard way that while you can pick on gays, you don’t mess with football players.
UPDATE – AFA wiped away all of the links and put up a “update” with a half-assed apology
11 Comments
Tebow 1, AFA 0.
And they wonder why their fundraising is falling off.
Football is its own religion. They are just mad that he insulted their football god
Alvin—good catch. While in general I despise evangelicals and organizations such as the AFA, it’s heartening to see some reasoned and eloquent rebuff by member of such an organization. Now if only they could see past their other bigotries.
In the Denver Post this morning Jeffress was quoted as saying that Tebow told him (Jeffress) that he (Tebow) would like to speak at some time in the future.
So did Tebow really ‘cancel’ or just postpone until the fires die down?
I haven’t found any additional on this.
have never cared for any athlete that “thanks god” for winning, as if their opponent is abandoned by god in a sporting competition
and i never cared for tebow, a wanna be quarterback who is not
however i think i will begin rooting for him for the position he took in this regard
Perhaps Tebow caved to all the religious conservatives that are not Baptists and don’t like being shit on by the likes of that miscreant running the First Baptist Church of Dallas.
“Dr. Jeffress is a man of unconditional love and will gladly receive him back.”
Yeah, it’s unconditional love, not dollar signs flashing in his eyes when he thinks about the donations that might come with having Tebow there.
an interesting case study here.
Tebow is not a very good NFL QB (in fact, he’s pretty awful) and one could say that the only reason that he has the prominence that he does is due to Christianist influence (although a little of that is also due to the cobverage of Tebow by gay blogs…which is an entirely different story but should be duly noted).
So this backlash here against the Christianists is interesting in that aspect.
Tebow may have unintentionally done a bit of a service here in highlighting the extreme bigotry of Jeffres religious views.
perhaps we could create a hash tag for jeffers and the afa; Tebow is apparently ooking for a more opportune time to share the pulpit with Dr Jeffers
Tebow cancelled, but not because he is any less of a bigot. He cancelled because his ambition for himself was greater than his bigoted principles.
He is being defended by bigots. They are defending him because they are Tebowbots, not because they are egalitarian.
Equal human rights is still the common enemy of bigot Tebow, his bigoted defenders and the AFA.
please produce the evidence that Tim Tebow is a “bigot”
and if you’re saying that his defenders (of which I’m really not one) against the churches are icon worshippers, well, you’d be right.
That, in and of itself, is not a positive or a negative.