If Jesus were alive today, wouldn’t he have been a liberal? My lefty friends and I have talked about this a lot. The consensus? Of course he would have been.
I have been trying to understand why Christian Conservatives find the Republican Party more desirable than the Democrats given that tolerance, helping the poor and taking care of the vulnerable dominated the teachings of Christ. It seems to be a better match.
No politician I have ever seen talks about their faith more than Mike Pence (Ok, Huckabee, but he is already in the hypocrite hall of fame) and yet few governors have done more to harm their poor and underprivileged constituents than Pence did in Indiana. Now he wants to do away with the ACA. A program designed to help those same people. Go figure.
Jesus made the poor and the sick the central theme of his time on earth. Conservative Christians seem to have made it abortion and I wonder why. If I may lapse in to a moment of cynicism here, the wedge issue of abortion seems to not just be about protecting the fetus, it also serves as the key litmus test for anyone wanting to run for office as a Republican.
Republican candidates learned long ago to talk about their faith and place it front and center in their speeches in certain regions of the country. They use code words (family, moral,testify) and phrases (“name and claim”) that might escape those of us who believe in a higher power, but don’t think that God cares that much about what car we buy or who we vote for. George W. Bush actually received instruction on “speaking christian” according to some biographers. His redemption story about escaping alcohol and drugs to find the lord was catnip for the Christian Right. Reagan didn’t do as much of this and had no real history of being a pious man. He relied on powerful surrogates like Falwell with a direct line to the lord and speech writers like Peggy Noonan to make the president look godly to the country. His voters knew what the “shining city on the hill” really meant.
This cozy relationship between the Evangelical Christian community and Republicans started back with Eisenhower and Billy Graham, but reached new heights under Nixon and Reagan, when Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson struck a deal and the Moral Majority was born. Since then, Republicans have successfully cultivated the perception that their party embodies Christian values more than the democrats. I assume we are talking about the teachings of Jesus Christ right? The guy who spent his life talking about helping the poor and taking care of the sick? From what I’ve read, he didn’t tell his followers to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, or tried to keep the lepers from medical care or denigrated the other races and tribes of his time. Being God, he could have had all the wealth he wanted. If he was a billionaire today, I doubt he have his gold sitting off-shore in tax free accounts while millions of people go hungry.
A Republican candidate who speaks about his or her faith and claims to be pro-life can often ride that horse in to office no matter what other transgressions they might have committed, or as we just found out, how unqualified they might be. On the other hand, one who is pro-choice and chooses as a priority of helping the homeless, feeding the poor or providing healthcare to the needy would not be welcome as a Republican candidate for high office. Why is that? I can’t help but think that today Jesus would be dismissed as a radical left wing socialist. Opposition research would turn up dirt on Mary Magdalene- and talk about the birth certificate issues!
Let me be clear. Liberals are not pro-abortion any more than they are pro-root canal. They just realize that ever so often someone needs one. The best way to stop abortions is to make contraception readily available and yet conservative Republicans are trying to shut down Planned Parenthood. Abortions make up only 3% of the services. The rest are for women’s health and contraception. Statistics this past week show that abortions have dropped to the the lowest number in 40 years, despite an increased population. It’s working, leave it alone! People are never going to not get abortions, any more than they are going to stop having sex.
There is nothing about the act of aborting a fetus in the Bible that I know of, but there are over three 300 references to helping the poor and sick. Seems like God had priorities. I suspect women found a way to abort back then, but not even in Leviticus, which banned almost everything and would kill you if you did it, mentions it in any form, language or act. I understand that my conservative friends believe it’s murder of the unborn, I pretend to have any knowledge as to when the soul is present and consciousness first exists, but I do know that children who are very conscious and feel pain, suffer and die every day from hunger, homelessness and lack of proper medical care.
That Trump was pro-choice for 69 of his 70 years on earth seems to be of little concern. It could be said that the Evangelical majority support for Donald Trump in November uniquely exposed a level of hypocrisy some of us had suspected. I have talked to some Evangelicals about why they voted for him and the most frequent reason given is the Supreme Court pick- they are sure Trump will appoint someone who will help reverse Roe vs Wade. While such character flaws of sexual assault (only alleged, not proven according to them) cheating his customers, fraud, adultery, etc, can be set aside as long as he puts in a conservative, pro-life judge. No mention of the need to select judges who might rule to stop child trafficking, mass incarceration, the death penalty and corporations who put chemicals in our food and water supply that kill us.
Trump doesn’t talk much about God, and when he does, I don’t think it’s the God conservative Christians are thinking about. He is more of an Old Testament kind of guy. You know, “an eye for an eye”, “vengeance is mine” and all that. He did say something about the almighty over the weekend. He insinuated that God stopped the rain at his inauguration. (It rained) Kings once used God to justify their self serving decisions, citing divine providence. I’m thinking that this is where Trump would like to see this thing go for him too.
Trump does share a common belief with some Evangelicals, something called the ‘Prosperity Gospel’. This is like a mini version of the ‘divine rite of kings’. It suggests that one of the ways we know God approves of a person and their actions is that they are prosperous and favorably born. Trump was raised on on this, his wealthy father took his family to Marble Collegiate Church where Normal Vincent Peale presided. This doctrine, which Peale was a pro generator of, must have been a welcome message for rich New Yorkers who may have felt a little guilty about their bounty while there were people living on the streets.
Peal’s sermon themes were picked up by the other church pastors to help boost their Sunday collections and donations. When television showed up, so did TV evangelists who used it as a religious con to extract money from viewers seeking God’s favor. (if you own a prayer cloth, or some righteous water in a tube at home, I apologize)
There are businesses that use it too. The Amway corporation, a huge network marketing company found a way to mix a more secular version of the doctrine in to a business model.
Uber Christian Conservative Betsy Devos became a multi-billionaire and is part of the family that owns Amway. The company indirectly promotes the theme that God wants you to be rich and you need to prepare a path for it to come. You know, plant the seeds. The covert messaging is that Amway can help you with that and they parade a lot of rich people, who were once average schmucks just like you to prove it. I went to a Amway meeting once, it was creepy and cult like. They opened and closed with a prayer to “petition” the almighty to deliver some more Amway customers and grow their down line. I bought some vitamins and got the hell out there!
There is no argument that the historical Jesus was in to helping the poor, the sick, the disadvantaged. He accepted and respected all people, races and creeds. I am told he sacrificed his life so that others might benefit. No judgement, no violence, no pussy grabbing that we know of. Sounds a lot like the liberals I know.
Additional Reading-
THE BIBLE CONTAINS MORE THAN 300 VERSES ON THE POOR, SOCIAL JUSTICE, AND GOD'S DEEP CONCERN FOR BOTH. THIS PAGE CONTAINS A WIDE SAMPLE OF THEM, AND SOME REFLECTIONS. WWW.ZOMPIST.COM/...
Sermon on the Mount - Beatitudes
(6-1/Matthew 5:1) Seeing the multitudes, he went up onto the mountain. When he had sat down, his disciples came to him. He opened his mouth and taught them, saying, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God. Blessed are those who have been persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven."