Christ Church Virginia Water’s Stephen Sizer & the Religious Far Right in the USA

Edit 18/11/08 Stephen Sizer has since removed the audio files and audio page from his website http://www.sizers.org. For proof of the claims in this article, please see the results of this google search. Perhaps Sizer wants to keep these files ‘in the shadows’

Stephen Sizer often blogs about the United States of America: see recent examples here, here and here. Sizer’s posts, articles and books, in particular Christian Zionism, reveal that his problem is not so much with the USA as a country, but more with what he sees as a ‘weird and wacky’ religious group determined to enforce their own political agenda in the Middle East.

Sizer’s article Christian Zionism: the new heresy that sways Americais particularly insightful with regards to understanding Sizer’s criticisms of dispensationalist Christianity in the United States.

Seeing as Stephen Sizer criticises many Christians in the United States, and draws upon links between Christian Zionists, American politicians and the Israeli government, it is only fair to consider which Americans Sizer himself is connected with.

On the 10th July 2007, Sizer gave an interview to Mark Dankof of the Republic Broadcasting Network, on his show Mark Dankof’s America. You can listen to the interview here and here. On the audio page of one of his websites, Reverend Sizer provides links to Mark Dankof’s website and indeed to the Republic Broadcasting website.

Who is Mark Dankof? According to his website, Dankof is a ‘regular contributor to American Free Press‘. He also contributes to Breaking All The Rules, and serves as a talk show host and radio broadcaster for the Republic Broadcasting Network. In December 2006, on his show, Dankof interviewed Mark Weber of the Institute for Holocaust Review. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) says of Weber that: “More than any other propagandist, Mark Weber, 45, embodies the Holocaust-denial movement.”

You can watch a programme by Weber and Hesham Tillawi discussing the jailed Holocaust-denier Ernst Zundel, here. Tillawi, incidentally, also makes programmes for Republic Broadcasting, as you can see hereand here. You can read Tillawi justifying himself to former Klu Klux Klan leader David Duke, here. Mr Tillawi here affirms that he is a supporter of Duke’s cause, and explains that he would “rather live in a white America than in a Zionist America.”

Other contributors to Republic Broadcasting include Terry Anderson, Alan Stang, Jack McLamb, and Stephen Lendman. Interestingly, both Stephen Lendman and Stephen Sizer’s articles appear in the same edition ofThe Revisionist Clarion.

Back to Mark Dankof, who gave the interview to Stephen Sizer.

One of the links from Dankof’s website is to rense.com, the website of American conspiracy theorist Jeff Rense, who defends Holocaust deniers such as Ernst Zundel, Frederick Toben, Gerd Honsik, Sylvia Stolz and Wolfgang Froehlich.

In May 2008, Stephen Sizer forwarded an email about ‘unintentional antisemitism’ written by Jeff Rense, in which Rense claimed that, “Today, evangelicals reflexively honor the code that, no matter how true an unflattering fact or opinion about Jews may be, it will not be repeated.” Another contributor to Rense’s website is Republic Broadcasting’s Frosty Woodridge. Conspiracy theorist Robby Noel, who boasts on the Vanguard website of interviewing Ernst Zundel, also hosts a show for Republic Broadcasting, as does Michael Collins Piper.

Right is a photo from the Adelaide Institute website.

The photo shows Michael Collins Piper ‘introducing the Holocaust boys’ at a conference on ‘authentic history’ hosted by theAmerican Free Press and the Barnes Review.
Michael Collins Piper is an American conspiracy theorist who claims that the Israeli Mossad secret service was responsible for assassinating John F. Kennedy. Mark Dankof comments on this conspiracy theory here. Stephen Sizer, incidentally, forwarded an email from Piper, defending anti-Zionist right wing commentator Dale Crowley, whose father once told him “not to discuss Israel or Jewish power in this country.” Crowley is also responsible for this broadcast.

Sizer, however, forwarded the article from Piper, which Piper had written for the American Free Press. The AFP was launched by notorious anti-Semite Willis Carto and his group Liberty Lobby, who once said “If Satan himself … had tried to create a … force for the destruction of the nations, he could have done no better than to invent the Jews”. Author George Michael wrote a book entitled ‘Willis Carto and the American Far Right‘ (pictured left). Carto and Liberty Lobby previously published right-wing conspiracy theory magazine The Spotlight. American Free Press is mentioned by anti-fascist magazineSearchlight, in an article entitled “Faith-based fascists bridging the waters.” Also writing for American Free Press is Mark Glenn.

Let’s revisit Mark Dankof one more time.

In August 2007, Dankof published a letter he received from anti-Semitic revisionist historian Michael A. Hoffman II on the “Revisionist Review” blog. In June 2008, Stephen Sizer forwarded an email from Hoffman, which contained disparaging comments about Messianic Jews and Orthodox Judaism, in which Hoffman claims that “Orthodox Judaism is distinguished by its dictatorial tyranny over the mind of man.”

Finally, Stephen Sizer’s close friend, the pro-Palestinian activist Eileen Fleming appeared as a guest on Mark Dankof’s America on May 10th 2007. In October 2007 Eileen Fleming attended an anti-Zionist conference alongside Michael Collins Piper, Hesham Tillawi, Mark Glenn, Wendy Campbell, and Charles Carlson (Carlson also wrote an essay on Christian Zionism, which you can read on David Duke’s website here. The essay refers approvingly to Stephen Sizer). You can read a report about this conference from David Duke’s websitehere. Fleming, incidentally, is a good friend of Stephen Sizer, who she talks about here, here and here. Sizer has forwarded messages from Fleming here, here, and here.

Stephen Sizer often talks about the “weird and wacky theology” of the American Religious Right. His book Christian Zionism heavily featured American dispensationalist Christians.

On the other hand, Rev Sizer forwards material from, gives interviews to, and links to websites of prominent members of the Religious Far Right in the USA, which is heavily represented by antisemites and conspiracy theorists.

Whilst it is of great concern that Stephen Sizer should receive praise from the likes of Carlson, Lendman and Glenn, he cannot stop anti-Semites, fascists or neo-Nazis from praising his work, although he should be taking steps to prevent this. Rev Sizer must seriously question why these antisemitic broadcasters and conspiracy theorists love his work so much. (And, indeed, why others like themlike Sizer.)

Rev Sizer is, however, entirely responsible for the information which he passes on to others, and for circulating antisemitic material from antisemitic writers. Rev Sizer is also responsible for the links he puts on his own website. Why has he linked to Mark Dankof and Republic Broadcasting?

When Jenna Delitsch sent around an article written by David Duke on UCU’s internal activists email list, her posting rights on were suspended indefinitely. When Jenny Tonge said she would consider becoming a suicide bomber if she were Palestinian, she lost her lost her job in the Liberal Democrats party.

Will the Church of England likewise take disciplinary action against Stephen Sizer?