Christian Right
Sunday January 30, 2005
Sex-based morality too narrow for today
A week ago, the man who swindled thousands of B.C. investors out of about $220 million pled guilty to five counts of fraud, breach of trust and misappropriation of funds. The Vancouver Sun called Brian Slobogian’s Eron Mortgage Corporation “the biggest financial fiasco in B.C. history.”
I’ve looked in vain for news reports of any religious leader condemning Slobogian’s actions. Granted, the media no longer dutifully report the topics of Sunday sermons. But fiscal irresponsibility, it seems, isn’t a moral issue.
Generally, the mainline (liberal, left-leaning, pinko – pick your favourite label) churches issue mind-numbing statements about the morality of international aid, justice, famine, etc. The evangelical churches, epitomized by what’s called the Christian Right in the U.S., restrict morality to sex.
This last week, for example, James Dobson, of Focus on the Family, accused cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants of promoting tolerance of homosexuality. Also Barney the Dinosaur, Winnie the Pooh, and the Rugrats.
A few years ago, Jerry Falwell called Tinky Winky, the purple Teletubbie who carried a purse, a gay role model.
But I don’t recall hearing those same folks condemn the massive swindles perpetrated by Enron or World-Com.
Morality and politics
I genuinely admire the dedication, the commitment, and the conviction of evangelical Christians. Most of them, anyway. The vast majority, I believe, do their best to live their faith.
The trouble is, their faith is too narrow.
Andrew Faiz, writing in the Presbyterian Record, national magazine of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, says, “The Christian Right does not consider equitable business and commercial practices issues of morality. Enron is not a moral issue. Cleansing the world of disease, hunger, and suffering are not considered moral issues. Christ’s edict to feed the poor, clothe the homeless, or even to suffer children are not considered as important as Paul’s utterances against gays. ‘Moral issues’ is a very particular ideological statement which speaks to a very limited list of political concerns.”
The Christian Right takes credit for the last Republican electoral victory. They claim they brought morality back into politics.
Rev. Rob Schenck, a board member of the Evangelical Church Alliance, said that American electors “will need to re-examine their positions on all the moral issues including the sanctity of human life, the sanctity of marriage, and the public acknowledgement of God.”
Those sound like lofty ideals. Until you decode them. Then they mean anti-abortion, anti-homosexual, and anti-multifaith.
Now, does anyone seriously think those are going to be reversed?
Unlikely reversals
Like it or not, the 1960s brought a sexual revolution. No amount of lobbying will deter today’s youth from having sex. So some women will get pregnant. Is any lobby group willing to entrust its daughters to back-alley coat-hanger abortions again?
Marshall McLuhan’s global village is about much more than communications. It’s also about oil. And consumer markets. And cheap labor. All of which involve other world religions. Can any group still expect to exclude the faith of its business partners from public acknowledgement?
Africa’s Anglican bishops met – not about AIDS, disaster relief, debt reduction, racism or resource exploitation – but about homosexuality. They accused the Episcopal Church USA (which ordained an openly gay bishop) and the Canadian Diocese of New Westminster (which approved same-sex marriages) of “following another religion.”
Exactly how much difference would same-sex marriages make to the fabric of Canadian society? None, I suspect. Not even the most rabid members of the Conservative Party argue for removal of the civil rights that same-sex couples already enjoy.
If the sanctity of marriage is endangered, it’s endangered by heterosexuals who treat their vows with casual contempt, not by gays and lesbians.
I resent those who stake out a particular patch of morality as their private preserve. It’s as if they seized a space in a public park, put up a fence, and claimed it for their use only. I consider myself a Christian. I refuse to let any self-appointed group arbitrarily define for me what’s moral, and what’s not.
If the Christian Right took an equally tough stance against fiscal irresponsibility, environmental degradation, human rights abuses, starvation, homelessness, war, and racism, I might applaud them.
But I’m afraid they might take the wrong side.
Too ruthless
Peter C. Glover’s book The Politics of Faith: Essays on the Morality of Key Current Affairs supports corporal punishment for children. Beat ‘em. It’s good for ‘em. The Bible tells him so.
He also defends the death penalty. Because the Bible mandates it. Selectively interpreted, of course. “The sixth commandment legislates against the individual taking of human life,” Glover admits. “It cannot be extrapolated, however, to place the same injunction on the community… Neither in his teaching in the Sermon on the Mount, nor anywhere else, does Jesus deny… the right to enforce the death penalty…”
Suppose the Christian Right consistently imposed the penalties prescribed by the Bible. Death, for profanity, fraud, blasphemy, worshipping foreign gods, and masturbation.
And for adultery, of course. In biblical understanding, adultery meant any kind of sexual relations outside of marriage. Including pre, and post. Jesus said that anyone who divorced and remarried was guilty of adultery. So was any man who lusted after a woman…
That would eliminate most of the population of North America. As well as most members of evangelical congregations.
Is that really the society we want?
If abortion really is murder, as the Christian Right proclaims, then they should demand the death penalty for every woman who has an abortion, and every doctor who performs one.
But they won’t. Because Americans wouldn’t stand for it.
North America will not go back to slavery – although the Bible endorses it. Nor will it retreat to a time when gays and lesbians lived in terror and there was only one God and He was white and male.
The Christian Right could be an enormous force for good. But they seem obsessed with fighting battles they’ve already lost.
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Copyright © 2002 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups permitted; all other rights reserved.
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