Obama Politics

The Politicization of Religion and the Religiofication of Politics

There is much to read at PBS's Jesus Factor beginning with the excellent interview with Dr. C. Welton Gaddy. Some quotes:

It is not without significance that the president opens the political campaign season in Los Angeles, talking for 45 minutes about faith-based initiative. We have seen, over the last three years, a politicization of religion unlike any phenomenon we have seen in this nation's history.

We have also seen the religiofication of politics -- that is, using religion to advance political agendas -- even to the point of suggesting that your patriotism is in question and your religious commitment is in question if you don't embrace certain social/political agendas.
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[What about the argument that President Bush's use of Christian language, and particularly evangelical language, is political?]

I've always made it a policy not to judge motives. I'm going to say that President Bush uses that language because he has found in that religious tradition a strength that has made a tremendous difference in his life. He does it without appreciation for the vastness of religious pluralism in this nation and without, I think, a full understanding of the complexity of church-state relations in this nation.

However, I think because the president has political advisers whose eyes are fixed on the 2004 campaign and getting him re-elected, they never step in to say, "Mr. President, that may not be the best language to use," because they know that if he speaks out of the sincerity of his own appreciation for his religious tradition, that's going to play well with a voter base that they want to mobilize and energize.

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Look, I'm for religion. I've spent my whole life in religious communities. The motivations for what I do have deep personal historical religious roots. Much of the criticism that I offer --constitutionally, politically, and even more specifically related to the president -- are about what his way of treating religion ultimately does to undercut the authority, the uniqueness, the power of religion.

Every time that religion has identified itself or entangled itself with a particular political movement or a particular government, religion has been harmed by that. I see religion as a powerful positive healing force for this nation and the world. But that force is blunted, weakened, compromised inestimably, if we turn religion into a tool for advancing political strategy; if we make it a matter of how to win political office; if we treat it as anything other than a sacred part of life from which we ought to draw sustenance and values and strength for living courageously as good citizens.

It is because I am for religion that I critique making religion secondary and houses of worship political institutions.

Ten Commandments Politics or Jesus Politics?

Pastor Jim Evans today in Ethics Daily:

Unfortunately it is not just U.S. history that’s being revised. Judge Moore and his supporters are also re-writing the meaning of Christianity. All those who champion a theology that makes the acknowledgement of God almost exclusively about the Ten Commandments leaves out an important component. Where is Christ in their Christianity?
 
This preoccupation with the Ten Commandments is clearly out of step with the teachings of the New Testament. Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount dealt a devastating blow to the legalisms of the law. He expanded the reach of the Ten Commandments to encompassing both act and attitude. The result of this expansion means the laws are impossible to keep. After all if anger is the same as murder, who is there who is not guilty? Many theologians believe that was precisely Jesus’ purpose—to demonstrate the inability of the law to create moral maturity.
 
In one of his letters the Apostle Paul describes the law as a temporary “custodian” that was no longer needed when Christ appeared. Christ, Paul wrote, is the end of the law. Following Jesus’ lead Paul wrote, “The whole law is fulfilled in one word: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
 
This has been the traditional Christian view of the law for over 2,000 years. What Judge Moore and his friends offer is a strange innovation. They are promoting a view of Christianity which ignores Jesus.
 
Think about it for a minute. Why do Christians want the Ten Commandments displayed and celebrated in public places? Why not the Sermon on the Mount? Why ignore the very words of Jesus—the center piece of Christian wisdom.
 
It’s enough to make you wonder if there is something in Jesus’ teaching that these new fangled Christians just don’t like.

Let's Put the Heathens Out

I wonder if there is a book out with pictures of church signs such as this:

I was recently driving on S.C. 707 in Socastee and actually stopped and turned around to read all the words in the neon-outlined message contained on the billboard in front of the Socastee Original Freewill Baptist Church.

On one side we are treated to the following words of wisdom:

"If perverts and liberals can flood the news with homosexual mess - I can say this - they will burn in hell." Romans 1:32.

The other side tells us:

"America keep under God in the pledge: and let's put the heathens out. This country was founded by Christians."

The Most Religiously Charged Election?

Another article exploring the religion-politics connection in this election year. Excerpts below:

"Had you asked me in 2000 if that was the most religiously charged election, I would have said yes. But I don't remember a presidential election with this kind of religious undertone to it," said Laura Olson, a Clemson University political science professor and the author of "Religion and Politics in the United States."

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"If Kerry can say, 'I'm religious, too, and my church teaches you need to take care of the poor and give them jobs and health care,' that gives him some moral grounding," said Olson of Clemson University. "He could stand to gain by talking about being Catholic and emphasizing some of the social justice teachings of the church."

The Jesus Factor is Coming

A preview here of tomorrow's Jesus Factor program on PBS's Frontline. A quote:

Jim Wallis, editor of Sojourners Magazine, says Bush "had been sort of a self- help Methodist, meaning someone whose faith made a difference in his personal life. Then Sept. 11 came, and the self-help Methodist became almost a Messianic American Calvinist, speaking of the mission of America" to spread democracy and punish evildoers.

Wallis cringes at this "language of religious empire," but Land tells "Frontline" that while he understands some people "are uncomfortable with the concept that someone thinks they're doing God's will, or that they're on a divine mission, that that says more about the left than it does George W. Bush. George W. Bush is standing squarely in the middle of American history and American tradition in believing in American exceptionalism."

Christians Voting Democratic

Mara Vanderslice writes in Sojourners:

Ultimately, I can’t separate my Christianity from my values or my values from my politics. For me, being engaged in politics is an expression of my deepest held religious beliefs—it is about actualizing a collective commitment to protect the integrity of God’s creation, it’s about meeting the needs of the "least of these," and about our nation being a generous and trustworthy leader in the world.

It is interesting to read Mara's experience in the Dean campaign. It seems like more needs to be done to get out the word that not only liberal Christians, but moderate and conservative evangelical Christians are ready and willing to vote for a democratic candidate. How can the democratic candidate outreach better to the 79% Christians in the democratic party and the at least 50% Christians in the Republican party who would be willing to vote for a democratic candidate?

Southern Baptists Join Liberal Protestants and Muslims to Advocate for Better Health Care

Is it possible that the Southern Baptist Convention, the National Council of Churches, the Islamic Society of North America and other religious groups are getting together in an awareness campaign to highlight the moral and spiritual scandal that 40+ million Americans do not have health insurance? Yes it is. Find out more here.

Noll on Evangelicals and the Potential for Jesus Social Service

Mark Noll, in a lecture about evangelicals, says:

At its best, the evangelical desire to rescue the perishing has meant putting the perishing on their feet in the here and now as well as preparing them for eternity. Of course, we evangelicals are often not at our best, so the occasions are many of having been lured away from Christ-inspired social service by prejudice, class-consciousness, middle class fastidiousness, blindness to the structural conditions of power that condition personal choices, and the many other forms of social sinfulness that beset the human race in general.

Reading evangelical writers like Noll and Campolo gives me hope that conservative Christians have plenty of resources available to take a more critical look at the Bush presidency. The history of evangelicals in the USA also shows that evangelicals have frequently been involved in movements that have focused their attention on the poor and other social and economic issues. There should be plenty of Biblical and church history reasons why evangelicals would prefer the social policies of a democratic candidate for president.

More Tony Campolo

Another excerpt from the Campolo interview:

When it comes to taking care of the poor, the evangelicals have a very good record on the micro- level. They are establishing more homes for the homeless than any other groups. They are out there on the streets giving food to the hungry, clothing the naked, ministering to the sick. They are doing wonderful things on the micro- level. But let me say this. Bishop Romero said, "When I take care of poor people, they call me a saint. When I ask why the people are poor, they call me a communist." What evangelicals are willing to do is to help poor people on the micro- level, face to face, person to person. They are brilliant at this. They are doing more about this than anybody else. But when it comes to addressing the structural problems that create poverty -- the role of large corporations, the role of the world economy -- they are not about to take a stand on those issues. We all want to buy sneakers at bargain prices at Wal-Mart. Children have to be exploited in factories in Thailand to produce them. If we want to stop that over in Thailand, we've got to be able to pay a price here in the United States. I'm afraid that most evangelicals don't want to deal with this, in this manner. In short, they don't want to change the system.

Is There a Way to Clone Tony Campolo and Put Him in the Pulpit of Every Conservative Christian Church From Now Until November?

Talking to Tony Campolo. Here is an excerpt:

I think that the policies of the biblical Jesus would, in fact, stand in opposition to both the Democrats and the Republicans. The reason why I buy into the Democratic Party more than the Republican Party is because there are over 2,000 verses of Scripture that deal with responding to the needs of the poor. Note: 2,000 verses. On the contrary, when you take the issue of homosexuality, which has become the defining issue among evangelicals, I love to ask this question: What does Jesus say about homosexuality? And they always look at me blankly. And I say, "That's right. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. What does he say about responding to poor people? A great deal."