'Serious Christians' and Politics
Last Thursday, fellow Illinoize blogger Dan Johnson-Weinberger, took a gentle swipe at religious conservative voters in his post, "Meeks, Blagovich, Topinka...".
(Meeks reminds me that those Christians who take the teachings of Jesus seriously are economically liberal — chasing the money-changers out of the Temple and all that).
My first response is that only those who don't know much about economics are economically liberal. Not only do socialism and communism don't work, they also deny the existence of the individual, his needs, desires, work and responsibility. Capitalism works not because it was ordained by God, but because so far it's the best system that caters to the individual.
Now for the spiritual response. I had actually been thinking for the past few weeks about the misconception you have, because a surface reading of the scriptures would back up your position.
New Testament Christianity is all about the personal responsbility of the believer.
[For the rest of the post, check out the original at IllinoisHistory.com as it's too long to post here.
22 comments:
I'm with you, John. I'm not intimidated by such swipes.
The obvious application of the story of Christ casting the money changers out of the temple is to cast the moneychangers (lobbyists) out of the State Capitol.
I don't see any precedent for taking more tax money involuntarily and giving it do someone who didn't earn it.
Economic liberalism is not socialism, you ditto-head.
Tell me, how do you square your 10% flat tax "tithe" with the beginning of Luke 21?
If you are describing economic liberalism as what's coming from the left side of the Democratic Party then it is based on Marxist and other socialist thought that gives rise to class warfare.
Any economic system that diminishes individual rights, diminishes private property rights, or encourages government to play an active role in choosing sides or classes to favor, is not free market capitalism and by definition is in opposition to the principles upon which our forefathers found this country.
Actually "Liberal Economics" is what Europe considers to be "Laissez-Faire Economics" or the central tenet of Classical Economics.
As to Gary's question about the widow and her donation highlighted in Luke 21, see the IllinoisHistory.com blog for the response.
There is a long tradition of Evangelical Christian leftism in the United States. I just picked up Michael Kazin's, A Godly Hero: The Life of William Jennings Bryan who's the classic Democratic Evangelical Leftist.
Lindy Scott was a nice example of it today. Google my post on his Christian-Federal-Budget.
Democrats raise this Christian Progressive Economics(it'sChristian Socialism in Europe) to outflank the right-to-life movement. They use the Christian word a lot.
The right-to-lifers seldom do. You can agree to a right-to-life position independent of Christianity or any other religion or lack of religion.
As a non-Christian, I find using the word Christian to discuss economics jarring to the ear.
It implies you have to accept Jesus to advocate a just economic system.
A right-to-lifer would never ask you to accept Jesus as a conditon to agreeing to the right-to-life.
It's a right-to-life movement, not a Christian-right-to-life movement. That's a huge difference in looking at the mix of Religion and Politics, progressives completely misunderstand when they start trying to reclaim a moral ground with Christian social policy on health and welfare.
Why Progressives misunderstand how moral values work in politics is an interesting question.
No, democrats and economic liberals don’t base our theory on Marxism or communism. We base it on our values – most coming either directly or indirectly from our religious heritage.
Overwhelmingly people – not just “liberals” – believe that capitalism should be fair. They recognize that because of the power that large corporations have, regulation is necessary to maintain fairness. That’s not anti-capitalist, that’s what we do to preserve capitalism and our value structure at the same time. That’s why, in our very pro-capitalist country, you’re not going to find a lot of support to eliminate child labor laws, anti-discrimination law, minimum wage laws, or workplace safety law.
Maybe you’re accidentally conflating the very radical left (hey, they’re not democrats, they actually are communists!) with those of us who believe its government’s role to get this – ensure that our economic system isn’t depriving us of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Maybe it’s not accidental.
But in either case, if you keep trying to tar people who put more emphasis on fairness than on economic ideology as communists, we’re going to award you the Sandy Wegman award for least relevant straw man. Because, as you may/may not have noticed, the cold war is over.
What in the world is fair?
Capitalism is all about winning and losing.
The game and rules should be fair i.e. rule of law.
But the whole idea of Capitalism is winning and losing, risk and loss.
The problem with communism and socialism is it puts the investment decisions in the hands of the state and ended up making everyone losers.
The classic economic example being the East German Trabant car. A car that created negative worth; it was something worth less than the sum totals of it's parts besides being a huge polluter.
Not only do socialism and communism don't work
My first response is that only those who don't know much about written English are conservative bloggers. Nice double negative.
"New Testament Christianity is all about the personal responsbility of the believer."
Interesting.
I thought the Sermon on the Mount was in the New Testament.
I though the Beatitudes were in the New Testament.
Are those all about personal responsibility, or do those show a mandate to help those unable to help themselves?
anon 9:25
Tag along with Lindy Scott next time he visits Cuba. You'll get the picture.
...or check Mugabe's interpretation of socialism.
Actually the difference in America where both major parties are committed to capitalism is over two basic issues.
One is the number of times market failure occurs with conservatives generally arguing it doesn't happen that often and liberals arguing it happens relatively frequently.
The second difference occurs over when a market failure occurs, whether government is an effective means of addressing that failure or whether it might cause more harm.
That individuals who espouse the market so highly fail to understand these very simple economic points indicates that many who pontificate on economics have more of a faith based view of them and are not concerned with actually understanding them.
Archpundit hit the nail on the head.
Both parties (rightly) are committed to capitalism. Sadly, they are also both committed to big government. In terms of economics, the two parties really aren't that different, with the exception that Democrats support a solvent big government, which I suppose is marginally better than a big government built on debt, but those who favor smaller government really have no option among the major parties.
I agree pretty much with Arch.
What I dislike though are Progressives trying to reclaim the evangelical vote by invoking Christ and Christianity on economics.
These are questions of social insurance and risk and loss... the size of the safety net best left to actuaries and economists...and the voters.
I'm not interested in a theologians viewpoints here right or left; capitalist or socialists.
Roberts made a good point when asked by Durbin on how he would rule on abortion: not as a Judge, but as a Father and Catholic.
I think he was cut off from responding but somehow managed to say he would rule as a Judge.
His role as Father and Catholic having no effect on his role as a judge..in fact it would be in appropriate for him to rule as Father or Catholic; but only as a Judge interpreting the law.
It's up to voters to make the moral calls (read Scalia) and we can turn to what ever faith tradition or lack of it, we find helpful, but I really hate it when someone tells me I should be against abortion, or for taxes because that's what Jesus would do.... or that's what a good Christian would do. That's just doesn't work for me and I find sort of offensive.
Especially as a Unitarian Universalist who are pretty much defined as non Christians by Christian Churches. It implyies Christians somehow have a unique in with God that allows them to write the fair budget.
Interestingly, I can't recall anyone arguing a pro-life stand with me in a specific christian context. It's been simlpe life begins at conception and taking innocent life is wrong. Pretty straight forward argument regardess of what one believes about religion or Christ.
Without question, Christ spoke powerfully about helping those less fortunate. That is why so many ministries perform charitable deeds in nearly every community.
The problem comes when some (on the left, and more recently the right) try to involve government in the charitable deeds. There are two problems here.
First, Christ spoke of helping others out of compassion. The contradiction here is that government receives its funds not by voluntary donation, but by coercive taxation. Taxpayers are forced to contribute to "public charity" whether they want to or not, and whether they already give voluntarily to a private charitable organization or not. Needless to say, compassion is not defined as using the heavy hand of the IRS or IDOR, with associated penalties, to collect from funders.
Second, those Christians interested in furthering charities should do all that is possible to encourage voluntary contribution, but don't because of the attitude "Let George do it". The first step here is to lead by example- those that advocate government social welfare programs should show how much they have personally contributed to mitigate poverty before they force the taxpaying public to hand over more money to the IRS/IDOT. The second step here is to lead a private, voluntary fundraising effort to fund charities.
Sadly, those advocating public charitable and welfare spending often (Al Gore comes to mind) give little or nothing out of their own funds, but are the loudest at proclaiming their own "support" as evidenced by their advocacy of government welfare spending.
It goes without saying that if a person doesn't personally give to charities, they aren't following Christ's teachings; you don't get credit for advocating forcibly taking money from someone else via the IRS/IDOR, siphoning off a significant part of it for salaries and then spending the rest of someone else's money on charity.
And to be fair to many conservatives in economics, many view less intervention by the government as the best way to help the poor. The argument in such cases isn't one of what would Jesus do, as much as how would Jesus do it--with all apologies to Bill who makes good points as well--just operating in the framework of the original discussion.
Economics is an empirical and positive science. As such it can answer questions of efficiency, but not one of morals or normative arguments without additional value judgments. Even if you have the same value judgments, the state of economics is such that one may not find a clear answer in the best economic policy to pursue--hence why there is such a wide gap between conservatives and liberals.
For Christians, and as a Christian, I don't see many Christians who prefer less government intervention as necessarily ignoring Christ's teaching--I assume the best and that they have a different view over how to actualize those teachings so we argue over evidence and theory, not over goals. Some prove me wrong, but that doesn't invalideate those who argue for such policies in good faith. It becomes more complicated then when you have many faiths discussing such issues so I usually refer only to tenets of values that derive from my faith, but can speak to anyone in a multi-faith society.
Archpundit:
"For Christians, and as a Christian, I don't see many Christians who prefer less government intervention as necessarily ignoring Christ's teaching--"
We disagree on that. Many on the right simply don't care about the poor, and feel that Christianity calls for a sort of "everybody for himself" world. That is why they refuse to support programs for the poor, and attempt to use Christianity to justifity it.
I agree Arch that Gov not intervening many times the best way to help the poor.
I think strengthening families one of the best things to do to help the poor.
If a Christian (or any Church goer for that matter) comes up to me and criticizes Gov policy, I turn around and ask what their church has done. The Churches in many respects have been huge failures... if we have astronomical divorce rates, out of wedlock births, and all sorts of ills...what has your church done about it... is what I ask. These can be significant contributers to poverty. (And it's also why I'm opent to faith based initiatives and school vouchers).
I hate to see Christ dragged into this ethical debates though, mostly because I don't think of him as a moral teacher...
I'm with C.S. Lewis here who wrote in Mere Christianity that Christ makes little sense as a moral teacher... Christian really discount their own faith when they follow this Social Gospel path... here's my favorite Lewis quote,
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about him: I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon and you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronising nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
So I really discourage folks from dragging him into debates on Federal Spending. He's on a different track.
I like Greco Roman neo-pagans much more for civil religion. It's no accident so many public buildings in Wash DC are Greco Roman.
One can come to social conservatism down some different paths... we're not all Pat Robertsons.
PS Arch, I understand your talk on gov intervention was a fair portrayel of conservative econ policy... and not yours necessarily...
Although I think Clinton's welfare reform was a good progressive program in the best sense of FDR's pragmatism...
Cooking dinner while commenting... if things seem disjointed... sorry...just scroll away if you don't like it.
===We disagree on that. Many on the right simply don't care about the poor, and feel that Christianity calls for a sort of "everybody for himself" world. That is why they refuse to support programs for the poor, and attempt to use Christianity to justifity it.
We both agree and disagree. Sure, the Robert Tilton's of the world are cynical and don't follow Christ's teaching on the poor, but I do know many conservatives who are Christians and do have a different view of how to achieve the same goals. I said many as to avoid the debate over how many or the overall number, but I know a fair number of evangelicals who aren't mean spirited, but believe in conservative economic thought and think they are teaching a man to fish. I don't begrudge them--but the all for themselves stuff--yeah, it's not the same thing as what I'm talking about.
Baar---a UU--that's got to be a hell of congregration.
Arch,
2% of UU ministers voted for Bush. I think they're about 1,000 of them.
The Geneva Church is very well run and also historic structure. One of the first churches in Kane County built in 1846.
I always try and assume the best motivations behind peoples views. And I try to think most involved in politics committed to what's best for America.
That's tough persepctive to hold in Illinois sometimes though.
B
I should have been online more! Neat discussion. I certainly don't think anyone should be 'intimidated' by my gentle swipe, but it is fair (I think) to engage in the WWJD debate over economics, largely because Christian thought plays such a large role in the current Republican coalition. To ignore the role of self-identified Christians is to miss out on some of the big currents in American politics. I mean, the coalition between the great malefactors of wealth and evangelicals that compose the two dominant wings of the Republican Party is an odd coupling. So, here's my direct question to the non-mean-spirited Christian/pious Republican voters who believe their religion calls on them to care for the poor: shouldn't income increases for the poor be driving your economic philosophy rather than income increases for the wealthy? Bush economics, which are largely cutting marginal tax rates on high incomes no matter the consequences, are not designed to raise incomes for the poor. Isn't that fact extremely troublesome to the pious?
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