An organisation called Conservapedia plans to rid the <i>Bible</i> of what it calls a liberal bias. Photo / AP

An organisation called Conservapedia plans to rid the Bible of what it calls a liberal bias. Photo / AP

The folk at Conservapedia - the "conservative encyclopaedia you can trust" (unlike that apparent hotbed of liberalism Wikipedia) - have made a shocking discovery. The Bible is full of liberal bias.

Yes, you read that right: liberal bias.

Well, of course. Conservapedia's creators appear to have homed in on a truth (though they of course call it "liberal distortion") that the Marxists never got: the Bible is on the side of the poor and oppressed. It's never been approving of the excesses of the rich and powerful.

Witness the 2000 or so verses in the Bible proclaiming concern for the poor and vulnerable: the widow, the stranger, "the least of these".

The wealthy, on the other hand, have to work out how to get around the sobering message that "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God".

Indeed, the Bible's pages are suffused with social justice concerns and other dangerous liberal ideas, like human rights and egalitarianism.

(If everyone is made in the image of God, then how can it be right to support economic systems that leave so many without the means to meet basic human needs?)

This is all very well if you're a non-believer who thinks of the Bible as outdated and irrelevant, but somewhat problematic for a particular kind of conservative Christian who needs to believe that the inerrant word of God supports his belief in the free market, tax breaks for the wealthy, small government, big business, the death penalty and every utterance of talk radio and Fox News; but doesn't believe in such liberal obsessions as universal healthcare for his neighbour (especially if it means putting his own at risk), or global warming.

Think former US President George W. Bush, who had no problem with the contradictions between the principles of his faith and his self-interested interpretation of them.

No matter, Conservapedia has a solution. It has launched the Conservative Bible Project to produce a "fully conservative" translation of the Bible, expunged of what it calls "liberal wordiness" (because liberals apparently use a "high word-to-substance ratio"), "gender inclusive" language, and "socialistic words" like "comrade" and "labourer". "Government", it has decided, is a liberal word, whereas "volunteer" is a conservative one.