I found the following article that I would like to share with you. (From- http://www.crosswalk. com/blogs/dr-james-emery-white/the-christian-and-politics-11582511. html)
—Enrique
If there are two words that can raise the
temperature in any room, they would be “religion” and “politics” - or as Linus
would add, “...and the Great Pumpkin.”
When it comes to religion and politics, we have deep convictions and
opinions, denominations and parties, divides and loyalties. Christians in particular can get confused
about how to engage the political realm.
On the one hand, we know that politics
matter, as there are issues which are inextricably intertwined with politics
that we are called to care deeply about:
the definition of marriage, when life begins and ends, care for the
poor, or the treatment of the oppressed.
These are deeply spiritual matters, and as a result, deeply spiritual
concerns.
But we’ve also been burned by
politics. Whether it’s embarrassment
over the excesses of the religious right during the 1980’s, or the groups that
would shout out “God hates fags” or scream at women entering abortion
clinics. In fact, we were so burned by
it – and associated with it - that it’s become one of Christianity’s biggest
image problems. As Gabe Lyons and Steve
Kinnaman have found in their research on young American “outsiders”, the
dominant view of Christians is that we are anti-homosexual, judgmental,
insensitive to others, and, of course, too involved in politics.
So here we are in an election year when,
in just a few short months, we’ll choose a new president. What to do? It might
be healthy to remind ourselves what churches and their leaders can do. Since
1954, when then Senator Lyndon Johnson proposed and successfully passed
legislation prohibiting non-profits from either opposing or endorsing a
candidate – after being opposed himself by a nonprofit organization - churches
may not directly endorse or oppose a political candidate.
The key word is “directly.” No church can
officially say, “We endorse John Doe,” or “We oppose Jane Doe.” Not only that, but a pastor cannot send out a
personal written endorsement on church letterhead. Political signs cannot be displayed on church
property. The only participation in the
political process that is allowed is “indirect.”
As a pastor, I can personally endorse a
candidate. I can tell you who I like in
the church parking lot or the grocery store aisle in normal conversation. I just can’t do it directly from the podium.
As a pastor, I can also personally work
for a candidate, and contribute financially to their campaign, but the church
itself cannot contribute financially with church funds even if approved by the
membership. I can also endorse a
candidate in print, and use my title and the church I am affiliated with; I am
free to speak and teach on moral and social issues that may be integral to the
political debate, such as abortion, gay marriage, and economic matters – even
if, by implication, it throws support toward one candidate and critiques
another.
As a church, we can also take official
positions on such issues, as long as we don’t directly endorse or oppose a
candidate in the process. We can
organize voter registrations and drives as long as they are directed at all
eligible voters and not toward just one political party. We can hold forums where candidates are
invited to address the issues. If a
candidate were to visit our church, they could be publicly recognized and
introduced. We can even host candidates
to speak from our stage, as long as that candidate is not directly endorsed or
urges the church to vote for them. We
can distribute non-partisan voter guides giving information on where each
candidate stands on the issues. And, of
course, we can offer our campus as a voting station.
This is what a church, and its leaders, is
currently allowed to do – though a group of pastors recently announced their
choice for president to their congregations and encouraged them to vote
accordingly in a “Pulpit Freedom Sunday” in the hopes they will be sued and the
laws inhibiting such speech will be changed in a court of law.
But what of the individual Christian? Politics can be a dizzying affair, and is
increasingly difficult to navigate.
Clearly God is not aligned with any political party. There is a fascinating passage in the Old
Testament where the angel of the Lord comes to Joshua. The Bible records that “Joshua went up to Him
and asked, ‘Are You for us or for our enemies?’
‘Neither,’ He replied, ‘but as commander of the army of the LORD I have
now come’” (Joshua 5:13-14, NIV).
Yet there are stands that one or both
parties may take on a specific issue that reflect the Kingdom of God or do not;
issues about the sanctity of human life, the definition of marriage and family,
how the poor are treated, and whether those who are victimized are
protected. Based on your reading of the
Bible, you may find that one party gets one set of issues right, and another
party gets another set of issues right.
And to add to the complexity, on some of these issues, thoughtful
Christians disagree about how best to flesh out the principles of the Bible in
addressing various matters, such as with immigration or welfare, when a war is
just and when it is not, or how best to care for the environment.
But however you vote, vote. Christians should dig deep into the issues,
even deeper into the Scriptures, and emerge with a resolve to care deeply and
work passionately while behaving in a civil and loving manner. They should run for office when God calls
them to it, and strive to make a difference in that realm – not as a partisan
Democrat or Republican, though they may be aligned with such a party, but
primarily as a Christian attempting to be salt and light.
Because it matters.
In my study, there is a small, brass bust
of Winston Churchill. It is the only
such sculpture I own. I purchased it at
his birthplace, Blenheim Palace, in England.
I have it there because it reminds me of a life that reflected passion,
resolve, and conviction. Almost
singlehandedly, Churchill resisted one of the greatest onslaughts of evil the
world has ever known, willing the world to victory. His words to the English people, particularly
during that dark summer of 1940, still stir the human heart:
"Hitler knows that he will have to
break us in this Island or lose the war.
If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the
world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world,
including the United States, including all that we have known or cared for,
will sink in to the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps
more protracted, by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our
duties and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth
last for a thousand years men will still say, 'This was their finest
hour.'"
Later, biographers would call it his
finest hour.
Compare that to the confession of Martin
Niemoller, a pastor who initially sent a telegram congratulating Hitler on his
rise to power:
"In Germany, they came first for the
communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't
speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then
they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up became I wasn't a
trade unionist. Then they came for the
Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no
one was left to speak up."
Let that never be our confession.
James Emery White
Sources:
David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons,
Unchristian: What a new generation really thinks about Christianity (Grand
Rapids: Baker, 2007).
Churchill’s speech was delivered on June
18, 1940, and is quoted here from Norman Rose, Churchill: The Unruly Giant (New
York: The Free Press, 1994), p. 329.
Martin
Niemoller’s confession was actually a poem and has been represented in various
ways with minor variations. This is the
version that Niemoller himself said he preferred, when asked by Richard John
Neuhaus in 1971, as relayed in the November 2001 issue of First Things
