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Robert
Corin Morris,
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Suzanne Morris,
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Lisa Green,
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by Robert Corin Morris
We need a way beyond the deadlock of
Right versus Left in American culture and politics. The pressing needs of
the 21st century demand it. We’ll be exploring ways to break out of this
logjam in our January-February course God’s
Politics: Beyond Left and Right to a New Vision of Values.
So bad are the stereotypes flung around that it sometimes surprises people
of liberal or leftist conviction to discover that some of their potential
allies may come from people of conservative religious faith.
People who believe government has a major responsibility to aid the poor
were heartened by the brave effort of Governor Bob Riley of Alabama — a
conservative, evangelical Christian in a state full of fundamentalist
Christians — to change Alabama’s tax laws. Riley, a widely popular,
conservative Republican governor, found the state’s combination of
rock-bottom tax rates and sky-high poverty rates appalling for an area
whose residents overwhelmingly identify themselves as “Bible-believing”
Christians. Riley became aware that there are hundreds of verses about
helping the poor in the Bible, and relatively few about favorite
fundamentalist hot-button issues like homosexuality or abortion. He knew
that Psalm 72 envisions the government as an active partner to “defend
the cause of the poor of the people and give deliverance to the needy”
(Psalm 72:4).
So, counting on his popularity and political capital, this “teetotaling,
Bible-quoting businessman” in 2003 pushed “a tax reform plan. . .that
shifts a significant amount of the state’s tax burden from the poor to
wealthy individuals and corporations,” according to a New York Times
article. He said that he’s just following the mandate of Jesus, who
taught us to “love God, love each other, and take care of the least
among you.”
The bad news is that the tax increase was defeated, with only 33% of
voters voting “yes.” Riley’s fellow Bible-readers apparently didn’t
like the part of the Bible that threatened to raise their taxes one bit.
As an old Southern saying puts it: “Brother, you’ve left off preachin’
and gone to interfering.’”
The good news is that the Bob Rileys are beginning to make their voices
heard —people of conservative religious faith and deep social concern,
who don’t think the Religious Right has a monopoly on the truth. They
think America is suffering from “culture wars” launched by extremists
on the Right and Left, and that people of goodwill need to reach out to
each other beyond partisan or ideological lines to create a new “moral
center” that can move us forward.
They don’t imagine that all differences, especially about policy, will
disappear. But they want to create a new sense of a common moral
territory, rather than the no-man’s land created between the trenches of
extreme partisanship.
 Jim
Wallis, founder of the Sojourners ministry, is becoming the best known of
these folk. Theologically, he is a conservative evangelical Christian.
Socially, he believes the Bible itself calls people to be proactive on all
sorts of issues identified as progressive or Leftist.
“The Right is comfortable with the language of religion, values, God
talk,” says Wallis. “So much so that they sometimes claim to own that
territory. Or own God. But then they narrow everything down to one or two
issues: abortion and gay marriage.
“I am an evangelical Christian, and I can’t ignore thousands of verses
in the Bible on [another] subject, which is poverty. I say at every stop,
‘Fighting poverty’s a moral value, too.’ There’s a whole
generation of young Christians who care about the environment. That’s
their big issue. Protecting God’s creation, they would say, is a moral
value, too. And, for a growing number of Christians, the ethics of war—how
and when we go to war, whether we tell the truth about going to war—is a
religious and moral issue as well.”
So Wallis’ challenge to the Right is to get real about the very Bible
they claim to venerate. His challenge to the Left is to get real about the
importance of religion in American life.
Wallis has moved from the margins to the mainstream of American religious
and political life in the last 30 years. With the best-seller status of
his latest book, God’s Politics*, and catchy slogans like “What Would
Jesus Drive?” as part of a campaign against gas-guzzlers, he wants to
rescue the power of religious moral values for the mainstream. With over
90 percent of the nation affirming the existence of God, “America is
still among the most religious nations in the world,” he says. “The
question is not whether religious values should influence politics, but
how.”
Neither voters, nor politicians, can leave religion at the polling station
or legislature door, he feels. It’s too important in the formation of
personal values. “Every major social movement in our history was fueled
in large part by religion and faith—abolitionism, women’s suffrage,
child labor law, and most famously, civil rights. Where would we be if the
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had kept his faith to himself?”
This doesn’t mean Wallis wants to marginalize the growing minority of
non-religious, “secular” Americans. He insists that many humanistic
ethical ideals are ultimately rooted in the Judaeo-Christian “prophetic”
values, so believers and non-believers can find some common moral ground
to work on social issues. “We all have an investment in politics having
a moral compass.”
Jim envisions, as I do, using those very “prophetic values” of the
Judaeo-Christian heritage — values about human dignity, justice and
compassion — to unite people in a new moral conversation and debate that
moves us beyond the stalemate. And he puts his life where is rhetoric is:
along with dozens of other ministers, he was recently arrested for “disturbing
the peace” of Capitol Hill to protest Congress’s deep cuts in programs
for the poor (in order to fund war and further tax-cuts for the very
well-off).
The 21st century presses in upon us, with unprecedented challenges. We can’t
afford the stalemate of this culture war.
Want to think outside the current, bogged-down box? Read Jim’s newest
book. Better yet, join us for one or all of the sessions of our God’s
Politics class beginning on January 18
*Read an excerpt from God’s Politics at
http://www.calltorenewal.org/events/index.cfm/action/press/item/ctrgodspolitics_bookexcerpt.html |
