American Theocracy Anyone?---Part Two

In last week's commentary I wrote about the recent onslaught of accusations being leveled in print against evangelical and charismatic Christians to the effect that we are really trying to turn America into a theocracy---that tyrannical right-wing Christians want to systematically dismantle democratic institutions and usher in an American facism. As laughable as this may seem to most of us, these authors are deadly in earnest in pressing their attacks. Unfortunately, just as some folks took seriously the absurd fictions of the Da Vinci Code, people are reading these books. I have counted nine of them, one of which was ranked number one on the New York Times bestseller list for a while. So, instead of simply ignoring the accusations, I have chosen to respond in this two-part commentary.

In American Theocracy, Kevin Phillips is evidently afraid of the Southern Baptist Convention becoming the "State Church" of the South! Now, apart from the ridiculous supposition that southern Baptists could ever agree on enough things to actually become an established Church, the fact of the matter is that no denomination in America is capable of that kind of influence today in our society. The days of the old WASP liberal mainline denominational hegemony in American society are long gone decades ago. Further, the evangelical influence that these writers are attacking is characterized by the lack of ecclesiastical organization that would enable it to wield any effective sort of power. The power of evangelical Christianity with the American public is pretty much limited to the powers of persuasion.

One example of an attempt at persuading the public comes to mind---the boycotts of certain American corporations' products organized by my friends at the American Family Association. They have launched consumer boycotts of corporations such as Walt Disney and the Ford Motor Company. Both of these boycotts have protested the companies' blatant support of the homosexual rights movement. How effective are they? That's hard to measure. Ford's sales have dropped dramatically while the boycott has been underway, but American car companies are in real trouble anyway, due to explosive sales growth by Toyota and BMW. In the past, AFA boycotts have caused a few companies to change their policies, but even in those cases it seems impossible to tell how effective the boycotts were. Was it that the boycotts actually caused their sales to drop, or it was that they were so conscious of their public image that they wanted to get rid of the boycott quickly? We'll probably never know.

Or, to take another example, it is granted that Focus on the Family 's Jim Dobson can put out a notice that will unleash a torrent of emails, phone calls, and letters on the members of Congress or the President. But, even that kind of campaign can be, and frequently is, ignored by Senators and Representatives and Presidents who are determined to do what they want to do. The ultimate influence of Christians on policy-makers of any governmental level is limited to the same level of power as the influence of any other type of Americans---the vote.

As our society becomes more secular, it should not be surprising to anyone familiar with the New Testament that the number of attacks on Bible-believing evangelical Christians is on the rise. Still, the falsity of the accusations against us and the absurdity of the attackers' reasoning knows no bounds. Bill Moyers, who has drifted very far away from what (if memory serves correctly here) are his evangelical southern Baptist roots, accuses us of not caring about global warming or the environment. In a New York Review of Books essay entitled "The Evangelist Menace" he wrote: "Why care about the earth when the droughts, floods, famine, and pestilence brought by ecological collapse are signs of the apocalypse foretold in the Bible? Why care about global climate change when you and yours will be rescued in the Rapture?"

Oh, good grief!! In the first place, Christians are just as divided on the global warming issue as the rest of the public. There are those who have jumped on the bandwagon, saying that this is a terribly urgent problem that the U.S. Government must address immediately. And, there are others that agree with me that although there are definite minor temperature changes, there is no demonstrably proven evidence that these are outside the limits of normal periodic change, and that the Michael Moores and Al Gores of the world are fomenting all this hype mainly to create careers for themselves.

Second, Christians are also quite divided on the issue of the rapture. There are those who believe that the Lord Jesus will whisk off the earth all true Christian believers before the period during the End Times that the Bible calls the Great Tribulation. And, there are many others, including myself (and ALL of the great 16th century Reformers, by the way) who do not look for the Rapture to occur until at least half-way through the Tribulation. In addition, no Christian knows when any of this will occur, whether soon or millennia from now. I have never met anyone, nor have I ever read about anyone adopting the attitude that Moyers accuses us evangelicals of having. No one in their right mind would choose to not care about the obvious deterioration of the world around us, if in fact it were obvious. Especially since no one has any firm idea of when the END is coming.

Third, both the Clinton administrations and the Bush administrations have refused to take drastic steps to deal with global warming. To view their refusals as based on Biblical teachings on the last days is a stretch that puts credulity totally out of joint. Would to God that these administrations had been that concerned about Biblical teachings! No, it really has much more to do with economics, and with good reason. To spend the kind of money attempting to fight global warming to the extent that is called for by the Kyoto protocol and many environmentalist organizations would bankrupt the American economy, for a very questionable cause.

Well, enough of the silly accusations about evangelicals wanting to turn America into some imitation of 17th Century Puritan Massachusetts. What is it that we evangelicals actually do want?

We definitely do not want to equate Christians getting involved in trying to change American society with their joining some political party or movement. In talking with a woman at the gym where I work out, after asking about some of my views she said, "You must be a Republican." "No," I said, "actually, I'm registered Independent. I vote for the candidate that seems to best stand for the values I believe in." In my experience there are literally tens of millions of Christians around the country that share my position on this. Sadly, several of the books mentioned in last week's commentary, especially Jimmy Carter's Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis, advocate "Christian" positions on issues that simply amount to the Democratic Party platform. He, and many of these authors attacking evangelical Christians, seem to believe that collective social action is the primary vehicle of Christian involvement, as opposed to the efforts of individuals. Taking that position inevitably results in party politics eclipsing religion. Which is precisely what they accuse evangelicals of doing---blindly supporting the Republican Party. Ironic, isn't it?

Proof that the Religious Left is really promoting political party action is seen in their advocated solutions for three issues: poverty, environmental concerns, and peace. In the case of dealing with poverty, to their credit authors Carter, Lerner, Meyers, Wakefield, and Wallis are indeed serious about feeding and clothing the hungry and poor. But, they think that this should all be handled by the government. Some of them are in favor of the government forcibly redistributing assets, which is Marxist policy, and not remotely Christian. Though government policies are necessary, Christian care for the poor and needy does not consist in lobbying the government to take care of things. Where is the private sector involvement? Trying to deal with poverty through politics simply excuses the individual from the personal responsibility to get involved---hardly what Jesus had in mind when he said that we should offer a cup of cold water in His name.

Some of these writers equate peacemaking with pacifism, which the Bible never does. In Romans 13, the Word of God makes it clear that the punishment of evildoers in society will involve the use of the sword. And certainly, there are times when the defense of my next-door or across-the-ocean neighbor will necessitate violence, such as deterring a rapist, or the present war on terrorism.

The positions of many on the Religious Left in regard to environmentalism raise serious concerns. Pressure from Western governments on developing nations to adopt our environmental regulations will stifle their fragile economies and thus bring more harm than help to their people. Besides, it smacks of what to them is an all-too-familiar imperialism. There is also the great danger of a proper reverence for God's creation sliding into a decidely non-Christian pantheism, or the worship of the creation. Any policy that denies the primary place in the creation to man, or equates human beings with the animals in value, is a policy that rejects Biblical truth, and must be resisted by Christians. A proper Bible-based environmental policy will be one that emphasizes proper stewardship of the creation as people who will have to give an account to the Creator. True environmentalism is an exercise in stewardship. We must neither rape and plunder the creation on the one hand, nor become captive to it and worship it on the other. As God instructed Adam, we are to "till" it, and to take care of it.

Christians are most definitely called to be involved in matters of public policy. To take seriously the call of the Lord Jesus Christ to love your neighbor is to accept the necessity of reforming whatever society we find ourselves in. We are also commanded by our Lord to be "salt and light," which means that we are to season and illuminate all issues of public policy with a Bible-based wisdom and discernment.

We seek no lasting strongholds of power, for the Kingdom to which we bear first allegiance is not of this world. I know of no Christian leader who advocates evangelicals "taking over" the reins of power. Our influence is to be persuasional, not coercive, after the example of our Lord. For no one can be forced to change his mind. Reformation and renewal in society can never be forced on people from the top down---from the seats of power down to the citizenry. Rather, reformation and renewal have to come about as a grass-roots movement of Christians being used by the Spirit of God to change their neighbors---one at a time, two at a time, a city at a time. By definition, it is a strictly voluntary movement, one that will have the characteristics of a revival. That is what we want to see happen.

What kinds of public policies do we evangelical Christians want to see take place in America today? A quick and by no means exhaustive list would include things like: a general prohibition of abortion; the allowance of prayer in public schools; the rejection of embryonic (not adult) stem-cell research; the Federal prohibition of homosexual marriage (either by law or by an admendment to the Constitution); further restrictions on pornography; a tightening of obscenity laws in movies and television; vigorous law enforcement against pedophiles both on the Internet and in the society at large; the replacement of sex education programs for students with abstinence-based programs; putting an end to the tyranny of Darwinian evolution teaching in public schools such that the flaws in evolutionary theory and creation science would at least get equal consideration; and stopping the Federal court system's twisting of the First Amendment to find some supposed "separation of Church and State" that in turn is used to remove all public expression of the Christian faith from American society.

Interesting...

You accept the big bang, but can’t determine when life begins.

You scrap different DNA? By that judgement my disabled mother should be put down because she doesn’t breathe on her own... hence ‘not really living’ and needs me.

I feel the Groningen Protocol coming on...

BTW, re: the meaning of life and founding documents

Slavery, abortion... was that thought about then?

Don’t worry, when Islam takes over, you’ll have no need (or right), to ponder these questions.

On abortion, you may get 40 days... depends on the sect.

On homosexuality... hung, pretty much.

On questioning... see above.

On the other hand, I would like to see you debate all men coming from apes with them though... it would be interesting.

Gotta hop, my daughter just told me they’re building footbaths at her university in Virginia.

An atheist coworker of my husbands is intrigued by Christianity because he says that it’s the only religion that talks about forgiveness.

For at least some religions, this is because they don't believe in "sin" per se--hence, nothing to forgive.

Yeah, some teachings of some religions overlap, but the love mercy and forgiveness offered to people that God does, is unprecedented.

Again, I understand why Christians think so, but followers of other religions very likely think the same of their deities. The Native Americans, for instance, speak of the love of the Great Spirit for his children. Here's one example.

He’s not a god who needs to be appeased to ward off His wrath.

Perhaps not now, but the scriptures which Christians call the Old Testament is full of stories about Yahweh's wrath and the attempts of the Israelites to appease him.

No, Christianity is not like other religions, even if some of the other teachings overlap, which is bound to happen.

Well, I suppose it can be said that no religion is like another, from the viewpoint of its adherents. And you're quite right that teachings overlap; it seems that all humans have certain innate needs and inclinations, which understandably turn up in the religions they create.

And so what if Jesus knew of Buddah’s teaching?

Well, so nothing, except that you had stated Jesus' teachings were "head and shoulders" above anyone else's. I merely meant to demonstrate that that was not accurate, especially if he took some of his material from the Buddha. No biggie.

Hey, I think it's great that you've found a belief system that works for you! Many people never do. All I'm trying to do here is point out a slightly different angle of perception for people who perhaps have only ever looked at things from one fixed viewpoint.

Thanks for the interesting discussion! :)

Sincerely,

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