An Iowa pastor put an atheist trying to kill Jesus in his church's Nativity scene
Pastor Adam Todd wants to remind Christians "there is an enemy out there whose real goal is to kill and destroy Christ."
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A Christian pastor in Iowa has placed an “atheist” in his church’s Nativity scene. It comes a year after he told his congregation that the atheists who were criticizing a government-sponsored crèche were really trying to murder Jesus.
All of this stems from a controversy last year in which the city of Toledo erected a display of the birth of Jesus outside the fire department:
When atheist Justin Scott saw that, he knew it wasn’t permitted under the law, so he contacted the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which sent a letter to the city. Justin himself admitted to a local news station that he doubted there was “any ill intent by the city of Toledo” and that they probably just didn’t realize it was illegal. Despite protests from conservative Christians in the area (and the elected officials themselves), the city eventually modified the display to include Santa and a reindeer.
Problem solved, right?
Not for Pastor Adam Todd of Solid Rock Bible Church.
On Christmas Eve last year, Todd railed against Justin and claimed the modified display was an example of atheists trying to execute Jesus.
I was gonna bring it up later in sermon. I'll bring it up right now. You know the coward that wanted to take the Nativity down here at the fire station? When they asked him for a comment: I never intended for nobody to take it down!
BS. That's what that is. A liar. I never intended for them to have to take it down. Sure you did! You just wanted to cause problems! But you’re gonna act like it was a noble—You never meant no harm. Sure you did! You act noble but have evil in your hearts…
…
An out-of-town evil man sticks his nose somewhere it had no place… just to demean Christ... He doesn't care about Santa. He just wants Santa to be up there to make a mockery of the Nativity, to demean it. So he can go around saying It’s just two imaginary fairy tales now.
That's why he's around. He sees it as a victory because he could put an imaginary creature, Santa, beside our Nativity. And in his mind, he's won, because he's just demeaned and defaced our Nativity.
…
You know, next year, I told my family, by next year, we need to have us something that’d fit in, same style, to go with our Nativity. We ought to have, over here, lurking in the shadows, a King Herod, with a knife, looking to kill Baby Jesus, and then tell everybody that's the representation for atheists. That way we're all inclusive, we represent everybody.
And we can represent atheists by having King Herod over here. We can represent Satanists by having King Herod over here trying to stab little baby Jesus, because that's all that's going on.
I mean, I'm dead serious. We ought to do that! King Herod has a place in every Nativity and he represents the atheists and the cowards and the Satanists because all they're trying to do is kill Christ.
That was the true spirit of Christmas right there: He wanted a depiction of King Herod trying to kill Jesus, representing the atheists and Satanists who… just wanted government officials to follow the law?
(This is besides the point, but adding King Herod to the same display wouldn’t have made it “inclusive” because adding more Christian fiction to a display of Christian fiction still makes it Christian fiction.)
In any case, there isn’t a Nativity scene outside the fire department this year, but Adam Todd has one up outside his church. And, according to a social media post, he decided to toss Herod in there for good measure.
… We are pleased to announce we are representing atheists this year.
The atheists want to be included in the nativities and bible readings in Toledo, so we included them this year. Herod is the perfect representation of atheists and he's a very real part of the Christmas account in Scripture. Herod wanted to destroy Christ. Herod pretended to be sincere to the wise men but in his heart his true intentions were just to kill the Savior. Many times it seems to me that atheists try to appear genuine, as if they want to just practice religious freedom, when in reality they have very ulterior motives, just like Herod. The wise men didn't fall for his schemes, so Herod retaliated against the wise men by murdering "all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under -Matthew 2:16"
Herod acted like he was genuine, but his only real goal was to destroy Christ. I don't think it is a coincidence that the atheists go where the Christians are and seek to destroy Christ, just like Herod did so many years ago. Every nativity ought to have a Herod to remind us Christians that still today there is an enemy out there whose real goal is to kill and destroy Christ.
I mean, at least it’s a badass depiction. Adam Todd could’ve done far worse than making us look like Jason Momoa. (Take note of what appears to be the Planned Parenthood logo on his belt buckle.)
It’s also amazing that he’s centering atheists around his own shrine to the birth of Christ. Herod isn’t some character on the side of the display. He’s right there, front and center! Every picture of the scene will include us! (With a knife that’s apparently already been used before.)
By the way, if Adam Todd ever read the Bible, he would know Herod never actually gets close to Jesus. He kills all children under the age of two in Bethlehem in order to destroy Jesus, but Jesus avoids his wrath, so even this retelling of the fairy tale is wildly inaccurate.
The pastor got another thing completely wrong, too. He said atheists “want to be included in the nativities and bible readings in Toledo.” That’s a lie. The issue last year involved a government organization promoting Christianity instead of remaining religiously neutral. No one ever gave a damn about Jesus-centric Nativity scenes outside churches or on private property. No atheist group has ever demanded a church include Santa or non-Christian imagery alongside their religious display. We don’t care. You do you.
There’s no “ulterior motive” in the other cases either. We just want to make sure the government isn’t taking sides when it comes to matters of faith.
As for killing Christ, it’s not very high on our list of priorities. (Also, you know, it’s been done.) Plus, when it comes to hurting Jesus, atheists simply can’t live up to everything Donald Trump and his conservative allies have done to the religion over the past decade.
It’s funny, though, how this ignorance-based belief that atheists are out to destroy Jesus has been on the pastor’s mind for a year now. As Justin Scott wrote on Facebook, “Looks like I've lived rent free in Pastor Todd's head the past year.”
Meanwhile, I had forgotten this entire story until I saw Adam Todd’s new display.
When I asked Justin for his thoughts, he suggested the pastor take an alternative approach next year:
I’m surprised Pastor Todd thinks atheists would be offended by this. Imagine if he had spent the time creating the display helping at a Tama County food bank or making a real difference in the community, instead of focusing on a group of Americans who have every right to participate in our secular government which Pastor Todd may have forgotten is guided by a godless Constitution.
(Portions of this article were published earlier)
Time to pull out my annual speech. I've posted this several times before, but here it is again:
Is it War-on-Christmas-time already? I thought we still had more shopping days left!
But seriously, here it is again, for anyone who still doesn't understand:
You can put up whatever you want in front of your house. You and your fellow church members can put up whatever you want in front of your church. But you can't put up whatever you want in front of someone else's house. And other people can't put up signs or displays in front of your house.
And public land is owned by the government, not you, not your church, which means it belongs to EVERYONE. That means it's not just your land. It's my land, too. So we, all of us, represented by the elected government, have a decision to make. Either we let everyone put up whatever they want, or we let nobody put up anything.
In other words, you can have your Christmas display on public land, with everyone else's displays, including the Satanists who will make a point of putting something up just to troll you. Or you can have nothing on that land, and just stick to putting it in front of your house and your church. And frankly, that's where it belongs, anyway.
Why is this so hard to understand?
"I’m surprised Pastor Todd thinks atheists would be offended by this."
Why would we be offended? Mostly we are just going to point and laugh.