From: wagner@spinoza.math.uh.edu (David Wagner)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: "Christian politics"??
Date: 3 Sep 92 03:56:26 GMT
Organization: UH Dept of Math

Here's my 2 or three bits on this.

I am a conservative Lutheran who supports George Bush and
the Republicans with very mixed feelings.  I support the 
Republicans with an almost visceral reaction because it
seems clear that the Democrats, including Clinton, want
to shove `gay rights' down our throats.  I also support
the Rebublican stance on abortion, although I do not
take the absolutist stand that (I believe) their platform
took.  

I tend to view the gay rights movement as a threat to my
religious freedom.  I can just imagine, for example, that
tax exeptions for churches that refuse to ordain gays
and/or women may be revoked in the near future.  However there is 
a more subtle threat to religious freedom in some of the 
Republican positions. Several proposals that Bush has made, 
apparently designed to appeal to conservative Christians, 
seem very dangerous to me.  

For example, the voucher system for funding education apeals 
to many Christians who want their children to have a Christian 
education, but who can't seem to pay for it, either individually 
or collectively.  (It also appeals to others for different reasons).
I know that many Christians, including myself, resent the burden
of paying for two school systems and using only one.  But my 
personal belief is that Christians should resist this proposal
as they would resist the anti-christ. (Maybe that's extreme, but
I want to get your attention).  As soon as we take government funds
we subject ourselves to government regulation.  There is absolutely
no way to guarantee what form that regulation may take in the future.
I think we can reliably predict that at some point, such regulation
will violate some Christian's conscience.  I leave the details
to your imagination.

There is also a danger in the Republican side of the moral issues.
There is a danger of going too far.  For example, in the area of
abortion, a politically active person may appear `weak' on abortion
if he or she supports exceptions for rape and incest.  At our
Senatorial district convention, I and another Christian supported
such exceptions, but my next door neighbor said, `We need to keep
it simple, so that people can understand it.'  There may be merit
to what he said, but there is a real danger in politically 
competitive moralizing.

There is also a very real danger that people will approach moral
issues with a non-Christian view of the purpose of law.  It is
profoundly non-Christian to view law a means for perfecting people.
It is legitimate, however, (at least from the Lutheran viewpoint)
to view law as a means for limiting sin and protecting the public
safety.  For example, we will never stamp out murder, abortion, 
fornication, adultery, stealing, homosexuality, or any kind of sin, 
but we can legitimately try to curb such sins.  I don't know how
often I have heard an argument that said that since we can
never stamp out a particular sin, we should not try to
legislate against it.  This argument proceeds from a non-Christian
view of the purpose of law.

In the case of homosexuality, for example, the `limit' this may 
simply mean that we do not enshrine homosexuality as righteous 
and acceptable in our laws--I have no interest in witch-hunts, 
but I am interested in maintaining a Christian view of what is 
right and what is wrong.

David H. Wagner		"The Law commands and makes us know
a confessional		What duties to our God we owe;
Lutheran		But 'tis the Gospel must reveal
			Where lies our strength to do His will."

			--Isaac Watts, 1709