Vote Christian or Vote Conscience

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/10/07/breaking-pastor-to-gop-dont-vote-for-romney-because-hes-mormon/

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/10/10/mormon.politics/index.html

http://mvbclander.com/2010/10/23/the-non-christian-vote/

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/10/15/my-take-are-evangelicals-dangerous/

Surprisingly, Rick Perry’s still campaigning and a close preacher friend of his, Robert Jeffress (conveniently preaching from Dallas, Texas) is telling members of the GOP to not vote for relatively popular candidate Mitt Romney simply because he’s Mormon. He qualified this so as not to see bigoted by saying he believed Romney was a moral man, but he thought that Christian citizens would prefer a competent Christian. At least he qualified that patently biased perspective; that you should only vote for someone if they share your religion; by saying they should be competent. I wonder how he expects the everyday Christian who is only moderately politically active to discern whether someone is competent. And what does he mean by this term? Does he mean someone who knows what they believe in terms of Christianity or in terms of sound policies for fiscal and social purposes in their campaign? If it’s the latter, then it could make sense, as long as they’re not expecting this person to try to legislate unconstitutional endorsement of Christianity. But if it’s the former, we have an issue that I’ve visited before in “Mormon Candidate Discrimination”. It shouldn’t matter whether the person you vote for agrees with you on everything, but only if the candidate holds a majority of the policies that you would advocate as well. If Rick Perry is incompetent, but a Christian, would you vote for him solely on the basis of his religious affiliation as opposed to whether he’s actually capable of running the country? If Mitt Romney is more effective as a president than Perry, then don’t you have a responsibility to vote for someone who will try to improve America as opposed to voting based on the status quo? So much of this depends on where GOP voters’ priorities are and I hope more of them reflect the tendencies of other nominees, like Michelle Bachmann and Herman Cain, who apparently think it’s a non-issue, however crazy they are for thinking God told them to run.

It’s astonishing that we still insist on making such a big deal about what are first and foremost personal convictions that people happen to hold. There has commonly been a difficulty in America of choosing between loyalty to a faith and loyalty to a country. Christians have been able to resolve this problem pretty well throughout history, commonly citing Romans 13:1, which states that believers should respect the authorities, since any authority is supposedly established by God. This is an idea that persisted in spite of the Protestant Revolution with some qualifications. Protestants would argue that they can respect authorities without conforming to them ultimately when they feel they conflict with God’s law. Ultimately what can result is antinomianism, which technically is formulated as the belief that moral law by religious authorities is not in any way pertinent to salvation, which is solely through faith. But one can observe a different form of “antinomianism” (literally being against laws; in this context, civil/secular law) which suggests that a theocracy should be established, where the citizens are governed by Christian based laws, not secular laws of the land. This explicitly manifests most commonly in Dominionism, but many Christians might overlap with that unknowingly with desiring that we apply the Ten Commandments in legislation or claiming the country was founded on the Ten Commandments, both of which are either dangerous or inaccurate. Fundamentally, it shouldn’t matter whether a person is Christian, Jewish or any religion one could describe as long as they conform to the Constitution consistently. Many Christians speak so highly of the Constitution and claim it is based on Judeo Christian jurisprudence and the like, but they neglect to consider that all the Christian scriptures were written in a fundamentally different time with city states in Greece and Rome in one form or another and going further back in Jewish law, more tribal ideas that don’t really conform in any significant sense to modern representative democracy. An elite group of people made decisions about policy as if they thought they always knew what was best for the people. But that wasn’t always the case. With the form of government we have enumerated in the Constitution, there is a greater potential for people actually getting their voice heard and getting their desires fulfilled in terms of legislation, as long as it doesn’t conflict with other laws. If you want the people as a whole represented, you don’t need to vote based purely on yours or a candidate’s religiosity or religious affiliation, but on whether they will treat everyone fairly according to basic principles of American law.

Christians have never needed the government’s endorsement of their faith or the church in order to exist. They take people in for various reasons and maintain themselves through tithing and donations of other sorts and have never needed federal support, primarily because they’re tax exempt and thus are prevented by law from intervening in political affairs as a church and non-profit organization under tax law. There’s also the general theme in Christian scripture that the Church will be supported by God itself through all the tribulations, so I don’t see why any Christian makes a big deal of government endorsement of them as essential. The fact that anyone thinks Christians need prayers sponsored by government entities or any representations of their religious history in a religiously neutral context, the governance of the whole United States or any individual state, suggests a strong insecurity that is ironic considering the privileged status Christians have. You are not automatically judged to lack morals by people, like atheists are, nor are you associated automatically with negative stereotypes that have no obvious counter example people can bring up. If someone alleges Christians are bad, people can find an equal amount of good Christians to counter that claim. As much as there are good atheists, people refuse to see them and the stigma remains in spite of more education and more prominence of atheists in church/state issues. This is a dangerous problem of popular opinion that exists with many, but not all, Christian voters and it stands to reason that they should not be seen as harmless by any stretch of the imagination. If they ally together to do something, you should keep your eyes on them for the simple matter that their perspective is commonly opposed in one way or another to fundamental rights and principles found within the Bill of Rights. They disbelieve people have a freedom from religion along with freedom of religion, they seem to insist as if it’s obvious that the majority rules and the minority shouldn’t have any influence over them and other ideas propagate through candidates like Rick Perry in particular regarding the constitution as it relates to their personal and communal religious beliefs.

If you want to vote in legislation based on your beliefs, at least consider the rights other people have of non interference in the practice of their religion or general ethical behavior without religious backing. If you think it’s unethical to abort a child, try educating children about birth control and responsibility in the same breath. Teaching children about safe sex is not an automatic condoning of pre marital sex anymore than giving a child a bb gun is asking them to shoot cats for fun. If you have problems with gay marriage, perhaps you could establish better standards for straight people marrying in the first place or keep divorce rates much lower by association of taking Jesus seriously when he commands you not to get divorced unless your spouse is unfaithful and trying to get the no-fault divorce law repealed for an explicit example. If you made that commitment, then stick to it, since you hold yourself to faithfulness before God except in the extenuating circumstance mentioned prior. Any issue of policy can be solved and campaigned for by people of faith without resort to legislating religious morality of a particular worldview upon everyone else who doesn’t necessarily share it. The difference is between voting your convictions and voting your conscience. If you want to change things, vote for action that is not oppressive to others, in the thought that people will give you the same courtesy and not vote for things that suppress your rights.

When you start advocating that a Christian only vote for a Christian, what’s to stop you from discriminating based on specific doctrinal differences of your politicians as a logical progression? The only thing stopping you is the rationalization in your head that you’re all the same, but that’s not the case. Christians can disagree fundamentally on a great many things, let alone the differences between Protestants, Catholics and Orthodox groups throughout history. Just because Mormons are the newest group of people with historically Christian overtones doesn’t mean they ought to be discriminated against because they don’t share particular mainstream Christian beliefs any more than Protestants would call Catholics “whores of the Pope” or such obscenities and call that fair. That sort of bigoted and ignorant idea has hopefully died away since the controversy with J.F.K. running for president decades ago, so this issue will eventually become less contentious with time and education. Bottom line, you should vote based on practical concerns, not superfluous issues that ought not to matter in the 21st century in as religiously diverse a country as ours. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

Mormon Candidate Discrimination

http://inthearena.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/07/tricia-erickson-an-indoctrinated-mormon-should-never-be-elected-as-president/

Mormon candidates for president are still pretty unknown for the most part in politics and part of it might be the rhetoric that may remind people, particularly those old enough to remember JFK’s campaign, of the anti-Catholic sentiment that existed back then which is now directed against Mormons, especially Mitt Romney, though I imagine Jon Huntsman might have his share of criticism as well. The same kind of idea persists with a religion that has secretive aspects of its teachings, the modern target being the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints instead of the Holy Catholic Church. Part of it might be that Catholics were still foreign in some ways to Americans in the 60s, though this is startling to me, having grown up around 20 years later when Catholics are regarded as, in most cases, little different from Protestant Christians, or at least tolerated in the same way Jews and Muslims are in many areas of the U.S. Of course, Muslims are treated with a similar, if not greater, suspicion than Mormons nowadays, since they are the new foreigners to pick on that immigrate into America, even more than Mexicans (you know, our immigration issues we’ve been having recently?). But Mormons are distrusted for different reasons. It’s not necessarily that they’re anti-American, it’s more that they reflect secessionist or separatist tendencies. They behave, to the uneducated, as a fringe group. While this might be the case for fundamentalist Mormons, more reformed Mormons, Romney included, have adjusted with the times, which is what makes former Mormons, like author Tricia Erickson, all the more skeptical of their trustworthiness. Erickson has written a book called “Can Mitt Romney Serve Two Masters?” In it she claims that any indoctrinated Mormon like Romney cannot and should not serve as president of the United States. Her reasons vary, but they overlap between her personal religious beliefs coming out of the Mormon church and her political ideology of how particular religions create dangerous politicians.

In terms of religious reasons, she has justification, from what I understand of Mormon beliefs and how that squares with her beliefs coming out of what she regards as a cult. I wonder why she doesn’t make a distinction between fundamentalist and reformed Mormons. It could be because she doesn’t view them as terribly different from each other in the similarities they share, such as the temple ceremonies and oaths they swear to the church. But I have to wonder if these are much different in the long run than other religions pledging loyalty to their divinity, particularly Christians of other stripes (yes, I consider Mormons Christian, at least in the basic sense of the term, finding salvation through Jesus in some form or fashion). How is a Mormon making an oath in a temple in Utah any different from a pastor in Tennessee being sworn in and making vows to serve his church and God? I don’t think it would be much of a stretch to say that both Mormons and Protestants have a capacity to distinguish between their loyalty to God and their loyalty to their country. Mormons understand, like evangelicals, that regardless of their eschatology, along with many Christians (rapture much?), they should try to be fair in their governing of people of various faiths and do what they think is best for everyone. There can be problems with making that distinction for some types of religious believers, especially those of a more fundamentalist nature, who insist that the U.S. must conform to certain basic tenets and laws derived from their holy scriptures, or it is doomed to failure. The people of the “Christian nation” mode of thought could be considered under this, especially those who insist that Christianity has and deserves a special place in our government’s eyes. When critiquing Muslims and Mormons alike for being untrustworthy in political contexts, Tricia Erickson forgets that cult like behavior she calls Mormonism and Islam on can exist just as easily in the Christian faith she embraces now. Beliefs in the resurrection of Jesus or the rapture are equally preposterous to an outsider and could make them just as skeptical of whether a committed Christian candidate can be trusted to make sound decisions for a religiously diverse populace, not all of whom share the same beliefs or even any of their beliefs concerning God and the afterlife.

Just because someone’s religious beliefs are nonstandard or irrational in one way or another does not automatically discredit them in terms of political decisions. A Mormon like Mitt Romney is not any less likely to follow American values than a Christian or a Muslim also running for president. You’d have to find some compelling evidence that he isn’t for America primarily, and his belief that he’ll be a god in the future hardly qualifies. Some Christians, for example, seem to believe God favors the United States and will rapture all the believers at some undetermined time, which is equally silly on its face. Muslims believe the same as Christians that Jesus will come back in the end times (with a sidekick), so how is that less silly than believing you will become a god by following God’s commands and such? Whether a person believes or doesn’t believe in God, an afterlife, a soul, or any other associated ideas that the U.S. population could present to a potential voter, shouldn’t affect whether they consider that person as being worthy of governing, be it as the president of the country, a congressman or a local official. I support Ron Paul, for example, because I agree with his libertarian politics, even if I disagree with his Christian beliefs. But if worse comes to worse, I will probably vote for him over even an atheist candidate who’s overly neo-conservative or an overly liberal agnostic. The religion or lack thereof of any candidate is incidental to their political beliefs, even if there can be associations between their faith and their choices about governance. An atheist politician can be just as misguided in their sociopolitical positions to me as a Christian and I would equally choose someone else over both of them even if they were a Muslim, for instance. That is how one should discern and choose a candidate to vote for: not based on agreeing with your personal beliefs about the divine, but whether they square with your political ideals. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

A New Kind of Mormon Candidate

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/06/21/understanding-jon-huntsmans-distinct-brand-of-mormonism/
http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/06/28/my-take-for-huntsman-a-little-faith-could-go-a-long-way/

I spoke a few weeks ago about the most popular Mormon candidate for the Republican Party, Mitt Romney and his appeal to me, which quickly faded in comparison to Ron Paul. But, unbeknownst to me, there was another Mormon candidate for president who started his campaign under my nose. Jon Huntsman Jr. was the U.S. ambassador to China under Barack Obama, having resigned a few months ago to focus on his presidential campaigning, no doubt. In comparison to Mitt Romney as a fellow member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, there are some stark differences that would put Huntsman as a possible candidate I’d vote for, even with my miniscule political aptitude and nominal conservative beliefs.

First off, Huntsman is less prominent in his Mormonism, since Mitt Romney has served in some function within the church at various points on his life. Not to mention Romney is over 10 years older than Huntsman, so he’s in a different generation of Mormons. Romney’s Mormon roots come from the 60s and 70s, where Mormons tried to distinguish themselves from American culture, which they saw as decadent and manifesting the end times of some form or another. In this sense, Romney has a disposition to make his religion a big part of his campaign, which could serve to further isolate him from the many Americans who wouldn’t vote for him because of his Mormonism even if he was well qualified. On the other hand, Huntsman’s generation is more accessible to non-Mormon Americans, associated with the “I’m a Mormon” online campaign you see across the Internet. Huntsman himself is associated with the LDS Church, but at the same time, he has an adopted daughter who was born into a Hindu culture, another into Buddhist culture, and his children also go to Catholic school to boot. So he clearly has an openness that Romney lacks in terms of religious engagement and diversity.

On issues of GLBT, Huntsman’s got my vote more than Romney at least, though Ron Paul’s advocacy of state’s rights on legislation of gay marriage, etc, has a nice ring as well. Huntsman supports civil unions, while Romney only wants them to have the basic legally equivalent rights to straight couples. But Romney was probably involved with the generation of Mormons that supported Proposition 8 in California a few years back, so his stance on gay marriage and civil unions is not too surprising. In other political terms, Huntsman and Romney are pretty similar, considering they’re running a Republican ticket: fiscally conservative, some social conservative positions, pro life in one way or another, among other talking points. Huntsman seems to be willing to engage in bipartisanship, which many Republicans are much more resistant to, if the healthcare extravaganza was any indication. Being the ambassador to China is a plus, since he sees the priority of keeping good relations with China. He no doubt had prior experience with China in his missionary trip for 2 years in Taiwan, and that was part of what got him his position as Chinese ambassador under Obama.

All in all, Huntsman seems like one of the most sensible Republican candidates so far, even with a background that might make many suspicious on its face. Mormon candidates are still low on the list of trustworthy candidates, though there is more likelihood that they’d be accepted by Americans before a homosexual or a septuagenarian, not to mention the most “untrustworthy” candidate, atheists. Ron Paul seems similar to Huntsman in some ways, though Paul has more of the Constitutionalist and Libertarian leanings that many Republicans pick and choose on, though I’m technically more anarchist than anything else, I’ve found. I imagine Huntsman will be a good nominee for Republicans, but Michelle Bachmann has become a media darling for Republicans to latch onto, not to mention others in the big pooling. Popularity in politics will be the determining factor, so we’ll see what happens in the coming months and year. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

The GOP-Generally Odd Party

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/16/my-take-gop-presidential-field-jars-with-americans-self-image/
http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/16/huckabee-announcement-puts-evangelical-votes-up-for-grabs/

Neither Mike Huckabee nor Donald Trump are running for President of the U.S. in 2012. Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney and others are in the stages of either forming an exploratory committee or working on campaigns across the country. But I wonder whether some of these candidates can stay relevant to their constituents. Newt Gingrich has been divorced three times, and Mitt Romney has become even more controversial than before by suggesting a form of healthcare many have claimed is similar to “Obamacare”, even terming it “Romneycare”. The Mormon Republican could have my vote, though there’s a stronger appeal from Ron Paul, who announced his plans to run this cycle. With these two problems alone, let alone pitfalls with other potential nominees, such as Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachman, the GOP seems to be falling behind with the times.

The main females with ambitions for presidency are appealing to Roy Moore’s methodology of pandering to the common people, aligning themselves with those values usually by design. Palin and Bachman are still popular with the Tea Party, notorious for comparisons and contrasts with the GOP, though even some Republicans running at present, such as Ron Paul, don’t necessarily agree with what might be called more neo-conservatives supporting the war in Iraq. The grassroots nature of how Palin and Bachman campaign, along with the popularity of their positions across a solid range of demographics means they might have a chance this time around, since Hilary Clinton had a decent run in 2008 for the Democratic party. Palin and Bachman share some common positions, such as opposing same sex marriage, advocating offshore drilling and general support of the war in Iraq. Any disagreements are slight, Palin opposing all abortion, while Bachman is willing to permit it in cases of rape or incest. Palin might have some conceivable difficulties due to her explicit association with the Tea Party she has, contrasting with Bachman’s incidental appeals to grassroots movements without severing her ties to the GOP. Palin also had the incident connected to Gabrielle Gifford’s shooting this year, so that’s not helping her chances. Ron Paul, ironically enough, also has some distinct connections with the Tea Party movement, though he still emulates a good deal of GOP positions, particularly the anti abortion one, though his strong opposition to the Federal Reserve System and more strict Constitutionalist leanings might clash more explicitly with the GOP’s move towards neo-conservative ideals.

Concerning Newt Gingrich, the most obvious critique is in his dissonance with the GOP focus on family values and marriage as a sacred institution. The man has been divorced three times, married twice, both times to the women he was cheating on the previous wife with; it doesn’t set the best example for fidelity. The flipside of his hypocrisy is his strong Catholic Christian background that creates a buffer against these criticisms by saying that he feels remorse and wants to set things right. I wonder if he said that the last two times he got in trouble for adultery, especially the first time when Bill Clinton was in Gingrich’s sights for the controversy of Clinton’s relationship with Monica Lewinski, hm? But with any incidents of infidelity, the Christian heritage and support within the Republican caucus means that as long as Newt or any other divorcee that’s remarried keeps apologizing, they’re not completely hopeless, though it doesn’t inspire confidence from a common voter as offenses pile up. It seems disingenuous to vote for people that clash with your values and think they’ll improve marriage when they can’t even maintain it themselves without letting their eyes and genitals wander from the one they betrothed themselves to. I’m not married myself, but I’d be hard pressed to screw up a relationship I put so much work into, especially since I’m so appealing to women as a provider (sarcasm much?), considering all I do is surf the net and type away various ramblings on my blog on a tri/bi/weekly basis.

And to conclude this range of candidates, we have Mitt Romney, who could have my votes if he does continue and I had to consider what Republican would be ideal if the Democratic ones all suck. Of course, I could just vote Independent, but let’s assume I go into the two-party system. Between Romney and Paul, however, the former’s too Mormon in his positions for me to take him seriously on GLBT issues, But Mormon support for Prop 8 should’ve tipped me off on that. He does have my support for his speaking against Islamaphobic discrimination, since they’re fast becoming the new group to hate in the 21st century. He has a general support for stem cell research, but is fiscally opposed to the government funding it, so there’s another strike against a plus. All in all, he’s hardly different from other candidates. The issue of trust he has with the American people and the Republican Party is no doubt due to his Mormon background, which Americans still have reservations about. Mormonism probably has tricky policies within their own church about one’s loyalty to the prophet and their proclamations, though since Romney is not himself a prophet or one of the 12 apostles right under him, it makes the situation less serious. Of course, people would still trust him more than they’d trust a candidate in his 70s or who was homosexual, even if he was celibate. It goes to show that people can ignore a great deal in politics as long as the person of interest squares with the overall party principles. It’s when they become the alleged RINO, Republican In Name Only, that people begin to accuse you of being a Democrat in disguise. Either way, the political field will always have uneven bumps on the horizon. A Mormon, a twice divorcee, at least 2 associates with the Tea Party and more to come in the future: this whole set of politicians and associated squabbles are why I try to stay out of political discussions for the most part. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.