August 2009 Archives

As the nation mourns the loss of Sen. Ted Kennedy, there is no more fitting way to honor the legacy of this prolific public servant than by fulfilling what he called the "cause of my life." Kennedy's impassioned advocacy for health care reform was not about partisan politics or narrow ideology. Inspired by Catholic social teaching that health care is a human right not a privilege, he insisted that the richest nation in the world had a moral obligation to assure quality medical care to all citizens. For Kennedy, the principles of human dignity, compassion and the common good --- central tenants of the Catholic faith -- were always paramount when he sought to change a broken health care system that fails millions of Americans.

People of faith have an essential role to play in picking up the torch Sen. Kennedy carried so proudly even as his own health worsened. A new campaign organized by Christian, Jewish and Muslim organizations united behind health care reform as a moral imperative is taking up this cause. Our coalition, 40 Days for Health Reform, hosted a national conference call with President Obama recently that featured religious leaders and engaged citizens sharing painful stories from the front lines of a broken health care system. One hundred and forty thousand citizens participated. Instead of shouting and demagoguery, there was thoughtful reflection, civil dialogue and factual analysis. Ministers and rabbis spoke about values that transcend partisan politics and narrow ideologies. A Muslim-American neurologist expressed frustration with insurance companies denying coverage to those in desperate need of treatment. A 15-year-old Catholic with scoliosis talked about how her family is going without medical care because they lost Medicaid coverage. A Christian minister spoke of a parishioner without insurance whose cancer remained undiagnosed until it was too late.

These powerful testimonies remind us that health care reform is not an abstract issue. Each day in our congregations and communities we see needless suffering because quality health care is not available to all. This is a grave injustice. The faith community refuses to concede the debate to talk-radio pundits, Washington insiders or special interests defending the status quo. We will not be satisfied until all Americans have access to quality and affordable health care. 40 Days for Health Reform includes more than 30 denominations and religious organizations that represent Americans across race, region and political affiliation. The campaign includes a national TV ad on CNN, prayer vigils, sermon weekends and visits with key members of Congress. This next month will be critical as Congress tackles several reform proposals. Each day 14 thousand Americans lose their health insurance and working families struggle to pay medical bills. Comprehensive reform can't wait any longer. As Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. once preached, we believe in the "fierce urgency of now."

Profound moral and ethical questions are at the heart of complicated legislative battles over health care. Even if we are satisfied with our own health care, what responsibility do we have as a society to make sure the system works for everyone? How do we balance individual interests with policies that best serve the common good? While specific solutions to a 21st century health-care crisis can't be found in the Bible, Koran or the Torah, our faith traditions offer timeless values about loving our neighbors as ourselves. People of goodwill can disagree over the most effective ways to shape reform. But we must not waver from this core principle: health care is a human right, not a privilege.

The faith community also has an important responsibility to correct those bearing false witness in this debate. Fears that seniors will be denied life-saving care or doctors will be forced to perform abortions against their ethical principles are gross distortions perpetuated by ideologues more interested in handing the Obama administration a political defeat than ensuring all Americans have quality health care. There are longstanding polices that prohibit federal taxpayer funding of abortions and sensible conscience protections for health care providers. Retaining these policies is critical to achieving the broad consensus necessary for health care reform. In contrast to outrageous claims about "death panels", a provision in the House legislation would allow Medicare to reimburse doctors for voluntary counseling sessions with patients that include discussions about living wills and hospice care. The Catholic Health Association has stated the provision would not encourage euthanasia, and a diverse range of groups including The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization, the American Medical Association and the AARP support it.

Faith-based movements have always inspired our nation to live up to its highest ideals. We know that justice and change never come easily. Again, people of faith are on the march, united in the belief that hope is more powerful than fear. I think Sen. Kennedy would be proud.

The Reverend Chloe Breyer is the Director of the Interfaith Center in New York City.

Whether advocating for the Americans with Disabilities Act, The Family and Medical Leave Act, the Head Start Expansion Act, or the Fair Housing Amendment, Senator Kennedy worked to make sure no American was left behind.

Some of the legislation he championed, however, has had special significance for people of faith.

Consider the bill enabling religious leaders in New York City to provide spiritual care to family members and clean-up workers at Ground Zero in the immediate aftermath of the World Trade Center attacks of Sept. 11th 2009. Local Episcopalian, Muslim, Buddhist, and Jewish chaplains received training from The Red Cross' National Spiritual Care Aviation Incident Response Team in the days that followed 9/11. They took shifts at the World Trade Center Site, the Family Assistance Center, and the make-shift morgue across town to provide spiritual care to bereaved family members or bless body parts pulled from the rubble by clean-up workers, fire-fighters, and police in the months following 9/11.

This work would not have been possible without Senator Kennedy's imaginative response to the complaints of victims' family members in the ValuJet 592 crash in the Everglades in 1996. Kennedy worked with other members of the Senate to pass the Aviation Disaster Family Act of 1996--a bill that made the National Transportation Safety Board accountable--through contracting with the Red Cross--for providing emotional care for victims' families in the aftermath of a plane crash. In the months following 9/11 and the build-up to war in Iraq, many conservative church-goers critical of Kennedy's anti-war stand, overlooked the fact that he had, in this obscure piece of legislation, helped Americans most directly impacted by the attacks make spiritual sense of their tragic loss.

Likewise, The Civil Rights Act for Institutionalized Persons ensured the constitutional rights of people in government institutions--the elderly, the disabled, the mentally ill, the incarcerated. Not only did the law enable the US Department of Justice to investigate institutions to ensure humane living conditions, but the law also detailed the protection of diverse religious practices for the institutionalized by providing access to religious leaders of different faith traditions.

Religious freedom and access to emergency pastoral care are hardly examples of the "liberal" causes Senator Kennedy was so often described by his foes as crusading for exclusively. Encouraging local religious leaders to offer their support in a time of crisis, however, should garner Kennedy praise from both sides of the aisle--Americans of faith and non-believers alike.

I can't say that I always loved Ted Kennedy.  For years, I have agreed with the issues he fought for--especially regarding his concern for the sick, the poor, and the elderly.  But, I confess, Senator Kennedy's personal behavior often proved embarrassing and sometimes appalling to those who agreed with his policies.  Like all three Kennedy brothers, there has been a disconcerting tension between the public servant and the private self. 

When I was a bit younger--and much more theologically puritanical--I thought that private behavior diminished public good.   That the inner and outer selves must be connected for acts of goodness to have real integrity and social impact.  The death of Senator Kennedy, however, points to a richer tradition of Christian theology, indeed of Catholic theology:  Even a sinful leader may accomplish God's will for the public good.  Personal perfection is not a prerequisite for ruling well.

That, of course, is profoundly good news.  The Christian tradition has insisted--since about the fourth century or so--that human sinfulness in no way diminishes acts of grace, mercy, and justice.  But it is also not an excuse to continue sinning.  Indeed, some public figures seem to think that their position is license to do what they like in private, as long as they continue to serve the people in their work.  "Should we sin," the Apostle Paul once wrote, "that grace may abound?"  No, the church has responded.  We will sin, and flawed humans will continue to do the good.   But Christian spirituality insists that if one is truly on a journey of faith, that goodness will eventually overtake weakness and the inner life and outward service will come into harmony.  Life is a progress toward such harmony, the symphony of faith in God.

Ted Kennedy's theological legacy may well be the demonstration of the progressive harmony of goodness.  For, unlike his brothers who did not live long enough to complete the journey of faith, Ted Kennedy did.  In recent years, he admirably and publicly overcame a host of private demons and became the kind of leader who walked his talk.  The tributes of family, friends, and foes increasingly praised his kindness, wisdom, and authenticity--all marks of Christian maturity.  His outer passion for the "least of these" aligned with the inner life. 

And, in the end, Ted Kennedy died well.  Through long months of preparation and witness--a gift never given to his brothers--he met God.  He believed in progressive causes.  But, more importantly, he showed us that all of life is spiritual progress--a journey of hands and heart--toward the One who loves the poor.  Even a rich man can get to heaven.  Well done, good and faithful servant.  

Senator Edward Kennedy has died. It is not unexpected but his death marks an end of the era of the Kennedy brothers and their profound contributions to America.  I titled this post The Faith, Value and Politics of Senator Edward Kennedy after the tagline of Progressive Revival as a tribute to the iconic place that the Kennedys have held in the progressive movement for the last fifty years.  

I was too young to remember either John or Robert Kennedy so Edward is the only one whose life and politics personally affected me.  My earliest memory of Ted Kennedy was of a woman with a Kennedy for President sign held high over her head in a defiant gesture at a DNC convention - I think it may have been 1980 when the Democrats instead went for Jimmy Carter.  

A Kennedy liberal was something that was viewed as a dirty word by Republicans but I never knew why.  Like FDR, Kennedy was something of a traitor to his class, content to see the very rich pay for the privileges of making so much money and living so abundantly well in this great country.  Kennedy unfailingly tried to represent the 'least of these' through public policy. The Kennedys were certainly driven by ambition, and they had many personal failings, some of them very grave, but the family also had a clear sense of the purpose of government, which was to try to create a more just and equal society.

I wish I knew more about the personal faith of Ted Kennedy.  In searching the web today I went to Get Religion and found an interesting post by Terry Mattingly about Kennedy as a Catholic Political Icon.  There I also found a statement by Rev. Jim Wallis that reflects Kennedy's sincere concern with how religious and moral values translated into public life especially healthcare:

In the aftermath of the 2004 Presidential elections, the Democrats were roundly accused of losing the "moral values voters" in America, and of being the party of "secularists" who were hostile to faith and religion. The very first Democrat to call me and ask to talk about that accusation and how to change the moral debate in America was Ted Kennedy. He invited me to his home, where he, and his wife Vicki, engaged me in a long and very thoughtful conversation, into the night, about the relationship between faith, morality, and politics. Their own deep Catholic faith was evident and their articulation of it very impressive. Our discussion was not partisan at all -- it was not about how to win religion back for the Democrats. Rather, we focused on the great moral issues facing the nation, and how we as people of faith needed to respond to them.

I also was intrigued by this excerpt from a speech called "Faith, Liberty and Tolerance" he gave at Liberty Unviersity upon the invitation of Rev. Jerry Falwell.  First of all it surprised me that Kennedy had ever been invited to Liberty University and even more that he had accepted and given such a sincere and thoughtful speech.  Senator Kennedy said:

I hope for an America where neither "fundamentalist" nor "humanist" will be a dirty word, but a fair description of the different ways in which people of goodwill look at life and into their own souls.

I hope for an America where no president, no public official, no individual will ever be deemed a greater or lesser American because of religious doubt -- or religious belief.

I hope for an America where the power of faith will always burn brightly, but where no modern Inquisition of any kind will ever light the fires of fear, coercion, or angry division.

I hope for an America where we can all contend freely and vigorously, but where we will treasure and guard those standards of civility which alone make this nation safe for both democracy and diversity.

His words about the role of religion in public policy reminded me of a comment made by one of my relatives who said that they didn't vote for JFK because they thought he would be taking his orders from the Vatican.  The relative spoke with some embarrassment about this, as well he should.  We should not assume by someone's religious faith or lack of it that we know how they will act in public policy - actions speak louder than identity.  Edward Kennedy took a lot of heat for the pro-choice stance of the Democratic party and stood by his political beliefs that abortion was a private decision to be made between a woman and her physician.  For this it was thought that he should not receive communion and sanctioned in other ways by the Catholic Church.  What the Kennedys reminded us is that politicians are informed by religious beliefs and influenced by religious leaders, yet in the end they are and should be independent of their control and represent all the people.

Finally, Kennedy was one of the people who most passionately and persuasively spoke about universal health coverage and that hopefully his death might in some way push us towards a more just health care system. Senator Edward Kennedy will live on if we have the courage to create real health care reform that makes sure that every American citizen receives the health care that she or he needs.    Perhaps we can even name the final bill after him as my colleague Diana Butler Bass suggested to me earlier today.  

Rest in Peace Senator Kennedy.