Faith and Politics

Keith Olbermann once wrote that "The man who sees absolutes, where all others see nuances and shades of meaning, is either a prophet or a quack." How true this statement is and how more illumined it becomes; especially with the current oversimplification of our national discourse on faith and politics.

I would like to direct the majority of my opinion here to the recent Civil Forum held at the Saddleback Church in California under the mediation of Rick Warren. The event was meant as a civil discourse between Rick Warren and the two major-party nominees for the Presidency. It was meant to elevate our national discourse, to start construction on the bridge between faith and politics, to facilitate the eradication of the demonizing of people who disagree with us; whatever their reasoning may be. In my humble opinion, this did not happen.

On the most superficial level, this did not happen due to the apparent dishonesty of the McCain campaign; or by the dishonesty of Senator McCain himself. Rick Warren had said on several occasions that Senator McCain would be in a "Cone of Silence", thereby unable to have foreknowledge of the questions asked and, thereby, having to answer them without prior coaching. The McCain campaign themselves stated that Senator McCain was in a campaign motorcade for the first half of Senator Obama's interview and then in a green room (without, specifically stated, a broadcast feed) for the 2nd half. Why was this fact not stated when Rick Warren asked Senator McCain if the "Cone of Silence" was "comfortable"? In addition, why did Senator McCain ask, midway through the interview, when they could "get back to the question" about Supreme Court appointees when they hadn't yet reached that question?

It is interesting to note the irony in the use of the term "Come of Silence", as this was a device used for humor in the 1960's television show "Get Smart". In the show, The Chief would lower the "Cone of Silence" so as to avoid eavesdropping. Unfortunately, it only served to cause Maxwell Smart and The Chief to not hear each other while the conversation was quite audible to anyone outside of the cone.

On a deeper level, while I applaud Rick Warren's intentions, I have concerns over what seems to be an ever-growing section of, for lack of a better term, the "Religious Right". There seems to be a push to boil down the entirety of the Bible, and especially the message and enlightenment transmitted by Jesus, to several hot-button issues; the two frontrunners being abortion and homosexuality. Within the entire Gospel, Jesus does not mention these two issues directly at all. There is not even enough real evidence to show that he mentions them indirectly. Furthermore, most of the issues with homosexuality come from the Old Testament. Unfortunately, when we show that The Law approved the stoning of people who ate shellfish, we are told that the New Testament made a new covenant with the people of Israel. Unfortunately, there seems to be little rhyme or reason as to what parts of the Old Testament are still applicable and which aren't. What is able to be cherry-picked? Who decides?

We have all witnessed the lengths to which people have sought to force their position to be legislated in regards to these two issues. We have seen the polarizing effect from familial rifts to schisms within our entire nation. People have, at times, resorted to violent acts to prove their point. My main question is, with all of the horrors that we witness today including war, poverty, disease, starvation, genocide, climate change, etc.; are abortion and homosexuality the only issues to be receiving the majority of attention? Understand, I am not dismissing the incredible gravitas that an issue such as abortion entails, but I am asking why faith-based litmus tests for President don't involve the questioning of how they will handle the other issues I mentioned.

As an example, the "Evangelical Vote" has been lauded as one of the main reasons for President Bush's election and re-election. This is a President who, among other things, brought us into 2 wars, one of which was based on misdirection and coercion; presided over torture abuses in Gitmo, Abu Ghraib and secret prisons abroad; hired lawyers to redefine and allow, through semantics and legal maneuvering, the torture of prisoners; allowed illegal surveillance of every single American citizen; presided over the tragic debacle that was the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and supported the death penalty as a governor and president. How does an Evangelical, who believes so much in what Jesus taught, accept that the President in question goes against EVERY SINGLE tenant mentioned in the Gospels? Is it because he stated that "Christ" was his biggest political role model, which cost him nothing but the air needed to push the word through his lips? Is it that he proposes to overturn legislation based not on democratic and legislative principles, but upon his own belief in the rightness or wrongness of a given issue, no matter what the majority of Americans think or feel? Because he "sees absolutes" and can "see the soul" of a man like Vladimir Putin?

What follows are some of the examples of an unappreciation or lack of depth in dissecting an issue that, I feel, the audience in the Saddleback Church displayed.

When discussing the issue of abortion, Rick Warren loaded a question with the phrase "when does a baby have human rights?" This is not the issue considering that a fetus is not a baby until after birth. This is a perfect example of destroying the ability for thoughtful debate by inferring that someone who is pro-choice somehow approves of infanticide. This was further compounded when Mr. Warren likened 40 million abortions performed since Roe v. Wade to the holocaust. When Senator Obama proposed that having a President staunchly opposed to abortion did not help to lessen them and that the real issue deals with WHY people seek out abortions and can we limit the risk factors - he was met with silence.

In addition, I would like to know how many abortions were performed prior to Roe v. Wade? I would like the statistics of dead mothers along with this, since the illegality did nothing to stop chop-shop doctors from performing brutal procedures that killed both mother and fetus.

In addition, Senator Obama gave a well-thought, nuanced explanation that the quaestion of when life begins, from both a theological and scientific standpoint, were "above his pay grade", inferring the fact that both theologians and scientists have been debating this fact for centuries. This was met with silence. The audience seemed unable to grasp the concept that we cannot understand the Mystery completely; therefore, our understanding of surface issues such as these needs to be approached with humility and a complete acceptance of our ignorance. Conversely, when Senator McCain stated, with complete and utter certainty, that life begins at conception and that he would be a pro-life President and, in essence, work to completely overturn legislation based on his own ignorance of what a democracy is and how it operates; this was met with an almost instantaneous round of applause.

The first two questions on real issues facing America and the next President of the United States were about abortion and the definition of marriage. Not about the wrongness of war, not about the torture of "enemy combatants" in Gitmo, Abu Ghraib and secret prisons abroad, not about the genocide in Darfur and throughout Africa, not about the destruction of our planet, not the erosion of civil liberties under the Bush Administration, not about worldwide poverty and starvation. No, it was about abortion and the definition of marriage.

Is this how we plan to start building a bridge between faith and politics? Is this the best we can do? Is faith so weak as to crumble under the weight of who is able to get married? Shouldn't faith be a lightning rod of righteousness that holds our elected representatives accountable on issues they face every day and that we have very little control over? Who we decide to fight and why? How much innocent blood will spill? How we care for the planet that is our ONLY home and that is a gift from our Creator? How do we face the genocide of our brothers and sisters half a world away? How do we care for our children and their ability to lead us in the future? How do we care "for the least of these"? Should some of these be the lead-off questions by people of faith? Or should we try and fit our understanding of our world, our hearts, our God, into the space of a bumper sticker?