Great WaPo Article: Faith and budgets in DC

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/13/AR2005121301764.html

This is exactly what Sen. kerry was talking about in his speech in Manchester NH in early Nov. This is a good article that explains some of the new evangelicals and the passion they are bringing to the deiscussion in DC. I highly recommend it!

I'll have to share it with my mom. She (as was my dad) is a life-long devout member of the United Methodist Church. We have these kinds of discussions often. Bush calls himself a member of the Methodist Church, what a ruse.

I am SO glad to see this sort of dialogue FINALLY happening--and being reported on. It's about friggin' time. :)

Edited:

Okay, I just read the whole article--and once again I'm cringing with embarrassment over the quotes from Dobson and co. Poverty isn't important? It's not the government's responsibility? I get so tired of them using this argument for things that are not their priority, and then fussing about how we need a government that promotes morality and values when it comes to their pet issues. Either the government is or is not a moral body--you can't argue both sides like that to suit your purposes.

I hope that somehow conservatives will feel some vague sense of unease when they read those statements from their demigods. Sometimes it seems like nothing will get through to them. Very frustrating.

We have had some bumpy roads as sometimes this is brought up and people shudder and think you are trying to recruit them for your personal religious point of view. Not so. This needs to be talked about. We must talk about how some extremist viewpoints are crowding out other religious viewpoints and that is wrong.

We should also talk about faith and politics. This is vital for going into the future. The Dems used to 'own' this issue. Ask Dr. ML King, Jr. His powerful and touching speeches were always a call to conscience that had one hand on the Constitution and the other on the Bible. He knew that you can reconcile and respect each and keep them separate and yet get something from both that is hugely powerful.

Jim Wallis is a vital person in helping the Dems to defuse the stranglehold that the Pat Robertsons of the world hold over the media imagination of religion in America. Wallis is much closer to mainstream America than Robertson ever was or is, yet Robertson gets the big play. It's wrong.

I just edited my post above after reading the whole article. I'm still working through Wallis' book--it's very good. Has JK ever read it, to your knowledge? Or spoken with Wallis? I bet the two of them would get along very well.

I agree about the need to talk about faith. After all, religion is part of what defines culture, along with government, language, and traditions. And when it comes to faith and government, almost all faiths have enough common ground to speak in unity to government. I might have deep theological disagreements with a Muslim or a Buddhist, but we share a concern for the poor and a desire to see people treated in ethical, humane ways--assuming none of us are inappropriately extremist about our theologies. I can't go as far as saying all faiths are the same because their beliefs make them each unique, but I do think that the majority of them share enough morals and values to work together to be a moral compass for our government.

So I'm glad to see faith being discussed and people of faith getting involved.

He mentioned him in a speech he gave in Manchester, NH in early Nov. (This is archived on C-Span under the Road to the White House series. I think it aired around 11/18/05.)

I attended my state Dem Convention (Mass) in May and everyone was reading three books: Don't Think of an Elephant, What's the Matter with Kansas, and Jim Wallis' God's Politics. I heard Teddy Kennedy's wife talk about this book. I can take it, ah, on faith that John Kerry has read it. (Great book.) Oh and boy, oh boy have his speeches, especially post-Katrina, have reflected views that could have been directly inspired by reading that book.

I'm on p. 73 right now, where Wallis is relating a story about talking to a republican strategist at Harvard who was crowing about his recent campaign successes because of the fact that they had the rich voting for them and had convinced the working class to vote against their own self interests in favor of "values." So Jim Wallis asked him the following question:

"What would you do if you faced a candidate who took a traditional moral stance on the social and cultural issues? They would not be mean-spirited and, for example, blame gay people for the breakdown of the family, nor would they criminalize the choices of desperate women backed into difficult and dangerous corners. But the candidate would decidedly be pro-family, pro-life (meaning really want to lower the abortion rate), strong on personal responsibility and moral values, and outspoken against the moral pollution throughout popular culture that makes raising children in America a countercultural activity. And what if that candidate was also an economic populist, pro-poor in social policy, tough on corporate corruption and power, clear in supporting middle- and working-class families in health care and education, an environmentalist, and committed to a foreign policy that emphasized international law and multilateral cooperation over preemptive and unilateral war? What would you do?"

The guy paused for a long time and apparently answered back, "We would panic!"

I would SO vote for a candidate like that. Heck, I'd do more than vote for a candidate like that. I'd actually get involved in a campaign for that person--which would be a radically new thing for me. :) JK seems like that sort of person. I wish he was MY senator! Hagel isn't horrible, but he's definitely not the person Wallis describes in that question. Where are the people like that? Ugh, I'm too much of an idealist. This sort of thing drives me up the wall.

Sen. Kerry also mentioned this in the speech he made at his birthday celebration on Sunday. He is so sincere in his faith, and truly believes the teachings in the Bible that say we need to take care of "the least among us". I am so glad that he, and other liberal voices are speaking out on these issues because doing so honors our Democratic heritage from FDR to John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and beyond.

on the abortion issue. But if "pro-life" means trying to reduce the number of abortions, while keeping it legal, then I'm all for that. I just think abortion (at least in the 1st trimester) needs to stay legal, or women's rights will be set back to the dark ages.

Here is a quote from the article that says it all for me about the religious right:



Excuse me? THAT is your "Christian" agenda? I don't recall Jesus having a Sermon about how homosexuals are ruining the world and destroying our values. I don't recall Jesus condemning and judging Mary Mageline for being a prostitute. His teachings are about love. Plain and simple. And the religious right's agenda is about hate.

Here is another quote that got me scratching my head:



What does this lady think government is? A building? It is made up of PEOPLE, for crying out loud, so the government, like any company, church or institution, is very much capable of "love", as in helping people. But you need to nurture it in order for it to give out that love. And FEMA was like an infant that was completely abandoned. If you saw that Frontline episode you will see that the agency was severely abused, cut, and reduced to a minor agency that * really wanted to just get rid of. So all the good people left. This woman represents the WORST of conservative thinking -- I mean I read JK's speech about the War on Terror and how in the ME, everything for people is done through the Mosque, with all of the extremism there, and the despotic governments do nothing. And people like James Dobson want that here.

These people need to be stopped is all I can say. And by the way, the other person besides Wallis who can show us the way is Bono. He used Christianity to get the religious right (even Santorum) to get on board about AIDS and poverty in Africa. So there is hope to get rank and file Christians to think about things differently.

I think there is even a Bono blurb on the Wallis book. They are on the same page here.

Monday on the Floor. Did anyone else catch that? I was really impressed.