Okay, I have not finished reading your entire post, because it is so full of ridiculous statements that I couldn't finish without commenting on a few of them.

I too reject any model of history which suggests linear progress. Only the most naive Enlightenment thinker could buy into that one after the 20th century. But please pick a different ideal than the Mayans! These are the people that lined up slaves and captives and cut out their hearts so that the blood would nourish their god.

If you got the idea about the Mayans being great social reformers from "The Motorcycle Diaries" here's something about that movie in general (from the Left I might add):

http://www.slate.com/id/2107100

And please retire this idea that the Left is friends to Islam and Muslims. I don't think they want you on their side anyway. A good article about that (written by a British atheist liberal) is here:

http://www.slate.com/id/2109377/

You said a lot of things about religion that make me think you don't really understand it very well, and I believe there are assumptions (based on faith) underlying everything you say, which I wonder if you are aware of. It doesn't matter if you believe God told you to do something or Thomas Jefferson, there's a leap from reason to truth in both cases.

Also, please note that there are people who have commented on here who were implying that they voted for Kerry BECAUSE they are Christians, not in spite of it.

Jeff --

Your eloquence is incredible. You have articulated many things that I have been thinking, but too frustrated to actually organize in my head or on paper. You're right, people in the Midwest don't have enough access to leftist literature (I've lived my entire life scattered around the Midwest). I'm astounded at how I felt last Wednesday. I work with people who were sore winners, emailing each other, giggling, gloating. It was terrible. And because of what is going on in my own life, I attached so much extra emotion to this election. I thought, "If Kerry wins, then things are bound to get better." A sign. Right? Wrong. I was devastated. And have been sad ever since.

And I've been thinking a lot about the difference between spirituality and religion. The US may have religion, but I don't think it has spirituality. And I've been thinking about East of Eden by Steinbeck a lot recently. I've yet to figure out any connections that Steinbeck has with the recent election, but I'm still thinking about it.

My friend is a pastor. Her colleague preached a sermon about the more important moral values of feeding the hungry and making peace and reconciliation in the world are the tasks at hand. The fallout from that sermon has only just begun, I'm told.

This may not add to the discussion you have started, but I had to join it. It's too important.

-Val

good point about the mayans. my bad. i pull my foot from my mouth. i do understand religion quite well as a matter of fact, and will not expend my energy defending that point.

with regards to your comment about the leap from truth to reason, i agree theoretically. the problem being, that the leap with george bush involves the destruction of human rights. regardless of who told him that being gay is a sin, his position on the matter remains unacceptable.

i never stated that islam and muslims support the left. frankly, they support very little {if any} of western culture. but that still doesn't make america's imperialism and jingoism {primarily the brainchild of the right} acceptable.

the vote for kerry because they are christians not in spite of it, is precisely how i think it should be. i don't understand how someone who sees themselves as connected to jesus and god, could vote for bush.

as for the motorcycle diaries, i give it 3 out of five, and do not by any means take it as a good critique of social matters. it was simply a movie with a good story and some great visual matter. it was just as biased as anything else.

now, back to the tub. ugh. perhaps i can do more than scratch the surface with that one.

and thank you val. east of eden is one of my favorite novels. your comment about the real moral issues, is exactly what i'm thinking. i wish i could have heard the sermon. may we all move in that direction. to quote an email from a friend: "who are these people of high moral standards who vote for more poverty, less education, more war, more polluting, less health care, more tax cuts for the wealthiest people in our nation?"

cheers.

Wow. Quite a lot of discussion and debate, which I love! I feel I must quickly comment on the question of Christians voting for Bush. I attended a Catholic Mass a few weeks ago. I attend a protestant church, but was tired of the weekly political preaching (which I disagree with not only because I am on the side of the minority in my church, but because of the assumption that all Christians are obviously voting republican), so I decided to church hop for a Sunday until the election was over. It was actually my first Catholic Mass. The message was so great that day. Finally I heard what I needed to hear. He explained that as a Christian, one must realize that both sides contain elements of Biblical principles, and neither side is without moral fault as well. You can vote one way and be supporting life before birth, but also supporting the death penalty. As a Christian we should desire to preserve live from conception to natural death. As far as how can a Christian vote for Bush? I think that is kind of obvious. Although I do know Christians that voted for Kerry, I don't know one that didn't struggle to do so knowing that a vote for Kerry was a pro-choice vote. I don't know one Christian, and trust me I know a LOT, who isn't pro-life. The Bible teaches life begins at conception, and as a Christian one believes the Bible and lives by it (to the best of our human abilities, that is.) Thus there is a sort of roadblock in the Christian mind that causes most to be unable to see past the abortion issue. I believe that many Christians vote the way they do entirely because of the abortion issue. (I know of two off the top of my head.) I struggled to explain that while I am pro-life, I see entirely too many other issues in the Republican party that go against the teachings of Christ. Basically, all I am saying is that I hope Christians can be open minded enough to look past the abortion issue and see other very serious flaws with the Republican party. I agree with the quote from your friend. That sums up my decision to vote for Kerry. But I did want to attempt to shed some light on the question of how someone close to Jesus could vote for Bush. I understand where they are coming from, I just wish they could see where I am coming from as well. I see your problem with an openly Christian president, but I also know that as a Christian it is impossible to not have Christ be a part of EVERY aspect of your life, and frankly, that's how I believe it should be.

i loved this entry. i've been reading this blog for weeks now and this is my favorite.

i could tell you did this in a fit of rage and i would warn you to be careful of this. there are a lot of people out there to piss off and create more division among the people. also, i could tell you did this pretty fast and furiously because of the bad grammar! it's ok... i'm guilty of it too, but watch those commas. it gets a little hard to understand.

But Jodi, politicians are public figures (not as in "celebrities," but as in "custodians of the public interest"). As difficult as it may be for them to manage as human beings, our system of government mandates that presidents separate their public personae from their personal beliefs as much as possible. Bush's personal life may be affected and influenced in every way by religion, but his duty to our nation demands that his professional reasoning remain more impartial. Of course, we've been having increasing trouble honoring this separation since Clinton's sex life became a reason to impeach him. But the inherent ideal of governing our democracy requires our leaders to fulfill a unique and vital role as, oddly, non-personal people. (And to consider the viewpoints of the vast number of citizens who do not share his orientations.) That's his job.

p.s. Jeff! Congratulations on everything wonderful that's been happening in your life. Ooh, and if you sneak back into the States on January 11th, you can see yourself on the big screen at the Parkway Theater. I'm organizing a film festival for that night, and "Dive" is a part of it. Name in lights, oh yes.

I agree with a lot you were saying - but just to touch upon one part of your discussion: the media. I don't know if you ever watch MSNBC w/ Keith Obermann. He's been doing a story the past three nights that no other media has been reporting on possible voting scams. What he is reporting on seems to make this another sketchy election and no one else seems to be reporting on it and he himself seems just as confused as me (on why no other person is writing or talking about this w/in the media).

Some of the problems are that there are some counties that there are more votes than actual voters. Also about 24 counties in Florida - the majority are registered Democrats and Bush won in all those counties by a significant margin.
Read about it in his blog here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6210240/

Scroll down to Nov. 9.

If I go way up on my tip toes and look around (past the initial and very deep disappointment), I can see that something really big is happening now. This election had a whole different feel this time. And there was such a strong feeling that the Dems would indeed win the Presidency. That's bigger than guessing: that's collection intution that tells us we're onto something BIG this time. Everything we're thinking and feeling now can be put to very good use over the next 3.5 years in preparation for the next election.

I heard the same message two different ways yesterday:
"The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice."
--Martin Luther King, Jr.
and
"I'm old enough now and I've run enough times and I've governed enough, succeeded enough and failed enough to know there is a limit to how much any election can repeal the underlying tides of history."
--Bill Clinton

This pain in our hearts is telling us what we know for sure. Basic human rights will prevail in the tides of history. But the waves will fall back sometimes. Like now.

One day each of our grandchildren will look at us wide-eyed and horrified when we tell them how it used to be for same-sex couples.

Ghandi said you can judge a nation by how it treats its animals. I'd add to that, --and how it treats its people.

Good luck with the bathtub. If you get that plumbing all fixed up, the next election will be a piece of cake. ;-)

I believe I understand that given a person believes A, B and C, they would find Bush's Christianity extremely disturbing. When I get confused is when that person tells me they think Bush is dangerous because he's trying to impose his "personal values" on others. When you say something along the lines of, "Bush is trying to impose his personal values on me, and that's frightening," I think the corollary to that statement is, "I am frightened, because I have no recourse for imposing MY personal values on Bush." This idea that the Right embodies dangerous "personal values" and the Left has safe neutral values is simply not true. The fact of the matter is that the Left and the Right have different values, which are equally threatening to each other. Labeling one set of values "religious" and the other "secular" has more to do with our specific society's perception of those values at this point in time. In the Western world, the opposite of "secular" used to be "sacred," with the "sacred" linguistically trumping the "secular." Obviously, our current vocabulary implies that the "secular" is somehow more neutral than the "religious," and given that we are Americans who are taught to value equality, the neutral trumps the culturally specific. The problem with this is that the "secular values" we inherited from our founding fathers (which the Left claims to adhere to) are in fact just as culturally specific as any religion. So I believe that before serious debate can continue in this country, the Left needs to concede the point that all values (even theirs) exclude other values. "Alternatives exclude." There is no difference between saying that Bush's personal religion is oppressive to those who do not believe in his religion, than it is to say that a candidate’s complete secularism would be oppressive to those who did not believe in his secularism. At least when it comes to exclusion, values are values.

So now the debate should be about what these different values are based on. The Left, I've noticed in the past few weeks in Blogs and in the media, continually appeals to reason over faith, citing the founding fathers, the American way and the Enlightenment as the precedent for pure reason. But in the past three hundred years, the reliance on pure reason has been challenged by Kant, the Romantics, the Existentialists, the Post Modernists, 20th century history, the failure of the Soviet Union, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, Chaos Theory and what every major religion has been saying since God said, "Abraham, get yourself to Ur, and maybe I'll tell you why when you get there." To accept the Enlightenment at face value, a person needs to believe:

1. Absolute Truth exists;

2. This Truth is accessible to humanity; and

3. The way humanity accesses this Truth is through pure reason (i.e. the Scientific Method).

A contemporary person is perfectly capable of believing this, even in light of all of the discoveries, movements and events I listed above, but given the philosophical and historical trouncing the Enlightenment has endured, I would say Enlightenment believers need as much faith to accept those three points as any Christian needs to accept their God. (Of course, any person who accepted those three points would disagree with me based on those points.)

But the reason Enlightenment principles have lasted until 2004 and continue to make their way around the globe is that, however they are undermined by philosophical arguments, in practice they provide freedom for people. And when a nation has tasted freedom, they have a hard time giving it up. Many people on the Left approach arguments from this angle, and this is where I think the Left is the strongest. If you're going to speak on behalf of secularism, don't bring up the "Enlightenment" at all, because the philosophical ground has shifted under your feet and you've got very little left to stand on.

You may find, the problem with this approach is that it concedes ground to the Right, because you no longer will be able to claim that the Left has the rational and philosophical high ground, which is what liberals have been saying almost constantly since the election. If Bush's faith is not consistent with the principles of the Enlightenment, then your very faith in the principles of the Enlightenment are not consistent with the principles of the Enlightenment. In other words, the Enlightenment has been undermined, and we here in the 21st century have to find new foundations for our values. Bush has found that foundation in his Christianity. I don't know where Kerry found that foundation, but I believe there was a perception in America that he didn't have one, because even if average voters don't read philosophy, many of them have still come to sense that a commitment to secularism requires faith and can be as dangerous (depending on circumstances) as any religion.

So to sum up, I'd ask the liberals, who believe their position is philosophically superior to the Right’s, to step down and start talking about moral issues directly and not from some 18th century tower with crumbling foundations.

Take away the text on the map and if you just look at the division of color, it seems to make complete sense. The map is divided into regions that make up either progressive or stagnant/regressive states and provinces. Progressive states which pull for equality, liberty and justice for all. And the regressive (especially 11) states which promote discrimination and bigotry. Those states feel that gay individuals pushed forward too hard on the gay marraige issue. What about the fucking war? George Bush fucked the world up for oil in a mere second..Isn't that more of an issue? No, clearly homosexuals and abortion are. I'm still livid and in a devastated fog and as for the map being a slap in the face to Christians...just think how the queer community feels. I'm a christian and can make that distinction.

Jeff,

I read the rest of your post, and I have a couple more comments. As long as these posts are free.

I wish you would clarify what you mean about the Midwest having "less exposure to leftist materials." As someone who grew up in Jersey (5 miles outside of Philadelphia) and spent four years at college in the Midwest (Indiana to be specific), I honestly have no idea what you're talking about. Any ideas on the national stage are discussed in the Midwest just as much as they are discussed on the coasts, and we are living in the golden age of mass media. People in the Midwest get the same Internet and TV that you get, and we are all drowning in print. I suspect that your mistake in attributing Midwestern "ignorance" to this is again part of why you found yourself asking, "How could this have happened," on November 3rd. You don't have an inkling about how some of these people think, and so you assume that they must not know what you know. You are again falling back on the Enlightenment, believing that there is one absolute Truth that anyone with enough sense can find as individuals. So if we could just push back ignorance, we'd all agree on what the best course of action would be, based not an "individual faith" but on reason, universally accessible to all. Is that what you believe?

3am. I seemed to be done sleeping. I'm inclined to go with the purple theory. There are so many who are polarized around a single issue, but that one issue isn't just pro-life. There are thousands of Jews who are pro-choice but feel Bush's stance on "terrorism" is in Israel's best interest. They are emphatically pro-Israel; so, they vote for Bush. People are passionate about issues of war, the economy, morals...none stacking up to one candidate or one party. But honestly, I don't think Bush has a chance in hell of unifying this country or building global allies.

And as for the stereotyping- we liberals must stop. Not only is it naïve, it certainly isn't the only way to be. Last week, I sat in a faculty/staff meeting where we talked about diversity at our school. We were asked if we felt "safe" to be who we are at school. One guy raised his hand and said "I feel safe as a black man but not as a Christian." Another said "I don't feel safe as a republican." It's true too. Diversity includes all kinds of minds. We get so insulated and righteous in our lefty-haven here in the Bay Area.
More dialogue, you're right, dialogue and real relationships are the hope.

Andy,

Philosophically I understand your argument that one group must impose their beliefs on another when there is law regarding a controversial issue; by some broad definitions of impose that is true. Having studied and processed the issues raised in the current debate I choose to more narrowly define imposition in order to highlight the differences between the right and the left. For the sake of my argument the imposed beliefs that cause worry are the ones that affect the individual actions of a person that holds an opposing view.

To illustrate my point I use gay marriage:

A majority of decision makers on the right want to limit marriage between two consenting adults if they are of the same sex. The only reason for this that I am aware of is that a religion of considerable power considers a loving relationship between two people of the same sex to be a sin. This affects the individual actions that gay couples may take on a personal level. (i.e. No you may not get married.)

The left believes that the right to marry belongs to consenting adults.
This is a position of non-discrimination.
This does not affect the personal lives of those that hold the opposing view on a level of personal action. They can still marry. They can still disagree with the idea of gay marriage. They can choose not to attend the wedding of a son or daughter that marries someone of the same sex. The choice however belongs to them. Their actions are not restricted

For the sake of argument a fictitious religion could exist that believed marriage within or among certain ethnic groups was a sin. (To me the argument that gay marriage is a sin is just as bigoted and ridiculous.) If this religion came into government power would it be ok to pursue limiting the rights of ethnic groups in marriage? What if heterosexuals were in the minority and the Gay and Lesbian community became as domineering as the Bush Administration on this level. Would I fight a movement that sought to make marriage between a man and a woman illegal? Yes.

Abortion is a much more complex issue. Beliefs about social programs and government finance of course are different issues entirely. My intent with this comment is to recognize that groups can have opposing beliefs without imposing them on each other on a personal level.

andy,
i am an educated woman, but not particularly politically astute. i am a left-leaning artist. i date girls as well as boys. i sacrifice a big salary and health benefits for a job that i find emotionally rewarding. i have a republican brother who i respect and love dearly. i have an aunt (a former nun) who agrees wholeheartedly with the advice of dr. laura. my mom goes to church every single sunday, without fail. i think about the world much more romantically than politically, and perhaps you will read my comments to you as naive. and perhaps rightly so, i don't know.

you have said a lot. a lot which i have found interesting, but will not comment upon. what i will comment upon is what you told jeff in your last post in relation to midwesterners: "you don't have an inkling about how some of these people think....". i think that is true of all of us (our president included), not specifically related to midwesterners, but americans as a whole. and i think that is where many of our problems lie.

it is not the convinctions of our president that frighten me the most (although they do happen to petrify me), it is his singlemindedness in relation to those convictions. it seems as though there is no room for dialogue, no room for even a conversation about views that differ from his own. it seems as though compromise of any sort is viewed by our president as weakness, rather than strength. in some ways (and i do not say this with a tone of meanness. it is simply my perception), he reminds me of an eight-year-old child stuck in the phase of concrete egocentrism: we must obey the rules, there is no questioning the rules, my rules are the only rules. that is what i find so terrifying.

and i think much of our country has followed his demonstration of egocentrism, screaming our ideas of truth and morality at each other, both on the right and the left. i feel like we have collectively stopped listening to each other. it feels to me like, as a nation, we have put our hands over our ears and said 'lalalalala! i can't hear you! my beliefs are the right beliefs! lalalalala!'. perhaps if we (our president included) took the time to, in your words, get an inkling about how some of these people think, our country wouldn't be quite so polarized. i think we would find that we have a lot more common goals than are visible on the surface.

i am not so naive as to think that a national group therapy session would solve all of the world's problems. but i do know that one of our fundamental desires as human beings is simply to be heard and validated (which does not necessarily mean agreed with). perhaps it's a good place to start.

Found this http://72.3.131.10/ and thought you could have a look. Or maybe not :)

Mike,
I personally, being a right wing Christian, am against same sex marriage based wholly upon the definition of marriage. If the people who make the choices to be with the same gender want the benefits (taxes, health care, hospital rights) then I feel they should be entitled to it. I am not against the choices other people make. It doesn't hurt or affect me directly. I am against the crying out of people who feel threatened enough to make a big deal about it when the underlying problem I see is the lack of benefits these same gender unions have. Most of my Liberal friends fail to see that the basis for these debates isn't "racist" or "Anti-gay" its simply about the word marriage. It seems equally difficult to change the word marriage and not bother the "right-wing christians" than it would be to propose a new plan (or word) that gives the same gender relationships the same benefits that heterosexual "unions" can be.

ben,
so in your opinion, equal rights for people who are gay boils down to semantics? i respect that you understand that the issue of gay marriage is more complex than what your religion may tell you. however, the issue of gay marriage is not entirely about the benefits, it is also about societal equality and respect. i just don't see how that can be accomplished if gay couples continue to be segregated. language is much more powerful than one may realize. i think we all can learn how to share the word 'marriage', don't you?

Jennifer, if this conversation had started with what you said, I would have never felt the desire to comment. My problem is really not with people who have problems with Bush. The president often worries me too and for some of the reasons you mentioned. My problem is with the arguments that some people on the Left are using to make their points and their perceptions of people in certain wide demographics (one of which I happen to fit).

Mike, you said, "For the sake of my argument the imposed beliefs that cause worry are the ones that affect the individual actions of a person that holds an opposing view." I would argue that all laws are an imposition of belief on an individual's actions. Most of these beliefs we hold in common. Really only murderers behave as if murder is acceptable, and we as a society have agreed to punish those who hold that view. If, for whatever reason, I woke up one day and decided I had a right to murder, then the law would be repressing my individual actions. Now I realize that that's a ridiculous example, because the right to murder is not under debate these days. But my point is that the purpose of laws is to state an agreed upon belief that allowing one thing and prohibiting another is correct, and to provide the state with the authority to enforce that position. The methods through which we reach these agreements are all built into our democracy, and it is a far from perfect system. So I am in no way suggesting that just because a law exists, that law is correct, as if democracy has sanctified it. Nevertheless, this system keeps everyone driving on the right side of the road.

But what I assume you're saying (correct me if I'm wrong) is that there are laws that protect us from each other (i.e. murder and theft are illegal), and then there are laws that infringe on a person's rights without cause (i.e. making abortion or gay marriage illegal).

I don't actually believe this election was decided by gay marriage and abortion. The exit poll data that suggested that was immediately qualified and reinterpreted. I think the main issues for the electorate were the obvious, the war and the economy. Many people on the Left are jumping on the it-was-the-homophobic-that-done-it bandwagon, because they can't imagine large numbers of people taking Bush's side on the war and the economy. I believe they did.

But you were talking about gay marriage, so I will too, since after all gay marriage was banned in 11 states. First, I would say that obviously hatred and unreasonable fear were two of the reasons that many people voted in favor of those bans. I have no interest in pretending that those people don't exist, but at the same time, it does not follow that everyone who voted against gay marriage was motivated by those emotions.

Christians believe that homosexuality is a sin. That belief (whether they realize it or not) is taken on faith, based on several brief passages in the Bible, a couple of which are clear and a couple of which are murky. Christians also believe that sin can and does affect the world in a negative way, much like a cancer. One sin often leads to another, both within an individual's life and among groups (i.e. families and nations). When people are sinning, they are not right with God, and God will not bless what they do. This leads many Christians to conclude that they should do everything in their power to avoid sinning and to help others avoid it as well, both for their own interests and the interests of those living within their sphere of influence. I think a lot of Christians believe that if gay marriage was condoned by the state, more people would believe that homosexuality was not wrong because of that, and as a result, more people would sin, which is bad for everyone.

Now I'm not just going to throw that out there by itself, because I have a lot of things to say about it.

1. The Puritans took this to an extreme, and it was not good. They believed that if someone was sinning in their community, that person could bring the wrath of God upon all of them, which could lead to bad crops, sickness or an Indian raid. So their paranoia, of course, has become legendary. Many is the story of the Puritan poking around in his neighbors business, or demanding someone be punished for a sin they may or may not have committed. So I'm not really holding to this principle as something I believe Christians should take to an extreme.

2. I don't really believe that the democratic process we have is really suited to stopping people from sinning when the issues are not generally accepted by the vast majority of Americans. I believe that the Bible teaches us that sin should be primarily confronted in our own lives, and that we should help others to know God, not by focusing on whatever it is we think they are doing wrong, but by introducing them to Christ's love, through our love. I believe Christ changes peoples hearts, not laws, so if homosexuality is in fact a sin (and I'm not utterly dogmatic about that), then a homosexual Christian can work that out for themselves.

3. Because I believe in changing hearts more than I believe in changing laws, I've kind of settled into a political nihilism (for the time being anyway). I do not believe that the United States government can save us from ourselves, no matter how we vote. (This position is somewhat hard to maintain living in the District like I do.) Christ didn’t preach against Caesar, even when Caesar’s government was authorizing his execution.

4. As for fear, I don't personally believe that gay marriage is a tremendous threat to the institution of marriage in America. I do think the family is rapidly disintegrating and that the institution is in danger, because I see evidence of it all around me. But I think the greatest threat to marriage is from the heterosexual community's attitudes towards sex and commitment. And obviously, given what I've said above, I don't think my vote or Uncle Sam is going to reverse any of those trends.

But even though I've distanced myself from the argument against gay marriage that I described above, I am hoping to convey the fact that Christians don't really believe that a person can be involved in what they consider a sin and affect no one but themselves. The idea of a kind of spiritual butterfly effect is very common in the Evangelical community, almost to the point where it is an assumption, and I believe it is supported by the Bible. It's when Christians try to control sin more from the top down (through the government) than from the bottom up (through relationships) that I think they get into trouble. But of course, that's not meant to be an argument in favor of gay marriage either.

I’m not trying to convince anyone that the Christian concept of sin, my concept of sin, is right. I’m just explaining it for those who thing the only motivating emotions behind these kinds of decisions are hatred and fear.

Jennifer,
For me the end of the debate lies in the question concerning whether or not people are born homosexual. I feel they are not. I respect the people who make those choices just as I would respect anyone who is heterosexual. I am sorry to say it involves semantics. I don't feel like I am being "racist" other races are born that way. They are equal to me.

Ben, et al.:

Semantics have been used for hundreds, probably thousands of years, to enslave, disenfranchise, and oppress whichever and whatever culture is the current "other." Homosexuality has been in and out of vogue for centuries. Currently, in this country, it is mostly out of vogue and so is attacked as a "moral issue" or, even more egregiously, a semantic one.

Remember that Nazi death camps were also based on a semantic issue (the definition of "human"), as were ethnic cleansings in Yugoslavia, and, in many ways, Jim Crow laws segregating lunch counters, bus seats, and drinking fountains. Try Steven Jay Gould's The Mismeasure of Man if you'd like to follow up.

Making a country is difficult business to be sure. On the one hand, we feel that American law and politics should somehow wash its hands of legislating morality based on Christianity or any other religious or spiritual rubric. But then again of course American law and politics can't ignore morality for such issues are fundamental to the country itself. Indeed, if the political process ignored morality completely, what laws would we have at all?

The problem is when middle class workers vote Republican, a position which is essentially self-damnation. (One can understand it when SUV-driving soccer moms and upper middle class businessmen vote Republican; of course they'd like the status quo to continue!) According to Thomas Frank the average worker votes Republican because of that party's demonizing of liberal politics as calling for the end of traditional "family values" (remember all the "family values" platforms of the Reagan/Bush years?). Again: a moral and semantic issue. (Frank's book "What's the Matter With Kansas?" covers this topic.)

Increasingly pointless and it grows increasingly late,

Christian

P.S. Thanks for the kind word ChinRing.
P.P.S. Pitcher: I don't read enough either.

I am greatful for having found your website. I have enjoyed everything you post. This is something I came across in the early hours of the morning.

"We must find out what words are and how they function. They become images when written down,
but images of words repeated in the mind
and not of the image of the thing itself."
- W.S. Burroughs

While we're on the map theme check out:
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/
as an example of how skewed the info that is presented is, it made me feel a bit better...

If anyone needs to argue semantics, why don't we start with the word "Christian", as in followers of Christ and his teachings, which, if I recall from all the years of Catholic schooling does not give us the right to judge anyone or to take away their freedoms. To put it literally, only God has the right to do that, not any president.

Dialogue is great, but it presupposes a spirit of openness and the wilingness to find common ground plus critical thinking skills that don't get bogged down in arguments of semantics. People need to step out and stop hiding behind labels.

Andy,

Thank you for weighing in again on the issue. I believe your description of why many Christians believe that homosexuality is a sin is clear and easy to process. I understand their strong sense of faith, and that they accept the bible as the word of god. Through interpretations of certain bible passages, many Christians believe their god is against homosexuality, and that the presence of homosexuality in their society leads to a degradation of morality; and ultimately the presence of more and potentially varied sins. You go on to distance yourself from the Christian argument for a number of reasons, which again are clearly stated and easy to understand.

I recognize your point about the necessary involvement of morality in law making and Kiefer’s further development of that idea. The place at which religious influence in law making becomes scary is that at which it becomes the only basis for a proposed piece governance. This, I believe, is where we are at with the issue of gay marriage. For rational discussion concerning the formation of laws shared between members of a society it is imperative that there be an agreement to separate religious ideologies from issues of human rights, i.e. – for what reason other than the thought that homosexuality is a sin is there to ban gay marriage? (Let’s assume Ben that we’ve agreed to rule out semantics regarding the issue as well, since definitions are fluid and relevant only to those that create or accept their meaning.)

Previously Andy has brought up Thomas Jefferson as the voice of the secular demographic, “It doesn't matter if you believe God told you to do something or Thomas Jefferson, there's a leap from reason to truth in both cases.,” so I assume that he has a decent understanding of Jefferson’s positions and those of Thomas Paine, etc. For a fairly detailed account which admittedly may have a separative slant I suggest reading:

http://www.rationalrevolution.net/articles/history_of_the_separation_of_chu.htm

The problem I see with Andy’s statement is that when the “word of god” is entered into a debate religious believers seem unwilling to question the justice of their “god’s” position, it’s validity in certain situations, or correctness. This stalls constructive discussion with those that do not share the same religious beliefs or even among those that believe in the same god but have a problem with a certain issue. The ideas of Thomas Jefferson are not given the same protection; nor should they be. The same goes for any god, author, or philosopher. I happen to like books by Tom Robbins. I think we would agree that there is a danger in believing Absolute Truth without submitting ideas to debate and opposing views. Jihadists within the Muslim faith are an extreme example what can occur when the question of “is this right?” is replaced by “God said this... so it is so.”

No matter what one’s faith is there exists a benefit to debate ideas of justice outside of religious beliefs. In many cases there is overlap. It is immoral to, rape, murder, and steal… and it is unjust.

This space outside of religion is where a healthy government functions.

In many cases I believe religion is a positive force within societies.

Perhaps the most caustic position within many of the world’s religions has nothing to do with gay marriage or abortion. It is the egocentric belief there is “only one true god”. Can anybody say WWIII?

Mike,

I agree with most of what you wrote, except I think you take morality for granted when you say, "No matter what one’s faith is there exists a benefit to debate ideas of justice outside of religious beliefs. In many cases there is overlap. It is immoral to, rape, murder, and steal... and it is unjust." It is true that we agree that rape, murder and theft are immoral, but why? The concept of justice suggests that we should be fair, and that would require looking out for the weaker people among us and putting limits on the power of the strong. I don’t think that logically that’s a necessary position to hold, given what we know about nature (survival of the fittest and whatnot). But the belief that we are created with an innate understanding of a common morality (at least on some level) has been used as the foundation for an apologetic. C.S. Lewis famously covered this in "Mere Christianity," which you may have read. Of course, the moral argument may serve as evidence for God, because we all agree on many things (like murder), but it is not a complete proof of the validity of our own morality, because people disagree on other points (like homosexuality). And I am not so naive as to believe that if we all just searched our hearts, we'd see that homosexuality is wrong. In fact, if I had my way, I'd rather the Bible did not condemn it at all. It would make my faith just a little bit easier if that were the case, because then my Christian ideals would be that much more in line with the American ideals that I was socialized with. But I believe that humanity, myself especially, is fallen and cut off from God, and if that is true, then the way back to God must be painful and difficult to understand. I believe that religion is only religion when we chafe against it. A religion that preached only what I, a flawed man, want to hear, would sound contrived and manmade. I need to believe that the Truth is so far beyond my reach that I need to strive my entire life and then only with death and the grace of God come to understand why there is evil in the world.

Somewhere else, C.S. Lewis writes about how people have asked him why, in all his apologetics and novels he never talks about the sin of homosexuality, and I think his response was apt. He says that homosexuality is not something he has personal experience with, so what could he say to someone who is struggling with it? I've pretty much adopted that stance. I don't think Christians say, "I don't know," enough. I believe the road back to God is long and hard, and to act and talk as if I've got all the answers about every moral issue is exhausting and ultimately fruitless.

As for what you said about God vs. Thomas Jefferson, I think I know what you're saying in theory, but in practice I don't think it works out that way. I believe there are many people who believe in the Enlightenment as unquestioningly as many Christians believe in their God (whether they recognize it as the Enlightenment or not), and I know there are many Christians who struggle with their faith and are willing to debate almost any issue.

For some great examples of Jews and Christians wrestling with their God, open the Bible at almost any point. Psalms is a great place to start, 1st and 2nd Samuel, Job, Jonah, the Gospels (especially stories about Peter). Also, Dostoevsky is a Christian who really bleeds, although it's my personal opinion that his books are widely misread these days. But the Brothers K, especially is at least in part about how faith can at once be so difficult and so necessary.

Oh, I forgot to add one point. You mentioned World War III. I would suggest that any World War started in order to spread Christianity is a gross mistake. On the list of reasons of why I am not a Muslim, somewhere near the top it would say, "Because Mohammad was a military leader, and Christ turned the other cheek." There have been many wars fought in the name of Christ, but I would argue that the people waging those wars were not living as Christians in that regard. I believe that some wars should be fought, like World War II, because "chaps like Hitler need to stopped," but the purpose of that war was not to evangelize the Germans, it was to keep them from slaughtering people. But I still believe we fought that war, and all just wars, based on one morality that comes from God.

So what I'm trying to say is that if Christians are reading their Bibles, praying and being for real, I don't believe you'll ever see WWIII, because the Evangelical community has decided it's time we put these Muslims in their place with the sword.

And please don't anybody even start on all those evil kings and popes, because with a little reading, I think you'll find that the average militaristic pope or Christian king is using their religion as propaganda to reach their political ends.

(Watch Out: Pet Peeve Coming) And for your information, all those wars between Christian Europe and the Muslim Ottoman Empire, were really not just a case of imperialist Westerners slaughtering poor innocent Muslims. That was a bloody bloody time, and both sides would do anything to grab more land and more power. To suggest that the Muslims involved were victims is ridiculous and an insult to their civilization. You do realize that the Christians never got Constantinople back, right? And before that the Crusades were also violent and pointless, but hardly a case of European repression, especially since all but the first failed. Jihadists talk about the Crusades, because they're steeped in propaganda, and some people on the Left have adopted their battle cry. When was the last time you got really worked up about a war that was fought almost 1,000 years ago?

This discussion is provoking a lot of thought.

Andy,

My question is why must we have faith in a singular God? This position rejects all other religions but the one you choose to believe in, and for you, that is fine, but for the rest of us who do not believe in the same god or believe in god at all?

What if we believe in the potential beauty of the individual? Or the majesty of nature? What if we find our morals outside the carefully constructed system of religion, which frankly is becoming nothing but a tool for the justification of some of the worst atrocities we have recently experienced.

I think faith is absolutely necessary, and as you put it, we are far from God, but when I hear the word God and then read your words, I know that we do not share the same god, because I do not have a problem with two people, whatever their sex, who love each other and wish to marry each other, even if they do not fit the idea of marriage you have. To me, marriage is the official recognition of two people who love each other so much they wish to declare it publicly.

That it is typically a man and a woman does not mean we automatically reject the idea of two men or two women because it is written somewhere in some book that it is wrong. Yes, the Bible is a book. It is not the word of God. It is the interpretation of men who listened to and interpreted the words of another man. That is twice removed from the original source. A lot of room for misinterpretation, nevermind the fact that the original isn't even in English.

The whole point is we are individuals with freedoms, and we should have the right to find our own paths and not stand in the way of others. That the U.S. can enter into war with Iraq to free the people and yet create walls and divisions at home reveals that their are serious flaws in the system of belief supported by Bush and those who voted for him based on his priniciples.

You are more than welcome to your viewpoint, as is President Bush but only in the privacy of his own heart and soul. There is a reason religion and state were separated. We do not have faith in or believe in the same things, and why should we?

Okay, need to write again. First of all, I agree with Andy that my faith would be much easier if homosexuality were not, according to the Bible, a sin. The Bible is the inspired Word of God, meaning yes, while it is written by men, they were instructed to write what they did by God. I'm sure you disagree, but that is the Christian belief. As far as only one way to God, this is how I explain it to people who have that same problem with the "egocentric nature of God." I have raised my son since birth, wiped his bottom, gotten up with him in the middle of the night, fed him, clothed him, cared for him when he was sick, I could go on. If he decided to call you "mommy" tomorrow, I would flip. How can God, who created the entire world, including me, and desires for me to have a relationship with Him in the way that He ordained, be okay with me worshipping Buddha? Doesn't make any sense to me. The idea of numerous god's makes no sense to me. Only one God created this world, and He deserves to be worshipped. The idea that this world was not created by a maker seems completely insane when you see how it all comes together, when you step back and see the ocean, trees, flowers, even how our human body functions. We were created. And as far as questioning the justice of my God's positions? How can I place myself above God? How can I claim for a second to know more than Him? He wouldn't be God if he had the ability to be wrong. Talk about egocentric. I recognize that I am human. That doesn't mean there haven't been times where I have thought I would have done things differently, but my faith causes me to remember how small I am and how big God is. I also do recognize that some things seem too hard to understand, especially in today's society, and especially when something seems so 'harmless' or not affecting anyone else around them. I believe that sin is never harmless. I believe that there is quite a bit of logic behind why sin is wrong. It makes sense to the average citizen why adultery, murder, lying, stealing etc. are wrong. But we get so caught up with homosexuality. I won't go into details of why I feel it is logical to see homosexuality as wrong, Biblical or not. I don't think I should even go there. The bottom line? Followers of Christ and those who choose to worship other gods are never going to see eye to eye without the belief that the Bible is the Word of God. There is no reason to even debate with that obstacle.

There must be absolute truth or each person can create their own idea of what that is. There must be a heirarchy or even a business will shut down. The problem lies when people misinterpret the Bible and use it to justify their own twisted ideas or actions. And, unfortunately, those few have given many Christians a bad name.

jodi,
there is so much that could be commented upon. but it is far too late and i am far too bleary-eyed to expound upon it all. but i am taken aback by your assertion about the necessity of absolute truths. we as human beings have the privilege of possessing free-thinking, intelligent, philosophic minds. it is one of our great joys in life to be able to question, reason, and come to individual decisions about what we hold as personal truths. this ever-evolving world we share is beautifully chaotic and brilliantly unpredictable and grandly imperfect. how is it possible for an absolute truth to exist here?

and also, i am honestly curious to hear your non-biblical reasons for why you find it logical to believe that homosexuality is wrong. your non-biblical reasons only, please. i think it's okay for you to go there. and, in my bleary-eyed state, i'd kind of like you to (honestly, i am not being antagonistic. i am just looking to understand).

Any person with average intelligence, a passable knowledge of scriptures, and a desire to manipulate the faithful can twist “the musings of god” to support their agenda. Andy has offered examples of this with his references to numerous land and power struggles throughout history involving a variety of faiths.

If I wanted to, I could cite bible versus to portray the Christian God as an entity that sanctions murder, rape, enslavement, and child abuse. But what is the point? I do not believe in arguments based on scripture, and my intent is not to discredit religion, a social construct I see as having a mostly positive force.

I do wish to stand up for human rights, justice, peace and non-discrimination. I do wish to have dialogue, but when a collection of words is considered by millions to be “the word of god,” and my millions more as a piece of literature, where can we go? Can we meet on a common ground to discuss issues outside of their religious context? This whole discussion started with the map depicting “Jesusland.” Many Christians took offense but we find ourselves debating issues of the right wing platform not on the basis of human rights charters or ideas about what is right; instead we discuss sin and the existence of “one true god.”

How can people as intelligent as Andy and with hearts as big as Jodi’s not see the quagmire this creates between those that believe in the Christian faith and those who do not?

It is all very troubling to me. The current stance of many Christians (and the Bush administration) is so inconsistent with the loving compassionate god I have great respect for (again I choose not to site the bible).

Perhaps with The Bush Administration we are coming dangerously close to another instance of a person with average intelligence, a passable knowledge of scriptures, and a desire to manipulate the faithful, twisting “the musings of god” to support their agenda.

I lost hours of sleep over this last night but finally got some rest after a bit of masturbation. Where does this fall in the continuum of sins? Or sex before marriage? I’ve done that too; enjoyed it quite a bit.

What is interesting to me is that some cannot see how God has created a set of "rules" (for lack of a better word) BECAUSE He is a compassionate God. I believe my God is a God of mercy and a God of compassion and love based on many things, but not despite His rules, because of His "rules". As a mother I have many rules for my children, don't play in the street, wear a helmet when riding your bike, that they often see as infringing on their "basic human rights", or freedom to do what they want to do when they want to do it because it's not hurting anyone else. My love for them causes me to hold them accountable to these rules, for their own good. Because I love them. Because I want what is best for them. I correlate that often with God when I start to wonder why some things are and aren't "acceptable". For example, you mentioned sex before marriage. Can you see, at all, why that would be something that God would not want? How many children without fathers do we have because of this? Or unwanted pregnancies? Or diseases? I could go on. It seems logical to me. And yes, that also means I didn't do it.

I also think it is interesting that we have gone from a political map to a discussion of ethics and "one true God" but I believe that is because we were all created to know & worship God, therefore we spend our entire lives searching for Him. Some call it "that something missing in my life" or don't recogize that that is the reason they are always deep down feeling that something is off. Just my belief, I know not shared by all.

Christianity is certainly appealing on an archetypal level. In some basic, psychological ways we spend our childhoods fearing and loving our fathers and upholding our mothers are virginal and angelic beings. Christianity gives us a huge, bearded and bethroned father figure whom we both love and fear (in the Old Testament sense) and a virginal mother figure (virgin birth even--egads!). Later, when we found ourselves wanting something kinder and gentler, we got a big brother in the form of Jesus: kind and caring, but not afraid to kick ass either.

In any case, I find it difficult to get beyond the simple psychology of it all. In fact, anything that goes into a "system" or story is mostly interesting to me only in terms of mythology and storytelling. The idea that human beings need to form a mythology in order to justify not killing each other (or, more often, to justify killing "non-believers") is bothersome. Are we so simple-minded as that?

The idea that everyone is searching for the one true god is an interesting one, but then again dissatisfaction is part of the human condition. Believers and non believers don't stop searching to better their lives for we all hold a hollowness inside. That's the hollowness that we fill with family, with work, with creating art. (I just wrote a long piece on a Christian guitar player friend of mine for our weekly paper here in Sacramento that touches on many of these issues. If you're interested, I've linked it as my website below this.)

Kierkegaard is the only Christian writer I've encountered that seems to have a good handle on the dilemma: That essentially Christianity is an incredibly difficult spiritual path with a distant, fuzzy goal at the end that is nigh impossible to reach.

okay. something's got my irish up, and i must defend brother pitcher's post.

i have as much of a christian pedigree as anyone. son of a preacher man, and stuff.

if you take seriously the adage, "what would jesus do," or "what would dr. king do," you need to face an important fact.

your religious liberty to believe what you do comes courtesy of that old american pricnciple known as the separation of church and state, which hearkens back to roger williams and the colony of rhode island (look it up), and is enshrined in the establishment clause of the constitution and numerous supreme court decisions thereafter. (btw, anyone who tells you the soviets invented it is a liar.)

show some respect for the united states! my ancestors bled and died founding this republic. if there's one guiding moral/civic principle that calibrates my political bullshit detector, it's this:

human rights and equal protection before the law are non-negotiable. anyone trying to parse these principles by claiming, for example, that gays are seeking "special rights," sets the detector through the roof. non-negotiable.

consequently, i believe that the attack on gays in this past election cycle is a shot across the bow of everyone's liberties by the religious right. this is a political and civic issue, and it is the duty of all patriots to cut this cancer from our republic. it's a moral duty, a civic duty. as is building the political coalitions to wrest away the power from the right. those uncomfortable with moral/religious rhetoric can leave that to those of us who can bring it. i welcome anyone as my brother who understands why noviolence, economic justice, and freedom of conscience are the moral issues of our time.

defense of religious liberty is a serious issue. defense of marriage is a crock.

so thanks, jeff, for the post. and to those who think my reaction is over the top--by coming and posting here you show your respect for reasoned discourse. my question to you: what makes you think people like you aren't next in line for demonization by the right? I guarantee that you are. wouldn't you be more comfortable with your own kind? you have a lot more in common with us than you do them! believe it.

to our foes, a warning/promise: "we shall overcome." still as true today as it was in 1968. no matter how many of us are assassinated. no matter how many tanks are sent down telegraph avenue. (look it up!)

but it needn't come to that. congressional midterm elections are coming in 2006. if you're a democrat, help me make sure howard dean plays a role in setting the party's course. if you're a green or other independant, organize locally, leverage grassroots power to influence democrats, and support democrats for national offices. if you're voting in the republican primary, don't vote for the religious right. if that candidate wins the primary, hold your nose and vote democrat. if you hate politics (who doesn't?) ask yourself if you love freedom more. but most of all--defend human rights, every day, however you can. engage the moral debate, but human rights and equal protection before the law are... say it...

non-negotiable!

paulie (tea-drinking oakland expat in minneapolis)

Here's another thing that bothers me when I hear it, and I hear it a lot: Paulie, there is no such thing as "Christian pedigree" in Christianity. Being raised in the Christian tradition does not make you a Christian. I have a coworker who is very anti-religious, and she explains away my faith by saying, "Oh, well you were raised that way." This is insulting, because while I was "raised Christian," I have had very serious doubts about my faith at different times in my life, and have struggled with it in a way that has made it mine. I do not believe that I inherited it wholesale from my parents, but rather that I have my own relationship with Christ.

Furthermore, Paulie, my religious liberty does not come from the good old USA, it comes from being a human being. Our government could impose a death sentence for professing faith in Christ, and this would not hinder my ability to follow my God, because that is something I can do in death as well as in life. I do not believe that the blood of American patriots is holy, and I will never value their sacrifices above the sacrifice of Christ. I believe it is Christ that saved my soul, so honestly, it does nothing for me when you tell me I should be able to look past my religion and feel patriotic about American wars. What I'm trying to say is that my faith is not a dependent on or a function of the political principles that allow me to practice my religion unharmed. On the contrary, because I believe in one God, one truth and one morality, I also believe that anything valuable in the sacrifices of American patriots or in our American laws comes from God.