Religion and Politics
I became aware, after becoming a board member of a UUA congregation many years ago, of a lot of political stuff going on which had nothing to do with religion. I was particularly distressed by the fact that we were adamantly opposed to any involvement of the church in politics. Well, apparently that just applied to those "radical religious right" folks. What kind of politics are we talking about here? Mostly anything having to do with promoting socialism and a bigger welfare state, with extreme environmentalism and pacifism thrown in for good measure. I'll use my dinner discussion group as a proxy for the congregation; what were the topics of discussion?
on President Bush's tax plan: the tax cuts are immoral, a give-away to the rich, Americans pay too little in taxes, and we should be more like those good-hearted Europeans, especially the French.
on the environment: no sacrifice is too great to fight global warming, economic development is bad for the Third World, we're running out of resources, we must provide funding for family planning groups which advocate abortion
Now this isn't just the UUA, there's a bunch of mainline denominations, represented pretty well by the National Council of Churches, who think that promoting this type of activism is promoting the gospel, forgetting about the difference between the food which perishes, and the food which endures to everlasting life. I hold no grudges against people who truly wish to help others, but I question how effective the help is when it is coming from government programs rather than genuine personal transformation.
Another issue is the anti-war movement. I noticed in my research yesterday that several churches, again including the NCC, were involved in peace marches last weekend. I was disappointed at first, but then I noticed something. They were all, except one, marching on Sunday, and had no mention in their iteneraries of any involvement in the Internation ANSWER hatefest. The one exception, which even proudly proclaimed their involvement with ANSWER on their Washington Office's website, was the UUA. So to all you other protestors who wanted to make your point, but didn't want to be associated with the World Worker's Party -- good for you!!!
Posted by joelfuhrmann at January 24, 2003 12:14 AM