July 2008 Archives

I was stunned by what was not in the letter from 50 Catholic groups asking the Pope to reconsider the church position opposing contraception. They argued that failing to promote contraception "has had a catastrophic impact on the poor and powerless around the world, endangering women's lives and leaving millions at risk of HIV."

Those are important points but if you're trying to convince the Pope (or traditional Catholics in general) wouldn't the strongest argument be that promoting contraception would reduce the number of abortions?

Have liberal Catholics become so allied with progressives in general that they couldn't go there less they anger pro-choice allies? Or have liberal Catholics become so pro-choice themselves that were uncomfortable including this powerful argument?

The Democratic Party for years has yearned for an energetic religious wing. Seeing the power that the religious right brought the Republicans, Democratic leaders realized that if they wanted to build a majority they would need to attract people of faith.

Party leaders wanted a religious left and they're beginning to get one - new grassroots organizations, vocal spokespeople, and a candidate conversant in the language of faith.

They're also getting a bit of a surprise: religious Democrats aren't so easy to control:

*The Democratic Party created a Faith in Action unit to help organize religious Democrats. According to the New York Times Magazine, the Alabama Democratic Party used Faith in Action funds to print a voters guide that pledged to "require public schools to offer Bible literacy as part of their curriculum" as well as pass a constitutional amendment banning abortion, and defeat efforts to provide marriage benefits to gay couples. All these positions run counter to the national party's approach.

*When Jim Wallis, Tony Campolo and other progressive evangelicals pressed Barack Obama to endorse an abortion-reduction initiative, pro-choice activists were furious. Two leaders declared this approach to be "condescending and sexist."

*Among the first posts in the new progressive religious blog at Beliefnet (where I work by day) was one from former Boston Mayor Ray Flynn advocating that Democrats advocate "tuition tax credits for non-public school parents."

Another post, from liberal Catholic writer David Gibson, proposed that progressive religious leaders push much harder for gun control, especially in the aftermath of the shootings at the Unitarian church in Knoxville. "Most faith groups have statements endorsing some form of gun control, but insiders will tell you that liberal religious groups don't see the issue as a winner," Mr. Gibson wrote. He urged religious groups to be bold where politicians are fearful.

But if religious groups did pressure politicians to take tougher stands on gun control, wouldn't that hurt the Democratic Party by associating it with unpopular positions? And if Democrats therefore lost elections to Republicans, wouldn't that retard the cause of social justice? You can be sure that argument will be made privately in the coffee klatches of the religious left. It's a real dilemma.

Democrats used to routinely lose elections because their most passionate activists cared more about being right than winning elections. On the other hand, several Republican evangelicals such as David Kuo and Cal Thomas have argued that religious conservatives became too concerned about helping the party -- and lost their moral compass.

Liberals have never been very good at party unity so I suspect that excessive deference to party bosses will not be their main problem. You'll have certain progressive religious tacticians focused on helping Democratic candidates appeal to religious voters using religious rhetoric and organizing tactics. You'll also have issue activists who will push particular moral issues with only partial regard for the political salability. They like to use the phrase "prophetic voice" - a reference to the radical Hebrew prophets who said righteous things even when unpopular. Of course, all Democrats agree on the need to "speak truth to power" when the power is Republican. But Democrats may soon feel the thrill of being the power that's having truths yelled at it. Religious leaders, once politicized, are not easily corralled.

Here's my list of top positions that may be pushed by religious progressive to the annoyance of Democratic Party leaders wanting to avoid either the wrath of another faction or the appearance of being excessively lefty:

1) Democrats should support "abortion reduction." (Likely ones advocating Truth to Power: Progressive evangelicals, Centrist Catholics, conservative African Americans, Hispanics)

2) Go faster on gay rights (Advocates: liberal mainline Protestants and others)

3) Go slower on gay rights (Advocates: conservative African Americans, some Hispanics)

4) More gun control (Advocates: all progressives outside rural areas)

5) Amnesty for illegal immigrants (Advocates: broad range of religious progressives)

6) More government funding for religious charities (Advocates: progressive evangelicals and Catholics)

7) Less government funding for religious charities (Advocates: progressive Jews)

Tax increases to pay for social spending (Advocates: broad range of religious progressives)

9) Cut defense spending (Advocates: liberal "peace churches")

Most religious activists believe that the doing what's right and what's effective need not be in conflict. If something is righteous but unpopular, their job is to persuade enough people to make it the majority viewpoint. As Rev. Campolo puts it, if a politician's proclivity is to put his finger in the wind, it's the job of religious people to "change the wind." Wind, climatologists will tell us, can be harnessed but seldom controlled.

Reprinted from The Wall Street Journal Onlinem

As I continue to seek an explanation for the sharp and sudden rise in the acceptability of out-of-wedlock birth and divorce, I came across a post from talented conservative radio personality Al Mohler. He noted a recent OK! magazine cover about Jamie Lynn Spear's new baby, which definitely played up the joyful side of teen motherhood.

This is an area where conservatives, in my view, have been consistently better than liberals. (Remember the outrage when Vice President Dan Quayle criticized the TV character Murphy Brown for having a baby even though she wasn't married?). Liberals who care about the poor need to remember that out of wedlock birth is one of the major causes of poverty.

But Mohler then goes the next step of criticizing Hollywood for glamorizing premarital sex. In other words: want to stop teen pregnancy? Avoid premarital sex.

This to me points up what ought to be a real dilemma for religious conservatives. Ideally, they'd like to have less premarital sex, less use of contraception, less teen pregnancy, less out-of-wedlock birth, and fewer abortions.

But what if they could win on a few of those by giving in on a few others? Specifically, isn't it likely that if contraception use were higher that teen pregnancy, out of wedlock birth and, most important, abortion would be lower? If that were the case, wouldn't it be morally incumbent on conservatives to lead the way for greater contraception use? To use the moral language of the pro-life movement, aren't those who oppose contraception responsible for the deaths of thousands of babies?

I know that the standard response is that through abstinance you can have it all: less sex, out-of-wedlock births, fewer abortions. But if it could be proven that contraception led to even fewer abortions, wouldn't you have to become aggressive advocates of contraception use?

Ed Kilgore has very interesting post about Tim Kaine over at Progressive Revival. Ed makes a persuasive case about why the Virginia governor would be an excellent running mate for Obama (he's now considered a leading candidate). Ed cites Kaine's facility with faith lingo and positioning.

Here's the puzzling part. Ed assumes that Kaine's Catholicism will help him win Catholics. But the Catholic John Kerry did worse among Catholics than the Baptist Al Gore did. So being Catholic obviously isn't sufficient.

My first impulse would be to say that it needs to be a pro-life Catholic. But then again the majority of Catholics are actually pro-choice!

In other words, it's utterly mysterious to me what actually moves the Catholic vote.

For the past 25 years, as the religious right has grown in influence, people would ask: where is the religious left? Well, looking at the All Star roster of religious leaders, writers and activists, we can clearly see that intellectually it has never been more vibrant. It's with great excitement that Beliefnet launches the ultimate group blog for religious progressives. Scan the bios and i think you'll agree: this is a rather extraordinary collection of religious leaders and thinkers. They will use this blog to comment on the news, philosophically combat religious conservatives and argue with each other over priorities.

We've been fortunate to have had Jim Wallis and friends on our site for about a year. In a couple of months, he'll be moving his main blog back to his home site, sojo.net, though we expect Jim will continue to contribute to Beliefnet in other ways.

You might wonder: why no religious right group blog? We're lucky enough to have Crunchy Con (alias Rod Dreher) as our premier conservative blogger. In fact, we're proud to say that as far as we can tell Rod now has the most popular religious conservative blog on the web. It's the ultimate compliment that we needed a group of 30 plus liberal luminaries to create parity with Crunchy Con.

He says it was a prank....

McCain's visit with the Dalai Lama strikes me as pretty clever politics. By meeting with the Dalai Lama, and calling on China to release Tibetan prisoners, he then got himself criticized by China - which can only win him...

To steal a man's prayer is despicable. To publish it is equally despicable, but one can understand that a basically secular newspaper might give in to that temptation. But for Beliefnet to put it up is just unbelievably crass. --Clasqm...

The estimable Mark Silk chastises Time correspondent Joe Klein for his belief that the root of Rev. John Hagee's support of Israel is End Times theology. "The simple and straightforward basis of evangelical support of Israel lies in Abraham's covenant...

A recent New York Times graphic had a few stunning stats about changes in public opinion since 2001 according to Gallup surveys. Out of Wedlock Birth -- The majority of the public now believes that it's morally acceptable for babies...

GetReligion asks a good question: why is it that Colbert is so often more informative about religion than the mainstream broadcast media?...

Sort of tells you a lot about America that James Dobson was elected to the Radio Hall of Fame just edging out... Howard Stern....

After Barack Obama stuck a written prayer in the Western Wall in Jerusalem, as is the custom, some college student swiped it and eventually gave it to a newspaper, which published it. "Lord--Protect my family and me. Forgive me my...

Reaganite in NYC (in the comments area) raises two very important points about how faith can be reflected in public life. First he says there's no conflict between an emphasis on personal (John 3:16) or collective salvation (Matthew 25). Reaganite...

I was listening James Dobson's recent radio broadcast in which he announced that he's considering endorsing McCain. The program, a conversation with conservative radio host Al Mohler, focused mostly on Obama's "extreme" positions on abortion and homosexuality. But the most...

Not exactly sure how to comment on this one without getting in trouble....

Here's a political riddle: When Republicans attack Democrats for allowing third-trimester abortions, why don't Democrats respond by pointing out that Republicans want to ban first-trimester abortions? When it comes to abortion, Democrats forever allow themselves to fight on Republican terrain....

Check out this video of Obama shooting hoops. If he'd hit the rim, it would have had no effect on the election. If he'd missed entirely, he would have lost the election (since he'd be an elitist girly-man). But since...

The political prognostication website 538.com explains that Obama's supporters are more enthusiastic than McCains and suggests that the solution for McCain might be to put Mike Huckabee on the ticket to rev up evangelicals. "It's certainly the simplest and most...

Via Andrew Sullivan, Jane Mayer elaborates on her criticisms of Marty Seligman, the psychologist who she believes helped the U.S. Government develop torture techniques. Many of her questions are good and we'd like to see him answer them, too. However,...

Long-time Beliefnet contributor Lama Surya Das represented Buddhism spectacularly well in this most challenging venue:...

David Brody of Christian Broadcasting Network has a good run-down of McCain's flip-flop (clarification? refinement?) about gay adoption. Basically, at first he said gays shouldn't be allowed to adopt even if the alternative was an orphange or foster care. Then...

I completely missed the story about Obama kicking the boy in the head:...

Shabos goy is the term used by orthodox Jews for gentiles who help them with certain tasks they're forbidden from doing during the Sabbath, such as operating electrical devices. According to Newsweek's excellent cover story on Obama's faith, when he...

An important split is emerging within the Democratic Party over abortion. Barack Obama's reaction to it will tell us a great deal about how he intends to unify people of different views and manage key voting blocs. A group of...

A man who created a beefcake calendar of (male) Mormon missionaries has been excommunicated. (Hattip: Andrew Sullivan) Those of you who follow this genre may be interested in the Nuns Having Fun calendar or the Roman Priests beefcake calendar. I'm...

I was rather stunned to see that Jane Mayer's new book is reporting that Prof. Martin Seligman helped the U.S. government design its torture regimen. The administration's torture architects used Seligman's research on "learned helplessness" to craft their approaches, according...

I'm puzzled by the Obama camapaigns response to the new Yorker cover. To me this seemed pretty clearly an effort to mock Obama's tormentors, not Obama. The depiction of the Terrorist Fist Jab mocks Fox News, not Obama or Muslims....

Thinking about the death of Sir John Templeton -- champion of research into science and religion -- reminded me of two passages from Thomas Jefferson. Though Jefferson was sometimes cast as a heretic, I think he and Templeton were kindred...

I find it reviting to listen to people describe near-death experiences. This one was posted in the Beliefnet Community by lfcoach...

In the website's online (therefore unscientific) poll, Obama has now pulled ahead of McCain....

Conservatives routinely (and correctly) chide liberals for misunderstanding the law of unintended consequences. One positive policy will lead to unanticipated negatives outcomes. For instance, it made sense to focus welfare on single mothers, since they're the neediest. But that accidentally...

Another interesting thing to me about Jesse Jackson wanting to "cut out" Barack Obama's "nuts" is that the Obama comments that stimulated the outburst are common fare in black churches. The majority of the people sitting in the pews in...

Most men might be irked if they heard that someone wanted to have their genitalia removed. Barack Obama, however, is probably celebrating. Drudge Report says Jesse Jackson apparently was caught on tape suggesting the procedure for the Democratic nominee...

How come evolution didn't wipe out the fainting goats? Seems like this wouldn't be such a good trait to have survival-wise....

I've given scores of talks and interviews on "the politics of evangelical voters" in the past seven years, so I was surprised after a TV appearance last week when my wife turned to me and asked, "Um, Hun, what do...

I found the first five funny. But this one? Not so much....

In his July 4 speech, George bush edited a Thomas Jefferson letter in a way that truly distorts its meaning. (Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan) Bush said: In one of the final letters of his life, he wrote, "May it be...

When talking about social issues of interest to evangelicals, we tend to lump abortion and homosexuality together. But the politics are actually different, especially among young evangelicals. I asked John Green of the Pew Forum to do one additional...

The revelation a few weeks ago that 21% of atheists say they believe in God confused those of us who took the term to mean someone who, well, doesn't believe in God. It seemed a bit like saying 21% of...

While I usually attempt to be objective, I need to fess up to a raging bias when it comes to "national service," i.e. government programs to encourage full-time civilian service. I wrote a book about the creation of AmeriCorps and...

One of the most controversial parts of Obama's faith-based plan - and Bush's - was the question of whether faith-based charities could hire or fire people on the basis of religion. I wroter earlier that there's less here than meets...

The most disconcerting part of Obama's faith initiative is that they didn't seem to be aware of the volatile politics of one provision: whether faith-based groups can hire and fire according to someone's religion. "Any religious organization that does not...

What will the liberals who criticized President Bush's "theocracy" make of Sen. Barack Obama's speech yesterday -- which argued that the problem with Bush's faith-based approach is that it didn't go far enough? In his speech, Obama said Bush's office...

Remarks of Senator Barack Obama (As prepared for delivery) Tuesday, July 1, 2008 Zanesville, Ohio You know, faith based groups like East Side Community Ministry carry a particular meaning for me. Because in a way, they're what led me into...

I havent read the full speech yet but a few things strike me right off the bat about Obama's big faith-based partnership initiative he's announcing today. Because his campaign ads have tended to emphasize his efforts for layed off workers,...