Max Lucado talks about blue and red state Christians

Christian author Max Lucado compares the values of both kinds of Christians and talks about how to heal the nation. Max Lucado is a conservative Christian, but clearly he does not share the same partisan spirit of other well known conservative Christians like Falwell, Land, Dobson, and others.

Comments

[john]

Good to see this one on your site. Max Lucado is very much in tune with God's commission.
Hate seems to be the word passed around alot. Conservatives "hate" gays, abortion clinics, and just about everything; liberals hate the intolerant Christians. Neither is true -- there are always exceptions. Jerry Falwell can be a thorn sometimes. Republicans rejoice over the extreme views of Moore and Eminem though.
Without the extreme words, we may run out of stuff to talk about.

[Carlos]

John, you are correct about how silent this blog and our conversation would be if everybody spoke in measured and moderate ways. But where was Lucado and the other moderate voices hiding before the election when their conservative Christian colleagues where just about saying that Christians were going to hell if they dared to vote for Kerry?

[john]

I think it is general knowledge that the election was won by the party whose nuts got the least air time.
Like a lot of things, you can mess up if you try too hard. There are a lot of staunch Democrats that are concerned about their children NOT having "alternative lifestyles" presented to them while in grade school. Instead of calling aversion to deviate sexuality a hate crime, they just might have that aversion and push the Bush button.

[The Atheist]

John, you make a good point, and no doubt some people who were more centrist or apathetic right were actually galvanized by all the talk from the left, and ended up pushing the Bush button. However, what I think is most significant is that still makes those voters *reactionaries,* which in a way validates some of the criticism of the republican party (though obviously reactionaries are found in all walks of life, and too many people are reactionaries in general).

[dlw]

Thanks Carlos, I wrote my own little bit on the article at my blog.
http://wetzell.blogspot.com/2004/11/lucado-irenic-political-calvinist.html

dlw

[dlw]

I wrote this just after the election. It encapsulates how Kerry's misunderstanding of the culture of Red America helped the cultural wars issues become more important in the presidential election.

1. To say one is personally against abortion and then justify the absence of any concrete commitment to prevent abortions because of the separation of Church and State does not fly with "conservative" evangelicals. It neglects how the meaning of the separation of Church and State is in contest with the cultural wars. Does it mean the segregation or the autonomy of Church and State? Conservatives know that the more historical understanding of the autonomy of Church and State permits religious groups to lobby to make legal changes based on their religious beliefs. And, since they, unlike elites like Kerry, are most eloquent in speaking with a language of faith, they perceive the segregationists approach as preventing them from having a voice in the polity. Kerry needed to come out with a plan to prevent abortions. He could have championed Tom Daschle's plan and vowed to reform the adoption system. He could have promised to make Planned Parenthood remove some of their more culturally offensive policies. He didn't and played into the hands of Rove in helping to ensure a heavy evangelical turn out.

2. Homosexuality is both chosen and not chosen. The biological facts of the matter are more complicated than either side of the cultural wars cares to admit. However, by stating with confidence that homosexuality is not chosen, Kerry set himself up as easily spun by those who view homosexuality as chosen as endorsing biological determinism/sexual libertarianism. It would have been better for him to make a distinction between chosen lifestyles and not-chosen or easily-changed sexual orientations. The reason why this issue is given so much weight by evangelicals like my mother is explained by the importance attributed to the marriage relationship by the right. As Pam Cochran, at the other journal, writes marriage is traditionally viewed as the foundation of society. Kerry's statement, made without a proper understanding of how it would be perceived by the other culture, cost him the election because it was viewed as endorsing a view that would undermine society. A more culturally sensitive Kerry campaign might have also gained him the support of Ron Sider whose Prism magazine reaches a good deal more conservative evangelicals than Wallis' sojourners.

[Chameleon3]

Kerry lost because he has no core beliefs or values. He flip flopped on so many issues. And its hard to appeal to "red america" when you approve of murdering unborn babies and the Catholic church is trying to excommunicate you. Oh yeah, he wouldnt silence the extreme left-wing hate mongers (the ABB crowd).

Kerry was a dud candidate from the beginning. They were better off with Howard "the scream" Dean.

[Streak]

Kerry has no core beliefs? Chameleon, you once again show your ignorance. Bush has yet to act on his faith, yet you continue to state that he is moral. Has he shown concern for the 100,000 dead Iraqis from his war? Even if we assume this war is moral (and I don't) how about some easy stuff. Has Bush ever treated a political adversary with grace and dignity? Remember his savaging of John McCain? Bush spread the rumor that McCain's adopted daughter was in fact an out of wedlock birth with a black woman. That is no the act of a moral person.

[john]

"However, by stating with confidence that homosexuality is not chosen, Kerry set himself up as easily spun by those who view homosexuality as chosen as endorsing biological determinism/sexual libertarianism."
Beautifully said, dlw! I noticed that while I watched the third debate. Bush said "I don't know"; Kerry (after his now famous side note) stated that Chaney's daughter would attest that ALL homosexuality is determined at birth.
He took a hard stance at the wrong time.

[Streak]

I will say that Lucado has never impressed me much in the past. His recognition that democrats have led on issues like race and poverty was nice to hear.

[dlw]

John, if you read the link I made, my general point is that rather than trying to make poverty an issue in the election, it would have been better for Wallis to help make Kerry more sensitive to red-culture so that the cultural wars issues would not loom as large in the election as they did.

Wallis needs to learn more judo, rather than rushing the religious right.

dlw

[Carlos]

dlw, Thanks for your participation here! Your point of view is needed and appreciated. I think you are correct. Clinton was much better at this, but then he grew up as a Southern Baptist in Arkansas. But then again, by not bending from who he way, maybe Kerry showed more integrity and honesty than Bush and Clinton.

[The Atheist]

Kerry had plenty of core beliefs, and the fact that the Republican party got away with calling him a "flip-flopper" is absurd. Whenever he changed his vote, it was simply because the issues at hand changed in order of significance, or he actually went back, read the legislation (unlike many congressmen) and realized what Republicans were ACTUALLY trying to get away with, so he changed. If anything, it demonstrates to me that he's able to admit mistakes and change his mind...something that Bush seems completely incapable of doing, regardless of the consequences.

Unfortunately, Kerry was a pretty boring person. It's a shame when a corrupt but laughable idiot trumps a boring but otherwise harmless man.

[Chameleon3]

Streak, identify John Kerry's core values. Cause if you can, where were you during his campaign?

If Kerry had a senate record, he could have done better in the election. He tried to get away with 20 years of work with little to show for it.

And with his view of leaving America's sovereignty and right to defend itself up to a corrupt organization like the UN, he is hardly harmless.

Streak speaks of 100000 dead in Iraq. First where does this number come from? Second, did you ever condemn Saddam and his sons for all the murder, rape, and looting of the Iraqi people? This number was six digits if not more.

[dlw]

I agree that Kerry was spun rather effectively by the right and did not counter until it late in the election. He also did stupid stuff like going after McCain to be his V.President when anyone who knows McCain could tell you that he would never agree to it.

But the whole "Separation of Church and State" line was terrible. I mean the dueling def'ns of what is entailed by the separation of Church and State is one of the key differences between the red and blue states and rings hollow when one does not actually have any alternative proposed measures to prevent abortion.

Kerry should have given back the feminists money that demanded that he support abortion-on-demand at all stages of pregnancy and listened to people like me who've been writing about ways to foster compromise. At the least, he could have supported Daschle's proposal.

Its not a matter of winning over the religious right's vote, but reducing their solidarity and propaganda for increasing turn-out.

dlw

[Chameleon3]

I have the silly idea that the idea was to not have state-sponsored churches as Britain had (the anglican church), not keeping religion completely out of government.

[The Atheist]

Why shouldn't religion be kept completely out of government? Tradition aside, I find references to god somewhat offensive when tied to public domains; it just rubs it in the face of the world that you can't get elected to anything here if you don't pay lipservice to religion, particularly some variant of christianity. I see absolutely no good that can come of conflating religion and politics. Separation of Church and state means don't have a state sponsored church, monitarily OR practically. You are free to believe what they like, but you shouldn't be methodist god-talking on tax-payers time because not everyone is methodist.

[The Atheist]

I haven't seen answers from Streak, so to answer a previous post from Chameleon:

**Streak, identify John Kerry's core values. Cause if you can, where were you during his campaign?**

As far as I'm concerned, Kerry's key values were "I'm not George Bush." Kerry's personal values, in no particular order, were:

1) A stronger economy, based on policies that work, including better social services for the poor, uninsured, and elderly, reducing unemployment by removing cost-cutting outsourcing INCENTIVES (not doing away with investment oriented outsourcing).

2) Fixing No Child Left Behind, because it's crap.

3) Preserving a woman's right to choose to abort an unwanted pregnancy.

4) More money allocated to actual home security in ports, airports, and shipping stations, which Bush had mostly ignored.

5) Repairing relations with allied countries that have been damaged by America's imperialist policies and unilateral preemptive war in Iraq and a push for more accountability for the actions of ALL nations within the UN.

6) Reinstitution of environmental legislation (that Bush struck down for personal profit) to protect our air, water, soil, wildlife, and national parks.

...basically, Kerry was going to fix all the mistakes Bush made.

**If Kerry had a senate record, he could have done better in the election. He tried to get away with 20 years of work with little to show for it.**

Bush is a drunk driver, a coke user, a military deserter, a terrible businessman, a sucker puncher, a corrupt politician bought by corporate America for his last name who has lied, cheated, reduced civil liberties and ruined the economy, and legislates according to his own pocketbook in ways resembling both imperialism and facism. Bush was ON VACATION for much of his presidency before 9-11. I'd rather vote for a man with no record than a man with a record like that. Bush is the penultimate example of the fact that wealth and a name will make one successful despite all other shortcomings.

**And with his view of leaving America's sovereignty and right to defend itself up to a corrupt organization like the UN, he is hardly harmless.**

You view is impossibly distorted. Kerry didn't want the UN to tell America what to do; he recognized that if the rest of the world thinks something is a bad idea, maybe you should think twice about it. Invading Iraq was not in the interest of american sovereignity or national security, much less our foreign policy. As far as your allegations of UN corruption...those in glass houses have no business throwing stones. If the UN is corrupt, the US is far worse.

**Streak speaks of 100000 dead in Iraq. First where does this number come from?**

That figure is the Iraqi civilian casualties; not US troops, not "coalition," not Iraqi security forces, but civilians. The figure comes from the extrapolation of the death tolls found in a random sampling of 1000 households throughout Iraq EXCLUDING Falujah (where the average death toll compared to the population is much higher). The study was run by a professor with the Johns Hopkins school of public health.

**Second, did you ever condemn Saddam and his sons for all the murder, rape, and looting of the Iraqi people?**

Yes. However, the US does not go to war for humanitarian concerns. There is no question that Saddam's regime was terrible, but that's not the point. Bush said we needed to go to war because there were "weapons of mass destruction." He lied. Plus the US has never gone to preemptive war before. Bush violated the rules to which we as a nation had agreed to adhere, from the UN, from Geneva, and before.

**This number was six digits if not more.**

And yet you would typically condemn uses of utilitariam calculus (even though you haven't studied it) due to your preference for moral absolutes. So, in terms of your own moral absolutes, is it better now that WE are killing innocent people, rather than Saddam?

[Chameleon3]

I would hear from the Streak, he is able to answer is he not?

And I am sick of the hippie mentality with this "we are killing people" baloney. You KNOW we are an effective army with powerful weapons. If we wanted to just march into Iraq and start killing everyone, we would. Why bother with setting up an interim governemnt? Protecting Iraqi oil rigs for the Iraqis? We could just blow everyone away, fire some neutron bombs, nukes, bombing runs, etc. Yet we protect Iraq for its people to our cost and detriment.

[Streak]

I am back. The Athiest did a great job of presenting my answer. Chameleon, I love how you go straight to the ad hominem argument--Athiest and I must be hippies, therefore must be ignored. Here are the real issues: the invasion didn't just kill insurgents and rebels. It has exacerbated the stress on an already stressful society, so the death rate in the main has gone up precipitously. And with regard to the people we actually kill, my understanding is that the Bush people told the coalition to not track those deaths--civilian, or otherwise.

You can call me a hippie if you want. You can belittle my concern for humanity. I don't really mind. I simply object to the way the conservatives talk about this war. Of course I hated Saddam and there is no doubt that he and his sons were evil and sick. Stopping them was a good thing--and possibly the only good thing of this war. But if you have replaced the rape rooms with mass chaos and death, have you really gained? We should at a minimum count the cost to both sides as we weigh the cost. You are following the conservative line by presenting this war as an altruistic act of the US. Really? Are we really fighting for our American freedom over there?

And finally, Chameleon, you really stoop low with your last few sentences. We are morally superior because we haven't obliterated Iraq. Really? Hmm. That must be in the part of the Bible I haven't read.

[dlw]

1. It is unfortunate that religion is used as a litmus test for who can get elected president.

2. It is practically important and strategic for people to communicate their ideas for policy changes in a manner that doesn't mandate for others to accept their faith to also support the changes.

3. Having said that, there is nothing wrong with pursuing legal changes based on one's faith. For some people, the language of faith is what they are most articulate with. To deny them the ability to speak with that language in the public square is to effectively exclude them from significant participation in the public square.

4. Though, it is generally a source of much folly to employ absolutist language in advocating fallible policy-changes. There is always a need for groups to be open to learning and modifying their goals and strategies for making changes.

5. The problem with the religious right is not that they justify their political activism based on their faith, but rather the fact that they are able to persist with poor strategies due to the their general scarcity of strong habits of political deliberation, wherein their members do not examine critically the actions of their leaders.

6. There also is the problem of dispensationalism where fallible traditions are conflated with scripture and then errantly proclaimed inerrant and defended/advocated with an unloving vehemence that misconstrues Jesus's last words as go and make carbon copies of yourselves of all the nations.

dlw

[The Atheist]

Excellent points, dlw, I am in agreement.