God, Money and Politics

 Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            Jesus said, No one can serve two masters.  Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.  You cannot serve both God and money. (Matthew 6:24)  If loving God requires that we love our neighbors as ourselves, especially the poor and weak, then we cannot love God and love the money and worldly power that exploits the poor and weak.  That is a principle of faith common to Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

            It is a stretch to describe the U.S. as a Godly nation given its materialism and hedonism.  And the consummate love of wealth, pleasure and power is not unique to the U.S.  It is prevalent wherever humankind has the freedom to choose between the love of God and money.  If the two are considered competing masters for our souls, then most people seem to have put the love of money and the pleasures and power it can buy over the love of God.

            Does God Bless America?  We hear that mantra from politicians as they campaign for money and votes, but it is an offense to God to claim blessings for a nation that worships money, pleasure and power.  Some young Muslims have been so offended by the decadent values of libertarian democracies that they have left them for the oppressive idealism of ISIS.  And many people of faith and reason in the U.S. also seem to be losing faith in the capitalistic and political structures that control the nation’s wealth and power. 

            The unlikely popularity of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders as presidential candidates is evidence of widespread public dissatisfaction with the political status quo.  They are at opposite ends of the political and economic spectrum: Trump personifies Ayn Rand’s objectivist philosophy that sanctifies unrestrained greed and self-satisfaction at the expense of the public welfare, while Sanders represents the socialist ideal of government as our brothers’ keeper.  Rand’s objectivism sacrifices altruism in free enterprise for vulture capitalism, while socialism sacrifices individual freedom for an unrealistic altruistic political ideal.

            The U.S. is at a crossroads of religion and politics, with freedom and democracy at risk.  The evolution of U.S. democracy has resulted in an emphasis on individual rights and wants at the expense of providing for the common good.  Plato predicted as much, favoring a benevolent dictator over self-rule since the majority of people could not be expected to act in their own best interests; and Edmund Burke warned Americans that in a democracy we forge our own shackles.  Pogo affirmed them both, observing that we have met the enemy, and it is us.       

            Libertarians have long warned of the dangers of big government to freedom, but today neo-libertarians condemn big government and ignore the greater dangers to freedom represented by the big banks and businesses of Wall Street, whose insatiable appetites for cheap money are fed by the Federal Reserve.  Those capitalists who control the wealth and power of Wall Street are Rand objectivists, and government seems either unwilling or unable to stem their power.       

             

            A healthy democracy depends on a strong middle class, and in the U.S. the middle class has been exploited more by Wall Street and the easy money policies of the Federal Reserve than by big government.  But most conservative Americans have not seemed to notice and consider the welfare programs of big government the main enemy of the middle class, even though most of those welfare programs are Social Security and Medicare entitlements that benefit a shrinking middle class rather than the poor and needy.

            The Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) has made health care a government entitlement, and has come to illustrate the conflict between socialism and capitalism.  When campaigning for President, Obama promised to provide for cost controls for health care before making it a universal right, but that never happened.  As a result, vulture capitalism has corrupted public health care, as evidenced by astronomical increases in pharmaceuticals, demonstrating the need for cost controls in government entitlement programs.            

            To protect the U.S. middle class from further erosion, Americans must acknowledge that big business can be as much of a threat to the middle class as big government.  Both are part of the problem and both must be part of the solution, and that will require political initiatives that provide a viable balance between individual freedom, free enterprise and providing for the common good.  Neither Trump’s objectivism nor Sanders’ socialism can succeed in America, but something in between must be done to prevent further erosion of the middle class by the rich and powerful vulture capitalists—otherwise, individual rights and democracy will be at risk. 

            A healthy democracy requires balancing individual rights with providing for the common good, and that requires regulating the big banks and corporations of Wall Street that have been flourishing while the rest of the economy (Main Street) has been languishing.  The problem is not free enterprise but the unrestrained greed of vulture capitalism that limits competition rather than encouraging it, and the monetary policies of the Federal Reserve and the lack of regulation of the banking industry since the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999 that have favored the rich and powerful conglomerates of Wall Street over the smaller businesses of Main Street.

            A strong middle class must be sustained by a form of free enterprise free of the vulture capitalism that exploits the weak to benefit the rich and powerful.  That is an imperative of faith taught by Moses, Jesus and Muhammad that is summed up in the greatest commandment to love God and neighbor.  It is ironic that most neo-libertarians claim to be evangelical Christians but do not see how the love of money and power is inconsistent with the teachings of Jesus. 

            Our faith is in what we love most.  If we love God more than money then we must put the value of God’s love over the value of money, and that should be reflected in the priorities of our politics and our pocketbooks.  People who love God share God’s love with others, while people who love money exploit others to promote their selfish interests.  In politics the love of God requires that we find a middle ground between the extremes of Trump’s objectivism and Sander’s socialism, balancing our individual freedom with providing for the common good.

Notes and References to Resources:

Previous blogs on related topics are Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Wealth, Politics and Religion, March 8, 2015; The Power of Humility and the Arrogance of Power, March 22, 2015; Liberation from Economic Oppression, May 31, 2015; Balancing Individual Rights with Collective Responsibilities, August 9, 2015; and Religion, the Pope, and Politics in the Real World, September 27, 2015.

For commentary on Matthew 6:24, see Faith God and Money at pages 117-119 of the J&M Book; also Lesson #8, Riches and salvation (Mark 10:17-27) and Lesson #9, the Widow’s mite (Mark 12:41-44), at pages 45-50; and Treasures and the heart (Luke 12:33-34) at pages 235-238.   

On Why Bernie Sanders Can’t be President, see https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/10/12/why-bernie-sanders-isnt-going-to-be-president-in-5-words/?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_evening.

On the need to find a political middle ground between the extremes of Trump and Sanders, see https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-sanders-trump-magical-mystery-tour/2015/10/13/d9fdfc3e-71e9-11e5-8248-98e0f5a2e830_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_opinions.

On the need to reveal the huge gap between CEO pay (in big business) and worker pay, see http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2015/08/04/this-new-rule-could-reveal-the-huge-gap-between-ceo-pay-and-worker-pay/?wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1.

On an egregious example of vulture capitalism in the pharmaceutical industry, see http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/09/23/pharma-bro-martin-shkreli-and-the-very-american-debate-over-maximizing-profit/?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_evening.

On how the Glass-Steagall Act effectively regulated banks from 1933 to 1999, see http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/economic-intelligence/2012/08/27/repeal-of-glass-steagall-caused-the-financial-crisis.

On why the Federal Reserve and other central banks can no longer save the world with easy money, see http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/10/us-imf-cenbank-idUSKCN0S40VE20151010.

On Ayn Rand’s self-centered objectivism, see  https://www.aynrand.org/ideas/overview.

Seeking, Being and Doing on Our Journey of Faith

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            Our journey of faith is a search for God’s truth.  It is a search motivated by doubts—doubts as to the truth of religious doctrines and dogmas that should not be discouraged by the boundaries of orthodox religion.  Beyond those boundaries there are few guideposts for seekers other than experience and reason, but Jesus encouraged questions raised by doubt when he said: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened unto you.  For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.  (Matthew 7:7,8).

            This saying of Jesus is in the context of prayer, but it goes beyond prayer and contemplates a detachment from worldly concerns and limitations that can open our hearts and minds to a transforming spiritual power that Jews, Christians and Muslims refer to as God and that Buddhists refer to as nirvana.  For Christians, God has been equated with love. (1 John 4:16-21).  It is a mystical spiritual power of altruistic love taught and exemplified by Jesus that shapes our relationship with God and our spiritual being; and it has a moral dimension that shapes those standards of legitimacy that determine how we relate to each other—that is, our worldly doing.

            Just as our spiritual being motivates our doing, it can be said that, As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. (James 2:26)  The relationship between faith and deeds (or works) has long been the source of debate between Protestants like Martin Luther who have argued that God’s grace is the sole source of salvation, and that good works don’t count for much, and Catholic doctrines based on the passage from James that emphasize the importance of good works to salvation.  For Muslims the Qur’an provides that both good works and belief in the Qur’an as the perfect and immutable word of God are required for salvation.

            In a world of many religions, the exclusivist belief that God favors one religion and condemns all others is inconsistent with the concept of God’s reconciling love.  Evangelism that has its focus on converting those of other religions is not based on God’s reconciling love but on a sense of religious supremacy that promotes religious conflict.  Jesus taught that all who did the will of God were his brothers and sisters in the universal family of God.  He never taught that God favored one religion over others—not even his own.

 

            Jesus was a Jew who rejected the deontological concept that Mosaic Law was God’s standard of righteousness.  Jesus taught the primacy of love over law, a teleological principle summed up in the greatest commandment to love God and one’s neighbor as oneself.  It combined the mystical being (loving God) with the moral doing (loving one’s neighbor); and when asked, Who is my neighbor, Jesus told the story of the good Samaritan in which an apostate Samaritan stopped to help a wounded Jew.  It illustrated that loving our unbelieving neighbors is the test of true faith, negating exclusivist religious doctrines that condemn unbelievers.

  

            Those bound by exclusivist religious doctrines and dogmas cannot see the truth of God’s universal and reconciling love and how it can set them free from the bondage of sin and death.  Religion can be both good and evil.  Satan does a convincing imitation of God with some of his best acting in the synagogue, church and mosque.  How can we tell the difference?  God seeks to reconcile and redeem believers with forgiveness and love, while Satan seeks to divide and conquer them with fear and hate.  History has confirmed that religions have confused the forces of good and evil in the past, and current events illustrate that they continue to do so.

            To be or not to be, that is the question.  That was the question of a despondent Prince Hamlet as he contemplated death as a means to escape his complex dilemma.  It is also a question for us related to our spiritual being that not only motivates what we do in this life but anticipates what follows—of which Hamlet was uncertain.  Our being (how we relate to God) and doing (how we relate to each other) is shaped by an understanding of scripture and tradition that must be made relevant to our time and place by experience and reason, including advances in knowledge and politics such as democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law.    

            Our journey of faith seeks God’s truth, and that requires using our experience and reason to interpret scripture.  One of the passages used to support the exclusivity of Christianity is John 14:6, which has Jesus say, I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father but through me.  In the preamble to John’s Gospel (John 1:1-14) Jesus is presented as the Logos or word of God made flesh, not as God per se; and John’s Gospel goes on to emphasize the new command of God to Love one another. (John 13:24,35)  A reasonable interpretation of John 14:6 in context is that God’s word to love one another is the way, and the truth and the life.  That word requires following Jesus as the word of God but not worshiping Jesus as God. 

            That is just one example of how seekers whose beliefs are not constrained by exclusivist religious doctrines and dogmas can experience new revelations of God’s word on their journey of faith, and it applies to Muslims as well as Jews and Christians.  God is bigger than any religion, and God’s word is a living word that is not limited to those words in ancient holy books and its meaning is not restricted to the doctrines and dogmas of exclusivist religions.  Believers should be seekers who embrace experience, reason and advances in knowledge—including critical biblical scholarship—that challenge the exclusivist doctrines and dogmas of orthodox religion so that they can help transform the world with the reconciling power of God’s love.

Notes and References to Resources:

Previous blogs on related topics are: Religion and Reason, December 8, 2014; Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; Religion and New Beginnings: Salvation and Reconciliation into the Family of God, January 4, 2015; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the Heart of Legitimacy, January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? January 25, 2015; Promoting Religion through Evangelism: Bringing Light or Darkness? February 8, 2015; Is Religion Good or Evil?, February 15, 2015;  Jesus: A Prophet, God’s only Son, or the Logos? April 19, 2015; An Introduction to God is Not One, by Stephen Prothero, April 26, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015; What Is Truth?, August 30, 2015; Politics and Religious Polarization, September 20, 2015; and Faith and Religion, the Same but Different, October 4, 2015.         

Faith and Religion: The Same, but Different

   By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            The words faith and religion are often used interchangeably, but there is a real difference in the distinction.  Religion requires faith, but faith does not require religion.  Faith is what we believe to be sacred, and has been described as “…being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” (Hebrews 11:1)  Religion is an institutional and pre-packaged form of faith, complete with a holy handbook, doctrines that define orthodoxy (right belief), and immutable standards of legitimacy that define what is right and wrong.     

            Most believers begin their journey of faith with a traditional religion and at some point question their religious doctrines and dogmas based on advances in knowledge, reason and experience.  This transition from religion to faith can be illustrated by the four elements of the Wesleyan Quadrilateral: Scripture, tradition, experience and reason.  Orthodox religious beliefs are defined by doctrines and dogmas based on scripture and tradition.  Experience and reason can cause believers to question religious doctrines and dogmas and challenge the boundaries of orthodox beliefs.  That is typical in libertarian democracies where believers have the freedoms of religion and speech, but rare in Islamic cultures where those freedoms are restricted.  

            A believer’s journey of faith from orthodoxy to heterodoxy is only natural and should not be discouraged, but most religious leaders condemn those who question their orthodox doctrines and dogmas.  The result is that many nones (those who claim no religious preference) have left religion, but few have abandoned their faith.  The transition from religion to faith is a positive development in a globalized world of increasing religious pluralism since it lessens the likelihood of religious conflict.  Christians and Muslims who once sent missionaries to convert the heathens and infidels of other religions now struggle to live with each other as neighbors.    

           

            Christianity and Islam are exclusivist religions that encourage polarization and hostility, since each claims to be the one true faith.  Since the Reformation, the Christian religion has mutated from the original Catholic and Protestant division into a panoply of competing faiths or denominations, a trend aided and abetted by critical biblical scholarship and the freedoms of religion and speech.  This process has diffused the contentious nature of exclusivist religion in libertarian democracies of the West but not in the Islamic East, where sectarian religious conflict predominates and apostasy and blasphemy laws prohibit the freedoms of religion and speech. 

            Islamism is fundamentalist Islam, and Salafism and Wahhabism are two prevalent strains of Sunni Islamism.  ISIS, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram and al-Shabaab have promoted particularly radical and oppressive forms of Islamism to justify their terrorism, and they will continue to attract disaffected Muslims to their violent cause until Muslims define Islam in a way that denies radical Islamism its legitimacy.  That will require Islam to reject apostasy and blasphemy laws and embrace the libertarian principles of democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law. 

            The fragmentation of Protestant Christianity into numerous denominations that continue to be exclusivist in matters of salvation but libertarian in their politics illustrates that the freedoms of religion and speech can mitigate the hostility between exclusivist religions and minimize virulent religious conflicts like those now plaguing the Middle East and Africa.

            Until Islam has embraced the freedoms of religion and speech, it must find the common ground needed to minimize sectarian conflict; and Islamic scholars have already identified that common ground.  In 2007 they offered the greatest commandment to love God and one’s neighbor as oneself as a common word of faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims alike; but there is a question whether loving one’s neighbor—especially one’s unbelieving neighbor—is an accepted norm within Islam.  The enforcement of apostasy and blasphemy laws and sectarian conflict in Islamic nations since the Arab Spring of 2011 has indicated there is no tolerance—much less love—of one’s unbelieving neighbors within Islam.

            The rigid and exclusivist religious doctrines of Christianity and Islam encourage religious conflict and discourage the growth of individual faith.  Making a distinction between faith and religion is of my own doing, not that of Webster, who defines the terms as synonymous—as is my use of experience and reason as a means of transcending the limits of religion with faith.  My purpose is to illustrate how exclusivist religious doctrines based on scripture and tradition discourage the growth of faith based on experience and reason.  Advances in knowledge coupled with experience and reason will always challenge the boundaries of orthodox religion, and when enough believers move beyond those boundaries religious conflict is minimized.

            The world needs more faith and less religion.  The freedoms of religion and speech have enabled believers in libertarian democracies of the West to transcend the rigid constraints of orthodox religion, and believers in Islamic cultures can experience the same religious and political liberation once they eliminate apostasy and blasphemy laws and embrace the principles of democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law.  Those libertarian principles can bring diversity to Islam just as they did to Judaism and Christianity, and that would minimize sectarian religious conflict and debunk the legitimacy of radical Islamism.

Notes and References to Resources:

Previous blogs on related topics are: Religion and Reason, December 8, 2014; Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; Religion and New Beginnings: Salvation and Reconciliation into the Family of God, January 4, 2015; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the Heart of Legitimacy, January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? January 25, 2015; Promoting Religion through Evangelism: Bringing Light or Darkness? February 8, 2015; Jesus: A Prophet, God’s only Son, or the Logos? April 19, 2015; An Introduction to God is Not One, by Stephen Prothero, April 26, 2015;  A Fundamental Problem with Religion, May 3, 2015; Religion, Human Rights and National Security, May 10, 2015; The Future of Religion: In Decline and Growing, June 7, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015; and Politics and Religious Polarization, September 20, 2015. 

The four components of the Wesleyan Quadrilateral—scripture, tradition, experience and reason—are described in Our Theological Task in The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church, 2012 (The United Methodist Publishing House, Nashville Tennessee) at pages 78-91. See https://www.cokesbury.com/forms/DynamicContent.aspx?id=87&pageid=920.  It should be noted that reason includes critical biblical scholarship that relates to interpretations of scripture that are part of tradition, illustrating how the four components are interrelated.

On how nones have left religion without abandoning their faith and spirituality, see the interview of Kaya Oakes, author of The Nones are Alright, at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/kaya-oakes-the-nones-are-alright_560d8787e4b0af3706dff3b1.

Religion, The Pope, and Politics in the Real World

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr. 

            Pope Francis has put a new face on institutional Christianity.  He has been called a Pope for all seasons for his willingness to address controversial issues and consider changes in traditional Catholic doctrines, but he is also “old school.”  When asked about gay priests, he said, “Who am I to judge?”  But he called the rise of the LGBT community “a new sin against God.”  He has offered forgiveness for those who have had abortions and streamlined the annulment process for the divorced, but he has stood fast opposing birth control while telling Catholics they should not breed “like rabbits.”

            Pope Francis has condemned consumerism and the unrestrained greed of capitalism as the enemy of the poor, and issued an encyclical on climate change that he described as moral guidance rather than a resolution of scientific disputes.  Conservatives like George Will have criticized the Pope’s idealistic positions as “fact-free flamboyance,” but Fareed Zakaria has noted that any criticism of the message of Pope Francis is a criticism of the message of Christ.

            While emphasizing moral ideals, the Pope has also addressed politics in the real world.  When he met with Turkey’s Erdogan last year the Pope condemned the fundamentalism and fanaticism of ISIS and asserted that the freedoms of religion and speech should be a matter of faith as well as law, and repeated that theme in his address to Congress last week.  The Pope has also challenged the 21,000 Catholic parishes in Europe to each take in a refugee family.

            Pope Francis has exemplified the greatest commandment to love God and one’s neighbor as oneself.  Translated into real-world politics, that is not just an ideal but a moral imperative to put love over law and balance individual freedom with providing for the common good.  That means emphasizing the common good in libertarian democracies where individual rights have often obscured public obligations, and emphasizing individual rights in Islamic nations where apostasy and blasphemy laws preclude the fundamental freedoms of religion and speech.

            Religion and politics are interrelated forces in the real world that can help us or hurt us.  They can bring us together or polarize us.  When Jesus spoke of reconciliation and redemption in a universal family of God it was not based on belief in any religion, but on sharing the power of God’s reconciling love to overcome our fear and suspicion of others—especially those of other religions.  Islamic scholars have asserted that the greatest commandment to love God and neighbor is a common word of faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims alike.  But is it?

            Religious fundamentalism is an obstacle to religious reconciliation.  Its exclusivism creates fear and hate among religions, polarizing them in a world of increasing religious pluralism.  Religious fundamentalists—whether Jew, Christian or Muslim—believe that their holy scripture is the inerrant and infallible manifestation of God’s word and law, thus preventing them from supporting the supremacy of the U.S. Constitution and its secular rule of law.  Religious fundamentalists are a minority among Jews and Christians, but recent polls indicate that fundamentalists are a majority among Muslims—and that has political implications.

            Article VI of the U.S. Constitution provides, inter alia: The Constitution, and the laws of the United States…and all Treaties…shall be the supreme Law of the Land.  All officers of the U.S. and the several States shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation to support this Constitution, but no religious Test shall ever be required. 

            Kim Davis is a fundamentalist Christian and county clerk in Kentucky who went to jail for refusing to perform her duty to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples because it conflicted with her religious beliefs.  It would be the same for any fundamentalist Jew or Muslim who could not put loyalty to the U.S. Constitution ahead of submission to Mosaic Law for Jews or to the Qur’an and Islamic law, or shari’a, for Muslims.               

            The 1960 Presidential election provided an example of such questioned loyalty.  As a Catholic John F. Kennedy had to assure the American public that his ultimate loyalty was to the U.S. Constitution and not to the Pope, the Vatican or to cannon law.  Today any person of faith seeking public office—whether Jew, Christian or Muslim—would have to pass the same political loyalty test.  And it is hard to imagine any fundamentalist believer passing that test.

            Believers in the U.S. who are not public officials can resort to peaceful civil disobedience to assert the moral supremacy of their religious standards of legitimacy over those of secular law, but they must still acknowledge the supremacy of secular law over religious law.  That is a prerequisite for anyone holding public office in the U.S. and applies to Christian fundamentalists like Kim Davis as well as to Jewish and Muslim fundamentalists who cannot subordinate their religious laws to the supremacy of the U. S. Constitution and its secular rule of law.

            The visit of Pope Francis to the U.S. has come during a messy debate over religion, politics and law, and his emphasis on moral ideals underscored the need for religious standards of legitimacy to be voluntary moral standards rather than coercive laws—but moral standards that shape our politics and law.  The greatest commandment summarizes the moral imperative of Jews and Christians to love their neighbors as themselves—including their unbelieving neighbors.  If Muslims can join with Jews and Christians and truly embrace that moral principle, then the three great religions of the book can be reconciled and coexist with a lasting peace.

Notes and References to Resources:

Previous blogs on related topics are: Religion and Reason, December 8, 2014; Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; Religion and New Beginnings: Salvation and Reconciliation into the Family of God, January 4, 2015; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the Heart of Legitimacy, January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? January 25, 2015; Wealth, Politics, Religion and Economic Justice, March 8, 2015; A Fundamental Problem with Religion, May 3, 2015; Liberation from Economic Oppression, May 31, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015; Balancing Individual Rights with Collective Responsibilities, August 9, 2015; Accommodating Religious Freedom under the Rule of Secular Law, September 13, 2015; and Politics and Religious Polarization, September 20, 2015. 

On Pope Francis as a pope for all seasons, see http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/local/2015/09/14/a-pope-for-all-seasons/?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_evening.

On George Will’s criticism of the fact-free flamboyance of Pope Francis, see https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/pope-franciss-fact-free-flamboyance/2015/09/18/7d711750-5d6a-11e5-8e9e-dce8a2a2a679_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_headlines. 

On Fareed Zakaria noting that those who criticize the message of Pope Francis are criticizing the message of Christ, see https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-main-message-of-pope-francis-and-jesus/2015/09/24/997e1e54-62ea-11e5-b38e-06883aacba64_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_headlines.

On welcoming Pope Francis to the messy U.S. religious and political debate, see

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/21/politics/pope-francis-religion-united-states/. 

On the address of Pope Francis to Congress, see http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/25/us/pope-francis-congress-speech.html and https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/pope-francis-to-address-divided-congress-in-washington-on-thursday/2015/09/23/971b0a9e-6260-11e5-b38e-06883aacba64_story.html.

On Pope Francis condemning religious fundamentalism and promoting religious freedom, see

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/pope-francis-religious-fundamentalism.

 

Politics and Religious Polarization

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            At a town hall meeting last week Donald Trump was told by a supporter: “We have a problem in this country, it’s called Muslims” and that “We know our current President is one.  You know, he’s not even an American.”  He then asked Trump what he intended to do about Muslim “training camps” in the U.S.  Trump was criticized for not correcting the supporter, but he was voicing broadly held views that reflect increasing religious polarization in the U.S.

            Religious polarization is one of the objectives of the Islamic State, or ISIS, and the Republican Party in the U.S. and right-wing political parties in Europe like that of Hungary’s Viktor Orban are aiding and abetting ISIS in achieving that objective by fueling the fires of religious fear and hatred.  The best defense against Islamist terrorists like ISIS is to deny them legitimacy among Muslims, and that requires supporting moderate Muslims who are seeking to define Islam as a religion compatible with democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law.

            It is wrong to denigrate Islam as an inherently violent religion, and equally wrong to deny that ISIS is a militant and fundamentalist form of Islam.  ISIS is just as much a distorted form of Islam as the Christian Crusades and Inquisitions were distorted forms of Christianity.  The distorted Islamist doctrines of ISIS are based on fundamentalist Salafist and Wahhabist doctrines of Islam that are currently being debated within Islam.  The future of Islam as a religion of peace and justice depends upon moderates prevailing over fundamentalists in defining the nature of Islam in a way that denies legitimacy to radical Islamist doctrines like those of ISIS.

            Religion has been a major cause of hatred and violence and continues to be so today, and religion must play a major role in finding a lasting peace.  Both Christianity and Islam have exclusivist and fundamentalist forms that condemn unbelievers and seek to impose their standards of legitimacy on others.  Historically the institutional church has distorted the teachings of Jesus to create religious doctrines consistent with worldly power, and Islamism uses similar exclusivist and fundamentalist religious doctrines to achieve the same political objective.

            Today Christianity is the world’s largest religion.  Christians and Muslims make up over half of the world’s population, but by 2070 it is expected that Islam will supplant Christianity as the world’s largest religion.  The increasing political polarization of Christians and Muslims has been exacerbated by the refugee crisis which has greatly increased the chances for religious violence; but violence can be minimized if Christians are true to the teachings of Jesus and Muslims insist upon modern interpretations of the teachings of Muhammad in the Qur’an.

            In 2007 a distinguished group of Islamic scholars offered the greatest commandment to love God and one’s neighbors as oneself—even one’s unbelieving neighbors—as a common word of faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims alike.  The love for others requires providing the freedoms of religion and speech, and since apostasy and blasphemy laws continue to deny those fundamental freedoms in Islamic cultures there is some doubt whether loving one’s unbelieving neighbor is consistent with the Islamic faith.  And while many Christian leaders applauded a common word of faith, only a few have since taken steps to make the moral imperative to love our neighbors—even our Muslim neighbors—a central theme of the Christian religion.

            If Christianity and Islam put the moral imperative to love others, even unbelievers, at the heart of their religious doctrines, there would be much less religious polarization and resulting religious violence.  To that end Christians who follow the teachings of Jesus should lead the way.

  

            Jesus taught that God’s will is to reconcile and redeem all people in the universal family of God, but without favoring any one religion over others.  Satan’s will is to divide and conquer people of faith, and Satan does a convincing imitation of God, with some of his best acting in the synagogue, church and mosque.  Reconciliation and redemption take place when God’s love and mercy are shared with others, and Satan’s fear and hate oppose God’s reconciling love.  It should be obvious which religions are aligned with God and with Satan in the great cosmic battle for the hearts and minds of believers.

            Partisan politics in the U.S. invariably produce polarizing political and religious issues that are used to mobilize the constituencies of those seeking power.  The Republican Party includes Christian fundamentalists and others who favor traditional values, while Democrats include socialists, feminists, LGBT people and other minorities.  Republicans favor “boots on the ground” to assert U.S. power overseas, while Democrats favor restraint.  And in Islamic cultures those seeking political power play on similar exclusivist and polarizing themes.  In the quest for political power, polarization is the norm rather than the exception.  To avoid the exacerbation of religious violence, the politics of polarization must be replaced by a politics of reconciliation.

 

            Religions must lead the way to a politics of religious reconciliation.  Christians must bring their religion back to the teachings of Jesus, and Muslims must define Islam as a religion of peace and justice compatible with democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law in order to deny the legitimacy of radical Islamism.  Religious reconciliation must begin with a genuine affirmation of the greatest commandment as a common word of faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims.  If that happens, there will be far less danger of religious polarization and violence.  

Notes and References to Resources:

Previous blogs on related topics are: Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; Religion, Violence and Military Legitimacy, December 29, 2014; Religion and New Beginnings: Salvation and Reconciliation into the Family of God, January 4, 2015; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the Heart of Legitimacy, January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? January 25, 2015;  Promoting Religion through Evangelism: Bringing Light or Darkness, February 8, 2015; God and Country: Resolving Conflicting Concepts of Sovereignty, March 29, 2015; Faith as a Source of Morality and Law: The Heart of Legitimacy, April 12, 2015;  A Fundamental Problem with Religion, May 3, 2015;  Religion, Human Rights and National Security, May 10, 2015; The Future of Religion: In Decline and Growing, June 7, 2015;  Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015; How Religious Fundamentalism and Secularism Shape Politics and Human Rights, August 16, 2015; and The European Refugee Crisis and Radical Islam, September 6, 2015.

            

Donald Trump was criticized for not correcting a supporter who asserted that President Obama is a Muslim and not even an American.  Trump responded by saying that “The bigger issue is that Obama is waging war against Christians in this country.  Their religious liberty is at stake.”

See http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2015/09/17/trump-doesnt-correct-rally-attendee-who-says-obama-is-muslim-and-not-even-an-american/.

       

Michael Gerson has noted that Republican politics have taken a sharp turn toward religious polarization since 9/11.  See https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/republicans-fringe-tone-on-islam-shows-a-sharp-turn-since-911/2015/09/10/5a1d6d80-57d9-11e5-8bb1-b488d231bba2_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_opinions.

Accommodating Religious Freedom under the Secular Rule of Law

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

           The freedom of religion is first among our freedoms in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and it forbids government from making any law that prohibits the free exercise of religion.  But religion can itself encroach on our freedom, as evidenced by Kim Davis, a clerk in Rowan County, Kentucky, who refused to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples based on her religious beliefs.  When a federal judge ordered Davis to issue such marriage licenses and she refused, she was found in contempt of court and spent a short time in the county jail.

            There can be no freedom of religion without a secular rule of law to protect it, and the law is ineffective if religious beliefs give people a license to disobey the law.  There is a seeming exception made famous by Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., but their peaceful civil disobedience was not really an exception.  Both Rosa Parks and Dr. King went to jail when they purposely violated the law to protest separate but equal laws in the Jim Crow South.  As a result of their protests, the law was changed through normal democratic political processes. 

            Michael Gerson of The Washington Post has asserted that Kim Davis is no Rosa Parks; but in the unlikely event that Davis ignites a quiescent majority of Americans to make same-sex marriage unlawful, then she would be more like Rosa Parks than Gerson would like to admit.

            Private employers are required to provide reasonable accommodation for employees whose religious beliefs conflict with their job requirements, but Davis is a public official.  She requires a statutory accommodation like those provided in North Carolina and Utah that would allow other public officials to perform her duties when they conflict with her religious beliefs.

           

            While secular law can accommodate issues of religious belief that conflict with lawful duties, the issue can be avoided altogether if religious standards of legitimacy (what is right and wrong) are considered voluntary moral standards rather than obligatory laws.  When religious standards of legitimacy are enforced as law, as with apostasy and blasphemy laws, there can be no religious freedom.  Unfortunately Jewish, Christian and Muslim fundamentalists all consider the holy laws in their scriptures to be coercive laws rather than voluntary moral standards.

            Kim Davis is a Christian fundamentalist who believes that the Bible is God’s inerrant and infallible word and that it takes precedence over secular law, just as fundamentalist Muslims, or Islamists, believe that Islamic law, or shari’a, is God’s law and takes precedence over secular law and human rights, so that apostasy and blasphemy laws preclude any freedom of religion or speech.  In similar fashion, ultra-Orthodox Jews believe that it is God’s will that they rebuild their temple in Jerusalem on the ancient temple mount now occupied by a sacred mosque.  Such fundamentalist beliefs based on ancient scriptural mandates are not only a threat to democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law, but also to world peace.

            By way of contrast, progressive believers consider their sacred scriptures a source of truth for matters of faith and practice, but not as the perfect and immutable word of God that must be applied as a matter of law and policy today just as it was in ancient times.

            Jesus was a Jew who never refuted Mosaic Law, but unlike Moses, Jesus never taught that it was God’s perfect and immutable standard of law and righteousness.  Jesus taught the supremacy of love over law, and that the greatest commandment was to love God and our neighbors as ourselves.  And Islamic scholars have confirmed that the greatest commandment is a common word of faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims alike. 

            The teachings of Jesus and Muhammad on morality and law are at the heart of legitimacy.  Both men understood that true faith was based on voluntary acts of love and mercy rather than on obedience to religious laws.  The laws of Moses and Muhammad were suitable for their time and place, but not for ours.  In modern times, we are governed by the rule of secular law, not by God’s law; but believers can assert the moral supremacy of God’s law over secular law in democratic political processes and ultimately through peaceful civil disobedience, so long as they are willing to pay the price for violating the law. 

            Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. exercised their religious freedom and protested the immorality of racially discriminatory laws in the Jim Crow South, and those laws were changed.  They used peaceful civil disobedience to demonstrate the moral primacy of love over law and the interrelated roles of religion, legitimacy and the secular rule of law.  Kim Davis protested the morality of the law on same-sex marriage based on her beliefs.  While her protest was ultimately accommodated by the law, it is unlikely to change the law she protested.   

  

Notes and References to Resources:

Previous blogs on related topics are: Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the Heart of Legitimacy, January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? January 25, 2015; Love, Marriage and Homosexuality, February 1, 2015; Promoting Religion through Evangelism: Bringing Light or Darkness, February 8, 2015; God and Country: Resolving Conflicting Concepts of Sovereignty, March 29, 2015; Faith as a Source of Morality and Law: The Heart of Legitimacy, April 12, 2015;  A Fundamental Problem with Religion, May 3, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; and Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015; How Religious Fundamentalism and Secularism Shape Politics and Human Rights, August 16, 2015; and Legitimacy as a Context and Paradigm to Resolve Religious Conflict, August 23, 2015.  

On Michael Gerson’s commentary comparing Kim Davis to Rosa Parks, see https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/kim-davis-is-no-rosa-parks/2015/09/07/e821d528-533b-11e5-9812-92d5948a40f8_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_opinions.

Eugene Volokh’s has provided an overview of religious accommodation law at https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/09/04/when-does-your-religion-legally-excuse-you-from-doing-part-of-your-job/.  Geoffrey R. Stone has considered the impracticability of applying the Supreme Court’s incidental effects doctrine in Kim Davis’ case to the free exercise rights of the First amendment at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/geoffrey-r-stone/kim-davis-and-the-freedom_b_8101334.html.

The European Refugee Crisis and Radical Islam

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr. 

            The images are heart-rending and mind-boggling: A three-year old Syrian boy lying dead on a Turkish beach, a symbol of the refugee crisis that has European nations reeling; ancient and precious artifacts in Palmyra, Syria, being demolished; and religious authorities instructing ISIS terrorists to pray before and after raping their female hostages.  And the list it goes on, like pages from a Medieval horror story played out in real time.

            Is this God’s will according to Islam, a religion that is projected to supplant Christianity as the world’s largest religion by 2070?  It is according to the radical Islamists of ISIS, and a number of young Muslims from Europe and America are heeding their call, joining ISIS to create a new caliphate that promotes murder and mayhem in the name of God.  Radical Islam, or Islamism, is as much a part of Islam as the Crusades and Inquisitions were part of Christianity.

            We are now witnessing the horrific effects of radical Islamism.  They are caused by the imposition of a form of Islamic law, or shari’a, that denies the fundamental freedoms of religion and speech with apostasy and blasphemy laws and subjects women and non-Muslims to harsh discriminatory treatment.  Brutal punishments imposed under this archaic code of religious law have caused thousands of refugees to flee areas controlled by radical Islamists.

 

            There is a major disconnect here.  In 2007 a distinguished group of Islamic scholars offered the greatest commandment as a common word of faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims alike.  That common word of faith is that we must love God and love our neighbors as ourselves, including our unbelieving neighbors (see the story of the good Samaritan).  By way of contrast, the Islamist shari’a is entirely lacking in love for unbelieving neighbors. 

            Which is the true Islam?  That is a question that only Muslims can answer.  Islam is in transition and there is a window of opportunity for moderate and progressive Muslims to define their religion.  How can we help moderate Muslims make a common word of faith a reality? 

            In the real world, religion, politics and the rule of law are inextricably woven together, but distinctions must be made for there to be legitimate governance.  The freedoms of religion and speech require that governments do not favor or establish any religion.  The libertarian concepts of democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law are essential to progress and modernity, and while they are an integral part of legitimacy in the Western world they are absent and considered contrary to God’s will wherever radical Islamism is the dominant form of Islam.

            The root cause of the problem is an immutable and coercive shari’a, a problem that could be remedied if shari’a were interpreted to conform to the libertarian values of democracy, human rights and the secular rule of law.  The refugee crisis is a predictable result of radical Islamism, and the U.S. should assist with the resettlement of refugees.  One thing that the U.S. should not do is deploy combat forces or “boots on the ground” in Islamic cultures.  That would only exacerbate the problem by undermining the legitimacy of moderate Muslim reformers.  That is a lesson in legitimacy that we should have learned in Iraq and Afghanistan.

            Radical Islamism is not the only religious factor in the refugee crisis.  Viktor Orban, Prime Minister of Hungary, has warned Europe that Muslim asylum-seekers are threatening “Europe’s Christian roots.”  It is an echo of Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant ravings about undocumented Mexican immigrants in the U.S.  Germans, to their credit, are seeking to help the refugees in Europe.  It is clear that religion has been a big part of the problem, but equally clear that religion must be part of the solution.

            Saudi Arabia—a wealthy ally of the U.S.—has contributed to the problem but not to the solution.  It has long promoted a Wahhabist brand of radical Islamism that gave birth to both al-Qaeda and ISIS, yet Saudi Arabia is doing nothing to help those Muslim refugees displaced by radical Islamism.  Egypt is not as wealthy as Saudi Arabia, but as the bellwether of Sunni Islam it continues to deny the fundamental freedoms of religion and speech with an oppressive shari’a, lending legitimacy to radical Islamism.  And another U.S. ally, Pakistan, does the same.                      

             The indiscriminate bombing campaign of the Assad regime has killed many more Syrians than has ISIS, so the motivation of the refugees leaving Syria is not clear. The possibility that some refugees could sympathize with ISIS rather than oppose them is a complicating issue in the refugee crisis, but the number of Muslim refugees coming to Europe dwarfs the number of Muslims leaving Europe for ISIS.  All Muslims will determine the future of Islam, and Muslims in libertarian democracies have opposed radical Islamism.  Hopefully the influx of Muslims into Europe will help transform Islam with libertarian values and undermine the legitimacy of Islamist terrorist organizations like ISIS.   

            Xenophobic reactions in Europe to Muslim refugees could work in favor of the ISIS objective to polarize religions and instigate a holy war, but if the greatest commandment to love God and one’s neighbor is indeed a common word of faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims, then those people of the book will join together to alleviate the suffering caused by ISIS, and in so doing undermine the legitimacy of radical Islamism with God’s love.  That is God’s truth.         

             

Notes and References to Resources:           

Previous blogs on related topics are: Religion and Reason, December 8, 2014; Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; Religion, Violence and Military Legitimacy, December 29, 2014; Religion and New Beginnings: Salvation and Reconciliation into the Family of God, January 4, 2015; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the Heart of Legitimacy, January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? January 25, 2015; A Fundamental Problem with Religion, May 3, 2015; Religion, Human Rights and National Security, May 10, 2015; De Oppresso Liber: Where Religion and Politics Intersect, May 24, 2015; The Future of Religion: In Decline and Growing, June 7, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015; How Religious Fundamentalism and Secularism Shape Politics and Human Rights, August 16, 2015; Legitimacy as a Context and Paradigm to Resolve Religious Conflict, August 23, 2015; and What Is Truth? August 23, 2015.

Reference is made to the following commentary: David Brooks on Islamist authorization for rape, at http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/28/opinion/david-brooks-when-isis-rapists-win.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fdavid-brooks&action=click&contentCollection=opinion&region=stream&module=stream_unit&contentPlacement=2&pgtype=collection&_r=0; Michael Birnbaum and Griffe Witte on the European reaction to the refugee crisis, at https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/hungarys-leader-to-migrants-please-dont-come/2015/09/03/d5244c6d-53d8-4e82-b9d7-35ec41ca2944_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_headlinesl; Ishaan Tharoor on the reaction of Saudi Arabia and other Arab states to the refugee crisis, at https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/09/04/the-arab-worlds-wealthiest-nations-are-doing-next-to-nothing-for-syrias-refugees/?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_headlines; Thomas Friedman on Saudi Arabia’s support of radical Islam, at http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/02/opinion/thomas-friedman-our-radical-islamic-bff-saudi-arabia.html?emc=eta1&_r=0; the Editorial Board of the Washington Post on the refugee crisis, at  https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/europes-abdication/2015/09/03/319e2cb0-5265-11e5-9812-92d5948a40f8_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_headlines; Hugh Naylor on the Assad regime killing more Syrians than ISIS, at https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/islamic-state-has-killed-many-syrians-but-assads-forces-have-killed-even-more/2015/09/05/b8150d0c-4d85-11e5-80c2-106ea7fb80d4_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_headlines.