A Mere Christian View of Romney
This seems like as good a time as any to see just how far we are willing to go with the detente of ecuminism.
Here's a simple question: Is the fact that Romney is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints a reason not to vote for him as president?
My take is not politically correct. I've often heard it cited, and even repeated it myself that Martin Luther once said he'd rather be ruled by a wise Turk than by a foolish Christian. I've since learned that the quotation is probably apocryphal. Either way, fundamentally I disagree. In my mind, the wisdom or foolishness of the ruler isn't the question. At a certain point in the hierarchy of humanity, we recognize that the chain of authority disappears into the heavenly clouds. What gives a priest a right to interpret scripture? Why is a husband apparently given some kind of rank over a wife? Why is a judge seated above those in the court? Why does the policeman or soldier have the right to kill someone? All these powers, theoretically, are granted by an invisible ruler who commands the order of the world, but sees fit to also work within it. Great damage is done by those who hold these seats of power without proper relationship to the source of all authority. The president is the head of our nation, and in matters of state, he or she must bridge between the people and the heavenly ruler who presides over the natural order.
Every Christian is a mess of contradictions and failings. It's almost axiomatic. But they cleave unto a forgiving God and a savior who has made allowance for them and therefore they have an accurate view of the world (completely fallen) and of God (completely perfect). Wise Christians don't claim to understand the whole scenario, but they recognize the fundamental importance of perspective applied to life. All science, hubristic as its advocates may be, is a holy reminder that the universe is most likely, as Sir Arthur Eddington once said, not only stranger than we imagine, it's stranger than we can imagine. Our attempts to make sense of it all is a fine exercise, as long as we don't ever fool ourselves into believing we've actually come close to accomplishing such a feat.
Mormonism and, in fact, most cults, are guilty of just that. They play on the inherent (and God-given) desire to understand the world by fabricating answers that seem to make sense. Christian dogma does have a poetry and beauty to it, Christian scripture is rooted in the complementary realms of fact and literature, but its rules are pretty unabashedly based in faith. There's no need to explain how the aboriginals of the American continent received Christ, because God did not set out to create such a sense of fairness in his dispensations. He has other ways, invisible to us, of exercising his justice upon the world. But Joseph Smith wanted a clearer role for his homeland, and either by deception, self deception, or satanic deception, relayed a message that was filled with falsehoods. The fact that millions of people believe it does not make it true. Obviously, at any moment, millions of people are wrong about any number of things. But when the truth in question is not a piece of trivia or current events, but the living underscore of the soul, it's pretty important.
Electing a Mormon as president is rather like buying a piece of critical software that has a bug in its kernel. It may have a slick interface and powerful tools for computing, but on the most fundamental level it is unreliable. It may operate as though it's in touch with all the software updates, but it's actually operating on it's own and when a virus enters the network or a critical fix is written by the programmer, it may not be able to process the information. Even a foolish Christian in authority has a heart attuned to God and prepared to turn on his command (Proverbs 21:1). Certainly God's will shall ultimately be done regardless of who is in office. I think the problem with electing a Turk or a Mormon is that without the proper relationship between king and Lord of All, one based in both faith and truth, God will have to take another route to achieve his will. When he cannot turn the heart of a ruler, he must turn the world.
Here's a simple question: Is the fact that Romney is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints a reason not to vote for him as president?
My take is not politically correct. I've often heard it cited, and even repeated it myself that Martin Luther once said he'd rather be ruled by a wise Turk than by a foolish Christian. I've since learned that the quotation is probably apocryphal. Either way, fundamentally I disagree. In my mind, the wisdom or foolishness of the ruler isn't the question. At a certain point in the hierarchy of humanity, we recognize that the chain of authority disappears into the heavenly clouds. What gives a priest a right to interpret scripture? Why is a husband apparently given some kind of rank over a wife? Why is a judge seated above those in the court? Why does the policeman or soldier have the right to kill someone? All these powers, theoretically, are granted by an invisible ruler who commands the order of the world, but sees fit to also work within it. Great damage is done by those who hold these seats of power without proper relationship to the source of all authority. The president is the head of our nation, and in matters of state, he or she must bridge between the people and the heavenly ruler who presides over the natural order.
Every Christian is a mess of contradictions and failings. It's almost axiomatic. But they cleave unto a forgiving God and a savior who has made allowance for them and therefore they have an accurate view of the world (completely fallen) and of God (completely perfect). Wise Christians don't claim to understand the whole scenario, but they recognize the fundamental importance of perspective applied to life. All science, hubristic as its advocates may be, is a holy reminder that the universe is most likely, as Sir Arthur Eddington once said, not only stranger than we imagine, it's stranger than we can imagine. Our attempts to make sense of it all is a fine exercise, as long as we don't ever fool ourselves into believing we've actually come close to accomplishing such a feat.
Mormonism and, in fact, most cults, are guilty of just that. They play on the inherent (and God-given) desire to understand the world by fabricating answers that seem to make sense. Christian dogma does have a poetry and beauty to it, Christian scripture is rooted in the complementary realms of fact and literature, but its rules are pretty unabashedly based in faith. There's no need to explain how the aboriginals of the American continent received Christ, because God did not set out to create such a sense of fairness in his dispensations. He has other ways, invisible to us, of exercising his justice upon the world. But Joseph Smith wanted a clearer role for his homeland, and either by deception, self deception, or satanic deception, relayed a message that was filled with falsehoods. The fact that millions of people believe it does not make it true. Obviously, at any moment, millions of people are wrong about any number of things. But when the truth in question is not a piece of trivia or current events, but the living underscore of the soul, it's pretty important.
Electing a Mormon as president is rather like buying a piece of critical software that has a bug in its kernel. It may have a slick interface and powerful tools for computing, but on the most fundamental level it is unreliable. It may operate as though it's in touch with all the software updates, but it's actually operating on it's own and when a virus enters the network or a critical fix is written by the programmer, it may not be able to process the information. Even a foolish Christian in authority has a heart attuned to God and prepared to turn on his command (Proverbs 21:1). Certainly God's will shall ultimately be done regardless of who is in office. I think the problem with electing a Turk or a Mormon is that without the proper relationship between king and Lord of All, one based in both faith and truth, God will have to take another route to achieve his will. When he cannot turn the heart of a ruler, he must turn the world.
posted by Rick Broussard at 11:57 PM
2 Comments:
I’ve gotta disagree on this one. (Though this is not to say I’m arguing anybody ought to vote for Mitt Romney – I’m not endorsing a candidate here.) One of the kernels at the heart of our democracy – buggy or not – is religious pluralism. The same arguments applied to Mormonism above could be applied to Protestantism or Evangelicalism by a Catholic, or to Catholics (and has been often in the course of American history!) by American protestants. You may point out that Mormonism diverges further from core-Christianity than do any of these other sects, and I agree it probably does (Mormon baptisms, of all Christian denominations, are the only ones not accepted as valid by the Catholic Church). But that would beg the question, what is the core (I, of course think it’s the Catholic Church – the original organic body of Christ that drew on the deposit of faith and tradition to compile the New Testament) – but does that mean that I wouldn’t accept or vote for a sola scriptura protestant as president (my options would be pretty darn limited each year) or that I would vote for a nominal Catholic with political positions I found abhorrent over Muslim, Buddhist or even atheist whose integrity and whose political positions seemed in keeping with the worldview my faith and my politics inform? Absolutely not. God pours out His grace equally on every human being – and if someone’s political positions and worldview seem to reflect that grace, I don’t care what his religion is or even if he has one at all. I’m not sure if this is a philosophical or theological decision or just a practical one. For example – there are so many Catholics in public life whose lives and political positions don’t seem to reflect their faith at all – I’m more likely to find a candidate I can get behind outside of my own faith tradition. The really sad thing is that to get a candidate who genuinely reflected Catholic values I’d have to merge two or three Republicans and Democrats into one candidate.
The far end of any religious litmus test I’m willing to exercise is this: if a candidate claims to have a religion, but then claims his religious beliefs don’t affect his day to day life or his decisions on weighty matters, then I conclude he’s dissembling – either he’s not really particularly religious (in which case he ought to just say so and get on with discussing the issues) or he is and he’s denying it to appeal to secularized electorate.
Right on about religious pluralism and democracy. The hardwire of democracy is the constitutional right, in fact the critical need, to make choices of who should be the leader of the country. Any one of any religion should be free to apply for the job, but a candidate's religious convictions or lack of them are certainly grounds for a voter's approval or disapproval (I think you made a similar point in a recent editorial). I'd argue that, because of the nature of this particular job, one that has the power of life and death not only over individuals but over whole countries, and one in which we stake our own freedom and survival, the religious core of a person should indeed be a "litmus" test. If the majority of people disagree, then that's democracy at work, but to shush the discussion of a person's core religious values in the name of pluralism is just political correctness (or whatever this pernicious form of overcompensation should more properly be called). You are willing to accept a test in which a candidate's lack of sincerity about religion might be cause for dismissal. I suggest that a candidate who fully accepted a New Age view of God, with tarot cards and spells as features during cabinet meetings, might also be a problem, no matter how sincere the practice. Why? Because these things are non-sense, their powers based in gullibility and deception. I'd say that a serious study of Mormonism might be in order for anyone considering voting for Romney to look for the same problems. I don't dislike Mormons, or JW types, or even fuzzy headed cultists of the more extreme clans. I'm always endeared to someone with strong convictions. I even feel some envy from time to time. But the line that divides those groups from others within the bounds of mere Christianity is not that hard to see. Books that replace or essentially supplement the Bible, suspect leaders who pronounce new revelations that cannot be backed up by scholarship or authorized by miracles, phony miracles, pat answers to complex questions, lies accepted as truth. I suppose that if the choice was between a brain-damaged Christian and a slick, managerial, experienced Latter Day Saint, I might have to go with the good manager, but that's not the situation that we have today, and so far God has never seen fit to give us such a Hobson's Choice.
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