Friday 19th of April 2024
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political miracles .....

political miracles .....

Anyone who still doubts that the evangelical Christian world is going through a political revolution was not watching Pastor Rick Warren's presidential forum this weekend. The era of reducing Christianity to a narrow set of ideological commitments is over. 

Just a few years ago, who would have imagined that Barack Obama and John McCain would hold a discussion of this sort in a church? Who would have thought that the session would be moderated by an evangelical pastor who was emphatic in counting both the Democrat and the Republican as his 'friends'? Who would have predicted that in such a setting, the issues of abortion and gay marriage would not dominate the pastor's queries? 

Oh, yes, and who would have anticipated that the passions of the pastor in question would be engaged not in the divisions created by the culture wars but in the imperative of civility in politics and the plight of the world's 148 million orphans? Here's betting that the next president will help some of those orphans find homes. 

The notion that Christianity in general and evangelicalism in particular are by nature right-wing creeds has always been wrong. How can a faith built around a commitment to the poor and the vulnerable be seen as leading ineluctably to conservative political conclusions? 

And when political commentators talk about 'evangelicals,' they are almost always talking about white evangelicals, forgetting that millions of African Americans are devout evangelical Christians and are hardly part of the conservative base. The civil rights movement was one of the greatest faith-based mobilizations in American history, even as it also drew on the energies of thousands of secular liberals who walked hand in hand with believers. 

Warren is an important figure not just because he's sold tens of millions of books but also because he has been leading evangelicals out of a political dead end that chose to ignore large parts of the Christian message. 

In 2004, Warren took the view that Christians should vote on a short list of 'nonnegotiable' issues, including abortion. But in 2006, on Fox News, of all places, Warren declared: 'Jesus's agenda is far bigger than just one or two issues. . . . We have to care about poverty, we have to care about disease, we have to care about illiteracy, we have to care about corruption in government, sex trafficking.' That is the new politics of evangelical Christianity. 

None of this means that white evangelicals will convert en masse to the Democratic Party. McCain, who carefully touched every hot button on the control panel of religious conservatism, will certainly get a substantial majority of their votes. The question is whether Obama can cut the Republican margin among white evangelicals by, say, five or 10 points. 

The New Evangelical Politics

John McCain's mate

John McCain aims to steal Barack Obama's thunder by announcing running mate
John McCain is poised to announce his vice-presidential running mate, hoping to steal the thunder of his rival Barack Obama, whom Republicans are mocking as an 'emperor' speaking on Thursday night at an 'Obamopolis'.

Senior aides to Mr McCain said that three people were on his shortlist - Governor Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut. But they were not ruling out a "dark horse" choice such as Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas. 

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Gus: I would suggest that whomever it is, McCain would have a better chance with Giuliani than Mitt and Joe... But Kay Bailey would actually woo the sisterhood... Hum... the plot thickens..

Obama's Faith-Based Follies

FAITH COMPLEX

By Jacques Berlinerblau

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suffice it to say that "religion and politics" reporting is essentially a new sub-genre of American journalism. It emerged, en masse, after 2004 as more and more editors and producers realized that: 1) the so-called "values voters" may have handed the election to George W. Bush, and, 2) few of their reporters had ever spoken to an actual values voter.

During the 2008 presidential race, by contrast, every major news agency in the country had a religion beat writer (or what I like to call a "faith and values" specialist) on staff. Most of this reportage rose to the challenge of covering the most religiously inflected election in recent memory. Some of it was truly top notch.

Yet I have always noticed one recurring flaw with Faith and Values journalism, a flaw that I think has come to the fore in the months after President Obama announced his renovation and expansion of George W. Bush's Office of Faith Based Initiatives. Whereas these new reporters are generally quick and eager to cast doubts on political figures they tend to be much more slow and hesitant to apply the same skepticism to religious figures who enmesh themselves within politics.

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One could wonder what this is all about but eventually the article beaches squarely on the rutile of beliefs and the honey pot. Who or what religious groups will get the dough?... And what influence this will have on the voters?... And what litigation from those getting less than others, plus annoyance from those who don't believe and court cases such as teaching evolution VS creationism in schools, etc. ... Yes "Thumpin' It: The Use and Abuse of the Bible in Today's Presidential Politics"  should be essential reading and extended to all faiths — if one does not know yet that Democracy should be exclusively faithless.

See toon at top.