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There’s not a whole lot over the past week that I felt strongly compelled to post about. There were a couple of reviews of “Evan Almighty” that I’ll expand on once I see the movie. My fear is that either the movie panders too much to the religious crowd or it over the top mocks religion to its face. I’ll reserve judgment until I see it. I hope it proves me wrong like its predecessor, “Bruce Almighty” did.

I also have some updating of links I want to do that I’ll probably use my day off on the 4th to work on. I’m still learning when it comes to formatting and such and I don’t want to make this too busy but at the same time I want certain sites to be a click away whether or not they’re specifically relevant to my blog.

The big news of the week was the Supreme Court handing down 5-4 decisions in three cases relevant to our lives as public Christians. One of my roadblocks to blogging regularly is that I want to do enough research on issues that I don’t make a complete fool of myself in what I write. The consequence of course, is that by the time I get around to doing that whatever I was going to post about to begin with is old news and there’s a new topic worth tackling. That was the case with these decisions. I’m no legal scholar and I wanted to know more than what I was reading in the news. But the more I read the more confused I got and the opinions I was going to post started to change in ways I didn’t like. So I’m going to keep it simple, both for your sake and mine.

The first case concerned a student who held a banner reading, “Bong hits 4 Jesus.” The argument was that schools are legally drug-free zones and that while students have free speech when it comes to politics or religion, they do not have the right to promote illegal activities. This makes sense as schools are allowed to adjust dress codes to address gang-related fashion for example. A student can’t go to school wearing a t-shirt with a gun on it, or with a naked woman. The risk of this decision however, is that it explicitly calls out speech that promotes illegal activities. If you’ve followed the news the last year or so, there are efforts out there making religious speech, specifically with regard to homosexuality, “hate speech.” If these laws were to pass, then this ruling would extend to such speech. Not necessarily a bad thing, because few things make my blood boil more than people who call themselves Christians yet will hold signs saying, “God hates fags.” But there are many on the left who feel that any religious expression, especially in a taxpayer-funded school, is illegal and some district-level courts have agreed. If it goes that far then Bible clubs, group prayer outside of the classroom, evens such as “Meet Me at the Pole.” could then be curbed at the whim of a particular school’s administration. To take this further, this could also then apply to Muslim women wearing head-coverings as another example. I’m not sure I agree with the decision on these grounds. But for now, the Bill of Rights still protects the free expression of religion despite the mythical separation of church and state.

Speaking of the separation of church and state, another decision was 5-4 against an atheist group suing the present administration over advocating faith-based initiatives. I’ll concede that President Bush’s goal to promote faith-based programs treads a very fine line, but I believe that the intentions are honorable and not a ploy to promote a particular religion. In context, AA was formed with a strong religious foundation and many will drop coins for the Salvation Army bell ringers at Christmas time without considering that the Salvation Army is actually a church denomination. But I digress. The ruling stated that the administration’s action did not cause harm to the taxpayer and they had no legal standing to bring the case forward. An example of what this means would be an anti-war group suing the government over defense spending. The reason this particular case got as far as it did was a previous ruling in a case called Flast vs Cohen that made an exception for religious spending. Yet this ruling limited Flast to “earmarks” or spending on specific programs promoting religion. President Bush speaking at a church encouraging applying for federal grants is not an appropriation bill authorizing that x-number of dollars goes to y-specific church. On that, I agree with their ruling. In one of the discussions I read on this case, they worry that the exception I noted differentiating between an appropriation by Congress and an endorsement by the Executive branch sets a dangerous precedent that the Executive branch isn’t held to as strict a standard as Congress. To this I disagree (without wholly understanding the opinions by the Justices) because like I said, President Bush (or anyone in his staff) never told Congress to authorize spending on a particular church or even a particular program. If a president wants to speak in a church, it should be his right.

The last ruling involves spending on “issue ads” prior to an election. These are ads that are not sponsored by a particular candidate or party, but rather special interest groups. Therefore they don’t explicitly fall under efforts to reform campaign finance. Why this is relevant is the ad in question was by a pro-life group and never said to vote against a particular candidate, but rather called to account his voting record on that subject. Personally, I prefer these ads to the mud slinging candidates throw at each other. I’d rather see an ad describing someones views and voting records rather than something obscure they did 30 years ago. The risk of this decision however is it opens a door for a lot of corruption. What’s to define an “issue”? Would the Swift Boat ads count as an “issue ad?” Not to mention the choke-hold special interest groups (the dissenting opinion calls out unions and corporations specifically) have on politics. Since money is spent on these ads, it should be able to be regulated as commerce. If someone wants freedom of speech in campaigning, write a letter to the editor, or an op-ed piece. Or for that matter, start a blog and you’ll get lots of attention. (See the recent defeat of anything resembling immigration reform) So I’m on the fence on this one. It will be up to future Courts and future decisions to make this more clear.

So if you’re not completely bored by now, let me sum up. We as Christians need to follow what goes on in our government. Not just by our elected officials, but also our courts. We need to be aware of what could infringe on our ability to express our faith publicly. For these three cases, with the same split in the decisions, on the surface it looks like a shift to the right for the Supreme Court. But on closer examination, at least one if not two, of the decisions run the risk of biting the Religious Right in the behind after making such a big deal in the last presidential election over court appointees. I guess it goes to show, be careful what you wish for.

I’m back! Did you miss me? I have to say thank you to whoever responded to my last post by saying, “DUDE! Update your blog!” I’m glad at least one other person has visited this site. And since I listen to advise, here I am. Eight months later. Can that be right? Wow, I’m lazy! I’ve been struggling with wanting to keep up this blog. Few days go by where I don’t read something in the news, or watch a movie, or talk with someone and think to myself, I need to share this! News that I’ve missed: the passing away of Jerry Falwell and Ruth Graham, President Bush vetoing (again) stem-cell funding, Rev. Al Sharpton showing up on the news just about every day to say something I feel I need to refute, the release of “The Color of the Cross,” and “Jesus Camp,” Veggie Tales editing out religious content for NBC, myself reading two books by Dr. James Dobson and actually agreeing with what he says, and on and on. So I figured instead of trying to rehash all that, I’d start fresh with a mission statement of some sort. Background on why I’m writing what I’m writing. And so on. But then I actually visit my blog to start writing and I read my last entry and realize I already did that. Kinda. It’s incomplete in a lot of ways, but I think that will sort itself out as I post in the future. And don’t worry. I’m typing on a shiny new laptop that I plan to talk to Starbucks frequently to keep this puppy fresh and hip and all that. I might even be ambitious enough to put some videos from YouTube, because that’s what everyone else is doing and that makes it cool! But not today. Today I need to stay on point and chart a direction for the future of this thing called a “blog”. Web-log. I guess it’s better than calling it a “webl”.

I’ve been thinking about starting a blog since the last presidential election when I observed an unhealthy connection between faith and politics. Contrary to a lot of people’s opinions, I didn’t see it in the candidates themselves, but in the talking heads—the newscasters, the commentators, the freelance writers, the talk-show hosts, and on and on. I remember hearing everyone gasp at President Bush when he claimed he believed it was God’s will for him to be president. I have news for you. He won, therefore it was. If you don’t believe me, read Romans. That when asked if he ever went to his father for advice, he answered that there was a higher father he turned to. Wait, he can’t say that! He’s president! OMGICBHJDT! He was held up as everything wrong with religion and politics and the separation of church and state. Because of this, he was asked during one of the last presidential debates what role his faith plays in his life. He answered that he prays every day that he does the right thing, that he trusts that God will get him through hard times, and that he gets encouragement and strength knowing others pray for him. That holy roller! That Bible thumper! How dare he! Then the question was posed to Sen. Kerry. His response? That he believes the Bible spells out how he should live and how that should direct his politics. He then laid out the standard “social Gospel.” No one beat an eye. That’s when I knew something was wrong. What violates the infamous separation of Church and State more, praying every day and trusting God, or getting your politics from the Bible? Yet the line was already drawn. The sides were already chosen. And the public at large were force fed a doctrine inconsistent with both reality and the Bible. And ever since, every politician has tried to capture the “Christian” vote.

So here we, gearing up for ’08 while the talking heads are saying that neither Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, nor John McCain can get the Republican nomination because the “Religious Right” will never back them. Wow, I didn’t realize I had that much power! These talking heads are falling all over themselves for Sen. Fred Thompson, reflected by him shooting up in the polls. So what am I to do? Obviously my mind must already be made up, since that’s who I’m being told is the only candidate that can appeal to me as a Christian. Nope. Not going to buy it. I’m not here to endorse, I’m here to inform. And not only that, but it’s too dog-gone early! So my goal between now and the elections for this blog, is to spell out how I think our convictions as Christians should relate to our politics. How our faith should be lived in the public square in the context of political debate. And maybe drop a book recommendation or two. I’m building up a reading list to prep for the final election. I’ll share that next time. I’m open to recommendations, although Amazon helps. Just type in one of the recent best sellers and I’m told that people who bought this also bought that, that I might also be interested in this, and what other people thought of that book. If I read all those recommendations, I won’t have time to sleep, much less go to work, take care of the family, or do anything fun. So I probably won’t get through everything, especially since I need to balance it with what I’m reading for my own spiritual growth. But hopefully, I won’t run out of things to post and I’ll actually keep up with this blog. Come back again. There should be something new to read.

Due to an inability to keep any sort of consistent posting schedule, the author of this blog has been sacked.

The person responsible for sacking the author has also been sacked.

Henceforth, all blogs will be written by a pack of wild llamas.

(Forgive me for not remembering exactly how the opening credits to the Holy Grail but I think you get the idea)

So it’s been three weeks since my last post. I pretty much took last week off for the holiday and have been traveling a lot for work. I guess this is motivation for getting myself a laptop- just so I can keep up with my blog. During that time, I’d catch a headline, make a note to myself, and then stress out about not logging in to post before the topic became irrelevant. So I have a lot to write about, but little time to do it. This blog is supposed to be an outlet for all that swims in my head and it’s getting pretty full up there. Instead of regurgitating everything up there, I’ll instead take this time to reflect on what the point of this blog is in the first place.

Last night I was spending time with friends and the topic of politics, religion, and the ongoing culture war came up. My specialty. My friends shared a couple of anecdotes which illustrate exactly why I’m doing this. Since it’s now after Thanksgiving, we’re officially in Christmas season so it’s time for all the talking heads to start to talk about the War On Christmas. Well one friend heard on the radio how one city was pressured by the ACLU to not hold their traditional holiday festival since it was too Christian. My friend was shocked such a thing actually happens. One of my other friends described how he was watching TV and some celebrities came on talking about raising money for the tragedy in Sudan. My friend said it was about time someone is noticing and the person he was with asked, “what’s going on in Sudan?” Gee, only the largest slaughter of Christians since Nero.

Both stories show that many Christians are simply unaware of what’s going on in the world. The extent of their Biblical Worldview is only what they hear from the pulpit. And unless their church is active politically, chances are the issues aren’t heard. And the risk if their church is politically involved is they will only know the side of the story they hear on Sundays. So you end up with a large segment of the population ignorant of issues that directly affect them as Christians. My conviction is that mainstream American Christianity is luke warm and expects next to no commitment. This results in a church body that only plays the religion game on Sundays, or when it’s convenient. If the 85% or so of Americans that claim to be Christians aren’t actually living daily like one, it’s easy for issues that etch away our rights or our civil morality to continue unabated. This issue is compounded when a church culture, that may be Biblically committed, is only concerned with itself. Namely, my church over the last two decades has isolated itself from the rest of the Christian world. So anything happening outside its walls was either ignored, dismissed, or mocked. Bridges are now being built from our island, but I would argue most of my brothers and sisters in Christ still don’t know the issues facing mainstream Christianity. So that’s why I’m here.

Another illustration comes from a comic book message board I frequent. The entire thread can be read here. It concerns the movie Jesus Camp. I admit I haven’t seen it. And honestly I have no desire to. But the comments reflect the attitudes the average (as average as someone posting on a comic book message board can be) Joe on the street. It begins with this comment:

“…this kinda bugged me. I went to Bible Camp and all that, went to Church every time the doors were open, don’t go anymore because most of the time the preachers harp on the same ____ over and over like the Bible was about as long a read as the instruction manual for Pac-Man. So maybe I’m out of the loop, but…At what point did it become acceptable to ANY Christian to have their kids bow down and praise a cardboard cutout of a politician? When did parents decide it was ok to raise their kids with the same extremist indoctrination used on terrorists?”

GOOD QUESTION! The first response reflects my opinion on mainstream Christianity, but put much better than I could:

“it’s all part of this new christian system in America with the megachurches and an organized religion more focused on being a reactionary force to what they perceive as attacks upon them. it’s religion with victim mentality… but this is what you get in an environment where people aren’t willing to take the time to study and understand a text for themselves and would rather someone just tell them what it means and go with that. “

The scripture that comes to mind is John 18:34 where Pilate asks Jesus if he’s the King of the Jews. Jesus replies, “Is that your own idea, or did others talk to you about me?” The point being, our convictions must me our own idea. We need to come to the conclusions ourselves. Many people don’t want to talk religion because “it’s personal” or are offended when invited to your church because that’s “just between God and me.” Yet we take no personal responsibility for our lives and rely on others to define what our convictions are. “Outsourcing” our spirituality if you will. The truth is, the culture war that many talk about isn’t against Christianity, but against a segment of christianity (note the little “c”) that has distorted the Gospel to meet their own personal or political ends. It will continue so long as real Christians (with a capitol “C”) stand by silent expecting political solutions and not actively engaging in the fight.

This blog is titled “Public Christianity: The Opposite PC” because that’s what it will take to fight and win the culture war going on around us and ultimately win the world for Christ. There isn’t anything more un-pc than the Gospel of Jesus. It is exclusionary. It is hard. It does have high expectations. And we’re expected to actually live our faith, not hide it in the name of political correctness or tolerance. The challenge is making this our “own idea” and understand all sides of the debate. Because there are whackos on both telling us loud and clear what to believe. This blog is to inform and educate. And urge us to live as Public Christians.

Ok, so I didn’t get to dissecting the Newsweek article nor did I have time to find other juicy bits from other media sources. It’s what we call at work “overcome by events” or “OBE”. But I figure, if you don’t know what you’re doing by now then there’s not much help I can offer. One piece of advice I can give though–pray. Pray the Lord’s Prayer before you vote. It’s entirely appropriate. “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done, on Earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” Remember, we’re citizens of Christ’s Kingdom and are only renting space here for now. Remember that the government’s purpose is to provide a society where our needs are met, but we can count on the God Who Provides to meet all of our needs. Ask for forgiveness, recognizing that we’re sinners just like those in public office we love to criticize and have the heart to forgive the corruption and deceit that we see so often from politicians. And finally, ask to be delivered from the evil of this world–that maybe through our vote and the decisions voted-in politicians make, the world can become just a little less evil.

As for the “value voter?” Well everyone should be voting their values anyway. Be them religious, economic, social, or moral. So don’t take the label too seriously and vote with a sense of entitlement that you’re part of a unique special interest that will turn the tide. You’re one of many, and just as valuable as everyone else in our system.

So what are you waiting for? Go vote already!!!!

Besides falling way behind on blogging, not to mention updating my links, and adding all the bells and whistles any self-respecting blog would have, I haven’t been able to follow the deluge of articles in the press regarding Value Voters and their role in the mid-term elections. So I’ll give you some links and you can try and figure it all out yourself.

First, from the National Journal, an article that does a good job summarizing the issues both sides of the isle are facing with rallying their base, distributing voter guides, facing down the IRS and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State.

Then Newsweek dedicates a whole issue to the subject. This I haven’t had a chance to get all the way through yet but will ASAP and will post my thoughts tomorrow.

Finally, I can’t close without commenting on what’s going on with Rev. Ted Haggard. None of us have any right to cast the first stone, but it is always disheartening to see men of faith elevated to national prominence only to have their deceit exposed. I don’t know the details, and I don’t want to. But this should stand out as a warning for those who want to elevate themselves, or their favorite pastor/author/minister, to a position where not only are God’s eyes on you but so are thousands who depend on your voice for guidance. Interestingly, this seems to plague the right moreso than the left. Rush and Bill Bennett come right to mind. Not to mention the televangelist scandals of the 80’s and Pat Robertson consistently putting his foot in his mouth. Like I said, none of us can cast the first stone, but we need to look sincerely at Jesus’ views of the hypocracy of the Pharisees and pray, “but for the grace of God, go I.”

I have to admit to a certain level of respect for those who blog regularly and are able to keep a daily, or nearly so, schedule of blogging. I’ve been wrapped up in just about everything that could wrap me up. If it wasn’t work, it was the home life. If it wasn’t home life, it was church life. And on and on. Here we are a couple of days away from the mid-terms and part of the goal of this blog is to relate politics to religion in an unbiased fashion so what do we see on this site? Two posts. Two. That’s part of the reason I haven’t actively publicized this site yet. I’m still getting my feet wet and my timing is horrible. So if you’re looking for something substantive, I apologize. I’m working on it. Thankfully this blog has a life beyond just partisan politics and elections. So there will still be things to talk about after Tuesday. In fact, this subject picked up steam after the 2004 elections, so I expect the same this time around.

So if you’re looking for something insightful, or witty, I’ll give you a joke instead. There was once a very rich man on his death bed about to die. He had a vision of God and pleaded, “please let me bring my wealth with me! I’ve worked so hard to obtain it that it is all rightfully mine.” God replied, “Ok, but you can only bring what you can fit in one suitcase.” Grateful, the man packed his suitcase full of solid gold as it would have more value than paper money. Upon reaching the Pearly Gates, St. Peter stopped him and asked to see what was in his bag. Showing Peter the suitcase of gold, the man told him that God gave him permission to bring it with him. Peter confused said, “I believe you, but I just don’t understand why you’d bring so much pavement.”

So you might be asking, “what’s up with the links?” (Or maybe you’re asking, “could this be a more boring blog?” with your best Chandler accent.) Well, they’re still a work in progress but what’s listed as “resources” are meant to educate with a balanced viewpoint. I’m not going to spoil my leanings, they should become obvious in time, by only linking to political ministries I agree with. Although, if I claim to believe the Bible is the inspired word of God, then in some ways I agree with all political ministries that use scripture to make their stances on issues while at the same time disagreeing with all political ministries that use scripture to push personal agendas or forgetting that, “this world is not my own, I’m just passing through. If Heaven’s not my home, then Lord what will I do?” So you’ll see a little from both. I wish I could say I monitor everything I link regularly, but most of my posts will be from headlines either from my local paper or obscure websites I browse. The “resource” links are to educate and inform.

Do I favor the ones I list first? No, I’m following a left/right format where left-leaning ministries are on the left and right-leaning on the right. Makes sense, right? But I think there may be a conspiracy afoot: I think the world is set up to brainwash us into becoming right-wingers. “WhaHuh?” Think about it. You turn screws right to put things together. You turn screws left to take things apart. Right-wing is about togetherness. Left-wing is about anarchy. Clear? Ok, here’s another example. Just the word “right” implies correct. Most people are right handed and lefty quarterbacks are looked down on. I’m on to something aren’t I? Don’t think this is too crazy. Perhaps you’ve heard how media is inherently racist when the good-guys wear the white hats and the bad guys wear black. What color did the crooks in Keystone Cops wear? That’s right, black. And let’s not forget the lesson we learned from Star Wars: the Dark side versus the Light. Or deeper still, that Darth Vader, the embodiment of evil, is all black only to reveal at the end that under the facade he is an old white man. Symbolizing that every black man, deep down, wants to be white. If you don’t believe me, watch Chasing Amy.

But I digress, this is about the links. Not my Oliver Stone-esque conspiracy theories. The links, take seriously. My ramblings? Maybe not so much. Of course I was kidding above, talking out of the left side of my mouth.

Is another religion/politics blog, like I need a hole in my head! (sung to Cracker’s, “What the World Needs Now”) So why me? Why this blog? And if you’re here because of a blog search, I’m sorry! There’s not much content yet, but I’m working on it.

A couple of years ago the world was introduced to a new term, “values voters,” a segment of the population that (gasp!) voted their conscience. It didn’t take long before this “new” segment of Americans became commercial, worldly, co-opted by special interests, and the new pop-culture buzzword. Since the ’04 election some ministers have become politicians, ministries have become special interests, and being a Christian became more about how you vote than how you live. Now we’re on the dawn of mid-terms, and both sides are fighting to capture the value vote.

So what makes me different? After all, aren’t I buying into the system by becoming yet another religious/political blog? That’s exactly why I’m doing this. To be different. While I’m not ashamed of this being political, I want the dialogue (or would a blog be more of a monologue?) to be more deep and broad than, “W sux!” or, “W rox!” I also want this to be more than just politics, but also how religion ties into pop-culture and what we can learn from what’s going on in the world.

The links to the right are a work in progress. So far “resources” are related to the topics I post about, while “blogs” are brothers in Christ whom I respect that post on their convictions and their life. You might notice some of the links look like they don’t belong (ACLU????). But I’ll talk about that next time. So please come back!