Wednesday, August 27, 2008

my thoughts on current politics

I am perplexed.

Donald Miller gave a decent prayer at the DNC. I was suprised by sanctity of life comment given the audience. Admittedly, in political arenas and policy matters, I am conservative. Regarding social issues I am a bit more moderate, to a point.
Oh yeah, and I love "Blue Like Jazz".

First off, I found it odd that there would even be a prayer/benediction that addressed a God, especially a Father God. The ACLU Liberal Wing has found its home in the DNC and are consistently pushing the anti-god agenda in all public arenas, and scream "separation of church and state" out of context to the reality of where that clause is located and its intent.

Then he goes on to invoke poor folks and fatherless children and single moms and corporate greed. Was he pandering? Does he feel this is the only political party that addresses these issues? Would he feel comfortable giving the same prayer at the RNC if asked? Does he really think that any party really cares or is the answer?

Now admittedly, the RNC would probably ask a more evangelical type like billy graham or rick warren in the first place. Cameron Strange is a cool guy and a great editor of Relevant Magazine (of which I read and was an original subscriber) was an odd choice anyway.

I guess i really felt that maybe this new emerging church movement would not be taking political sides and would, instead, be focusing on solutions and holding both parties accountable. Because neither one has delivered on their promises and people are still hurting while the bureaucracy moves right along.

If, somehow, this is going to turn out to be the other end of the spectrum, you know opposite of the religous right, i.e., the religious left, its not going to be helpful.

It is difficult for me to digest that anyone proclaiming the good news of the gospel would put their faith in a political party as some sort of solution. The religious right did it with the Republican Party and it got christianity nowhere really.

Can we quit throwing the stones? I am hoping we are bigger than that.

5 comments:

KJ said...

yeah....al I can say is that politics makes my head hurt. And I thought it was allergies! LOL.

nonprofitprophet said...

and my wallet. actually, i thought this was going to be a boring election...it is spicing itself right up. if nothing else, its entertaining! ~npp

KJ said...

funny, we both made political entries this week. BTW, I left you a comment and suggestion on my blog.

Anonymous said...

i love donald miller, personally and as a writer/thinker. i was glad he prayed. yep, i'm with you - i don't like all the religion/politics mixture bullshit. but i thought donald did the right thing: say the things jesus would say - which i think donald did - and then pray for the other party too - which donald did - and then shut up and get off the stage. which donald did. no flowery crap. no pontificating. just say what he genuinely hoped for.
it's either that or not pray at a convention - in which case, it gets left to the old white dudes and the evangelicals and the rich church-as-institution people. so, donald said yes.
would jesus pray at either political party's convention? hell, he rode into town and threw furniture and taught and demonstrated and hollered and wept and healed at the big convention at passover.
of course, we see what THAT got him ... :-)

nonprofitprophet said...

journeying rick - agree with all the above of course. this "phase" of my journey has me concerned with what i see as the opposite of 2 decades ago. Not that it will happen, but I'm afraid if it does happen, will derail the progress that has been made in the postmodern movement away from quote "religion" and into "christianity".
Lets call it the "Christian Left" versus the 80s "Religious Right". I will probably blog this , but here is my short thought. Both sides think they have God figured out thus hold the answers. Either approach nor more fits God than the other. Then to label each side continues to widen the rift between christians instead of closing the gap. So...we are no further along that we were two decades ago. Anyway, thats the short of it. ~npp