I’m going to tell you who to vote for regarding the upcoming
Presidential Election. But first you’ve
got to put up with my political rambling.
Here is:
Every four years the American people begin a process which
I’m very proud of, and which horrifies me at the same time. We begin that process of nominating and
electing the President of the United States of
America. That process has now begun, and the
news media is having its pre-election field-day, following candidates,
analyzing polls, and dividing the American people into polarized camps.
I’m proud to live in a democracy, but I find the whole
political process uncomfortable, and even distasteful. And as we brace ourselves for the coming
onslaught of negative political ads, I thought I’d take a moment to talk about
politics and faith, and specifically how we as a family of faith can avoid
being sucked into the negative atmosphere that tends to permeate political
discourse.
While there are a number of Americans who seem to want
politics discussed from the pulpit, I’m not a big fan of mixing Christianity
and political ideologies. So here’s why
I think we need to keep partisan politics out of the Maple Avenue Pulpit.
1. Churches that
become political are in danger of losing their tax exempt status. In other words, freedom of expression
guarantees my right to preach political sermons, but doing so could jeopardize
our congregation’s non-profit status.
Obviously this law isn’t enforced very often, and it’s easy to find
congregations and clergy who ignore it with no bad consequences. Still, I intend to respect this separation of
church and state.
2. We live in a
politically diverse congregation, and I’m proud of this fact! We have strong Republicans and we have strong
Democrats. If we start dividing up into
political teams it would harm, or even destroy, our ministry together. For that reason it is essential for us to
focus on our life together above our political agendas. In fact, I’m going to go so far as to say
that our joint ministry is more important than our political agendas.
3. Our ministry is
more important than political agendas because we seek first the kingdom
of God…not the kingdom
of Democrats, or the Kingdom
of Republicans, or the Kingdom
of Independents. The Christian faith must always rise above
our narrow political ideologies, and whenever Christianity becomes entangled
with a particular political stance it gets dragged into the political mud. Jesus was not a Republican, and neither was
he a Democrat.
4. Because we’re
rising above politics, we need to respect each others political views. We are citizens of the United
States of America and we have a duty to be
politically informed and vote our conscience.
But whenever I come to believe that the person on the other side of the
political fence is just crazy, doesn’t make any sense, and doesn’t need to be
heard, I’ve destroyed any possible dialogue and unfairly demonized that other
person. In a church we need to operate
under the assumption that all sides of a political debate have some valid
points to make and are worth considering.
In a church, we don’t always agree but we always respect one another.
I do have political opinions and I have no problem sharing
them--especially if you ply me with coffee and ask me privately. I’m sure the same thing is true of most of
our members. But in a church we operate
by a different set of rules than others in the world, and we must always resist
the temptation to get sucked into political divisiveness.
So here’s where I tell you who to vote for. After careful consideration, vote for the
person you think is best qualified to lead our country. I’ll respect you and your decision, and I
hope we can all do the same for one another.
David
