Rash Vows and Beautiful Grandchildren: Political thoughts

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Political thoughts

I have been rereading Randy Alcorn's books Deadline, Dominion and Deception (wonderful books and highly recommended.) In light of my considering voting for Obama because I like him and I think it is high time that we have an African-American president - I found this in Dominion. I would like any of my 2 or 3 readers to comment on this - it seems right on to me - but as Greg and Christian were talking on Christian's blog recently - we come at things from a white, sububan life but are trying to be Christ-followers. To do that first we need to understand. So read, think and give me your thoughts. To set the context, a conservative black reporter is talking to a black pastor (who then responds.) It also may be relevant that this book was written in1996 (but has anything really changed?):

"Here's one my wife and I have talked about a lot. Politics. White evangelicals tend to be Republican because they're concerned about biblical and family values and morality, and they're pro-life. Black evangelicals are heavily Democratic, maybe because in recent decades Democrats have been more sensitive to issues of social justice, racial equality, and concern for the poor. Now I happen to be concerned about all these issues, but I think that Democratic policies and programs have hurt the black community. I think it's safe to say that at your church, the members are mostly Democrats, right? I admit, that bothers me, especially on the abortion issue. I care a lot about those suffering children."

"In my experience" Pastor Clancy said, "Republicans tend to be more wise and less caring, and Democrats tend to be more caring but less wise. But both parties fall way short. You mentioned abortion. I know white evangelicals who can't understand why so many of their black brethren seem unconcerned about abortion. Likewise, black evangelicals can't understand why so many whites are unconcerned about poverty, drugs, crime, racism, and ther deterioration of urban America. And why they seem to be doing so little to improve education, employment, housing, medical care, you name it. .... To black Christians, yes, abortion should be on our list of concerns. But it has to take a number, considering everything else we've got to deal with. White churches are concerned about abortion and homosexuals and feminism. We're concerned about gangs, and drugs and AIDS and homelessness and jobs."

8 comments:

neverlie said...: Christian can probably speak more into this than me, but that dichotomy seems to be accurate, at least historically. The other issue is money, and the general sense in politics that wealth votes Republican and poverty votes Democrat. This also historically breaks down racially. The pieces that are problematic to me are what are considered moral issues. Things like abortion and homosexual marriage are "moral," but questions of justice, racial equality and poverty are not? I think there is a sea change amongst evangelicals (particularly white) in this election that recognizes the moral concerns of loving our neighbors. My favorite part of this primary season is the complete lack of influence that the religious right has had. There's more here, but I need to think through it a bit more.; February 21, 2008 at 6:50 AM
Rash Vows and Beautiful Grandchildren said...: I couldn't agree more and I really appreciate your characterizing justice, racial equality and poverty as MORAL issues. It seems biblical to be concerned with those issues and many churches are trying to have some impact of homelessness, lack of adequate food and health care for all, and other social issues. I find myself turned off by both parties but still trying to be involved as part of my seriousness of following Christ.; February 21, 2008 at 9:42 AM
neverlie said...: Alright, so I have posted on this a bit on my blog. Be warned ahead of time that many may find this to be troublesome. I think though you may find it a bit freeing.; February 22, 2008 at 7:35 AM
Rash Vows and Beautiful Grandchildren said...: Greg - thank you so much for the discussion that has been started on your blog. You are correct - it is a freeing concept. For my small audience - go to Greg's blog for an interesting discussion.; February 22, 2008 at 3:57 PM
christian said...: A few randomly generated thoughts...

Your book (which I read) summarizes it pretty well- along with the dillema for those of us who feel like all those issues should matter.

It is amazing though to hear the venom city people have for Bush and then to hear the ABSURDLY uninformed or misinformed reasons for their hatred. It's America so you can hate the president, but you should at least know why you hate him and that your reasons for such disdain are rooted in reality, not just because Kayne West said, "George Bush hates black people."

I have been around a good amount of AA who are part of a small "movement" to see abortion moved to the forefront of AA issues.

It is clearly a cultural issue (not universal though) for letting politicians use your pulpit during political seasons.

I do think that the American church (on both sides of the political coin) puts too much "faith" in our government and what could happen should their candidate get into the White House.

God help us.; February 25, 2008 at 12:54 PM
Amy said...: Politicians are what they are, and we'll never be completely satisfied. But we have to keep pushing them to do what is right.

I cannot heal a man by laying my hands on him, but I would if I could.

By voting, I am laying my hands on the entire world in one of the few ways that I as a suburban American can.

The people we vote for make decisions and take action that affect us individually, societally and globally.

War is wrong. Violence is wrong. Poverty is wrong. Inaction is wrong.

Laura, I encourage you to vote for Obama.; February 25, 2008 at 5:51 PM
Sarah said...: I am very surprised to hear you are considering voting for Obama. I'd love to hear specifically why you like him.; February 26, 2008 at 3:41 PM
MJ Krech said...: I'm surprised, too, Say. Your dad and I are also considering Obama. We wonder if it isn't time for America to put on a minority "face" when it deals with the world. We've heard too many almost first-hand things about McCain that really give us pause.

Greg-Your thoughts are a bit "out there" for me, but I do admire your deep thinking. Thoughtfulness--not manners in this case--is something I've always been "plagued" with. People sometimes tell me I think too much. That's who I am, though. You redefine deep thinking, Greg, and to me that's a VERY GOOD thing. Keep it up! And keep sharing your thoughts. I'm listening....; February 27, 2008 at 8:41 AM

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The Inspiration for the title of my Blog - What is a RASH VOW!

A Defence of Rash Vows by G.K. Chesterton An abridged version of a chapter in Chesterton's book The Defendant.
If a prosperous modern man, with a high hat and a frock-coat, were to solemnly pledge himself before all his clerks and friends to count the leaves on every third tree in Holland Walk, to hop up to the City on one leg every Thursday, to repeat the whole of Mill's 'Liberty' seventy-six times, to collect 300 dandelions in fields belonging to anyone of the name of Brown, to remain for thirty-one hours holding his left ear in his right hand, to sing the names of all his aunts in order of age on the top of an omnibus, or make any such unusual undertaking, we should immediately conclude that the man was mad, or, as it is sometimes expressed, was 'an artist in life.' Yet these vows are not more extraordinary than the vows which in the Middle Ages and in similar periods were made, not by fanatics merely, but by the greatest figures in civic and national civilization -- by kings, judges, poets, and priests. One man swore to chain two mountains together, and the great chain hung there, it was said, for ages as a monument of that mystical folly. Another swore that he would find his way to Jerusalem with a patch over his eyes, and died looking for it. It is not easy to see that these two exploits, judged from a strictly rational standpoint, are any saner than the acts above suggested. A mountain is commonly a stationary and reliable object which it is not necessary to chain up at night like a dog. And it is not easy at first sight to see that a man pays a very high compliment to the Holy City by setting out for it under conditions which render it to the last degree improbable that he will ever get there.
But about this there is one striking thing to be noticed. If men behaved in that way in our time, we should, as we have said, regard them as symbols of the 'decadence.' But the men who did these things were not decadent; they belonged generally to the most robust classes of what is generally regarded as a robust age. Again, it will be urged that if men essentially sane performed such insanities, it was under the capricious direction of a superstitious religious system. This, again, will not hold water; for in the purely terrestrial and even sensual departments of life, such as love and lust, the medieval princes show the same mad promises and performances, the same misshapen imagination and the same monstrous self-sacrifice. Here we have a contradiction, to explain which it is necessary to think of the whole nature of vows from the beginning. And if we consider seriously and correctly the nature of vows, we shall, unless I am much mistaken, come to the conclusion that it is perfectly sane, and even sensible, to swear to chain mountains together, and that, if insanity is involved at all, it is a little insane not to do so.
The man who makes a vow makes an appointment with himself at some distant time or place. The danger of it is that himself should not keep the appointment. And in modern times this terror of one's self, of the weakness and mutability of one's self, has perilously increased, and is the real basis of the objection to vows of any kind. A modern man refrains from swearing to count the leaves on every third tree in Holland Walk, not because it is silly to do so (he does many sillier things), but because he has a profound conviction that before he had got to the three hundred and seventy-ninth leaf on the first tree he would be excessively tired of the subject and want to go home to tea. In other words, we fear that by that time he will be, in the common but hideously significant phrase, another man. Now, it is this horrible fairy tale of a man constantly changing into other men that is the soul of the decadence. That John Paterson should, with apparent calm, look forward to being a certain General Barker on Monday, Dr. Macgregor on Tuesday, Sir Walter Carstairs on Wednesday, and Sam Slugg on Thursday, may seem a nightmare; but to that nightmare we give the name of modern culture. One great decadent, who is now dead, published a poem some time ago, in which he powerfully summed up the whole spirit of the movement by declaring that he could stand in the prison yard and entirely comprehend the feelings of a man about to be hanged.
'For he that lives more lives than oneMore deaths than one must die.' And the end of all this is that maddening horror of unreality which descends upon the decadents, and compared with which physical pain itself would have the freshness of a youthful thing. The one hell which imagination must conceive as most hellish is to be eternally acting a play without even the narrowest and dirtiest greenroom in which to be human. And this is the condition of the decadent, of the aesthete, of the free-lover. To be everlastingly passing through dangers which we know cannot scare us, to be taking oaths which we know cannot bind us, to defying enemies who we know cannot conquer us -- this is the grinning tyranny of decadence which is called freedom.
Let us turn, on the other hand, to the maker of vows. The man who made a vow, however wild, gave a healthy and natural expression to the greatness of a great moment. He vowed, for example, to chain two mountains together, perhaps a symbol of some great relief of love, or aspiration. Short as the moment of his resolve might be, it was, like all great moments, a moment of immortality, and the desire to say of it exegi monumentum aere perennius was the only sentiment that would satisfy his mind. The modern aesthetic man would, of course, easily see the emotional opportunity; he would vow to chain two mountains together. But, then, he would quite as cheerfully vow to chain the earth to the moon. And the withering consciousness that he did not mean what he said, that he was, in truth, saying nothing of any great import, would take from him exactly that sense of daring actuality which is the excitement of a vow.
The revolt against vows has been carried in our day even to the extent of a revolt against the typical vow of marriage. It is most amusing to listen to the opponents of marriage on this subject. They appear to imagine that the ideal of constancy was a yoke mysteriously imposed on mankind by the devil, instead of being, as it is, a yoke consistently imposed by all lovers on themselves. They have invented a phrase, a phrase that is a black and white contradiction in two words -- 'free-love' -- as if a lover ever had been, or ever could be, free. It is the nature of love to bind itself, and the institution of marriage merely paid the average man the compliment of taking him at his word. Modern sages offer to the lover, with an ill-favoured grin, the largest liberties and the fullest irresponsibility; but they do not respect him as the old Church respected him; they do not write his oath upon the heavens, as the record of his highest moment. They give him every liberty except the liberty to sell his liberty, which is the only one that he wants.
It is exactly this backdoor, this sense of having a retreat behind us, that is, to our minds, the sterlizing spirit in modern pleasure. Everywhere there is the persistent and insane attempt to obtain pleasure without paying for it. Thus, in politics the modern Jingoes practically say, 'Let us have the pleasure of conquerors without the pains of soldiers: let us sit on sofas and be a hardy race.' Thus, in religion and morals, the decadent mystics say: 'Let us have the fragrance of sacred purity without the sorrows of self-restraint; let us sing hymns alternately to the Virgin and Priapus.' Thus in love the free-lovers say: 'Let us have the splendour of offering ourselves without the peril of committing ourselves; let us see whether one cannot commit suicide an unlimited number of times.'
Emphatically it will not work. There are thrilling moments, doubtless, for the spectator, the amateur, and the aesthete; but there is one thrill that is known only to the soldier who fights for his own flag, to the aesthetic who starves himself for his own illumination, to the lover who makes finally his own choice. And it is this transfiguring self-discipline that makes the vow a truly sane thing. It must have satisfied even the giant hunger of the soul of a lover or a poet to know that in consequence of some one instant of decision that strange chain would hang for centuries in the Alps among the silences of stars and snows. All around us is the city of small sins, abounding in backways and retreats, but surely, sooner or later, the towering flame will rise from the harbour announcing that the reign of the cowards is over and a man is burning his ships.
©1997, The American Chesterton Society

Rash Vows and Beautiful Grandchildren

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Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Political thoughts

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