Christian? Right?By Marilyn Chandler McEntyre
Here are some
of the identifying features of that agenda: One commentator has used the term "citizen militia" to describe the flag-waving hoards who celebrate the election of a president who has used his supposed "mandate" to ratchet up weapons programs, further assault the ecosystems that sustain all our lives, protect the interests of the rich, and subordinate the needs of the poor. Alas, a good number among those cheering the Republican takeover are churchgoing people who sincerely believe that God has sent us a leader whose purposes are God's own. Why do they think this? (I've asked.) Because he prays. Because he gathers with his cohort to study Scripture. Because he's "unafraid" to invoke the name of God publicly. Because he opposes abortion. (This from the single-issue voters who need look no further.) Because he supports "traditional family values." Because he appears to believe that America is a Christian nation (demographic and historical data notwithstanding) and as such, a chosen people whose objectives are God's own. The very public nature of Bush's religiosity ought to be at least a yellow flag for any believer who remembers Jesus' admonishment to the Pharisees: "Beware of practicing your piety before men in order to be seen by them; for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 6:1). Bush's "God talked to me" approach to political decision-making needs at least to be submitted to the test Paul sets forth in enumerating the fruits of the Spirit: if an action is truly "Spirit-driven," it will be marked by "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control" (Galatians 5:23). Moreover we are explicitly reminded that "Not every one who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 7:21). So it appears "sincere belief" is subject to a "reality check." Sincerity itself is, of course, a manifestly useless and dangerous criterion of rightness. A list of those history has shown to be sincerely and disastrously wrong would require a volume at least the size of the Bible itself. Some of the most sincere people I know are also the most poorly informed. Indeed I sometimes wonder if sincerity isn't the opiate of the invincibly ignorant. And I wonder how those on the "Christian Right" whose rallying cry is "family values" read Jesus' admonishment to the disciples, "If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26). Or his answer to the messenger who interrupted him to say his mother and brothers wanted his attention: "Who is my mother and who are my brothers? . . . whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother" (Matthew 12:42). Obviously these startling "hard sayings" need to be read in context. No one claims Jesus was "antifamily," but neither did he elevate a particular model of family life as the only acceptable context in which to live a godly and faithful life. Rather he seemed to indicate that there would be circumstances in which people would be called to leave their families, to reconfigure them, to challenge them, and in any case to understand that as members of the Body of Christ, they would have to subordinate their allegiance to all human institutions, including family. Focusing on the family can become idolatry. Politically, the "family values" banner conveniently serves the purposes of Bush's deeper agenda, all too reminiscent of the National Socialist slogan, "Kinder, Küche, Kirche" (Children, Kitchen, Church) that focused the attention of a compliant population on the domestic sphere as the locus of their proper moral concern, while real political power was usurped by the state. The claim that the last election was won by those who voted on the "moral issues" is surely one of the most offensive to those of us who believe in the richness and complexity of the biblical story and the way it invites us to moral reflection. Evidently the "moral" issues in the election were reduced, for the Christian Right to abortion, gay marriage, and stem cell research. Liberal Christians (unlike most of their compatriots to the far Right) recognize the moral complexity of these issues and the need for careful reflection on the context of biblical guidelines invoked in discussing them. What is most offensive about the positions routinely taken by the "Christian Right" on all three of these issues is the oversimplification of what is at stake for persons immediately involved, and their alarming unwillingness to see these issues in the wider context. Abortion can hardly be opposed without giving comparable attention to systems that support people in a wide range of desperate situations--people for whom the decision is neither abstract nor ideological, but rather economic, relational, and radically personal. As to gay marriage, a colleague of mine put it best when she pointed out that Christians who most vocally oppose it are generally those whose lives are least affected in any direct way. "Why don't we spend our time on the sins—if they are sins—that we ourselves are most prone to, rather than adjudicating the behavior of those whose needs and longings we can't know or experience?" she asked. To which I can only add, Amen. (cf. Matthew 7:3) Stem cell research, like abortion, is not a simple issue, and we need to be vigilant indeed about the uses to which human lives and bodies are put in the name of science. As with abortion, it does raise significant moral and medical questions and ethicists who have done their biological homework are needed to serve as guardians over the processes by which stem cells are collected and used. Nor do I think we should simply "leave it to the experts." But those of us who aren't experts have some homework of our own to do before presuming to pronounce with the utter certainty of many on the far right that efforts to determine the healing potential of stem cells are evil. Most troubling of all, of course, is the fact that so many seem to restrict their concept of morality to personal actions. Where is the moral concern for the underfunding of services for the poorest among us, or stewardship of the natural world that has been put into our keeping? How can we overlook the moral obscenity that is war? Especially a war based on lies that has laid waste to the land and infrastructure of Iraq, killed well over 100,000 innocent civilians, and brutalized the psyches of our own troops as they brutalize their victims in the name of security. As a Christian teaching at a Christian college, wife of a Christian pastor, I am appalled at the irresponsibility, ignorance, and self-righteous posture of the "Christian Right." I am deeply grateful for progressive Christians like the editors of Christian Century (christiancentury.org) and Sojourners (sojo.net), congregations that have rallied against war and weapons buildup, organizations like the Mennonite Central Committee (mcc.org), the American Friends' Service Committee (afsc.org), Pax Christi (paxchristi.org), and Church Folks for a Better America (cfba.info) who offer an alternative political vision to people of faith. Many on the "Christian Right" are fond of posing the question "WWJD?—What Would Jesus Do?" I'd like to remind them what Jesus DID do: he cared for the poor. He did not condemn the woman caught in adultery. He prayed alone. He commanded us to love our enemies. He preached peace. He ate, drank, and lived with "tax collectors and sinners"—the lowlifes and outcasts of his day—while reserving his condemnation for the religious leaders who lorded over them with their hypocritical, legalistic morality. He told his disciples not to oppose the healing work of those outside the ranks of his followers. And again and again he reminded us to care for the poor. (Concern for the poor gets more air time than any other topic in the gospels: 1 verse in 9.) If Christians concerned about how to respond to the grave global issues facing us were to reread the Gospels for guidance, I think we'd find some pretty clear indications there about what Jesus would do. And what he wouldn't. (One of the few bumper stickers I've been tempted to affix to my still undecorated car reads, "Who would Jesus bomb?") Whatever Jesus would do, given what he did do, and what he has promised he will do, I don't think it looks much like what the insulated, self-congratulatory Fox News fans on the Christian Right are doing. Visit us at
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"Christian
Right" is possibly the most insidious misnomer of our time.
Among those who are most mournful and angry about the outcome of
the last election, doubtful about the integrity of the process,
and opposed to the neoconservative agenda are Christians who believe
the name of Christ is being pressed into service to market a corrupt
and militaristic political agenda.