About time!
I was watching the Daily Show w/ Jon Stewart last night and was pleasantly surprised with the guest he had on http://www.comedycentral.com/tv_shows/thedailyshowwithjonstewart/videos.jhtml. The show featured Jim Wallis from Sojourners(a great website/magazine that looks at politics and stuff from a faith based perspective) talking about his new book "God's Politics" http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=special.display&item=050111_godspolitics. It was refreshing to hear some of the things he said because I share similar sentiments. Heres a quote:
"Since when did believing in God and having moral values make you pro-war, pro-rich, and pro-Republican? And since when did promoting and pursuing a progressive social agenda with a concern for economic security, health care, and educational opportunity mean you had to put faith in God aside?
God's Politics offers a clarion call to make both our religious communities and our government more accountable to key values of the prophetic religious tradition - that is, make them pro-justice, pro-peace, pro-environment, pro-equality, pro-consistent ethic of life (beyond single issue voting), and pro-family (without making scapegoats of single mothers or gays and lesbians). These are the values of love and justice, reconciliation, and community that Jesus taught and that are at the core of what many of us believe, Christian or not."
I was blown away when I read this because I totally believe this and felt that I was in the minority at the last election. While many of my Christian brethren seemingly swore allegiance to Bush and the Republican party whole-heartedly, I had many reservations concerning Bush himself and his platform. But everywhere I turned, church people were adamant about how important Bush was to Evangelical Christians everywhere and how voting him to office would be a great victory for our faith...oh really? It was a travesty to watch followers of Christ rallying behind only two moral issues(war and gay marriage) while neglecting all others. The shady, deceptive half-truths for the war is a moral issue...the needless destruction of God's creation is a moral issue...but none of these were addressed as if they did not matter...Evangelicals looked past them without hesitancy hoping Bush would be the savior of the free world. I voted for Bush but not without great concern, consternation, and doubt. There wasn't one important issue that I did not personally look into myself...not once did I allow preconceived notions of where I "should" stand politically as a Christian to preclude me from deciding which side is doing the better job. To face a moral issue with your mind already made up because of what someone else tells you is dangerous...especially if you get wrapped up in the religious fervor that that was so apparent in the last election. There needs to be a personal examination and analysis of the "moral values(collection of culture war issues )" by each individual in order to preclude an autonomous response predicated upon what political party one associates with. Just because I follow Christ shouldn't automatically make me a die-hard Republican...
"Since when did believing in God and having moral values make you pro-war, pro-rich, and pro-Republican? And since when did promoting and pursuing a progressive social agenda with a concern for economic security, health care, and educational opportunity mean you had to put faith in God aside?
God's Politics offers a clarion call to make both our religious communities and our government more accountable to key values of the prophetic religious tradition - that is, make them pro-justice, pro-peace, pro-environment, pro-equality, pro-consistent ethic of life (beyond single issue voting), and pro-family (without making scapegoats of single mothers or gays and lesbians). These are the values of love and justice, reconciliation, and community that Jesus taught and that are at the core of what many of us believe, Christian or not."
I was blown away when I read this because I totally believe this and felt that I was in the minority at the last election. While many of my Christian brethren seemingly swore allegiance to Bush and the Republican party whole-heartedly, I had many reservations concerning Bush himself and his platform. But everywhere I turned, church people were adamant about how important Bush was to Evangelical Christians everywhere and how voting him to office would be a great victory for our faith...oh really? It was a travesty to watch followers of Christ rallying behind only two moral issues(war and gay marriage) while neglecting all others. The shady, deceptive half-truths for the war is a moral issue...the needless destruction of God's creation is a moral issue...but none of these were addressed as if they did not matter...Evangelicals looked past them without hesitancy hoping Bush would be the savior of the free world. I voted for Bush but not without great concern, consternation, and doubt. There wasn't one important issue that I did not personally look into myself...not once did I allow preconceived notions of where I "should" stand politically as a Christian to preclude me from deciding which side is doing the better job. To face a moral issue with your mind already made up because of what someone else tells you is dangerous...especially if you get wrapped up in the religious fervor that that was so apparent in the last election. There needs to be a personal examination and analysis of the "moral values(collection of culture war issues )" by each individual in order to preclude an autonomous response predicated upon what political party one associates with. Just because I follow Christ shouldn't automatically make me a die-hard Republican...
posted by danny at 1/20/2005 01:14:00 PM
3 Comments:
amen.
yeah, I would totally agree with ya.... and I wonder what those "evangelical republicans" reaction would have been like had kerry been elected. i don't get the impression that it would have been very Christ-like.
Did you guys catch his inauguration speech? I'll post something on it later.
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