Nepotism is Alive and Well in America

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Civility Isn't a Bad Thing in Politics...Nor is the Constitution

Twelve days ago, I listened to some of Talk of the Nation's interview with Chris Matthews. Matthews told two interesting and evocative stories from his days as an aide to Democratic Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill. Both involved O'Neill and Republican President Ronald Reagan, two men with markedly different political philosophies and differing visions for the country.

The first of Matthews' stories took place in Reagan's hospital room in March, 1981, shortly after the President had been shot. On entering, O'Neill leaned over Reagan's bed and kissed him. Then, holding hands, with O'Neill on his knees, they recited Psalm 23 together: "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters; he restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff— they comfort me..."

The second is a personal memory of Matthews from those days. Reagan entered the anteroom of the Speaker's office, a place occupied by Matthews himself, just before the President was to deliver a State of the Union message. "Mr. President," Matthews said, "this is the room where we plot against you." "Oh, no," Reagan replied impishly, "the Speaker says that we're friends after 6:00."

I wonder how some of today's Red or Blue ideologues would react to such bonhommie between two political rivals, one an unabashedly liberal Democrat, the other considered to be the godfather of today's conservative Republicans?

How would they feel about the fact that after hard-fought battles, the Republican President and the Democratic Speaker could have a belt together?

And how would it strike them that, even these people indisputably committed to their own parties and philosophies, found ways to compromise and make government work?

How, in short, do the ideologues of the Left and of the Right react to civility, even friendliness, among rival politicians?

When I read the blogs or listen to the comments of today's fierce ideologues, I think that they look askance at any camaraderie or compromise in politics. They'd rather win an argument, at least in their own eyes, than advance the interests of the country at large. (Or even their own causes, if incrementally and incompletely.) And they have no patience for the simple practical fact that politics, like much of life, is about people working together with people, sometimes people who have deep disagreements.

The most recent issue of The Week reports on an interview that Playboy conducted with actor, director, and one-time political activist Robert Redford. He was apparently asked why he's given up on political involvement. He spoke of being at a Washington, D.C. fete on the night he received a Kennedy Center honor two years ago. Remembers Redford:

Here were sworn enemies, the leaders who beat the ____ out of each other all day in public, but the minute those doors closed for the state dinner, the daggers went away and it was one big happy family. I saw former Republican Sen. Bill Frist weaving through the tables, and he came over to Ted Kennedy and start [sic] massaging his shoulders and laughing like they were the oldest buddies in the world. Everybody was crossing the aisles and chuckling, and I said, "Oh, I get it! It really is just a game."

Redford is one of my favorite actors. He hasn't, in my view, always gotten a fair shake for his talents, with critics often overlooking the subtlety of his performances. I also admire him as a director.

And there is reason to doubt the genuineness of what political figures claim they believe when the cameras are turned on. I think of the virulently anti-gay Senator Larry Craig found soliciting a homosexual tryst in an airport restroom. Much of our politics is a game, a kabuki dance of parroted talking points in which the parrots don't really believe.

But, these political figures aren't meant to be and shouldn't be, in Redford's phrase, "sworn enemies." Not to be pedantic about it, but members of Congress, for example, take a different oath:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter.

Members of Congress and other public officials are sworn to do what's best for the country. It's disappointing how infrequently they do that, to be sure.

But surely the solution to that problem isn't for members of competing political parties to wall themselves off from one another, sworn enemies. According to most people who've spent decades in Washington, there's been too much of that partisan walling-off in recent years anyway.

Okay, you think, it's only Robert Redford's opinion that pols of different persuasions shouldn't be friendly to one another. Not everybody feels that way, right? Wrong.

Today, I see that uber-blogger Arianna Huffington is proudly publicizing her interview with current Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Huffington isn't touting Pelosi's words, but her confrontational question of the Speaker, "Are you too well-behaved to get us out of Iraq?"

Of course, the answer to anybody familiar with the Constitution, is that, frustrating as it may be for many in the country, Pelosi's inability to shut down the war has nothing to do with her being polite. It has everything to do with the fact that neither she or Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid have majorities able to override vetoes President Bush would smack against any measures the Congress passed for ending the war.

But to ideologues of the Right and the Left, it seems, the niceties of the Constitution are only to be heeded when doing so advances their preferred political decisions.

The Framers knew that the only alternative to adherence to such "niceties" was tyranny and mob rule.1

I like civility in politics. In fact, I think that such politeness is essential to getting things done, not to mention being one of the characteristics that separate human beings from the rest of the creatures of the world. (I believe that courtesy is something to which God calls us, as an expression of love for others.)

I also admire the Constitution.

There are frustrations that go with democratic-republican government. But lose civility or lose the Constitution and we lose America.

Reagan and O'Neill knew that. I wish that today's firebrand partisans knew it too.

1It should be pointed out that Thomas Jefferson, father of nasty partisanship in US politics, wasn't among the Framers at the Constitutional Convention. In fact, he initially opposed the Constitution, disliking power going to a central government and looking askance at the establishment of an executive, the President. But, ideologue and hypocrite as he always was, when Jefferson became President, he claimed authority never granted to the chief executive by the Constitution and openly told his friends that sometimes, a leader had to break the rules in order to get things done. Jefferson would be supportive of today's virulent ideologues, be they conservative or liberal. But I think that George Washington is a far better model for us today than Jefferson. Washington adhered to strong principles and he set this country on a positive course from which we benefit today. But, in spite of a fierce temper, he was civil.

[The picture above, showing House Speaker Tip O'Neill and President Ronald Reagan, comes from The New York Times.]

[THANKS TO: Andy Jackson of SmartChristian.com for linking to this post.]

[UPDATE: Esteemed blogging colleague, Charlie Lehardy, shares some thoughts on the topic of civility in the same post in which he generously links to this piece.]

[THANKS TO: John Schroeder, co-blogger of Article 6 Blog, for linking to this post.]

By the Way, Why Are We So Hard on the Famous?

Here's an oldie.

A Pledge I'd Like Every Christian Leader to Make

I promise not to endorse any political candidate, platform, or party in the 2008 election cycle. I promise instead to use my influence and my recognized position of leader to pursue the mission of the Church, making disciples for Jesus Christ.

This is a pledge which I make as a Christian leader. It's one which I wish every Christian leader in the United States would make.

In 1979, Jerry Fallwell founded the Moral Majority. Since that time a faction of Christians has gained a certain amount of political influence for their own particular agenda and, owing to their legalistic desire to force it down others' throats, the cause of Christ has been harmed immeasurably.

Another faction, most notably led by Jim Wallis of Sojourners magazine, has insisted that their brand of politics is Christian.

While the Christian Church must be committed to advocating justice for the poor, the victims of discrimination, the unborn, and others, our primary mission is to make disciples for Jesus Christ.

When we hold Jesus captive to particular philosophies, parties, or candidates, we're really guilty of a kind of idolatry in which we make Jesus over into our image.

In doing so, we also display a profound distrust toward Jesus, failing to believe that through things like service, witnessing, and worship in Jesus' Name, the Holy Spirit can transform people internally so that in their decision-making, including their political decision-making, they will be persuaded, rather than coerced, to do God's will.

In doing so, we further display an egotism in which we value our own political judgments over those of God.

By all means, Christians should be involved in the political process. We should also pray that God will show us how we should behave and believe politically.

But only in the most exceptional of circumstances does a Christian leader have the right to advocate a particular course of political action.

God isn't a Republican.

God isn't a Democrat.

As a Christian leader, I will not whittle the almighty God of the universe down to the level of political gadfly or a ward heeler. I will honor God as God. I will share the message of Jesus. I will pray that God will guide political leaders and make them open to that guidance. I will be an informed citizen, I will pray, and I will vote. But I will not publicly express a political opinion in 2008.

I have more important work to do.

What other Christian leaders would like to take this pledge with me?

[THANKS TO: Joe Gandelman of The Moderate Voice for linking to this post. Further thanks to Pastor Jeff of Conblogeration for linking to it. Jeff makes the pledge!]

[THANKS TO: EU-DIGEST for linking to this post.]

How Christians Might Think About the 2008 Presidential Election, Part 4

George Smathers, the dapper US Senator from Florida and friend and ally of President John Kennedy, died last month. One obituary remembered this of Smathers' first run for the Senate in 1950, when his primary opponent was the incumbent Claude Pepper:

The congressman badgered incumbent Sen. Claude Pepper on his support of civil rights and labeled him a communist sympathizer. But his most celebrated remarks -- innocuous declarations intended to appear scandalous to less educated audiences -- might have never been uttered.

"Do you know that Claude Pepper is known all over Washington as a shameless extrovert?" Sen. Smathers was quoted as saying. "Not only that, but this man is reliably reported to practice nepotism with his sister-in-law and he has a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York. Worst of all, it is an established fact that Sen. Pepper, before his marriage, habitually practiced celibacy."

Sen. Smathers denied ever making those remarks. He offered a $10,000 reward to anyone who could prove he did, but no one could.

If Smathers ever did say these things, it would represent one of the cleverest campaign strategems ever: A candidate using innocuous, if not widely known terms, to make innocent activities seem questionable.

That would almost be refreshing to hear in the already-whirring 2008 Presidential race. Instead, many of the candidates are ripping into each other, even through their use of dismissive, backhanded compliments. But disturbing as the rhetoric of candidates and campaigns is, their assaults on one another's characters isn't what concerns me most in the 2008 marathon.

It's likely that 2008 will see bloggers play a bigger part in the campaign than ever before. With unprecedented access to a huge audience, we members of the pajama brigade can pass along ideas and information with breathtaking speed. We also can give rumors, unfair characterizations, and disinformation credence they may not deserve. Today, ordinary voters who blog or know those who do, should, to a degree never known before, ask themselves the same question that responsible candidates and handlers should ask: Is what I'm about to say about the candidate who opposes my viewpoint accurate or fair?

This question is especially important for we Christians to ask, I think. The fourth way in which I believe we Christians need to look at the 2008 election is through the fairness window.

The Eighth Commandment says:

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

According to Martin Luther, writing in The Small Catechism, this command prohibits a lot more than telling lies about others. Luther says of the commandment's meaning:

We are to fear and love God so that we do not betray, slander, or lie about our neighbor, but defend him, speak well of him, and explain his actions in the kindest way.

There's no point in trying to extricate ourselves from the implications of this command by saying that people like Joe Biden, Barack Obama, John McCain, or Mitt Romney aren't our neighbors. From God's perspective, everybody else on this planet is our neighbor.

Luther seems to be saying that toward these neighbors, as well as those who live in the house next door or worship from the next pew, we Christians are to be dedicated spin doctors. But instead of putting unflattering spins--interpretations--on the words and perspectives of candidates we don't support, we're to "defend him [or her], speak well of him [or her], and explain his [or her] actions in the kindest way."

People who do this aren't gullible softies, but realists. They know that there are only two kinds of people in the world: unforgiven sinners and forgiven ones. Christians believe that we receive forgiveness through the grace of God offered to all with faith in Jesus Christ and that we will need to come to God through Jesus Christ in "daily repentance and renewal" every day of our lives. Realistically, we understand that only those without sin should dare to cast the first stones. (Meaning, of course, that none of us dare throw stones!)

We also know, as Paul says in Romans, that all of us sin and fall short of the glory of God. But few people are the monsters that political rhetoric, buttressed by very un-Christian self-righteousness, often portrays candidates for the presidency and other elective offices to be. (I'll never forget the conservative Christian who, in 1996, told listeners of a nationally syndicated Christian radio program, that if Bill Clinton were re-elected, it would be the last vote any American ever cast. It seems we've voted several times since then.)

It strikes me as sadly ironic when Christians lament the disintegration of civility in our society and attempt to impart truth-telling to their children, yet feel that they have God-given license to shoot from the hip, often through their computer keyboards, about candidates they oppose.

Very few candidates for political office are the monsters their detractors cast them as being in the heat of political battles. We Christians can't control the rhetoric of others. But we can ask God to help us keep the Eighth Commandment even when it comes to politics.

Campaigns tend to produce more heat than light. As people of the light, maybe we Christians can decrease the savagery and elevate the civility of our political debates.

More tomorrow, I hope.

[For more on the Eighth Commandment, see here.]

[THANKS TO: The Search for Purpose for linking to this series.]

[THANKS ALSO TO: John Schroeder of Article6Blog for linking to this series.]

[UPDATE: See here.]

How Christians Might Think About the 2008 Presidential Election, Part 3

"He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?" (Micah 6:8)

In these posts, I don't intend to push a particular political agenda. Instead, I want to present a series of windows through which Christians might look at 2008 Presidential election.

In the first post, I suggested that the first lens through which Christians might look at the election is the Bibical call to care about what happens in government, as a practical way of enacting the Christian's call to love God and neighbor.

In the second post, I talked about as second lens, the Christian belief in upholding the rule of law for the sake of the neighbor.

Now we come to Lens #3: God's call for justice and for believers to pursue it.

These days, the Bible's emphasis on justice is often overlooked. To some extent this may be understandable: Much of what might be appropriated directly from the Scriptures on the subject shows up in the Old Testament, coming from a time when Israel, God's people, were part of a theocratic nation. No nation in the world today is a Biblical theocracy, making the mandates for Israel's judges and kings found on the Old Testament's pages difficult to apply, especially in religiously-diverse Western democracies.

Complicating our view through the Bible's "justice window" is that in the New Testament Greek, the word for justice never appears. Its Hebrew equivalent shows up only infrequently in the Old Testament.

But, the variations of a word related to justice appear frequently in the Bible: righteousness (diakaiosune). It has the notion of rightness in our relationships with God and one another. (In fact, when the New Testament speaks of repentant sinners being justified by Jesus Christ, it uses a form of this word.)

But the relative absence of the word justice doesn't denote an absence of concern for it on God's part. The concept of just treatment of others permeates much of the Old Testament law and prophecy, addressing not only the actions of kings, but also interpersonal relationships. And a commitment to justice is certainly apparent in Jesus' teaching, even in His voluntary death and resurrection for a human race weighed down by the curses of sin and death.

To understand the Biblical mandate for justice, we need to study another key Biblical concept.

When asked what the greatest of God's commandments are, Jesus responded that there were two of equal importance: to love God completely and to love one's neighbor as one loves one's self.

In this response, Jesus was summarizing what the reformer Martin Luther described as "the two tables" of the Ten Commandments. By the traditional reckoning of the commandments brought down from Mount Sinai by Moses, the first table is composed of the first three commandments:

• You shall have no other gods.
• You shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain.
• Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.

Each of these commandments deals with our relationships with God.

The second table is made up of the remaining seven commandments, as traditionally reckoned:

• You shall honor your father and your mother.
• You shall not kill.
• You shall not commit adultery.
• You shall not steal.
• You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
• You shall not covet your neighbor's house.
• You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his cattle, nor anything that is his.

As this second table deals with our relationships with others, the two tables, you can see, correspond with the two components of Jesus' great commandment. (The verbiage of which come from Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18, by the way.)

Love, in the Biblical understanding of the term, has a lot in common with what we mean today when we talk about justice. For the Biblical writers, love has little to do with what we feel and a lot with what we do. Love, from the standpoint of God's Word, relates to the way we live out our relationships with others. Specifically, it has to do with whether they're marked by a commitment to do for others what we would like others to do for us.

In addition to not seeing love as primarily an emotion, contrary to our usual contemporary view, the Biblical writers would also be uncomfortable with our post-Enlightenment notions of justice, which are rooted in ideas about rights and entitlements. They would prefer to speak of the mutual responsibilities each of us have to share the undeserved blessings of God with others and to treat others with respect.

In fact, at the outset of Paul's famous commendation of servanthood rooted in the example of Jesus Christ (Philippians 2:4-11), he encourages believers by saying, "let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others."

Christians are called to do this and empowered by God's Holy Spirit to do this, no matter what the circumstances of our lives. The apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the Philippians:

I have learned to be content with whatever I have. I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being well-fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need. (Philippians 4:11-12)

Gratitude for God's grace and a commitment to love others as Christ has loved us is at the center of the Christian value system, no matter how our lives may be going at a particular time. Through Jesus Christ, Christians live in the confidence that they have a place in eternity. We have the assurance that a God Who, when He came to earth, didn't shirk the cross and then rose from death to give us life, will always be by our sides (Matthew 28:19-20; Romans 8:31-39; Acts 2).

The reality of God's grace operating in the lives of people who follow Christ is an objective truth, irrespective of the circumstances of our lives. It's a solid foundation that frees Christians to risk loving their neighbor. In practical terms, that means enacting God's love and justice in the ways in which we live, vote, buy and sell, trade, hire and fire, and so on. In elective political terms, it means that Christians should vote less on the bases of self-interest and more on the bases of the interests of our neighbors, far and near.

Of course, no Christian ever embodies love of neighbor completely in his or her life. The siren call of inborn sin keeps on wailing in even the most saintly of Christians. (see here) The awareness that every Christian has that she or he is a sinner saved from death because of the gracious intervention of Christ on their behalf only gives us added incentive to love our neighbor and to press for justice. Saved by grace, we express our gratitude by loving others. (See here, here, and here)

The Old Testament prophet says that God finds worship which is composed of words alone tiresome. He wants people to worship Him also by the way in which they love their neighbors:

Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream.(Amos 5:23-24)

So, what is Biblical justice? Father Walter Burghardt, a venerable Roman Catholic priest whose ministry has centered on justice for decades, is helpful on this point:

...the philosopher can tell you what his mistress, naked reason, demands: Give to each what is due to each, what each can claim as a human right. The jurist can tell you what his blindfolded Lady Justice demands: impartiality, no favoritism, simply the law on the books. Neither--neither philosopher nor jurist--can command that we love. Only God can demand love. Only the Jesus of Bethlehem's cave and Calvary's cross can demand that we love as he loved. Such is the justice that rises above the ethical and the legal, the justice that is divine, the justice of God.

Christians may not demand that a pluralistic society see things their ways. But as they live their everyday lives, including the responsible exercise of their vote, they can and should make Biblical justice, loving neighbors in substantive, unsentimental ways, should be a major consideration. (See here.)

[In the next installment, which I hope to post on Monday, I'll delve into a Christian perspective on how campaigns are waged.]

How Christians Might Think About the 2008 Presidential Election, Part 2

Yesterday, I began this new series by saying that I wanted to present a set of lenses through which Christians can look at the 2008 presidential election, to help us all think about it as people of faith. The first lens I presented was this: The Bible teaches that we should care about what happens in government. Our active concern becomes a means by which we can share the love of Jesus Christ with others.

Now, onto Lens #2: Christians believe in obeying the law of civil authorities, as long as those authorities don't command us to ignore God's will for human beings. Christians, for the most part, believe in upholding the laws of their society, even when they're not completely in agreement with them. We've believed this, as I mentioned yesterday, even when civil authorities were hostile to Christian faith.

In spite of the enmity or malignant indifference of the Roman Empire toward Christianity, for example, Paul wrote to the band of Christians in ancient Rome:

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities; for there is no authority except from God, and those authorities that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists authority resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Do you wish to have no fear of the authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive its approval; for it is God’s servant for your good. But if you do what is wrong, you should be afraid, for the authority does not bear the sword in vain! It is the servant of God to execute wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore one must be subject, not only because of wrath but also because of conscience. For the same reason you also pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, busy with this very thing.

Pay to all what is due them—taxes to whom taxes are due, revenue to whom revenue is due, respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due. (Romans 13:1-7)

Martin Luther said that God rules in two ways, through two kingdoms:

• First, there's God's kingdom of grace. This is the kingdom under which Christians live. Christians believe that they've been given a new relationship with God, with others, and with themselves. Their old sinful selves have been crucified with Christ and by God's charity--His grace, they know that all believers in Christ live with God forever. That new status begins now, in this life. In the kingdom of grace, God doesn't have to coerce His people to love God or love neighbor. They seek to do so voluntarily.
• Second, there's God's kingdom of laws. Luther says that because not all will want to voluntarily surrender to Christ, God also establishes coercive government authority. Governments exist in order to establish a baseline of mutual expectations and a modicum of order among people who live in any country or community. Governments are authorized by God to levy taxes, create police and military forces, and impose fines, all to coerce those who would otherwise "go their own way" (Acts 14:16) into involuntarily acceding to respect for God and respect for neighbor.

Christians are called to voluntarily submit to the kingdom of laws out of consideration for their neighbors. They know that unless people have come to submit to God's kingdom of grace, given to all with faith in Jesus Christ, the love of Christ controlling them, they are wont to live selfishly and to disregard the good of their neighbors. (Romans 3:9-20) So, in voluntary deference to the common good, Christians believe in obeying civil authority and the law.

Of course, whenever a governing authority commands people to do what they know is contrary to God's will for us--to love God and love neighbor, Christians are obliged to resist civil authorities in whatever way is appropriate. Means of resistance could include everything from an email to a member of Congress to overt acts of rebellion, depending on the egregiousness of the command. Whether in the face of mere peer pressure or government authority, Christians are also told in God's Word:

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect. (Romans 12:2)

When confronted with the choice of either conforming to God's will or to the will of those who command us to do something against God's will, Christians know that we're called to go with God and His call to love God and neighbor every time.

Christians then, believe in obeying the law of civil authorities, so long as they don't command us to violate God's command to love God and neighbor. Upholding the rule of law for the sake of our neighbor is an important reason for paying attention to the 2008 presidential election.

[This post is largely a reworking of a previous post on another topic. So will the next installment. I'll introduce all new material in subsequent posts. In this, the second, and in tomorrow's, the third, installments, I wanted to lay a foundation for all that follows.]