The Democratic party exemplifies more of the Christian philosophy than the Republican party.

My opponent's quotes will be in bold. I. Help the sick & feed the poorIt is important to note that Jesus Christ never sent someone sick or someone homeless away on the principle of self-reliance. Instead, that's exactly what the Republican party's intentions are. The difference here is that one party is saying rely on yourself even if you can't do it, and the other is saying if you need help here is a safety net. My opponent noted, in his response to my first two contentions, that, "Republicans argue that social welfare programs, ideally, should be initiatives run by private charities and not the government. " Indeed, this is true. Ideally, private charities should be the ones who support those who need help. However, when you have a "Christian" nation, and when the private charities can't handle the magnitude of what the people need, it is important for that "Christian" nation to step up and do what they were commanded to do, feed the poor and heal the sick. My opponent then goes on to say, "In all of the passages that my opponent has provided Jesus only speaks about the importance of individuals doing charitable acts; Jesus does not command that society or government should be forced to provide for the poor and needy. Jesus contends that it is the role of CHRISTIANS to tend to the poor and sick. " Again, the problem here is that when you don't try to establish the government as 100% secular, and you try to claim that it is a Christian nation (placing Christian relics in federal buildings in court houses) and you make your decisions off of prayer and the guidance of God or call yourself God's party, you are then the nation that needs to tend to the poor and sick because you're intending to uphold Christian values. That understood, we're looking at which party exemplifies this with the least amount of resistance and the answer is the Democratic party. My opponent's final response to the contention was the most controversial. He compared those who are in poverty and starving everyday or dying from health diseases that could be treated with proper care to thieves who are stealing other people's money citing Ephesians 4:28, "Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. " The sick and poor are not thieves who refuse to do honest work. They're the unfortunate. One must embrace that, in a capitalist society, not everyone can reach the top & there are those who cannot come from the bottom. When you establish an economic system that essentially is progress/survival of the fittest, you must do things like provide safety nets for those individuals who are not as well off when you pride yourself on being the nation of Christian values— lest you become a nation of savages. All in all, it's not that Jesus commanded that the government has to feed the poor, that's not the issue. The issue steps in when you say you're to be a nation that upholds Christian values and then say you're the specific party of those Christian values. When you say these things, you must then become a nation who abides by feeding the poor, healing the sick, loving thy neighbor, loving God, and judging no one. People are dying everyday from starvation and treatable illnesses because private charity can't handle the magnitude. When you are upholding Jesus' teachings and you have the ability to feed them and treat them, you do so. II. Jesus' teachings on judgement and loving thy neighbor. My opponent's stance that, "Jesus' teachings on judgement are largely about the avoidance of hypocrisy," is simply false. Jesus doesn't teach to only (or mostly) try to judge based on non-hypocritical situations, he teaches that all judging is hypocritical because all sin is equal in the eyes of the Lord. John chapter 8 is important to this contention. It consists of a number of religious followers who brought a woman to Jesus who was accused of adultery and asked if they should stone her because that's what Moses' commandments required. Jesus then stated, "Let he without sin be the first to throw a stone. " What's important here is that Jesus was saying that all of you have sinned, so picking at one person's sin is pointless because you're looking at a splinter in your neighbor's eye, while having a log in yours. It's not that you only get to judge people who sin differently, it's that all sin is sin and you don't get to judge at all. Also, my opponent is wrong for stating that Jesus upheld Leviticus when it made statements about homosexuality. Jesus made no such judgements of homosexuality. With the understanding of the first paragraph, you have to look at the issue of homosexuality in today's society. With it combined that Jesus spoke out about judging other people based on old testament law, that he said absolutely nothing about homosexuality being bad, and that scientists have zeroed in on homosexuality being nature as much as nurture[1], one must consider that homosexuality is at least something they cannot speak out against & at most something that is uncontrollable and a legitimate attraction therefore impossible to be immoral. It is this understanding that the Democratic party upholds. The issue of deportation and illegal immigration is more complicated than my opponent is letting on at face value. The issue of border patrol is one that is ideologically & fundamentally different between the two parties and this difference played a large role in the Hispanic vote that helped march Abeam back into the white house. [2] The problem comes in when Republicans and Democrats fail to reach agreements on the issue so we're stuck with the same laws that the government must uphold. My opponents 4th source in his latest round outlines exactly this with the following statement, "Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials announced on Friday that the agency surpassed its record number of deportations in the past fiscal year, but also will enact reform of a controversial immigration enforcement program that could lead to fewer non-criminal immigrants being removed from the country. .. Obama has promised to make a major push next year for comprehensive immigration reform that would give legal status to some of the estimated 11.1 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the U. S. " [My opponent's 4th source] It then goes on to state that the Obama administration has set forth a new policy that says they will not even go after illegal immigrants who have committed crimes unless they've accrued more than 3 misdemeanors. So, in my opponent's source, you have a Democratic president forced to uphold the law, and then when he sees the laws are leading to an escalated number of unfair deportations he introduces a new policy that makes it to where illegal immigrants can stay even if they've committed up to 3 misdemeanors. That's not helping my opponent's case, it hurts his case. III. No fundamentally Christian values being upheld by the Republican Party. It's important to note that my opponent has yet to show how the Republicans uphold Christian values other than by simply claiming they're the party of God. It appears he's shown how they have tried to slip through the cracks on societal welfare policies and get away with doing nothing by claiming fiscal responsibility. But even the, Jesus made it clear what his views on holding money over societal acts. "It is easier for a camel to squeeze through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. "~Mark 10:25. [1]. http://io9.com...[2]http://www.huffingtonpost.com...[3]http://www.biblegateway.com...[4]http://www.presstv.com...