Mike's Noise

Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, RIP

One of the leading intellectual lights of the "Religious Right," Fr.Richard John Neuhaus, died this week at the age of 72. Neuhaus was instrumental in creating and nurturing perhaps the two most powerful American cultural partnerships of the past thirty years: uniting Protestants and Catholics in the pursuit of common moral interests, and allying social conservatives with traditional free market fiscal conservatives.

Neuhaus' greatest body of writing stemmed from his position as editor-in-chief of the journal First Things. His monthly editorial column, "The Public Square," was one of the most influential soapboxes for religious conservatism, and his brilliant command of language, combined with his astute observations and marvelous intellect, made his work appealing to both the political Left and Right.

If you've never read Fr. Neuhaus, then you will enjoy this excerpt from his excellent First Things piece on post-Katrina New Orleans entitled "The New Orleans That Was":

There remains the question of rebuilding New Orleans. I have friends whose families go back generations there, and they are deeply divided. Some are in profound mourning for its death, and others defiantly declare that a little hurricane, or even a very big hurricane, cannot kill what New Orleans was and will be again. All agree that New Orleans was different from any other American city. Joel Lockhart Dyer once wrote, "New Orleans is North America's Venice; both cities are living on borrowed time." Michael Ledeen thinks Naples the more apt comparison: "Naples also faces destruction--volcanic destruction from 'Vesuvius the Exterminator,' as the poet Verga once wrote--and Naples, too, is noted for a lively, and often lawless style of life, along with great literature, art, cuisine, and music. . . . The European stereotype of the Neapolitan is very much like the American image of New Orleanians: lazy, happy, spontaneous, and unrepressed, slow-moving but quick-witted, and very happy with the food."

New Orleans is a streetcar named Desire that has made its final run. The French Quarter, built on the city's original and higher ground, was not so badly damaged. I suppose it could be revived as a clean, well-lighted place, but that would not be New Orleans. The play city of New Orleans was also situated in a swamp of poverty, corruption, and decadence. Swamp and city were inextricably joined, and the hundreds of thousands who have relocated may not want to return to the swamp. Halliburton and Disney may spruce up the tourist attractions, and it may be a great success, as the cleaning up of Times Square has proved. But it will not be New Orleans. Times Square is not New York; there are many other places to go and things to do. In New Orleans, the central attraction was the French Quarter--and it cannot be the French Quarter without the surrounding decadence, Dixieland, and broken dreams.

[...]

In the chaos of Katrina, it was repeatedly said that this is the kind of thing that happens in the third world, not in America. There had always been something of the third world about New Orleans. It was an American anomaly. In addition to Naples, there was also the feel of what one finds in Buenos Aires or Rio de Janeiro, or even of Dakar in Senegal in the last days of colonial control. Throw in the antebellum South. In New Orleans, one often came across historical oddments, such as the crown of thorns that Pope Pius IX plaited for the imprisoned Jefferson Davis, in the tattered Museum of the Confederacy. New Orleans was a pervasively Catholic city that knew all about "inculturation" long before the Second Vatican Council. There was voodoo, pentecostal enthusiasm, and superstition galore, and it was far from clear what had inculturated what. Between the evil eye and sacramental grace there was an unspoken pact, and for everything, if you didn't get yourself killed, there was absolution. New Orleans lived off absolution. Theologians may call it cheap grace, but it was grace enough to keep the sinners going from day to day.

I spoke there from time to time at the universities, Loyola and Tulane, and once to a group of business leaders. These are the white and wealthy patrons who pretended to let the black folk rule by choosing the politicians for whom they could vote. New Orleans was an unabashedly traditional and hierarchical city that managed to accommodate the civil rights movement with relatively slight inconvenience. Welfare and circuses did not make for prosperity, but it pacified the restless. The "krewes" were the elite clubs in charge of the lavish Mardi Gras floats, and nobody seriously challenged their authoritative delineation of who was who in the social order of New Orleans. I was musing with the business leaders about the strangeness of it all and wondering how it came to be, when a gentleman who was "in real estate" (and was said to own a third of the city) politely interrupted and said, "Well, you have to understand, Father, that New Orleans just kinda happened."

I expect that's right, and no amount of local pride, entrepreneurial capitalism, or massive government aid will make it happen again. There will be a New Orleans again. The port and refineries will get back on their feet and the tourists will flock to the "revived" French Quarter. But it will not be New Orleans. It will work hard at being New Orleans, but precisely to the degree that it works hard at being New Orleans, or works hard at anything for that matter, it is not New Orleans. The tourists will tell themselves they have been to New Orleans, and those who remember will kindly decline to disabuse them.

With the ever-increasing presence of the Religious Left in our national ethics, and the strong alliance between the Obama Administration and liberal Christianity, Fr. Neuhaus' strong conservative voice will be sorely missed.

...

The Richard John Neuhaus Blogspot page contains an exhaustive compendium of death notices, remembrances, interviews, and First Things editorials.

The Anchoress also has a good Neuhaus link roundup.

Dollars, disorder, and death

Monday morning's top news story will undoubtedly be the volume of cumulative sales generated by American Christmas shoppers this weekend, as financial analysts argue over whether or not it was "enough."  But this year's "Black Friday" take-away story is undoubtedly the senseless death of a Wal-Mart employee in Valley Stream, NJ, who was trampled to death by an unruly mob of bargain hunters.

And those shoppers didn't just trample Jdimytai Damour to death; they continued to rush into the store, past his lifeless body, shoving paramedics out of the way until the agitated mob was finally pushed back by police.  Then they fumed when authorities cleared the store and closed it down.

What does it say about us, when the value we place on cheap video games and DVD players overwhelms our ability to do even the simplest of decent things, to step back and allow paramedics to try to save an injured man's life? 

It's easy to come up with a lengthy list of "-isms," to whose surface we can easily affix blame -- Americanism, capitalism, materialism, consumerism, racism, etc.  But the root cause is far more complex, and dare I say, far more painful.  Please consider this excellent analysis by The Anchoress:

I once actually saw two women quarrel over an item, just like in the movies, while Christmas shopping. I was very young, and knew everything at the time, so I blamed it on American materialism and its corruptive influence on the soul. Materialism CAN corrupt the soul, of course - as can capitalism untempered by compassion - but as I’ve matured, I’ve come to reject the easy and cynical course that finds “America” and its values to be at the core of every negative situation I encounter. Instead, I have decided to think of the aggression of the battling shoppers to be rooted in vulnerability. They’ve decided they want to purchase a particular item for someone they love. Perhaps this is how they express love. Perhaps they believe, subconsciously, that this is the only way they can be loved back. Perhaps this is a budgeted item and the only way they can afford to purchase it is at a heavily reduced price and - because they love - they’re willing to fight for it.

Looked at in this way, the “crassness” of all of this consumer excess seems less clear, and one finds oneself - as one does all too often, if one is paying attention - in the middle of yet another Holy Mystery. Love is the highest human aspiration, but when it lacks anchoring in something bigger than itself, it tends to drift a bit and take on some detritus (doubt, hurt, anger, self-hate) that gets into the workings and distorts the navigation, a little; in that case, suddenly love can lead us away from, and not toward, our best selves. And then where are you? You’re tugging on a toy with another shopper and sending all sorts of messages to your family and to the world-at-large, that you never intended to send. About yourself and your values, about your society, even about your nation.

There was an early episode of CSI, "Unfriendly Skies," that dealt with a similar ordeal.  A passenger on a transcontinental flight is suffering from undiagnosed encephalitis, or swelling of the brain.  This causes extreme discomfort and eventually leads to psychotic behavior.  A group of five fellow passengers fears for their lives, and what begins as an attempt to restrain the victim soon escalates into a violent attack that leaves the man dead.

Although this fictional story dealt with a much more serious issue (the taking of a life in order to subdue an unknown threat and thus save one's own life) the underlying premise is the same one faced by the mob of Wal-Mart shoppers --to what extent do we ignore our conscience in order to get what we want, particularly in a situation where we assume (or dictate) that responsibility is "shared," and therefore we are somehow allowed to abdicate our normal moral boundaries?

In fact, another essay linked by The Anchoress in an earlier post noted that those who commit or inspire the greatest acts of evil (think Cromwell or Robespierre or Mugabe or Hitler) often do so because they ultimately desire to accomplish something good (religious freedom, or equality, or security).  To satisfy this end, evil often masquerades as morality, imparting heavy doses of guilt and conviction to those who are judged to be less than fully committed to "the new way".

I'm sure that most of the people in that out-of-control Wal-Mart mob love other people greatly --  parents, children, neighbors, family -- and would make great sacrifices in order to impart happiness, even shallow, fleeting happiness, upon their loved ones.  Yet as we have seen, even these people are capable of commiting great evil through the disordered way in which they attempted to achieve a good end.  That disorder led to the death of an innocent man.  The Wal-Mart incident is simply a local representation of a global problem; a problem, I believe, that is beyond the capabiliy of mankind to solve on its own.

Sally Kern might have been on to something

Michelle Malkin has a chilling round-up of violent reactions and threats made by unhinged gay activists in California in the wake of Tuesday's Proposition 8 victory.  Proposition 8 specified that "marriage" is solely the union of a man and a woman.  Some incidents being reported:

• A San Diego man physically assaulted his elderly neighbors because of a Proposition 8 sign in their yard 

• Commenters and bloggers on radical gay sites are threatening to disrupt weddings, physically assault or kill Prop 8 supporters, and burn down churches

• An Huffington Post contributor is leading yet another charge to strip the Mormons of their tax-exempt status

Let's put this in perspective, shall we?

Last year, Oklahoma state representative Sally Kern made a speech about the radical gay agenda.  She compared the danger posed by radical gays to that posed by terrorists (the same comparison Rosie O'Donnell made concerning Christian fundamentalists).   You can agree or disagree with what she said, but Rep. Kern simply made a speech.  A speech.  No threats, no intimidation, no physical violence.  Yet she was creamed by liberal blogs, gay activists, and show business personalities for what she said.

Fast-forward to today, to the aftermath of Prop. 8.  Think the mainstream press will make page one news out of it these unhinged threats?  Think Ellen Degeneres will call Lawrence Pizzicara and demand to know why he attacked his neighbors?  The only reaction we'll get from the liberal chattering class is the sound of crickets chirping.

Assault, arson, murder.  I dunno ... it sure sounds like terrorism to me.

_____________________________________________________________

One more thing - if gay rights groups hate Christians and the institutionalized church so much, then why do they demand marriage, which is a religious sacrament performed by licensed clergy?  Why would they want the church involved at all?  If the whole "gay marriage" thing is nothing but an "equal protection under the law" issue, then why not promote secular civil unions, administered by the state and completely void of any religious affiliation?  Wouldn't that make things simpler for everyone? 

I believe that legalizing "gay marriage" will only pave the way for radical gay activists to begin to harass religious organizations with discrimination and equal protection lawsuits -- particularly churches that are clear in their refusal to perform gay wedding ceremonies.  Is that what we really want?  Let's give gays equal protection through civil unions, and leave "marriage" out of it.  

...

ADDED:  My blog friend LaShawn Barber, who is sickened by the "gay marriage=civil rights movement" argument of radical gay activists, notes that California already allows state-sanctioned domestic partnerships.  Perhaps this is why Californians continually vote to keep marriage sacred -- a measure similar to Proposition 8 passed with 61% of the vote in 2000, only to be struck down by the California Supreme Court this year. 

Also, blacks supported Proposition 8 by a 70% - 30% margin.  What does that say about the "gay marriage=civil rights movement" argument?

Blacks haven't been spared in the vicious reaction to Prop 8:

It was like being at a klan rally except the klansmen were wearing Abercrombie polos and Birkenstocks. "YOU NIGGER," one man shouted at me. "If your people want to call me a FAGGOT, I will call you a nigger."  Someone else said same thing to me on the next block near the temple...me and my friend were walking, he is also gay but Korean, and a young WeHo clone said after last night the niggers better not come to West Hollywood if they knew what was BEST for them.

The momentum for more amendments banning gay marriage is strong right now.  Gay activists are panicked.  

I believe that gay activists should simply face the truth: "Thus far, 30 states have outlawed homosexual "marriages" by an average close to 70% approval by voters through amendments to the state constitutions."  There is clearly an opposition among the general public to gay marriages.  Not domestic partnerships or civil unions for gays, but gay marriage. 

Gay activists can attack religious groups until they are blue in the face, but the election results clearly indicate that the opposition to gay marriage goes way beyond hard-core fundamentalist Christians, and deep into the mainstream of America.  They can falsely accuse the Christian Coalition and other groups of staging hate or fear campaigns, but the truth is that such tactics (were they employed) could never consistently deliver two-and-a-half to one opposition to gay marriage, if people really believed in their hearts that it was a civil right necessary for a free and prosperous nation.  Hatemongers like Fred Phelps are not the driving force behind the opposition to gay marriage.

Unfortunately, gay rights activists are even less capable of swaying popular opinion in their favor than the Religious Right.  Gay activists have been, for the most part, obnoxious, intimidating, vulgar, and violent, and they have delighted in scandalizing and deliberately offending their opponents.  This makes many people (including myself) continually fearful of what their next move is going to be. 

Perhaps the gay community should start by firing the current group of malcontents and agitators currently leading its protests, publishing its newspapers and magazines, and writing its blogs.  Find people instead who are willing to have conversations.  Dialog is the key here, not shouting obscenities through a bullhorn or engaging in crude stereotyping and name-calling.  The sincerity and civility that gay activists use to address and motivate their own people should carry over to their conversations with community and religious leaders.  In other words, don't become like Fred Phelps in order to stop Fred Phelps.

Or maybe the gay community could involve its people in a series of smaller, proactive projects that create a more direct and positive impact in local neighborhoods.  For example, sponsoring a food or clothing drive during the holidays for needy families will garner much more support than marching through the streets wearing leather and chains and yelling into bullhorns.  It's all about winning people's trust, rather than bullying or frightening them.

A final Christian argument against socialism as the cure for everything that ails us

This will be my last post dealing with election politics.  I just wanted to make one last retrospective argument concerning wealth and class envy.

It seems that Barack Obama has been hit hard by the McCain camp's charges of socialism.  His latest rebuttal (after unsuccessfully attempting to denigrate "Joe The Plumber" Werzelbacher as a loser who could never possibly earn $250,000 a year) is that anyone complaining about tax rate increases is selfish.

There is anger and frustration among ordinary Americans over tax increases, but it is not because of selfishness.  It is because of reality -- only an idiot would believe that the minority of taxpayers taking home $250,000 (or is it $200,000 or $150,000 or $120,000?) or more will be the only group of people to bear the cost of Obama's colossal government expansion.  And it is because of resentment.  We don't resent those with wealth per se, but we certainly resent an erudite cadre of wealthy, elitist lawyers, tenured professors, political consultants, and politicians telling us what to do with our money.  The Anchoress summed it up perfectly some years ago:

Every weekend I meander through the New York Times [...] And every weekend I finally close the paper and think, this is a publication which editorializes on the evils of capitalism while it praises European-style socialism, and foments class resentment between the rich and the poor…and it disdains middle-class Republicans like me…and yet it is chock-full of people so rich I have never heard of them, people who breathe such rarified air and move in such insulated little conclaves that I would only be likely to encounter them face to face if I rammed into them on the Long Island Expressway as they moved back and forth between Town and Country, between Sotheby’s Manhattan and Sotheby’s Southhampton, so to speak. The paper prostrates itself before the public-education devotees who send their children to private schools and the illegal immigrant sympathizers who have bought up the last private beachfronts in Montauk, inviting those brown-skinned Catholics onto their property only long-enough to erect the high walls of their fortresses or to stain their decks.

She continues,

I, in my middle class world, with my callused-handed husband and my Eagle Scout son, and the friends with whom we volunteer at church and in the community, do not begrudge the hyper-rich their riches.

What we do begrudge them is their “superior” disdain for our values, and their hectoring that we are somehow less compassionate, less well-meaning, gosh darn it just LESSER people because we believe in giving a hand, rather than a hand-out.

I mind gazillionaires like Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, Jon Corzine and Hillary “we’re going to have to take some things away from you for the common good” Clinton pretending that our yearly income, our solidly middle-class income (and very modest emergency fund) is too, too much for us, unfair to others, undertaxed, greedy, ignoble and selfish. I mind people who are bouncing on fluffy pillows of honest-to-goodness wealth shaking a rhetorical finger at us for daring to try to get comfortable on our foam rubber mats of hard-earned wages. (emphasis added)

And do you know what really gets under our skin?  I'll let Peggy Noonan handle that one:

Our elites, our educated and successful professionals, are the ones who are supposed to dig us out and lead us. I refer specifically to the elites of journalism and politics, the elites of the Hill and at Foggy Bottom and the agencies, the elites of our state capitals, the rich and accomplished and successful of Washington, and elsewhere. I have a nagging sense, and think I have accurately observed, that many of these people have made a separate peace. That they're living their lives and taking their pleasures and pursuing their agendas; that they're going forward each day with the knowledge, which they hold more securely and with greater reason than non-elites, that the wheels are off the trolley and the trolley's off the tracks, and with a conviction, a certainty, that there is nothing they can do about it.

I suspect that history, including great historical novelists of the future, will look back and see that many of our elites simply decided to enjoy their lives while they waited for the next chapter of trouble. And that they consciously, or unconsciously, took grim comfort in this thought: I got mine. Which is what the separate peace comes down to, "I got mine, you get yours."

I think that many of us know, deep down inside, that people like Michelle and Barack Obama, who earn a combined annual income comfortably in the 7-figure range, are more or less insulated from the financial affects of the public policies that they support.  We know that any "solutions" proposed by Ted Kennedy to our current health care problems ultimately matter little to Kennedy himself, because his family connections, political connections, and personal wealth ensure that his personal medical care will always be the finest available, regardless of location or procedure or cost.  We know that the opinions of billionaires like George Soros or Warren Buffett or Bill Gates on tax policies are essentially meaningless because they will still be billionaires, regardless of what the tax code says.  Likewise with Hollywood celebrities.

We also know this because this select group of people, with rare exception and seemingly in inverse proportion to both their physical health and their publicly-expressed concern for the poor, are themselves embarrassingly weak benefactors of charity.  They are also notorious for exploiting every possible tax loophole, all the while complaining that the rich don't "pay their fair share" in taxes.  What did John Edwards, champion of the poor, do during the 1990s when his lawsuit windfalls began to roll in? He formed an S-corporation in order to avoid paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes.  Why did Ted Kennedy probate his mother's estate in Florida, even though she had been a lifelong resident of Massachusetts?  Florida has no state inheritance tax.  And neither John Kerry nor Ted Kennedy pay the optional higher 5.85% Massachusetts state income tax rate.  And so on and so on.

We know that the super-rich will not really be affected by income and payroll tax increases, simply because such increases do not affect their principal wealth.  Even if the very rich were income taxed at a rate of 100%, they would still be able to live very, very comfortably off the value of their enormous reserves of stocks, bonds, precious metals, cash, real estate, fine art, and other investments.

Perhaps they'll owe a little more under Obama's plans, but they've got theirs, and the enormity of their fortunes means that most of their money will be securely tucked away in tax shelters.  And what happens to the rest of us really doesn't matter to them as long as they've paid just enough to assuage their slightly-guilty consciences.

The people who really get nailed under the high marginal taxes and estate taxes of "spread the wealth" schemes are the professionals and successful business owners who have just barely crossed over the $150,000 to $200,000 per year earnings threshold.  These people will find themselves working harder to earn substantially less, permanently stuck with enough money to live comfortably, but never really earning enough to fund a retirement account that will allow them to continue to live that way after they retire, or able to accumulate enough to afford their children a comfortable inheritance.  And they are the ones whose children will never have enough cash reserves to pay both extended/elderly care costs (such as nursing homes) for their parents, and estate taxes on real property or a business.  This is the scenario that hits farmers and ranchers particularly hard.  If a son or daughter inherits a farm valued at $2 million, where are they going to come up with the $500,000 or $750,000 in estate taxes for the government?

You may ask, what's so wrong with that?  There are tens of millions of people in this country who spend their lives mired in poverty.  Why should anyone support the idea that some people should be free to grow rich while others struggle from day to day?

I think the answer is two-fold.  First, our nation has never enforced the principle of redistribution of wealth by the Federal government.  Our Constitution was written in order to specifically define how our government would function, and to enumerate specific rights of citizens that could not be infringed by that government.  The Constitution creates a Federal government that, for the most part, is limited in its ability to interfere in people's lives.  It also implies that what is yours is yours, not the government's (or euphemistically, "the people's").  Under such a system, some will prosper and some will fail, but their failure cannot be attributed to persecution or limits on their individual freedoms imposed by the Federal government.  In fact, under our system, state governments have more direct control over the rights of their citizens -- it was the state governments in the South that enacted "Jim Crow" laws; yet it took action at the Federal level to ultimately overrule state's rights on that issue.

Barack Obama was exactly right when he said that our Constitution "doesn’t say what the federal government or the state government must do on your behalf."  He wants to see that changed, of course, but such a major Constitutional overhaul would give the Federal government an unprecedented and ultimately dangerous amount of power over our individual lives.  I believe that the potential for the abuse of that power far outweighs any benefits to be gained from it.

Second, as a Christian I strongly object to other Christians attempting to use the government as a strong arm in order to enact their vision of social justice.  Many Christians read about the equal partition of the Promised Land among the Israelites, and the communal nature of the early Jerusalem church as described in Acts, and conclude that God's plan for mankind is the equal distribution of wealth among all people.  They then propose to task a benevolent centralized government with the administration of such a distribution plan.  Unfortunately, the Bible contains no passages that support such a scheme.  The New Testament teaches that Christians should peaceably co-exist within the framework of secular governments, and give generously to those in need, but it never teaches that Christians should co-opt those governments as a means of achieving their own ends.  (Admittedly, the Church and much of Christendom has repeatedly failed in this regard.)

And in the Old Testament, God does indeed partition the land equally among the tribes of Israel, but He also clearly establishes that the land belongs to Him; the Israelites are merely tenants.  They are forbidden from selling land in perpetuity, and whatever land is sold or mortgaged is to be returned to its original owners every 50 years.  Therefore, whenever land is sold or mortgaged, its value is to be prorated according to the proximity of the 50 year Jubilee.  The Israelites are also required to pay the Temple (i.e. God) an annual tithe of 10% of everything they own.  (The Old Testament narratives indicate that the Israelites also failed to honor these commandments, just like the Christian church throughout the ages.)  And God specifically requires His people to be generous with the poor and to refrain from profiting from their misfortune.  Yet outside of these requirements, the children of Israel are allowed to honestly earn whatever they can, and -- with the previously noted exception of possessions that have been borrowed or purchased from others -- God never commands His people to redistribute their own personal wealth.

There is also one other thing.  Redistribution of wealth schemes will do little to solve the primary affliction suffered by the poor in this country -- civic poverty -- which is the belief that they are irrelevant to the course of events in their communities.  Civic poverty is most prominently displayed among African-Americans, who suffered persecution and loss of basic civil rights in this country for over a century after they had been freed from slavery.  Even though civil rights laws have been amended, and even though academia and the professional workforce has striven to provide affirmative action and equal opportunities for Blacks during the last 40 years, there is still (particularly at the lowest economic levels) a basic distrust of America, its government and its financial systems among Blacks.

So far, all of our attempts to fight poverty have involved material solutions.  And honestly, our poor enjoy a much better standard of living that average working-class citizens in many nations.  But no one has been able to explain to me how a massive, materially-oriented redistribution of wealth scheme will somehow make the lives of the civically impoverished any better.  Theirs is an emotional and spiritual deficit, and money will not make the hurt and distrust disappear, nor will it mend broken families or dysfunctional communities of any kind.  In fact, I believe that such a scheme would make the lives of the civically impoverished even more miserable, because receiving free money with no required interaction could very well create an even greater temptation to stay disconnected from society at large. 

So how do we fight civic poverty?  The same way that Jesus taught us to spread his Gospel -- through relationships.  By listening.  By lending a hand whenever people are truly in need.  By teaching others self-worth and self-respect.  By helping people overcome addictions and hangups.  In short, by getting our hands dirty, making ourselves vulnerable, and doing it all voluntarily, without coercion or intimidation from the government.  

Such a solution is difficult, frustrating, painfully slow and seemingly hopeless.  You can't accomplish it simply by writing a check or creating a government bureaucracy and then hoping everything works out OK.  Is America capable of such a task, right now?  Probably not.  Certainly not without a spiritual awakening and revival, which is what I pray for daily for my own life and for our nation.  Shouldn't we do something in the mean time, then?  Yes, but only if our stop-gap measure is not worse than the problem at hand.  I believe that socialism -- even non-violent, "democratic" socialism approved by voters -- is not the answer, because it only alters behavior by force of law; it does not fundamentally improve the character or spirit of its subjects.  And it takes our allegiance away from God and lessens our responsibility for each other, since socialism recasts government as the ultimate owner of all wealth, and, subsequently, the sole source of our livelihood and well-being.  When we turn the state into a God, we are not doing His will.

That's what I believe, and that's why I cannot support redistribution of wealth as a solution to America's current financial and spiritual problems.  Please join me in praying for a better way.

"Palin Derangement Syndrome" illustrates the Left's poor comprehension of Christian ethics

(This post has been bumped and updated.  Make sure you read it all.)

A couple of days ago, I wrote about "the slime has already begun to ooze from the fever swamps of the left," with respect to Vice Presidential pick Gov. Sarah Palin.  It got worse over the weekend, with left-wing kooks deliriously celebrating the extraordinary "truth" they discovered -- Sarah Palin's baby boy Trig was actually the illegitimate son of her oldest daughter Bristol, and Palin wore a "pregnant suit" in public in order to pull off the ruse.

In response, the Anchoress pointedly asked,  "How much do you have to love your hate in order to surrender your reason, and your humanity, to it?"

(Added: This much.  God help us.)

Today Sarah Palin publicly announced that Bristol is, in fact, unmarried and pregnant.  But she plans to marry the father, a young man who has been her high school sweetheart for over a year now, and the couple will keep their baby.  This is simply yet another example of the rugged ordinariness of the Palin family, and why they resonate so deeply with middle America.

Desperately looking for anything hypocritical that could drive a wedge between Sarah Palin and likely voters, liberal bloggers and MSM reporters were quick to note that Palin supports the teaching of abstinence in schools.  Unfortunately, the much-anticipated reaction from Dr. James Dobson was not the outburst of righteous indignation and disapproval that they certainly were expecting; nor was the reaction of the Evangelical community at large, and the left is currently going crazy.  Read the comments here.

Observing the continuous, glittering string of failures suffered by the Left as they attempt to attack Sarah Palin's character, one might ask, how can the Left be so mistaken about the core values of Sarah Palin's supporters?

Let me reintroduce you to this propitious quote from Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism:

[Margaret] Sanger's genius was to ... [argue] that motherhood itself was a socially imposed constraint on the liberty of women. It was a form of what Marxists called false consciousness to want a large family.

Sanger believed -- prophetically enough -- that if women conceived of sex as first and foremost a pleasurable experience rather than a procreative act, they would embrace birth control as a necessary tool for their own personal gratification. She brilliantly used the language of liberation to convince women they weren't going along with a collectivist scheme but were in fact "speaking truth to power" ... Sanger's analysis was surely correct, and led directly to the widespread feminist association of sex with political rebellion.

Margaret Sanger's anti-morality (further expanded by contemporary radical feminists) resulted in hard-core progressives completely losing touch with traditional teachings about sexuality, marriage, and child rearing. This is the reason for all of the incredibly crude and ignorant comments from hard-core Leftists.  They are totally out of touch with normalcy as the rest of us would define it and, as is typical for human beings, they react with fear and hatred toward things that they do not understand.

Here's the deal -- we traditionalists teach abstinence to our children primarily so that our sons and daughters won't end up being gigolos, whores and tramps. There, I said it. We understand that abstinence will not result in a 100% cessation of pregnancy. After all, God designed human beings with the desire to procreate. But it will teach our children to respect their bodies -- girls should not use sex as a tool to subordinate men, and men should not use sex as a tool to dominate women.

On the other hand, pills, condoms, and the like may prevent pregnancy if used correctly and consistently, but they cannot help a teen learn about self esteem, self control, and the sanctity of their own body. Ditto for abortion on demand. The loneliness, emptiness, and utter despair that plague sexually promiscuous men and women is well-documented (e.g. Looking for Mr. Goodbar).  And then there are the problems with STD's, particularly hepatitis and HIV.

None of the support for Sarah Palin and her daughter has anything to do with Evangelicals suddenly "approving of" or "ignoring" the promiscuity of a seventeen year old simply because her mother is a Republican.  Rather, it has everything to do with what the family has chosen to do next.

As human beings we all have the ability to make choices.  Sometimes we make choices -- bad ones --  without clearly thinking about the consequences.  But it is in dealing with those consequences (and more importantly, the consequences resulting from events that we cannot control) that we undergo true spiritual growth. The mark of Christianity is not the rabid observance of puritanical legalism, nor is it the brutal humiliation of transgressors; rather it is the ability to overcome difficult circumstances through love, hope, and grace.

Traditional Christian ethics teaches that even if the conditions surrounding its arrival are less than absolutely ideal -- even if they may be traced directly to an act of evil -- new life is always a holy event, a cause for thanksgiving, even if that life is not "perfect" in our eyes.  The imperfect arrival of life, or the arrival of imperfect life, both give ample opportunities for the Holy Spirit and the Body of Christ to impart love, hope, and grace, each upon the other.  We do not seek out sin or imperfection so that God's grace may be celebrated; rather, we seek to better understand how to celebrate grace when we are faced with adverse circumstances.

Abstinence goes hand and hand with responsibility.  If two people make the decision to enter into a sexual relationship and then they make a baby, they are expected to be responsible for their actions. Initially, the grandparents-to-be may be shocked, angered, and disappointed. But through the work of the Holy Spirit, love and grace will eventually triumph over these emotions, and then the new life will be celebrated.  This seems to be the situation with Bristol Palin.

Unfortunately, too many teenage mothers come from broken homes or families void of any kind of real spiritual guidance. It is always a shame to see runaway sexuality in those situations -- those girls seem to have latched on to the "pleasurable experience" aspect of feminist sexuality, without bothering to trouble themselves with the birth control part. Understood in those terms, progressive sex education is certainly as much -- probably more -- of a failure than abstinence education.

Progressives claim to have the perfect solutions to the problem of teenage pregnancy  -- designating children and families as punishments or obstacles in the pursuit of an enriched life, then promoting guilt-free promiscuity balanced by medical birth control (including abortion).  Yet these are really nothing more than shallow appeals simply designed to satiate our most youthful desires for immediacy and personal satisfaction.  They are not designed to promote responsibility.  They are not designed to freely allow the propagation of grace from one individual to another, nor are they designed to allow the propagation of grace freely from the Holy Spirit to each of us.

We believe that depriving our children of such responsibilities and experiences will severely impede their spiritual growth.  This is why we teach our children abstinence, rather than promiscuity and birth control.

...

Added 9-3-08:  Here's a lovely gem from feminist icon Sally Quinn (via RushLimbaugh.com):

I've been a working mother for 26 years and practically every friend I have is a working mother and works full time. So, uh, I think we are so far beyond that issue of whether women should work or not, in -- uh, certainly in your world and my world.  But in the world of evangelicals, that's not the case.  Women are supposed to be subservient to their husbands and they are meant to be stay-at-home moms.  And women, in fact, are not allowed to be pastors in the Southern Baptist church. (emphasis added)

Well goll-dang - we's all just a buncha redneck chauvinist pigs, us Eeeeeevangelicals, that is.  Here's a news flash -- the Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox churches both disallow women from entering the priesthood too.  Sheesh.  Another glittering leftist/secularist jewel of colossal ignorance.

__________________________________

Welcome Anchoress readers!  And thanks for the link, Elizabeth.
And welcome WizBang readers.  Thanks for the link, Lori.
Aw, what the heck - a hat tip to Mr. D Aristophanes from SadlyNo.com.  Welcome aboard.

__________________________________

Post script:

I want to make two brief additional points.  First off, blaming only the Left for the misunderstandings of the Church that exist today would not be telling the whole truth.  Certainly, through political pressure, excommunication, inquisition, witch hunts, and other means of coercion, the Body of Christ has damaged itself by failing to deal gracefully with those who depart from its teachings.  We have only ourselves to blame for that, and we are still struggling with spiritual shortcomings.  Today, we seem to have no problem being gracious toward those who commit sexual sins -- unless those transgressions involve same-sex relationships.  Homosexuality is still a serious stumbling block for Christian grace.

Second, Christianity teaches that God's standard of perfection is not the same as ours.  We screw up this message as well, choosing to skip over the process of perfection (sanctification) that develops as the result of our spiritual formation through the work of the Holy Spirit, in favor of simply pillorying those who fail to live up to our human ideal of absolute sinlessness. 

No one is responsible for these distortions of the Gospel except Christians themselves.  This should give us pause whenever we see ourselves portrayed as rabid puritans who humiliate the imperfect.

The lineage of Jesus Christ himself shows us that God can use anyone, regardless of how "impure" we may think they are, as a vessel for His divine will.  Matthew's lineage of Jesus specifically includes four women -- Tamar (who disguised herself as a prostitute in order to become pregnant by Judah, thus ensuring the continuation of his lineage), Rahab (a prostitute and an ethnic Gentile), Ruth (an ethnic Gentile), and "Uriah's wife," Bathsheba, the mother of Solomon and the object of King David's greatest moral failing.  The commonality that links these women, besides their lack of moral and ethnic purity, is that each of them were involved in an open confession of sin and a public repentance, and afterward, they remained close to the LORD.  This is what He truly desires of us as well. (Updated at 12:35PM
9-2-08)

The Purpose Driven Presidential Forum

Tonight at 8:00 PM (7:00 PM central time) Rev. Rick Warren, the pastor of Saddleback Church and best selling author of The Purpose Driven Life will host a first-of-its kind event -- a one-hour interview with Barack Obama and then John McCain, with both candidates appearing live with Warren, but not on stage with one another.  John McCain will not be able to hear the questions that Warren asks Obama, nor will he be able to hear Obama's answers.  Neither candidate will have an opportunity to respond to the other's answers.

Pastor Warren says, "I’m going to ask them questions about character, competence, about values, vision, virtue, about their convictions in leadership, about their experience ... Every one of your decisions you make is based on your world view.  So I’m going to ask them about abortion.  I’m going to ask them about the definition of marriage, but I’m also going to ask them more than that ..."

It is interesting that a church and a well-known and respected Christian pastor are the hosts of this event.  If anything, it illustrates just how closely religious and political beliefs are to a significant number of Americans.

But during the interview, Matthew 25, a liberal-leaning Christian PAC lead by influential author Brian McLaren, will be running an ad suggesting that Barack Obama is on a stronger moral footing because -- unlike John McCain -- he has never been divorced.  Writing at SmartChristian.com, Dr. Andy Jackson notes, "Now the so-called progressive Christians are becoming as entangled in partisan politics as the Moral Majority once did."

I will shortly be posting a multi-part review of McLaren's latest book, Everything Must Change.  I am trying to write a review that is as non-political as possible, focusing on the theology and praxis that McLaren claims will transform the Christian narrative into something that can eventually displace the broken narratives of pleasure, power, beauty, and wealth that control our world today. 

McLaren is a good writer, and although some of his ideas are still rough he makes some compelling arguments in his book.  However, his decision to unequivocally align himself with the Barack Obama presidential campaign will make a non-partisan review of his book difficult.

Protecting the Gospel from progressive wolves

One of the dominant themes of the modern progressive movement, particularly Christian progressivism, is "disparate parties putting aside their differences and working toward common goals."  In many respects, this is a noble undertaking.  And as an alternative to the confrontational and schismatic struggles that have plagued Protestant Christianity for centuries, it is certainly a very appealing option.

A little over a century ago, the leaders of both the nascent progressive movement and the mainline Protestant churches situated in urban parishes began to recognize the terrible plight of the poor and disadvantaged living in the large cities of the United States.  These people, largely immigrants from Europe, were exploited and tossed aside by greedy industrialists and then cast down as hopelessly ignorant and corrupted by the wealthy Anglo upper classes.  Both social progressives, transformed by the writings of Marx and the science of Darwin, and mainline Protestants, driven by the tenants of the Christian Gospel, made the abatement of urban poverty their ultimate goal.  To this end, mainline Protestant Christian denominations and secular leftists/progressives have been working in tandem on many social justice issues (community organizing, civil rights, health care rights, living wage, etc.)  for over one hundred years.

Yet within this close relationship lies a problem that has continually plagued progressive Christians -- how does the Church prevent the Gospel from being polluted by the anti-Christian ideologies of secular progressives?  One could earnestly ask the same question regarding the dangerous relationships between the "Religious Right," big business, and the military, but in this essay I want to specifically focus on how the pro-abortion teachings of the secular progressive movement have affected contemporary progressive Christianity.

The biggest lightening rod in the current abortion controversy is Sen. Barack Obama, a self-professed Christian who has also been one of the most outspoken and dogged foes of any legislation that could negatively affect abortion rights.  His stubborn refusal to support the Illinois "born alive" legislation (which would have mandated that hospitals provide medical services for infants who survived abortion procedures) led to Alan Keyes' now infamous quote -- "Jesus Christ would not vote for Barack Obama."

Of course the Christian support for abortion does not end with Barack Obama.  One of the nation's most active abortion rights advocacy groups is the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, an interfaith association of clergy and lay leaders who support abortion rights and sponsor birth control and sex education programs, primarily for inner-city for teenagers.

And I have had many sincere conversations with dedicated Christians, particularly those who work closely with the poor, where the topic of abortion has been introduced as a "necessary evil," an option that should be made available without stigma to women who know that they cannot provide a safe home for a child, and who simply don't "have it together enough" to endure a full term pregnancy and adoption procedure.

It's a compelling argument, to be sure, but is it consistent with the ethics exemplified by the life of Jesus Christ?  Or is it an argument that is actually rooted in the selfish desires of man?

One foot in the gutter

Last week, in a spoken commentary aired on the Focus on the Family radio program, Dr. James Dobson and his VP of Public Policy, Tom Minnery, came out swinging against Sen. Barack Obama, with Minnery accusing him of "dragging biblical understanding through the gutter."  I guess Dr. Dobson won't be voting for Obama this fall.

The impetus for this rant was a speech given by Obama two years ago at a conference sponsored by Call To Renewal, a liberal/progressive association of Christian pastors, authors, and lay-workers. 

You can read Obama's speech in its entirety here. Obama doesn't have anything earth-shattering to say; he is merely preaching to the choir on subjects that liberal Christians hold dear, particularly finding shared strengths and working toward common goals, rather than emphasizing differences and working against compromises. (Curiously, this is something that liberals seem eager to initiate with anyone except conservatives and Christian fundamentalists.  Go figure.)

Obama begins his speech by citing an ad hominum attack from Alan Keyes, his opponent during the 2004 Illinois senate race.  Toward the end of the race (when Keyes was down 40 points in the polls) he charged that, "Jesus Christ would not vote for Barack Obama. Christ would not vote for Barack Obama because Barack Obama has behaved in a way that it is inconceivable for Christ to have behaved."

Obama continues,

Conservative leaders have been all too happy to exploit this gap, consistently reminding evangelical Christians that Democrats disrespect their values and dislike their Church, while suggesting to the rest of the country that religious Americans care only about issues like abortion and gay marriage; school prayer and intelligent design.

Democrats, for the most part, have taken the bait. At best, we may try to avoid the conversation about religious values altogether, fearful of offending anyone and claiming that - regardless of our personal beliefs - constitutional principles tie our hands. At worst, there are some liberals who dismiss religion in the public square as inherently irrational or intolerant, insisting on a caricature of religious Americans that paints them as fanatical, or thinking that the very word "Christian" describes one's political opponents, not people of faith.

Now, such strategies of avoidance may work for progressives when our opponent is Alan Keyes. But over the long haul, I think we make a mistake when we fail to acknowledge the power of faith in people's lives -- in the lives of the American people -- and I think it's time that we join a serious debate about how to reconcile faith with our modern, pluralistic democracy.

... Because when we ignore the debate about what it means to be a good Christian or Muslim or Jew; when we discuss religion only in the negative sense of where or how it should not be practiced, rather than in the positive sense of what it tells us about our obligations towards one another; when we shy away from religious venues and religious broadcasts because we assume that we will be unwelcome - others will fill the vacuum, those with the most insular views of faith, or those who cynically use religion to justify partisan ends.

In other words, if we don't reach out to evangelical Christians and other religious Americans and tell them what we stand for, then the Jerry Falwells and Pat Robertsons and Alan Keyeses will continue to hold sway.

Following this, Obama cited a lengthy list of examples of Christian social activists who used their faith to influence progressive public policies.  Then he made the comments that twisted Dobson's panties into a knot:

While I've already laid out some of the work that progressive leaders need to do, I want to talk a little bit about what conservative leaders need to do -- some truths they need to acknowledge.

For one, they need to understand the critical role that the separation of church and state has played in preserving not only our democracy, but the robustness of our religious practice. Folks tend to forget that during our founding, it wasn't the atheists or the civil libertarians who were the most effective champions of the First Amendment. It was the persecuted minorities, it was Baptists like John Leland who didn't want the established churches to impose their views on folks who were getting happy out in the fields and teaching the scripture to slaves. It was the forbearers of the evangelicals who were the most adamant about not mingling government with religious, because they did not want state-sponsored religion hindering their ability to practice their faith as they understood it.

Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.

And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is ok and that eating shellfish is abomination? How about Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount - a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let's read our bibles. Folks haven't been reading their bibles.

It seems that Dobson and Co. missed the joke here, which is a long-running observation by Christian leaders that the liberal/secularist fear of a "theocracy" is totally ridiculous simply because the Baptists, Pentecostals, and Methodists would never relinquish control of anything to the other.  Did Obama really "equate" -- as Focus on the Family charges -- Dobson and Sharpton?  Only if you take Obama's comments completely out of context, which is what Dobson and Minnery do.  It seems very clear to me that Obama intentionally chose two high-profile religious leaders with extremely different worldviews and understandings of how Christianity should be applied in public policy discussions.

If you want to appreciate just how far out of context Dobson and Minnery have to take Obama in order to use his speech as a proof text of their talking points, listen to this seven minute excerpt from Dobson's radio program:

Download dobson-on-obama_062408.mp3

If Focus On the Family's talking points require such a deliberate misrepresentation of opposing views in order to be coherent, then how far should we trust their interpretation of Scripture?  For that matter, how far should we trust Barack Obama's? 

Obama has recycled one of the oldest and most cliche attacks against Christian fundamentalism's belief in biblical inerrancy, namely the accusation that no one could ever espouse a complete literal interpretation and practice of the Bible, because doing so would require practicing the entire 600-plus commandments of Law as revealed to Moses by Yahweh in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. 

Of course Christians have never made the practice of the Law a part of their faith.  One of the earliest theological battles between non-Jewish and Jewish Christians was over the role that Law was to play in the Christian faith.  In Acts 10, the apostle Peter was forced to confront his belief (as a devout Jew) that strict adherence to dietary laws was a prerequisite for holiness.  And the apostle Paul devotes nearly all of his letter to the Galatians to explaining why it is not necessary for the Galatians to become circumcised or observe Jewish law in order to be considered holy in the sight of God.  Christian doctrine teaches that the imitation of Christ -- dying to oneself and being transformed by the work of the Holy Spirit -- is the most fundamental requirement of holiness. 

Because of this, it is highly unlikely that any Christian, regardless of his particular religious heritage, would suggest a return to the full observance of Law as a way to justify our society.  Perhaps Obama is being cute, pointing out to a progressive audience things that contemporary progressives would obviously consider to be barbaric. (He did get a laugh from the crowd with the Leviticus line.)  But in doing so he seriously deflates the legitimacy of his argument by attacking a straw man that Christians have never taken seriously.*

That being said, Obama's point about out-of-context Biblical literalism is right on the money.  The truth is that no Christian believes in literal interpretation of the entire Bible.  The fact that we have so many denominational schisms within Protestant Christianity bears witness to the fact that we have never had widespread agreement about which passages of scripture to take literally, and which to understand in a figurative or metaphorical context.  What Obama is asking is simply this -- would those who read numerous verses from Leviticus literally as proof texts in support of capital punishment by the state also take The Sermon on the Mount literally and insist that the state use the Beatitudes to shape public policy related to individual welfare and defense?  Would those who believe executions to be Biblically mandated also support foreign policy based around a literal, plain text interpretation of "love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you," or an economy based around a literal, plain text interpretation of "Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you"?  An interesting question, to be sure.

Dobson accuses Obama of "deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible," but in doing so he reveals Protestant fundamentalism's most glaring flaw, which is an assumed monopoly on the truth.  This is the same error made by Alan Keyes when he dismissed Obama as a man completely at odds with Jesus Christ.  Growing up in the Church of the Nazarene during the 1940's and 1950's, James Dobson surely learned traditional Protestant fundamentalist doctrine.  Dobson's worldview is what it is, and it is shared by millions upon millions of Americans.  But none of that gives Dobson or Keys divine authority to diminish Barack Obama or declare that his faith is heretical, even though Obama has consistently identified himself as pro-abortion.

I am mystified by the pro-abortion stance of many Christians that I know.  I pray for them, that they may feel as passionately about ending abortion on demand as they do about ending the death penalty.  But nowadays I feel more discomfort around conservatives who are moral absolutists than I do around "liberal" Christians who tolerate behaviors that I find repulsive.  For some reason, moral absolutists seem to have a much more difficult time connecting with people who are suffering.  They are very good at preaching, but struggle with solidarity.  This is why "Moral Majority" types tend to alienate people rather than win widespread support among communities at large.

Fundamentalists say that this is because Satan blinds unbelievers to the truth.  I say that people like James Dobson should spend more time reading their Bibles.

...

My Godblogging friend LaShawn Barber has also responded to Dobson's critique of Obama.  She provides an easy-to-understand explanation of the Reformed Christian understanding of the relationship between the Levitical Law and its fulfillment through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  This was the classic understanding that I was taught in Sunday School, but as I began a deeper study of theology I found this explanation to be somewhat lacking.  Perhaps sometime in the near future I'll write an exposition of Leviticus and the alternative community established by God for the Israelites.   Of course such a project will be difficult and time-consuming, particularly because it will demand clarity and brevity, the latter I struggle with greatly.

* Yes, I have heard of Rushdoony and The Institutes of Biblical Law.  While many his philosophies have influenced a number of influential "Religious Right" leaders, there has never been a consensus among any group of serious Christians that we should move our nation immediately toward his concept of a "theonomy."

My title is drawn from the classic 1961 jazz album by the Dave Bailey Sextet entitled One Foot In the Gutter.  One of the best jazz albums of all time, it holds a sure spot on my "desert island" list of music.

Should Christians Invoke Law and Order Above Peace and Justice?

Recently I entered into an online discussion about several mainline Protestant churches that were offering sanctuary to aliens who had entered the US illegally.  The responses to my post were civil, but centered around a theme common to Protestant fundamentalism:

"Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities..."  Sounds to me like violating the laws of a nation and crossing their borders illegally falls under that.
...

You appear to be confusing compassion for aliens with supporting their illegal activities which are very clearly sinful behavior ... I’m sure God is just thrilled that these “aliens” are sinning over and over again just put themselves first regardless of the cost to their soul or this nation’s sovereignty.
...

As Christians we are to follow man’s laws unless they directly conflict with us being required to deny Christ. This is not even close to that scenario.

Of course I am referring to "law and order" Christianity.  As a child, I was clearly taught that sin included the breaking of civil and criminal laws instituted by our government.  The call to be a law-abiding citizen is basic to the doctrines of Protestant fundamentalism.  And given that one of the major underlying narratives of the Protestant fundamentalist movement is the unique mission and blessing that God has given to the United States of America, it is also one of the primary reasons that Protestant fundamentalists are generally very patriotic.

The Deification of Barack Obama

On the heels of this cheesy picture (painted on velvet?) of Barack Obama that recently ran in an Oregon weekly comes the following new-age exploration of his spirituality by The San Francisco Gate's Mark Morford:

Barack Obama isn't really one of us. Not in the normal way, anyway.

... No, it's not merely his youthful vigor, or handsomeness, or even inspiring rhetoric. It is not fresh ideas or cool charisma or the fact that a black president will be historic and revolutionary in about a thousand different ways. It is something more. Even Bill Clinton, with all his effortless, winking charm, didn't have what Obama has, which is a sort of powerful luminosity, a unique high-vibration integrity.

Dismiss it all you like, but I've heard from far too many enormously smart, wise, spiritually attuned people who've been intuitively blown away by Obama's presence - not speeches, not policies, but sheer presence - to say it's just a clever marketing ploy, a slick gambit carefully orchestrated by hotshot campaign organizers who, once Obama gets into office, will suddenly turn from perky optimists to vile soul-sucking lobbyist whores, with Obama as their suddenly evil, cackling overlord.

Here's where it gets gooey. Many spiritually advanced people I know (not coweringly religious, mind you, but deeply spiritual) identify Obama as a Lightworker, that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of relating and connecting and engaging with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a very high order, and they speak not just to reason or emotion, but to the soul.

The unusual thing is, true Lightworkers almost never appear on such a brutal, spiritually demeaning stage as national politics. This is why Obama is so rare. And this why he is so often compared to Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., to those leaders in our culture whose stirring vibrations still resonate throughout our short history.

Are you rolling your eyes and scoffing? Fine by me. But you gotta wonder, why has, say, the JFK legacy lasted so long, is so vital to our national identity? Yes, the assassination canonized his legend. The Kennedy family is our version of royalty. But there's something more. Those attuned to energies beyond the literal meanings of things, these people say JFK wasn't assassinated for any typical reason you can name. It's because he was just this kind of high-vibration being, a peacemaker, at odds with the war machine, the CIA, the dark side. And it killed him.

Now, Obama. The next step. Another try. And perhaps, as Bush laid waste to the land and embarrassed the country and pummeled our national spirit into disenchanted pulp and yet ironically, in so doing has helped set the stage for an even larger and more fascinating evolutionary burp, we are finally truly ready for another Lightworker to step up.

So there you have it.  The "spiritual" among us -- not the religious! -- but the spiritual, those in tune with the non-corporeal realm inhabited by the essences of ultimate truth and goodness, believe that Obama is one of them.

After a little digging, bloggers traced the Lightworker terminology to Steve Pavlina, a self-help guru who focuses on New-Age techniques such as "raising your consciousness" in order to increase productivity and increase self-worth.  Pavlina explains that people progress along two paths, Lightworkers (who serve others) and Darkworkers (who serve themselves).  Lightworkers try to heal.  They "expand consciousness."  Darkworkers love power.  They seek to profit from the misfortune of others, often leaving things in worse shape than they found them.  Pavlina writes,

The collective consciousness of humanity is well aware of its condition. It knows the body is unhealthy and is headed downhill. It knows that left unchecked, the darkworker threat will take the body down with it. While this climate gives rise to more darkworkers, there’s also a strong counter-reaction on the rise. The presence of disease is triggering the body’s immune system to increase the white blood cell count. Those white blood cells are lightworkers.

The result is that many people are now hearing this call. It actually began decades ago, but it’s particularly strong today. The body of humanity is acting in its own defense by calling more and more lightworkers into action. Some people are born with this inclination, some have had it for many years, and others are currently waking up to it.

The blogger DoublePlusUndead also links the thinking behind Lightworker/Darkworker terminology to an X-box game, Jade Empire.  He also provides this interesting insight into Pavlina and Morford's thinking:

In Jade Empire, you could either follow the philosophy of the Open Palm or the Closed Fist. Open Palm is a philosophy that argues one should always give aid to someone, be in tune with nature, and to know and accept one's place in this world.  Closed Fist is a philosophy that teaches self-reliance, to control one's surroundings, and to try and be ambitious.  Lightworker and Darkworker operate on similar principles.  From Morford's article,

The unusual thing is, true Lightworkers almost never appear on such a brutal, spiritually demeaning stage as national politics.

Let me repeat Jade Empire's Open Palm philosophy:   Open Palm is a philosophy that argues one should always give aid to someone, be in tune with nature, and to know and accept one's place in this world.   

The reason you don't see an Open Palm or Lightworker on the national stage is because philosophically speaking, they aren't supposed to be ambitious.  This is why Morford is so excited.

For what it's worth, blogger See-Dubya notes that Lightworker sounds eerily similar to "lightbearer," a term infamously used in Isaiah 14 to describe a hubristic Babylonian king who bragged, "I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God."  God's wrath was stirred against this king, and Isaiah mocks him in his death, a rotting corpse covered with worms, and says, "Those who see you stare at you, they ponder your fate: Is this the man who shook the earth, who made kingdoms tremble?"  The King James bible translates the Hebrew "lightbearer" into a name that we all know very well -- Lucifer. Spiritualists, of course, would deny this relationship, because in their understanding this Babylonian king who left destruction and suffering in his wake would in fact be a Darkworker.

Progressive and liberal Christians, and to a significant extent, young so-called "emergent" Evangelicals, have excitedly embraced the Obama candidacy. The reason for this is the underlying hermeneutic of both the progressive and emergent Christian movement, which seeks to animate and personify the word of God in its people through a direct, transformational engagement with the world.  Justice and equality are top social priorities for progressives and emergents. And, perhaps even more importantly, a shared vision of a peaceable kingdom.  Thus both movements are very passionately involved in peace and justice issues. 

For these reasons, Barack Obama's rhetoric about peaceful negotiations with our enemies, disarmament, health coverage for all Americans, expanding services for the poor, and imposing tighter controls on corporations appeals to the kingdom vision of emergent evangelical Christians.  Even here in Oklahoma, Obama is extremely popular with a significant portion of young, emergent evangelicals.

There is a strain of liberal Christian thought (perhaps best known through the writings of Marcus Borg) that proposes to explain the dual nature of Jesus Christ (fully God and fully human) by suggesting that Jesus was fully human, and yet a "spirit person" so in tune with God as to be indistinguishable in word, thought, and deed from God Himself.  According to the "spirit person" understanding of Jesus Christ, he did not reach his full spiritual maturity (or 'enlightenment,' if you prefer) until he was around 30 years old;  it was at that time that he was baptized by John (Matthew 3) and officially began his earthly ministry.

Borg fully integrates Scripture and its teachings about Jesus and the revelation of God through the life of Jesus into his understanding of "spirit people," and thus concludes that Jesus is in fact THE "spirit person" -- not just another enlightened spirit leader like the Dali Lama or Ghandi, but a living, breathing son of man who is also the one and only begotten Son of God.  In contrast, secular spiritualists generally steer clear of any "God talk" in their writings.  But the concepts are similar -- existence on a higher plane of spiritual consciousness, a special detachment from the encumbrances of the flesh (exemplified through Christ in the desert temptation of Matthew 4) that allows an individual to directly embody ultimate truth and goodness.  This is what defines a "spirit person."  This is what many religious seekers (such as Buddhists) attempt to achieve through meditation and trance-like repetitive prayers.

I mentioned Borg's writings because they seem to fit nicely with other things I discussed in this piece, but I believe that Borg's specific understanding of Christ as a "spirit person" represents the view of only a genuine minority of contemporary Christians.  From readings and conversations that I have had with progressive and emergent Christians, I sense less of a "spirit person" understanding and more of an idea that Obama is simply a man who has his theology "right," and thus is interested in directing the United States toward becoming a leading advocate for peace and justice in the world.  Or to use good old evangelical terminology, Obama is a man who is "being led by the Spirit."

While Christians see Obama as a man following God's will, secular spiritualists see Obama as an actual manifestation of God (or "The Source," or whatever New-Age terminology the like).  Still, it is plain that no candidate in recent memory has stirred-up  spirit-talk and God-talk like Barack Obama.

Frankly, I don't know whether to be excited about this or not.