No noggin exam for Bishop Bushey?

Sister Mary Bernadette a.k.a. Tammy Lewis of Necedah, WI is scheduled for a competency hearing May 27 in Juneau County related to her two felony charges of causing mental harm to a child arising from having left a deceased 90-year-old woman to "rot on a toilet" for nine weeks whilst the children at issue shat in a bucket.

No word yet on similar process (as against the identical charges) for Lewis's co-conspirator in attempted resurrection and religious "Superior," Bishop Alan A. "John Peter" Bushey. Lewis's attorney had a pretty good line in court yesterday, though.

Dan Berkos disputed comments of prosecutors that Bushey headed a cult. Berkos said almost any organized religion could be described that way.

Well, maybe so. But that doesn't mean this one is excluded from the definition. "Cult" may be overbroad or even underinclusive, but if it has any legal meaning at all, it must apply to these circumstances.

Ya think?

I wonder if Counselor Berkos has his experts booked yet. Any hearing involving the distinctions between mental illness and religious belief is bound to be interesting. That's why they should flog the Bishop in there too. And while they're at it, grab that Kenny Van Hoof dude.

Certainly not by reason alone

A "right-wing Christian" offers the following meditation this morning:

Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. — 2 Timothy 1:9

Only hours ago, the same penitent described a Memphis man whose works include allegedly shooting and stabbing six people to death as a "piece of trash" and "garbage" who deserves to be put to his own expedited death by the government.

Among the stranger interpretations of Christian doctrine is the one whereby the adepts are "saved by faith alone" as opposed to by works, which Jesus tends to downplay, since they lead a man to boast (as if an omniscient being wouldn't be hip to the motivation).

The potential conclusion to all this, of course, is that the Memphis man, by means of the appropriate expressions of faith, winds up frolicking gaily on the Elysian Fields while those of us not accepting Christ as our personal Saviour — for whatever reason — find ourselves writhing in perpetual agony on the eternal rotisserie no matter our positive attributes (such as a commendable facility in resisting urges to shoot and stab other people to death).

Apparently this is justice from an inspired perspective.

How readest thou the law?

Four years ago Victor DeLeon of Texas died following a loud thump. The said concussion was caused by his unfortunate contact with Lorena Guerra's Ford Expedition, which was observed moving away from the scene at a high rate of speed. Ms. Guerra was charged and convicted under Tex. Transp. Code Ann. § 550.023, a "Good Samaritan" law which imposes the duty to stop and render aid.

Ms. Guerra appealed her judgment of conviction on a number of grounds, including an asserted fundamental constitutional right "to be left alone" and the claim that § 550.023 impermissibly codified Christian doctrine in violation of the First Amendment's Establishment of Religion Clause.

As to the former, the appeals court reasoned, "Taken to its logical conclusion, Guerra is asserting a fundamental right to hit someone with her vehicle and not stop and provide any assistance to the victim." Because it could find no textual or other support for this proposition — not even in Ms. Guerra's own presentations — the court rejected that claim.

Ms. Guerra's Establishment Clause argument consisted of portraying
§ 550.023 as “imposing Christian conduct, custom, philosophy and principles to all drivers." The court similarly found this claim to be without merit, because laws do not respect an establishment of religion when they simply happen to coincide with religious beliefs.

Which just goes to show you, religion has no monopoly on good conduct, not even in Texas. Guerra v. State.

h/t Prof. Friedman.