When people mix politics and religion, they inevitably concoct recipes that are hard to swallow. The Conservative Bible Project, which is the brainchild of the subjectively written online encyclopedia Conservapedia, ranks at the top of the list — and I say that as a conservative.

The folks at Conservapedia are concerned about liberal bias in modern Bible translations, so they have taken it upon themselves to excise offensive terminology and replace it with words more pleasing to the conservative ear. There’s one glaring problem with the idea, summed up nicely by Ed Morrissey of Hot Air, one of the better writers in the conservative movement:

[I]f one believes the Bible to be the Word of God written for His purposes, which I do, then the idea of recalibrating the language to suit partisan political purposes in this age is pretty offensive — just as offensive as they see the “liberal bias” in existing translations. If they question the authenticity of the current translations, then the only legitimate process would be to work from the original sources and retranslate. And not just retranslate with political biases in mind, but to retranslate using proper linguistic processes and correct terminology.

All Bible translations have strengths and weaknesses, and conservatives are right to be wary of many modern versions, which arguably have more weaknesses than strengths. But the worst possible solution to the age-old dilemma of man translating God’s Word is to get political with the Bible. Conservative prejudice in scripture will lead a person to hell just as readily as the liberal variety.

Nothing good can come of the Conservative Bible Project, and much bad already has come. The effort has given atheists, heretics, pagans and every other enemy of God new and explosive ammunition for ridiculing the good news of the gospel and blaspheming God.

The best possible end to this story is for the much-deserved criticism from left and right to kill the project — and the sooner, the better.