I am a Christian Too

I’ve been remiss in not blogging about the IRS/All Saints’ controversy, especially since All Saints Church is in my backyard. The LA Times broke the story of the IRS investigation into a decidedly anti-war sermon delivered at All Saints by the Rev. George Regas a couple days before the 2004 elections. The LA Times followed up the next day about conservatives joining All Saints in objecting to the IRS investigation. (A pdf with the sermon in question is here.) Regas ultimately gave his side of the story in an opinion piece in the LA Times. Just this past Sunday, the Pasadena Star-News had an article with the latest at All Saints.

The Christian blogosphere, left, right and center, has been abuzz about it. Dwight, Camassia, and Hugo all see it as political intimidation against a liberal church (as do I). Hugo speaks with authority on the subject, since he heard the original sermon and criticized it at the time. Mark D. Roberts, pastor at Irvine Presbyterian, has a 12-post series on the topic criticizing the All Saints sermon but with a certain ambivalence towards the IRS.
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The Republicans’ rhetoric in reaction to Congressman John Murtha’s bold truth-telling conceals an utter lack of logic. They are trying to play on Americans’ emotions, while acting as through we have no brains. It’s, um, how can I put it, dishonest and reprehensible.

Here are the arguments I heard tonight during the House debate on the Hunter Resolution from the Republicans, and why they are empty:

We must support the troops. Apparently, our military personnel are very fragile, and if we debate U.S. policy regarding the Iraq war, we will hurt their feelings.

Now I have the utmost respect for the men and women in our armed forces. In fact, I have so much respect for them that I believe they understand and accept that the U.S. is a democracy with a loyal opposition. I respect their intellect, and their ability to understand that Americans are questioning our policy, but aren’t questioning our soldiers. This “don’t hurt the troops’ feelings” argument is condescending. They deserve more respect than that. What they really deserve is to be taken out of harm’s way.
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From Working for Change:

Christians of strong religious faith and sound moral conscience often end up in disagreement. Human affairs are a messy business, unfortunately, and even at the best of times we only see through a glass, darkly.

It is hard for that reason to call Christians to a universal standard of behavior. At this moment, however, we cannot afford to dilute the message of Jesus into meaningless ambiguity. There are certain acts that a follower of Jesus simply cannot accept. Here is one: A Christian cannot justify the torture of a human being.

[...] Christians must oppose torture under any circumstances. Consider this: Who would Jesus torture? I cannot imagine Jesus finding a single “exemption” that would justify such an abuse of any individual made in God’s image.

Though I bristle whenever I hear someone refer to the United States as a Christian nation — it is such a loaded phrase — many in the Muslim world see us as such. How tragic it would be for Muslims to identify the message and mission of Jesus with torture and terror. We must not allow that to happen.

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There has been a lot of press lately on the dysfunctional initiative process in California. It has become a way for special interests to bypass the compromise and negotiation required in the legislature by going directly to voters, sometimes with disastrous results.

Last year, Kevin Drum at Political Animal had the definitive argument for voting no on pretty much all initiatives. After a well-thought-out enumeration of three reasons propositions no longer work, he summarizes:

The bottom line is that I think ballot initiatives do more harm than good these days. The process is mostly limited to use by wealthy interests that can afford expensive signature gathering campaigns and million-dollar ad buys, the results — locked in stone for all time — are increasingly reactionary, and they contribute to keeping the California legislature in a permanent state of infantilism since they control fewer and fewer important issues as time goes by.

The only real answer to this on my end is to vote no on everything and urge everyone else to do the same. My hope — undoubtedly vain — is that if enough people feel this way it will become almost impossible to get anything passed. And when that happens, special interests will give up and go back to bribing legislators, just like in the old days.

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