I’m not comfortable with all the God talk taking place this election. Fearing the consequences of seeming too secular, all kinds of pols are increasingly wearing their religion on their sleeves. As The Nation reported recently, it’s become important to acknowledge that God is now a integral part of our election process, if only because Democrats are alarmed at how the Republicans are winning by doing so:
At last month’s Democratic convention, few words were uttered more frequently than the one that seems to roll most easily off the tongue of George W. Bush: faith. “Let me say it plainly,” announced John Kerry in his acceptance speech. “In this campaign, we welcome people of faith.” John Edwards thanked his parents, Wallace and Bobbie, for instilling in him an appreciation of “faith” from an early age. Barack Obama declared that Kerry “understands the ideals of community, faith and service,” and added, to those who think only Republicans turn to religion for inspiration, “We worship an awesome God in the blue states.”
That Democrats are eager to propagate this message is not surprising. The United States is, after all, an astoundingly religious country. And in recent decades, Americans who take their religion seriously have been flocking to the GOP in numbers that have left Democratic strategists alarmed. Back in 1992, voters who told exit pollsters they attend prayer services on a frequent basis supported George H.W. Bush over Bill Clinton by a margin of 14 percent. Eight years later, in 2000, those same voters backed George W. Bush over Al Gore by 20 percent. In the 2002 Congressional elections, the religiously devout also favored Republicans by 20 percent, prompting Trinity College religion professor Mark Silk to observe, “Never before in American history have churches been tied so directly to one political party.”
I guess most of my personal discomfort with this comes from my own very strict religious upbringing. God knows what’s in your heart, I was taught, and there are few things more sure to enrage Him than false prophecy. Exploiting His name in any context is extremely dangerous. So much so, that it’s best never to even approach it. Hence our reticence to wear our religion on our sleeve in my family. It’s respect and fear that causes us to believe God’s will shouldn’t be reduced to slogans for bumper stickers, T-shirts, or campaign speeches (as if one understood God’s will well enough to boil it down into a sound bite). It’s also tacky, but that’s another thread.
I’ll admit it. I wince every time Kerry mentions his faith in response to a question about abortion or whatever. But at least he usually goes on to explain why his faith shouldn’t be forced onto other Americans. Many religions leaders these days are arguing that there’s no distinction between one’s faith and one’s public duty, for example, Archbishop Charles Chaput:
Lawmaking inevitably involves some group imposing its beliefs on the rest of us. That’s the nature of the democratic process. If we say that we “ought” to do something, we are making a moral judgment. When our legislators turn that judgment into law, somebody’s ought becomes a “must” for the whole of society. This is not inherently dangerous; it’s how pluralism works.
Democracy depends on people of conviction expressing their views, confidently and without embarrassment. This give-and-take is an American tradition, and religious believers play a vital role in it. We don’t serve our country – in fact we weaken it intellectually – if we downplay our principles or fail to speak forcefully out of some misguided sense of good manners.
I’ll be clear here: I don’t feel anyone who believes that should take the oath to uphold the Constitution. That’s not to say one’s morals, as informed by one’s religious beliefs, shouldn’t be used to guide one in serving the nation, but the idea that the beliefs one ought to impose on others should feed directly from theology and not necessarily rational thought is how theocracies come to be.
An idea can be both rational and believed by one or more religions, but the rational argument is the only one that has any place being promoted by elected officials. Solid “moral” beliefs are rational as well, in my opinion. Any belief that relies on being “the way God wants it” alone, has no business being promoted by our government.
This is why it unsettles me to read the role religion plays in Bush’s decision-making process. In an op-ed piece in the New York Times today, Robert Wright notes:
It’s hard to settle “he said, she-said” questions, let alone “he said, He said” questions. But there is a way to get a clearer picture of religion’s role in this White House. Every morning President Bush reads a devotional from “My Utmost for His Highest,” a collection of homilies by a Protestant minister named Oswald Chambers, who lived a century ago. As Mr. Bush explained in an interview broadcast on Tuesday on Fox News, reading Chambers is a way for him “on a daily basis to be in the Word.”
You’ll need to read the devotional itself to be sure these pearls of wisdom are not taken out of context, but they suggest a rather frightening worldview to me:
- “Everything outside my physical life is designed to cause my death.”
- “If we turn away from obedience for even one second, darkness and death are immediately at work again.”
- “Life without war is impossible in the natural or the supernatural realm.”
- “Beware when you want to ‘confer with flesh and blood’ or even your own thoughts, insights, or understandings – anything that is not based on your personal relationship with God. These are all things that compete with and hinder obedience to God.”
As startling as these sentiments may seem in the context of the war, it’s not as if Bush can’t separate metaphor from wisdom here, so I’m not suggesting he believes we need to be perpetually fighting (although, I’d love to hear his plan for ending the war, mind you). But it’s the sense of ignoring the pitfalls along one’s path that scares the, er, bejesus, out of me:
Once you’re on the right path, setbacks that might give others pause needn’t phase you. As Chambers noted in last Sunday’s reading, “Paul said, in essence, ‘I am in the procession of a conqueror, and it doesn’t matter what the difficulties are, for I am always led in triumph.’ ” Indeed, setbacks may have a purpose, Chambers will tell Mr. Bush this Sunday: “God frequently has to knock the bottom out of your experience as his saint to get you in direct contact with himself.” Faith “by its very nature must be tested and tried.”
Some have marveled at Mr. Bush’s refusal to admit any mistakes in Iraq other than “catastrophic success.” But what looks like negative feedback to some of us – more than 1,100 dead Americans, more than 10,000 dead Iraqi civilians and the biggest incubator of anti-American terrorists in history – is, through Chambers’s eyes, not cause for doubt. Indeed, seemingly negative feedback may be positive feedback, proof that God is there, testing your faith, strengthening your resolve.
This, I think, is Mr. Bush’s optimism: In the longest run, divinely guided decisions will be vindicated, and any gathering mountains of evidence to the contrary may themselves be signs of God’s continuing involvement. It’s all good.
The problem with this approach is it presumes Bush truly understands God’s will. Regardless of how bad things get in Iraq, he doesn’t need to change course. This reminds me of the man who drowned in the flood:
[A] man heard that his neighborhood was flooding due to a heavy rain storm. He got down on his knees and prayed to God: “Dear God, save me from the coming flood!” The waters began to rise and a truck came by and the driver said, “Get in and I’ll drive you to higher ground.” The man said no, God would save him. The waters continued to rise. A woman in a boat rowed by. She called, “Jump into the boat and I will row you to safety.” The man said no, God would save him. The floodwaters continued to rise. The man was perched on the roof of his house. A helicopter flew by and let down a rope for the man to grab onto. “I will fly you to safety,” yelled the pilot. “No.” the man said, “I am waiting for God to save me.” The man drowned. He got to the heaven hopping mad. “What are you doing here?” God asked. The man said, “God! I am mad at you! I asked you to save me from the flood and you did not!” God smiled and said, “I sent you a truck, a boat and helicopter? How much more saving did you need?”
I disagree. I am a big believer in the separation of church and state–my faith in the First Amendment is stronger than my faith in God, and I am very uncomfortable with how Bush and many other politicians use religion. But I think religious arguments are totally legitimate and should take place.
Remember that the Constitution guarantees against restrictions on free exercise as well as against establishment. Making religious arguments for laws is part of free exercise. It’s not an establishment unless there is no legitimate secular purpose for a law.
To say that religious arguments should never made comes, that politicians must put their religious beliefs entirely aside, comes perilously close to proposing a religious test for high political office. A voluntary, self-imposed religious test, but a religious test all the same.
Whether these arguments are good or bad depends on how religion is used, and to what ends.
This is a religious argument:
(Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural)
These are religious arguments:
(Letter from a Birmingham jail)
This is a religious argument:
(You know where this one’s from)
This is a religious argument:
(A rabbi at my temple’s invocation at the DNC. See also this sermon on gay marriage.)
This CNN article describes a religious argument:
I could go on; you get the idea.
I agree, Edward.
I’m happy for the Red Sox, for example, but if Einstein was right that God doesn’t play dice, then he sure as heck is not a baseball fan. During the playoffs, Orlando Cabrera, the slick shortstop, blooped a single over the infield. When he rounded first, he pointed at the sky, which until now was at least limited to homeruns and no-hitters. I noticed he ignored God when he failed to come up with a bare-handed play at shortstop later in the same game.
What’s next, are pitchers going to acknowledge God between pitches, but only on strikes?
On a personal note, the other day I was late for an appointment and in traffic but got a break as I made it through yellow lights in the nick of time. Actually said under my breath “Thank God”. Then watching the news that night, I realized that God had intervened for me with the yellow lights at precisely the same time the 50 Iraqi soldiers were slaughtered.
Suggestion to God: manage your time better and prioritize your interventions. Get an assistant, if nothing else. That’s why I kind of like the animist model: lots of little gods with specific tasks.
I would add that if Bush does not understand (I’m not one who thinks he is dumb) the concept of metaphor, that’s trouble.
Also, I have no problem with religious speech by baseball players or prelates. But if it is only a shallow reflection of “yippee for me”, as in the former, or “deny confession and perhaps excommunicate politicians” in the latter as Chaput at least alludes to, then we will all have trouble living together in a pluralistic society.
To be clear, there’s a lot of the post I agree with. I disagree with these statements:
“I’ll be clear here: I don’t feel anyone who believes that should take the oath to uphold the Constitution.”
“Any belief that relies on being “the way God wants it” alone, has no business being promoted by our government.” (if you mean promoted by signing into law, I agree–there must be a secular purpose. There is legitimate a secular purpose for banning abortion; there is no legitimate secular purpose for banning the teaching of evolution from the schools. If you mean promoted by making an argument, I disagree.)
In my first comment: “if Einstein was right that God doesn’t play dice, the HE sure as heck is not a baseball fan.”
I think we are witnessing an existenial crisis caused by a poor grasp of the issues and poor leadership. I think many people are tired of politicians and leaders on all levels of civic life exhibiting the life-sapping, bland and corrupt rationality of relativism. This has left us with the disturbing sense that mainstream, appeal-to-everyone, middle-of-the-road politicians represent nothing but their personal interests. Many people on both the right and left sense that problems are emerging that just will not be solved by the business as usual approach.
This has had two distinct consequences: 1. Those who are in the habit of basing decisions using a rational dialectic are desperately seeking not only the right means but truly good ends to aim for that address the emerging problems. And no honest dialogue by “leaders” is to be found. Therefore they remain squashed into the pragmatic. select the lesser-of-two-evils nonoption. And 2. for those who are comfortable with religious doctrine as their guide, there has never been a better time to work for change that reflects their personal beliefs. Plus there is no dearth of “leaders” (preachers and priests who have done the hard work at a grassroots level) to tell them what is right.
We could say the same thing right now about the political climate in India (the world’s largest democracy), Iran and other places.
But, speaking of India, M.K. Gandhi (who was niether a priest nor a politician but darned popular) spent his life appealing to people of faiths (Hindu, Muslim, Christian and Buddhist) to exercise democratic rights in a secular framework. There was a commonly sought reward for doing so–national independence.
In a nation fraught with religious diversity and discrimination, Gandhi had to make the argument for secularism in a way that didn’t ostracize the religious. He argued that no one could know God’s mind or God’s plan (no argument from the faith-based) and no human design would be eternal or perfectly satisfactory (again no argument from anyone). But, he argued that it was people’s duty to participate in society and do whatever they could to make it more just and more compassionate–whether they were guided by their own religiousity and desire to get right with God, or whether they were guided by non-religious philosophy. The key to success here was that an honest deliberation was required and steps had to be taken even if they were imperfect.
Violence done to others was the baseline no-no. Violence indicated a bad resolution to a problem. Such a resolution would not last. Violence was defined in not only physical terms, but in terms of economic consequences.
Of course, India’s experiment wasn’t perfect, but I think it does offer some ideas for moving away from the mind-numbing liberal-conservative debates (we needed to invade Iraq vs we needed to manage the invasion better) that we are mired in right now.
The question for us is–do we trust that the majority in our society, whatever their philosophy, will agree that violence is the litmus test and that the ends do not justify any means necessary?
Bush, God and Certainty
I have long believed Robert Wright to be one of the Smartest M*****f***ers on the Planet (trademark pending). Via Obsidian Wings (which, if you’re not reading, you should be – excellent, multi-partisan debate from bloggers and an active readership who…
slightly OT, but i like it nonetheless:
“The Fanatic is a man that does what he thinks the Lord would do if only He knew the facts in the case.’
— Finley Peter Dunne
I like Bill Mahr’s comment on the invocation of God in politics from the New Rule segment of his show: “God’s a flip-flopper. He commanded us to beat our swords into plow shares. God: wrong on defense, wrong for America.”
Bill was essentially making your same point. Involving Him in politics has become increasingly silly and His positions often contrary or misconstrued to the point the politician is trying to make.
Life has become increasingly more complex and issues demand factual comprehension well beyond what most of the public can readily understand in the 60 second soundbites and executive summaries that are offered, or better yet, consumed.
So religion becomes a way to simplify the complex and turn difficult issues into moral judgements. And who is the better spokesperson than God Himself for those who find it necessary to frame secular issues as moral ones.
The fundamental issue for me is much like that great quote provided by cleek: I don’t object to religious arguments per se, merely when the religious arguments to authority take the place of rational (or, to my eye, moral or ethical) thought. The fact that this is such a subjective call means that I would never, ever suggest it as any kind of systematized litmus test, only as an internal heuristic.
To say that religious arguments should never made comes, that politicians must put their religious beliefs entirely aside, comes perilously close to proposing a religious test for high political office. A voluntary, self-imposed religious test, but a religious test all the same.
You clarify your position later, Katherine, in a way I should have clarified mine, suggesting we agree more than disagree here. You later write:
if you mean promoted by signing into law, I agree–there must be a secular purpose.
On this point “Any belief that relies on being “the way God wants it” alone, has no business being promoted by our government.” I mean specifically when it stops short of having a rational secular purpose as well.
An example would be that gays should not be allowed to have sex because the Bible says so. Yes, one can feel that way, and one can add that to other secular arguments against gay sex in a debate surely, but arguing that we should legislate based solely on what the Bible says bothers me. Again, “Any belief that relies on being “the way God wants it” alone,” is what I’m arguing against.
Statements like “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights” are also nonspecific enough with regard to who the “Creator” is. So much so that the “Creator” could be one’s own mother (or Mother Earth) if one chose to interpret it that way.
I don’t think argument from religion is less rational than argument from morality — in either case the person making the argument is relying on a shared set of assumptions on the part of the audience. It’s just that contemporary American society has been steeped in ecumenism and is generally less comfortable with appeals to religion than with appeals to a smaller set of quasi-religious principles (often justified by their commonality in most or all major religions); and the appeal to a specific religion is just a fall-back for policies which don’t find support in that more restricted “universal” set.
Re ballplayers thanking God for good plays: John, I think you’re reading it wrong — it’s usually an expression of humility, a way of saying “it’s not me, it’s just the gifts I was given”. I think that’s an entirely healthy attitude.
There’s a poem by a British poet, John Betjeman, which I cannot resist quoting in full:
“In Westminster Abbey”
Let me take this other glove off
As the vox humana swells,
And the beauteous fields of Eden
Bask beneath the Abbey bells.
Here, where England’s statesmen lie,
Listen to a lady’s cry.
Gracious Lord, oh bomb the Germans,
Spare their women for Thy Sake,
And if that is not too easy
We will pardon Thy Mistake.
But, gracious Lord, whate’er shall be,
Don’t let anyone bomb me.
Keep our Empire undismembered
Guide our Forces by Thy Hand,
Gallant blacks from far Jamaica,
Honduras and Togoland;
Protect them Lord in all their fights,
And, even more, protect the whites.
Think of what our Nation stands for,
Books from Boots’ and country lanes,
Free speech, free passes, class distinction,
Democracy and proper drains.
Lord, put beneath Thy special care
One-eighty-nine Cadogan Square.
Although dear Lord I am a sinner,
I have done no major crime;
Now I’ll come to Evening Service
Whensoever I have the time.
So, Lord, reserve for me a crown,
And do not let my shares go down.
I will labour for Thy Kingdom,
Help our lads to win the war,
Send white feathers to the cowards
Join the Women’s Army Corps,
Then wash the steps around Thy Throne
In the Eternal Safety Zone.
Now I feel a little better,
What a treat to hear Thy Word,
Where the bones of leading statesmen
Have so often been interr’d.
And now, dear Lord, I cannot wait
Because I have a luncheon date.
Let’s distinguish between the process of religious argument and the conclusions that religious argument reaches. I may agree with the conclusions, sometimes, but that agreement does not derive from any respect for the process by which they were reached.
I think that this misunderstanding is at the root of a great deal of conflict over religion and politics. The devout are entitled to make their views known. What they are not entitled to is any presumption that these views are correct simply because they are derived from religious belief.
If you base a conclusion on arithmetic, I will respect it because of the way you reached it. If you base one on verses from Leviticus I will not. It seems to me that too many believers want the same respect accorded to their reasoning that we accord to arithmetic, or more broadly to scientific methods in general. This should not be granted.
kenB: Maybe .. but no. I see no humility in Barry Bonds’ stroll down to first and the pointy sky thing after the homeruns.
Look, he might be the greatest hitter of all time, but if Bob Gibson or Don Drysdale were still around, we’d see humility.
Hit the ball, and then you and your God put your heads down and get around the bases and back into the dugout after the homerun.
All else is showing the other team up. GWB needs this lesson.
Then God orders chin music. High and tight. You and God own the inside half of the plate; the outside half is mine.
There’s a great scene in the movie “The Ruling Class” where the Peter O’Toole/Christ want-a-be character is asked, “How do you know you are Christ?”
He answers: “Because every time I pray, I find that I’m talking to myself.”
Lawmaking inevitably involves some group imposing its beliefs on the rest of us … When our legislators turn that judgment into law, somebody’s ought becomes a “must” for the whole of society.
To the Romans, there were “made” laws and “found” laws. A “found” law is simply a codification of something that everybody does anyway. For example, everybody agrees that stealing is wrong. The law takes this and establishes categories — shoplifting, grand theft, armed robbery, and so forth.
“Made” law is where you run into trouble. This is where people have no natural (cultural) inclination to obey your shiny new “law”. You end up putting far more effort into trying to get people to obey the law than you get in benefits. Think of Prohibition, drug laws, the 55 mph speed limit.
It’s a useful concept — and it keeps you away from the trap of “no morality without God”.