Is it just me, or are these two topics crossing over a whole lot more than usual in the past few years?
Why are some candidates for the presidency of the United States having to answer so many questions regarding their religious affiliation? What happened to the concept of a separation of church and state in this country?
When one is making moral decisions, your spiritual belief set is bound to come into that decision making process. I understand that. I also understand that if someone shares a religious affiliation with you, there's a pretty good chance you'll agree on the results of the decision making process, but that's no guarantee, contrary to what a lot of people seem to believe. I want to see what a person does, not what they say, or what labels they have stuck to them, before I'd consider voting for them.
It worries me that many people seem to be looking for an easy litmus test to decide their choice of candidate. The president has to make too many choices on various subjects for voters to support them on the basis of one issue. What good is it to make your choice based on one issue that's important to you if that candidate is against everything else you believe in? It's a more complex decision than that, and should be approached accordingly. A general agreement on religious affiliation is stronger than a one issue agreement, and so it would be a better basis for a choice of candidate, but I've seen enough people who claim a particular belief set without actually living their lives according to it to be a bit skeptical until I see the choices that person actually makes.
On the other side of the coin, if someone has a different religious affiliation than I do, but makes a lot of choices I agree with, I have no problem with voting for him/her.
To focus on one particular candidate for a moment, here are some reasons I could not support Huckabee for president. First, he spends $30k to make a commercial attacking the record of another candidate, then he decides not to use it. This does not demonstrate the fiscal responsibility I want to see from the president. Then, he brings the press in and shows them that commercial to demonstrate how he's taking the moral high ground by not using it. Except that he is using it, because the press is, by nature of what they do, going to publish information about the content of the not-being-used commercial, which means that he isn't truly taking the high ground at all. In fact, I trust him a good deal less now because these actions show that he's deluding himself or trying to delude others, and either way it doesn't give me confidence in him.
It also bothers me that he was quoted as saying that he wanted to take this country back for Christ. What about the many non-Christians who live here? Doesn't the president work for everybody in the United States? After eight years of George W. saying that God is on our side, I'm sure our Muslim friends who perceive the U.S. as being at war with Islam would appreciate it if we followed up with a new president who has publicly announced that he'd like to take the U.S. back for Christ.
It's a delicate time. I'm glad that so many people in the world seem to be getting more interested in spiritual issues, but it concerns me that that interest seems to be resulting in people choosing sides on which to fight when we should be focusing on what we have in common to resolve conflicts instead of making them worse. Are people looking for real spirituality or clear and easy answers in a confusing world?
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2 comments:
i wonder which Christ this guy's talking about?
-Nathan
Its a complicated subject. On the question of Church and State I would observe that the intent of the founding fathers was to prevent government from interfering with religiion and not necissarily the other way around. The phrase itself is from Jefferson who was trying to ally the fears of a particularly denomination that the Government would create a state religion (which is specificly mentioned as a no no in the First ammendment) and he was clarifying it would not happen.
If you actually study the founding fathers though they were in fact religious men and with two questionable exceptions (Jefferson and Franklin) Christian men. Washington among others feared what would become of the country if it lost God. Another even wrote he thought we would be better with a muslim, or a jew or one of several other religions over an atheist as president. Also for that matter the intervening presidents have been some denomination of Christian and its left its mark on their presidencys.
Ok enough with the history. Personally I disagree about the relevence of a candidates religion. No I don't mean that I would not vote for a non christian (or even an atheist) if I agreed with their positions on important issues what I mean is it can be very relevent particularly if your talking about a fanatic. Case in point George W. Bush is very much a fundamentalist Christian and its played a role in decisions he made (and not for the better). In particular I'd say a very relevent question isn't "what is your religious affiliation?" Its do you think the Apocolypse is comming in the next 20 years. We really don't need another president who thinks he's preparing the world for the end times.
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