The American brand of Christianity continues to grow even more paradoxical to me. Why are Christians (or at least the ones we hear about) so typically and deeply entrenched on the right wing?
The infuriating and equally mind boggling phenomenon that is Palin-mania brings about my latest round of questioning on the matter. She was brought in to lock-in the far right, largely to reinvigorate those Republicans who felt John McCain was a little too moderate for their liking. Her strong family values and adamant stance against abortion made her an instant hit. Fine, I suppose I can understand that. But what about the other 99% of issues?
When I see Christianity at its best, I see love, peace, grace and forgiveness. When I see Republican ideology and tactics I see the complete opposite. If you are against killing, why is war the answer and worse yet, why is it called God's will? (Attributing war to God sounds a little too Taliban-esque if you ask me). If you believe God created the Earth, how can you ravage what little is left of the pristine wilderness and ignore devastating warnings of climate change? If you believe in helping the less fortunate, how can you be adamantly against universal health care and believe in gifting the biggest tax cuts to corporations like Exxon Mobil rather than providing for the homeless and the poor?
I'm ignoring key concepts like the protestant work ethic and the spirit of capitalism and a million other philosophical and historical issues that I won't pretend to know about. And yes, I'm taking a rather simplistic view. But how tough can it be to identify love, and sadly, to recognize its striking absence?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Welcome to the blogosphere...not that I'm a blogger myself!
Anyway, I understand your frustration and bafflement over "right-wing chritianity". However, I've come across a few christian, pro-Obama websites that I thought might interest you. I discovered most of them through Brian McLaren's (author of "A New Kind of Christian") website.
http://www.brianmclaren.net/
http://www.prolifeproobama.com/plpo_welcome.htm
http://www.matthew25.org/
http://clergy4obama.wordpress.com/
Hope you find these as refreshing as I did.
Thanks for the links...definitely gives me some hope. Funny how you never seem to hear about these people. I guess the traditional base still rules. But hopefully this is a reflection of a growing trend of open-mindedness and thinking within Christianity.
To me the word "Christain" is to folow Christ's own heart. Religion is human-made and is used for to advance each groups agendas.
If you take a closer look at each religion, it is more or less the same - peaceful.
If you read the old testament int he Bible, it is scary - the principle of eye for an eye. It was not working and then Christ came with the simple message of "Love" and "Forgiveness". What else can change or capture a human heart than these two??
Post a Comment