From: mls@cbnewsm.cb.att.com (mike.siemon)
Subject: Re: Christians at Work in Oregon
Organization: AT&T
Distribution: usa
Date: Mon, 7 Sep 1992 04:04:59 GMT
Summary: various considerations

In article <1992Sep6.060609.17249@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>, lfoard@Turing.ORG
(Lawrence C. Foard) writes:

I wrote: 

> >Non-Christians are very quick to condemn politicized
> >sects for engaging in politics -- it is a bit hypocritical to then
> >start *asking* for the very same thing (as long as its on the "good"
> >side.)

> I don't believe in killing, but if I had a gun and a madman was mowing
> down a school yard full of kids with an uzi I would kill the guy. 

As a statement of your own principles, this is unexceptionable, whether
or not I would agree to it (and whether or not, if disagreeing, I might
make an effort to persuade you otherwise.)  Something similar (in the 
sphere of this same Oregon political problem) was on my mind in a recent
soc.motss posting in which I said that Christians have to be able to handle
certain "double-binds" on matters like this in our own political life,
if we do not take the (sometimes highly valued) way of opting out of
politics altogether.

However please be clear on the difference between what you just said,
and the rather different tone of "sure, you don't believe in killing,
but if there was a gun nearby and a madman was ..., *you'd* better kill
the guy." Or perhaps even worse, "well, *I* don't believe in killing,
but if ..., *you* should kill the guy."

In any case, the last thing I think this country needs is "left/liberal"
counter-storm-troopers doing battle with the goons of the "Christian"
right.

> But there is a difference here, NAMBLA doesn't have a snowballs chance in

I thought I made a clear statement of the same thing.  I was afraid of
this -- my point is that the tactic being used is similar and, I think,
loathsome -- regardless of whether it could be effective and if so
whether I approved or disapproved of the supposed political result
aimed at.

The structure of the rhetorical appeal being used is an attempt at "moral"
blackmail to foster political ends.  Some putatively nasty group is
named, a much larger group -- with little or no relationship or complex
and largely hostile relationshsips, it hardly matters to the blackmailer
-- is painted as guilty by association UNLESS the target of the blackmail
acts (with unspecified limits, always to be pushed as far as possible)
as the blackmailer desires.

And I repeat: I *do* think better of Jack Carroll than this, which is
why it distresses me to see such a thing from him.  It particularly
surprises me that a Buddhist could be so caught up in the futile cycles
of politics -- however painful and disagreeable the situation -- that
he suggests by his rhetoric the necessity of political or parapolitical
action addressed at the highly visible symptoms by, in effect, indulging
in name-calling.

> It is not a threat it is a statement of fact, if OCA speaks unchallenged
> for Christians then Christianity will be percieved as supporting the OCA.

More blackmail.  If you are saying that the only Christians you know are
the ones foaming at the mouth on TV news, then you are admitting an almost
total ignorance of the lives of the majority of people around you.  What
you "perceive" is YOUR problem, though I may suffer for it along with a
lot of other Christians.  (Again, this is NOT saying that my "suffering"
on this is equivalent to the devastations visited on gay men and lesbians
bashed by rightwing goons, or tossed out of jobs or homes or hospitals
by the sanctimonious dictator-wannabes of the "religious" right -- but
the fact that the blackmail is rather petty does make it any more pretty.)

You seem astonished, in response to Chuck Hedrick, that churches put out
press releases on these things all the time.  The more crackpot fundie
types are convinced -- and will tell you at considerable length if you
but give them half a chance -- about how all the *powerful* (they often
say) denominations are "captives" of liberal politics and do NOTHING
ELSE but foster the left/liberal agenda.  What would you have us do?
turn our Sunday Schools into indoctrination sessions, like THEY do --
have our brainwashed kids MARCH Hitlerjundenisch like the anti-abortionists
do?  Burlarize THEIR offices, as they do ours, and threaten them night
and day?  I doubt it -- you know as well as we do that it shall not profit
YOUR political lives, at least not for more than a moment, if WE lose our
souls in political battles.

If there were a religious "establishment" -- say of my Episcopalian
denomination -- there might well be unctious official pronouncements
condmenning these popular, vulgar but hightly unsound theological move-
ments of the uneducated masses.  We might indeed be getting more press
than they -- as the religious war gears up.  But a religious establis-
ment is itself political and can be taken over by particular factions
(as the fundie Southern Baptists take over a previously noncreedal denom-
ination and enforce loyalty oaths on it, they are meanwhile screaming
their heads off about the "apostasy" of the "liberal" denominations
such as mine (which is hardly "liberal" enough by any standard I know
of that would honestly address the liberation of the gospel.)

No.  You do NOT want the intra-Christian political battles spilling
over into secular politics, any more than can be helped, though it is
obvious that some of us will operate in the secular realm with agendas
partly derived from our church lives.

This is a HARD issue.  The churches now derided by redneck bigots for
being captives of liberalism are the ones that allied with the Southern
Black churches and poured money and people into support of Freedom 
Marches and the religious leaders who were, basically, all the leaders
the blacks had.  Religious leaders like Martin Luther King -- but also
like Malcolm X.  Consider the *political* implications of all this a
generation later, with religious leaders in "succession" to these,
like Al Sharpton and Louis Farrakhan.  And think again whether you
*really* want religious institutions, or charismatic religous leaders
acting as forces in politics.

What most "liberal" Christians these days will do is to operate WITHOUT
religious identity in politics.  At most, they will join other like-
minded religious people for umbrella groups (I will mention one example
I know off the current issue -- the Religious Coalition for Abortion
Rights; I do not doubt that there are more local such organizations in
Oregon opposing the OCA from a "generic" religious position, though my
own limited involvement is purely through secular groups.)

> I know of churchs that are not that way, but not everyone has been exposed
> to liberal Christianity.

According to the fundies we are everywhere, in control of the media,
etc. etc. ad nauseam.  I personally think it HIGHLY unlikely that any
large number of Americans have NOT been "exposed" to liberal Christianity.
It's just that we respect you enough not to scream in your faces all the
time -- and so you ignore us.  What the average couch-potato may KNOW of
Christianity (liberal OR conservative) is likely to be pretty slight --
even less than the potatoes THINK they know, in general.  Again, consider
the alternatives -- state-run enforced religion curricula that would MAKE
you know ALL (that the establishment wants you to know) about this stuff.

You *should* be aware, through census and poll data, of the rather large
numbers of Americans who specifically call themselves Christian when
asked.  Given that the vast majority (I dearly hope! if not, you live in
a statistical fluke) of the people you know do NOT shove intolerance
and right-wing agendas at you, and that statistically MOST of them are
a good bet for thinking themseves Christian, how can you draw any kind
of respectable conclusion that the televangelists represent "Christianity?"

> How can you expect people to believe any differently when the OCA and
> republican party represent themselves as the spokemen for your religion.

I can expect people not to frame an opinion out of ignorance.  But then,
I am in the cultural elite.  If these "people" you so blithely speak of
go to church, then there is a fair chance THEY HAVE BEEN PREACHED AT on
these things.  Again, statistics are relevant here.

	EITHER people are NOT especially religious, in which case NO
	pronouncements from any kind of "Christian" spokesman, left
	right or Martian, will make any difference (if buttons are
	pushed by the fundies, it will be from socialized bigotry that
	goes far beyond any mere liberal sermon to mitigate.)

	OR they are already in the churches that pour out hatred in
	their sermons, hatred which already insists that the liberal
	churches believe otherwise -- even if that isn't true :-)

	OR they are IN the liberal chruches and HEAR the liberal message.

	(there are several other possibilities not quite so stark --
	but in general the idea is sound: any one who CARES will know
	that liberal Christians, of whom there are many, oppose the
	political agenda of the right-wingers.)

> How are people supposed to know that the liberal church which keeps its
> mouth shut is not in agreement with the OCA?

I can understand non-Christians not knowing that there is large part of
Christianity in America which *does* speak out on these things -- but if
you're worried you could look around, you know.  It isn't all that hard
to identify the National Council of Churches as a particular target of
fundamentalist wrath, so you could call them up and ask.  They have REAMS
of press releases.  You don't even have to do THAT much; the press will
do it for you, at least on the largest matters, though it may ignore a
great deal you'd like to know about:

When the Republican Party made its crude attempt to "represent themselves
as the spokemen for your religion" the _New York Times_, *the* paper of
record for American political life, proclaimed in its editorial page, to
the whole earth, the rebuke delivered to the White House.  There is a
religion section in the Saturday Times each week, and a fair amount of
reportage throughout the week.  Like all journalism, this is iffy in its
accuracy -- but no one could possibly read it with any attention at all
and believe that the OCA represents "Christianity" -- on its issues or
any others.

You are entitled to judge anyone, Christian or not, according to your
own moral principles -- or theirs, to judge them hypocritical.  That
is not at issue.  But I will not be bludgeoned into political cooperation
by the threat of being called a fundamentalist.  It is important (to me)
that I write this, because I *do* have the same political aim -- defeat
of the Oregon initiative -- that animates Jack's note.  If the aim were
one I thought bad, I would merely sneer at the sleazy tactic and move on.
When it is an aim *I* am working for, I have to protest the "means
justifies the ends" kind of thing.
-- 
Michael L. Siemon			"I know of nothing -- I suspect
					not even death -- that is so fixed
mls@usl.com				in the present tense as love."
standard disclaimer					-- Jess Anderson
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc