The Creationists’ Universe
We mostly avoid websites with which we’re unfamiliar, but today we found something we can’t ignore at a website called The Inquisitr (that’s how they spell it), which describes itself as “an internationally recognized news website read by more than 40 million unique visitors each month.” Wikipedia has a brief write-up on them: The Inquisitr.
Their headline is Mainstream Pastor: Jesus Christ “Rose Up” To Heaven, So The Earth Must Be Flat And Resting On Stilts. Hey — how can we resist that? Here are some excerpts, with bold font added by us:
An influential Christian pastor claims that the earth must be flat, stationary and resting on stilts, because how else could Jesus Christ have “risen” to heaven? Michael A. Fenmore, a columnist at a mainstream publication that also covers sports, entertainment, weather and news, shocked readers with two instances of hardline biblical literalism this week, as reported by Kamloops this Week.
That’s a newspaper in newspaper in Kamloops, British Columbia, and this seems to be the article they’re talking about: Did Jesus Christ really rise from the dead? But since we already started with The Inquisitr, we’ll stick with them. They say:
Fenmore is making it his mission to revive the flat-earth movement, urging his readers to visualise what is happening when they kneel and pray to heaven. “Throughout Scripture, God and heaven are portrayed as being ‘up.’ This doesn’t work well on a globe.”
He’s right! Isn’t this great? Let’s read on:
‘”Up” for someone in the northern hemisphere places God at one end of the universe whereas someone gazing upward in the southern hemisphere would be looking billions of light-years in the opposite direction.’ Fenmore added.
The rest of The Inquisitr article quotes other people, so we won’t bother with any of that. It would appear that the rev is making the same points we made in The Earth Is Flat! and The Earth Does Not Move!
We applaud rev Fenmore for his accurate reading of scripture. He’s a true man of faith.
Copyright © 2015. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.
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The Sensuous Curmudgeon 
A bit bizarre, the pastor being a flat earther and believing in billions of light years!
Poe??
I’d love to see this guy debate Ken Ham!
The rev’s earlier letter is the better one. He cites many of the same bible verses I do, and says: “To maintain their position on biblical inspiration and authority, and avoid being considered hypocrites, Christians have no option but to renounce the teaching of modern science and declare by faith that the earth is flat. “
My impression from reading the “earlier letter” the Curmudgeon links to in his comment is that Fenmore is actually mocking those who claim the bible is literally true. At least his letter, as I understood it, is pointing out the absurdity of some of the things the bible says. But perhaps my view is biased by the fact I think it’s almost entirely absurd.
My feeling is that there are extremely few people who are serious about belief in a flat Earth. Charles K. Johnson (1924-2001) may have been the last that we will hear of. We’re going to have to make do with the geocentrists as being the last holdouts for true Biblical inerrancy.
Oh, they are alive and kicking, TomS.
http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/forum/
Makes you wonder which achievement of modern science is disputed by the least amount of deniers.
How many people deny the existence of atoms, for example? More or less than holocast deniers or moonlanding freaks?
Or plate-tectonics.
@mnbo
I am aware of The Flat Earth Society.
@Eddie Janssen
Are there people who deny the possibility of human heavier-than-air flight? (There must have been people in the 19th century who came up with proof-texts against flight.)
Are there people who deny the existence of Americans and/or Australians? They are not mentioned in the Bible. (How about forming a Biblical Geography Society, which accepts only those lands which are mentioned in the Bible? Does anyone have proof of Americans and Australians? Or do you just accept it because people tell you about them? How do you know that you are an A’an?)
waldteufel says: “Poe??”
That would suggest that the preacher is being playful. I don’t think they have that characteristic — at least not when discussing the bible.
Hmm, holocaust. Please?
@abeastwood – Bingo. He is at worst a sarcastically liberal religionist, at best a full-blown professional provocateur and tweaker of religious noses.
From “http://www.discoverrevelation.com/Rev_21.html”:
“[Revelations] 21:16 And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal.
The city lies foursquare. The size of this city indicates that each border is approximately fifteen hundred miles long. Thus the dimensions of the city would be equal to the area from the eastern seaboard of the United States to Colorado on one side and from the Canadian border to the southern tip of Florida on the other. In addition to the length and breadth, the city will be fifteen hundred miles high. This great size will afford sufficient space for the habitation of the saints from all ages of history.
We see here that this city is a cube. Twelve thousand furlongs is 1500 miles. This city is 1500 miles square and 1500 miles high.”
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This, I take it, is after “redemption.” Will the earth be remodeled into a perfect cube 1500 miles on a side? If so, I would like to make a request to the Grand Old Developer: Please devote one entire side to bathrooms. Thank You.
The Bizarro World lives!
By the way, if the earth were flat and standing on stilts, what would the stilts be standing on?
Eric: Turtles, of course.
Anyone denying a spherical earth must also be a denier of the moon landings as well as artificial satellites. The Apollo program gave us photographs of the spherical earth, and artificial satellites would be impossible with a flat earth — while traversing the underside, they would collide with either the stilts or the turtles.
I don’t know what to make of this guy’s writings. On the one hand, it seems he is using satire to call literal interpretations of the Bible into question. But on the other hand, doing this in a regular column of the local paper with his photograph at the head is not the way to win friends at the other churches in town that he mentions.
If I had to choose one or the other, I’d go with the first interpretation — the satire. He’s demonstrating the absurdity of literal interpretation while at the same time claiming to be a literalist.
I would remind everyone that Poe’s Law predicts this situation: It is impossible to discern whether a creationist or fundamentalist argument is real or satirical, because there is no creationist or fundamentalist argument so absurd that some creationists or fundamentalists will not take it seriously.
Flat earth creationism used to be a common teaching in Missouri Synod Lutheranism. Not sure whether it persists today.
@Paul D.
I thought that they were distinguished by being geocentrists up until the 19th (or maybe even early 20th) century. Luther complained about Copernicus, but I’d be surprised if he was a flat-Earther.