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Kevin ClarkeMarch 10, 2011

How 'bout political fearmongering? Faithful America suggests a Lenten fast of Glenn Beck radio...your (f)ears will thank you.

 

Online Faith Community Calls on Christian Radio Network to Give Up Glenn Beck for Lent

As the Christian season of Lent begins, Faithful America—an online community of over 100,000 people of faith—issued a call to the New York area Christian-owned radios stations WMCA and WNYM to “give up Glenn Beck for Lent.”

The two stations, owned by Christian company Salem Communications, are the only stations left in the New York City area who have not yet committed to keeping Glenn Beck off the city’s airwaves. Faithful America is urging Salem Communications-owned stations to make a commitment not to pick up Glenn Beck because of his “caustic remarks, fear-mongering and bigotry” and reminding them that “the bottom line is no responsible person or company should support programming that promotes menacing conspiracy theories and tells listeners to flee from churches that talk about social justice.”

Full statement follows:

Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the Christian liturgical season of Lent.

Millions of Christians observe the season by "giving up" something -- a treat, indulgence, or a bad habit or practice -- to help them re-focus on the ideals at the heart of their faith.

In this spirit, we at Faithful America are calling on the New York area Christian-owned stations WMCA and WNYM to “give up” Glenn Beck for Lent, and make a public commitment not to pick up his program.

It would be a very pragmatic Lenten observance. Every other radio station in New York has already promised to keep Beck off the city’s airwaves, and Beck's caustic remarks, fear-mongering and bigotry have led to a national backlash. Radio stations from Philadelphia to Madison have already dropped Beck from their line-up, citing falling ratings and increasingly poor content. Over 300 advertisers have dropped his FOX News program. People of faith have responded similarly. Faithful America alone has already generated over 20,000 petition signatures and emails from people of faith calling for a stop to Glenn Beck's craven attacks.

The pressure on Beck and his sponsors is building. And the bottom line is no responsible person or company should support programming that promotes menacing conspiracy theories and tells listeners to flee from churches that talk about social justice. This should go double for a company claiming to represent Christian values.

We invite WMCA and WNYM to use this Lenten period to reflect on their Christian values and make a commitment not to pick up Glenn Beck, during the next 40 days or anytime after.”

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Marie Rehbein
13 years 8 months ago
Even if Glenn Beck were the only one, this still cannot be seen as a legitimate approach to Lenten sacrifice.  An approach more in keeping with the sentiment would be to listen without becoming upset - for Lent I will not let these characters upset me, but will think of pleasant things and people in both reaction to their rabble-rousing and on my own initiative.
Juan Lino
13 years 8 months ago
I agree with Marie.  If I only wanted to read things that support my views then I would not bother reading “heterodox” blogs, magazines, etc.  After all, those whose opinions are different than mine might actually be saying something that’s true - and it’s the truth we are after isn’t it?  Or better, since we’ve met the Truth (which is a person who loves us!) then we shouldn’t be afraid of anything – even Glenn Beck.
13 years 8 months ago
Doesn't anyone see the irony here.  As some ask people to give up fear mongering by fear mongering aganist someone and trying to silence the person.


And by the way, Beck was right on the social justice issue.  There was a long discussion about it after he made the comment and in truth what he was advocating from published reports that I saw was closer to social justice then what many on this site advocate. 
Tom Maher
13 years 8 months ago
We should all be good Catholic shcool boys and girls and write essays on the topic "How Glenn Beck is scary to me".  This way we will finally get tther details of why Glenn Beck's ideas should be banned from the universe.  Why should Catholics be tolerant of others ideas? Ideas may be just too scary to be heard or mentioned. Oh my. 

Really bad stuff.  The modern version of book burning. Not impresive or inspred.
John Barbieri
13 years 8 months ago
Fighting intolerance with more intolerance is throwing more wood on the fire! 
Home and car radios have selectable tuners as well as on/off switches.
These should be quite enough to allow anyone not to listen to Glen Beck

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