Health and Diet Scottish Recipes Ferret for Ferrets


Re: [pf] Christianity/Progressivism
by Sharon Flesher
03 December 2000 20:44 UTC

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Julia wrote:

> It bothers me that Christianity has become associated with a right-wing
> political agenda.

This bothers me, also. I think it's a largely inaccurate portrayal of
Christians. There's a substantial Christian Left, too, and nobody ever
checks to see how we voted.

> My mother is proof that this is not so.  My father, who
> was involved with the Catholic Worker as a young man, often says that
Jesus
> was a radical and a socialist.  Even the Pope is consistently
> anti-capitalist.

Will Willimon, who is the dean of Duke Chapel, says Christianity (when
practicised as Jesus taught) is a radical, counter-culture movement.

I guess I'm nominally a Christian. My goal is to follow the teachings of
Jesus, which I do poorly. But I don't necessarily accept Jesus' divinity and
some of the other tenets of the faith. Some would say that means I'm not
really a Christian. Life is too short and there's too much to be done to
argue over definitions. But I do attend a mainstream (Methodist) church
regularly, and *most* (although certainly not all) of my fellow congregants
do not fit in with the political right. In my Sunday school class are
several human rights activists (most of whom are over 60 and have been doing
this a long time). In the pulpit today, our pastor, who normally sticks to
"folksy" topics and shies from anything too controversial, condemned racism,
compared anti-gay movements to the Nazis, and praised a couple of church
members who are on the controversial Traverse City Human Rights Commission.
This will not make the news. What makes the news is the "Christians" who
have circulated petitions in town asking for an amendment to the city's
charter that would prevent any resolution or law protecting homosexuals from
discrimination, and the local pastor who, with members of his congregation,
held up graphic signs at a summer festival depicting the "disgusting" things
homosexuals do and proclaiming that "God hates fags".

While my mother guessed that many Christians in her church
> voted for Bush (though not her), I can't understand how Christians would
> believe that W. flies the flag of their values

I never could figure out why right-wing Christians turned against Jimmy
Carter in favor of Reagan! Still doesn't make sense to me.

 > I don't understand how it's come to pass that Christians choose to
identify
> themselves with selfishness, insularity, shunning their less-fortunate
> neighbors, diverting largesse from the public welfare toward aggression
and
> the instruments of war, murdering prisoners, casting out the orphans and
the
> widows.  Having read the Bible, I can only believe that this is an obscene
> perversion of what Christ preached.  The bible-thumpers adhere to the God
of
> the Torah/Old Testament, the god of vengeance.  But Jesus was very
explicit
> about creating a new covenant based not on the law, but on grace.  Where
is
> that grace?  He said he came to free the prisoners.  Fundamentalists must
> take that literally.  I am saddened by what is going on.

Again, I think this is one segment of Christianity (and IMHO, a very
misguided segment) that gets a disproportionate share of media attention at
the expense of those who are motivated by their faith to work for peace,
justice, human rights, environmental restoration, etc. When people think of
Christians, why can't the ones who come to mind be the two nuns who were in
town recently to tell of their arrests and imprisonment for their
anti-nuclear protests? Or the local Catholic man who conducts training in
non-violent civil disobedience and has put his work in action at protests at
the School of the Americas and many other places? My guess is its because
few of these people seek attention for themselves and, thus, their faith
motivations do not become identified with their causes.

Sharon Flesher
CarSharing Traverse, Inc.
Traverse City, Mich.
sflesher@traverse.net

"Be the change you wish to see." M.K. Gandhi