Why Won't Democrats Mention God?
One of the most maddening things for me about contemporary politics is that liberals and progressives choke on words like God and Jesus and Judaism, or even spirituality. This of course hands the whole field over to the Falwells of the world, not to mention that nut-case military officer who said that God had raised George W. up to lead us. George himself acquiesces in these offerings.
Kim Campbell, former Canadian PM, made an interesting observation on Bill Maher's show: "Americans don't appreciate the fact that a political candidate who says that the jury is still out on evolution and who says that God told him to run would not stand a chance of being elected in any other modern democracy."
She also made a plea to Nader not to disenfranchise his followers, i.e., to join with Kerry.
Anyways, why do democrats talk about God like Baptists talk about sex? Yeah, we believe and all that, but can we not talk about it? Whom are we afraid of offending? Now we know there is a large Jewish contingent on the progressive side of things, and they are nervous about religion. And with good reason. But atheists surely cannot be holding us up for ransome here.
Just because we have different views on spirituality doesn't mean we don't have them. I thought the whole modern progressive movement was about finding common ground. If we can accomodate diverse views on abortion, war, raising taxes and a host of other issues, why can't we accomodate different views on God. Screw the atheists. They need to appreciate my firm conviction that God exists as much as I need to appreciate their right not to believe. Anyway, in my view, scratch an atheist and you find a very angry person witha huge authority problem. This is of course due to having Yahweh (the god of fire and brimstone) rammed down your throat instead of Sermon-on-the-Mount Jesus, but more on that later.
The most important result of this failure to acknowledge God is horrible bad karma. After all, he/she/it is only the groundmass of existence, the BIg Kahuna, the source of existence/consciousness/bliss, and the giver of life. Hey, but what do I know? Go ahead and rank him somewhere below recycling in the political scheme. I'm sure he doesn't mind, being so humble and all. I'm sure that the Holy Spirit will continue to guide the country,even though the Founding Fathers would puke at our current spiritual cowardice. It borders on apostasy, actually.
But as noted above, the more important thing is that millions of spiritual people are left out. Just because you are spiritual doesn't mean you are anti-gay, anti-feminist and pro-abortion. What I am saying is that those groups who demand that their special issue be addressed need to grant the same favor to those who think the spirituality of our people needs to be addressed. And the spiritual among us need to quit being shy and demand recognition by the democrats.
If this means finding common spiritual ground with the Jews and non-denominational souls in order to make the progressive movement complete, then so be it. The post-denominational age is coming anyway. Get used to it.
Kim Campbell, former Canadian PM, made an interesting observation on Bill Maher's show: "Americans don't appreciate the fact that a political candidate who says that the jury is still out on evolution and who says that God told him to run would not stand a chance of being elected in any other modern democracy."
She also made a plea to Nader not to disenfranchise his followers, i.e., to join with Kerry.
Anyways, why do democrats talk about God like Baptists talk about sex? Yeah, we believe and all that, but can we not talk about it? Whom are we afraid of offending? Now we know there is a large Jewish contingent on the progressive side of things, and they are nervous about religion. And with good reason. But atheists surely cannot be holding us up for ransome here.
Just because we have different views on spirituality doesn't mean we don't have them. I thought the whole modern progressive movement was about finding common ground. If we can accomodate diverse views on abortion, war, raising taxes and a host of other issues, why can't we accomodate different views on God. Screw the atheists. They need to appreciate my firm conviction that God exists as much as I need to appreciate their right not to believe. Anyway, in my view, scratch an atheist and you find a very angry person witha huge authority problem. This is of course due to having Yahweh (the god of fire and brimstone) rammed down your throat instead of Sermon-on-the-Mount Jesus, but more on that later.
The most important result of this failure to acknowledge God is horrible bad karma. After all, he/she/it is only the groundmass of existence, the BIg Kahuna, the source of existence/consciousness/bliss, and the giver of life. Hey, but what do I know? Go ahead and rank him somewhere below recycling in the political scheme. I'm sure he doesn't mind, being so humble and all. I'm sure that the Holy Spirit will continue to guide the country,even though the Founding Fathers would puke at our current spiritual cowardice. It borders on apostasy, actually.
But as noted above, the more important thing is that millions of spiritual people are left out. Just because you are spiritual doesn't mean you are anti-gay, anti-feminist and pro-abortion. What I am saying is that those groups who demand that their special issue be addressed need to grant the same favor to those who think the spirituality of our people needs to be addressed. And the spiritual among us need to quit being shy and demand recognition by the democrats.
If this means finding common spiritual ground with the Jews and non-denominational souls in order to make the progressive movement complete, then so be it. The post-denominational age is coming anyway. Get used to it.
posted by John McGuirk at
9:20 AM
1 Comments:
I think you said it right off : democrats need to be more comfortable with acknowledging God and spirituality. Ultimately, all so-called morality is derived from spiritual enlightenment. What if candidates urged their followers to strengthen their connections to the spirit -- whatever they conceived that to be -- and were willing to talk of compassion and tolerance as spiritually-derived values and not just the good ideas of smart people. What if democrats acknowledged that God acts through us and permeates our lives. What separates us from conservatives is that we tend to focus on mercy and love, while they tend to focus on justice and virtue. But they have no problem trumpeting justice and virtue. Why do we have a problem with mercy and love -- except as we relate it to some philosophical rather than religious derivation. This is what the criticism "secular humanist" means -- liberals just WILL NOT talk about spiritual things.
What if our leaders practiced yoga and meditation -- or were willing to be seen actually praying in silence? What if the Dalai Lama or one of India's living saints visited the White House or spoke at the convention? What if we sponsored a national day of reflection, on which we would explore what it means to be human? What if one of our leaders actually FORGAVE a transgression, rather than meting out punishment and vengeance. For example, and hopefully I am not being trivial, but I thought the lesson that Notre Dame should have sent with the George O'Leary deal was forgiveness. Why not accept a sincere apology for a simple human failing, instead of casting him into the outer darkness.
Carter tried some of this, incidentally, and was reviled for it.
This is the kind of thing I mean -- not quoting scripture.
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John McGuirk, at 4:21 PM
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