Let's go straight to the tape... so to speak:
A recent Washington Post profile on Jack Danforth, a former Republican senator from Missouri and an Episcopal priest, doesn’t pull any punches. “Jack Danforth,” it begins, “wishes the Republican right would step down from its pulpit. Instead, he sees a constant flow of religion into national politics. And not just any religion, either, but the us-versus-them, my-God-is-bigger-than-your-God, velvet-fist variety of Christian evangelism. . . . Danforth [says he] worships a humbler God and [he] considers the [religious] right’s certainty a sin.”
This judgmental tone is all too common these days. And it’s unfortunate that Jack Danforth is going along with it. According to Danforth, our work on issues like embryonic stem-cell research and same-sex “marriage” inspires “nausea.” And he was offended by what he saw as the GOP’s “effort to appease the Christian right” in the Terri Schiavo case. If not for us, Danforth told the Post, the Republicans wouldn’t be involved. Well, that’s true, but when a woman’s life is at stake, I don’t see anything honorable about refusing to get involved.
It’s a good thing that Danforth wasn’t around during the campaign against slavery. Then, abolitionists were chastised for being religious zealots. Abraham Lincoln’s opponents said that he would “impose” his moral views on the nation. Well, thank God that Lincoln had the courage to press for an end to the abomination of slavery.
Half a century earlier William Wilberforce led the campaign against the slave trade in the British Parliament. Moved by his Christian convictions, he took on one of the British Empire’s biggest sources of revenue, and in the process, lost any chance of becoming Prime Minister. He and his companions were derided for their Christian beliefs. As one opponent, Lord Melbourne, said, “Things have come to a pretty pass when religion is allowed to invade public life.” Thank God it did—then and now.
I find this whole thing to be a fascinating look into ribald hypocrisy. Danforth and other progressives point a fat finger of blame for just about all that might be seen to be problematic at religious conservatives who mix politics with their faith and yet are about as quiet as a mime when those on their side of any issue do the exact same.
On the same day that I received Colson's piece (one by the way you should read in it's entirety), I get a Sojourner's e-mail that reads in part:
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"Preaching the Word" is for those who preach "with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other."
Anyone with half a brain will know that anything Sojourners is involved with will be A) Highly political and B) more than highly leftist leaning.
Can someone on the left side of the spectrum explain to me how the Religious Left are anything besides the x-ray version of those so called evil people belonging to the so called Religious Right?
Anyone?
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