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 A ‘Third Way’ for Liberals and Conservative ChristiansPosted on Oct 9, 2007By E.J. Dionne WASHINGTON—You know the religious right is in trouble when some of its leaders threaten to bolt the Republican Party if it nominates a candidate who supports abortion rights. But the well-publicized warning directed against Rudy Giuliani earlier this month is decidedly not the most important sign that religious conservatives are facing the disintegration of their movement. What matters more is that a new generation of evangelical leaders, tired of the rancid partisanship, is breaking away from the culture wars. The reach of this new evangelical politics will be tested this week with the release on Wednesday of a statement under the very biblical title, “Come Let Us Reason Together.” The question for the future is how many in the evangelical ranks will embrace this call? Organized by Third Way, a group that is close to many leading moderate Democrats, the statement calls for “first steps toward bridging the cultural divide between progressives and evangelicals.” Third Way’s effort is not happy boilerplate about how religious Americans and liberals share a concern for helping the poor, protecting the environment and reaching out to the victims of AIDS—although these areas of agreement are important and too often overlooked. Rather, the statement, co-authored by Robert P. Jones, a progressive religious scholar, and Rachel Laser, director of The Third Way Culture Project, takes a step toward religious conservatives by acknowledging the legitimacy of many of their moral concerns. For example, while not backing away from Third Way’s support for stem cell research, the statement urges a series of restrictions to prevent the sale or manipulation of human embryos and reproductive cloning. “Americans have a deep faith in science, but also worry that scientific advances are outrunning our best moral thinking,” Jones and Laser declare. Worrying about ethical issues raised by science is not the same as being anti-science. The statement identifies other areas, including abortion, gay rights and strengthening families, where progressives and religious conservatives might continue to disagree but still make progress. One passage nicely summarizes the possibilities of a less polarized, post-Bush future: “The differences in how evangelicals and progressives see government’s role in affecting social change—one of changing hearts, the other building institutions—need not be in conflict.” Social improvement requires both. Now declarations and manifestoes come and go in our nation’s capital with the speed of the news cycle. What matters is whether they can catalyze action. Laser, who sets herself only a modest goal—“We want to end the culture wars,” she says firmly, but with a smile—knows this, which is why she worked to win support for the statement from evangelicals who can fairly be regarded as conservative. One of the most interesting is the Rev. Joel Hunter, senior pastor of Northland Church in Longwood, Fla. In 2006, Hunter was slated to become the head of the Christian Coalition. He wanted to broaden the group’s agenda to include questions such as the environment and poverty. That turned out to be a deal-breaker. “‘These are fine issues, but they’re not our issues,’” Hunter recalls being told. He says this without bitterness, and insisted in an interview that liberals and conservative evangelicals could work together where they agree without compromising their core principles. “We don’t all have to fit in a label,” he says. “God does not see the world in terms of liberals or conservatives.” A fine sentiment, but how can progressives and conservative evangelicals work together on issues such as abortion and gay rights? Here, Hunter gets very specific. “I am pro-life, and since I believe that what is in the womb is a baby, I would be excited if Roe v. Wade were overturned,” he says. “But that is not what I spend my time on. What if we could save babies who would be aborted ... if we gave help to low-income women who want to carry their babies to term? They really don’t have a choice. The old ways of encouraging the reduction of abortion, the strident ways, aren’t productive.” Hunter is opposed to gay marriage, yet he believes that “honoring human dignity and protecting committed relationships” requires recognition of “the basic human rights” of gay and lesbian couples. That doesn’t settle the gay marriage issue, but it would lead to a more—dare one use the word?—Christian approach to a matter that has bred so much anger. I’m not sure Laser will get her wish about ending the culture wars. But Americans are so tired of being on a political and cultural road to nowhere that her hope seems almost realistic. E.J. Dionne’s e-mail address is postchat(at)aol.com. © 2007, Washington Post Writers Group Previous item: Here We Go Again Next item: Time Is Running Out for Brother and Sister Elsewhere: . CommentsAre you a Truthdig member yet? Login now, or register with Truthdig.
By rage, October 15, 2007 at 4:33 pm # America is never going to bother the religious right about their being supersaved and rapture ready. In fair reciprocation, the America from whom the supersaved wish to be piously separated should not be overbearingly subjected to their dogmatic traditions and dictates. American law mandates a separation of church and state. The Christian Bible mandates an exclusion of the sanctified from the secularly profane. Consequently, evangelical’s letting their light so shine that men may see His glory is never going to be realized as the result of their hostile subjugation of American civil law to their ludicrous scripture-twisted contortions of Jesus’ teachings and will for the Nation. America is either going to acknowledge and adhere faithfully to the tenets mandating the full separation of church and state established in The Constitution and The Bill of Rights, or cave to the religious coersion of the evangelical sect of Christendom in America, whose schismatic legitimacy many longer established orders of Christian faith (e.g. Catholics, Protestants, Anglicans, etc.) either question or fully renounce as anathema. Continued pacification of these Falwellian voters through any extention of offered civil gestures to incorporate their recalcitrant tyranical untuousness into mainstream society unfairly infringes on the rights and religious liberties of the true majority of Americans who just as adamantly wish to freely and liberally elevate other respective standards of dogma and canon. Thus, if Dr. Dobson and his horde of miffed Pharisees wish to renounce the political right because of the dress-wearing, serial adultrous antics of Dame Edna Guiliani, let them move on. Let these selfrighteous zealots finally see themselves politically for who they really are - a bunch of bigoted, covetous, narrowminded, deluded, puritanical, hypocritical, out-of-touch, cynical, misinformed isolationists who statistically aren’t as culturally prominent in American society as they esteem themselves to be. Scandals like Ted Haggard and Richard Roberts have critically weakened evangelical credibility, making a Dobson endorsement a lot less valuable now than when Turdblossom Rove used megachurch members to win the White House in 2004 when Bush only narrowly cheated his way back to a 2nd term. By 2006, when the Democrats took both the Senate and the Congress, with a lot of red states turning blue or a cool shade of purple, it was obvious time, chance, and circumstance had diluted the evangelical voting strength.
By Dr Richard Blackmoor, October 10, 2007 at 10:15 am # Superstition is incompatible with reason.Reason meaning empirical,scientific evidence gathering.
By Chuckwagonchuckie, October 10, 2007 at 4:26 am # It is interesting to listen to the Democrats/Progressives/Liberals harp over the Neocons and Religious Right caving in on the culture wars. No one wants to point out this group is the Neomarxist of today, They have taken Marx and marketed his views as the future utopia. Our two party system has slid down the slope of the Marxist agenda hook line and sinker.
By thomas billis, October 9, 2007 at 8:44 am # Yes EJ there is a third way the religious right fades into the oblivion where they have lived since the days of Father Coughlin and the rest of us get on with the job of fixing the mess their golden boy George Bush has gotten us into.This is not a liberal conservative issue.This is insanity vs sanity.Before the moral majority we did not always agree but we were not at each others throats.Karl Rove pushed that hatred and turned it into a campaign.To show you that it is worse now than ever:When George Romney ran for President there was not any prejudice toward a Mormon running for President as it should be.Well take a look at the talk with his son Mitt Romney running.Stark isn’t it?Who manufactured this great leap backward?
By Debbie French, October 9, 2007 at 4:11 am # I am a mother who is personally pro-life personally, but pro-choice in general. No body has the right to tell someone else what they should do with their life! Nobody has the right to judge anyone’s descions. PERIOD Add Your Comment |
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Newsroom Carnage Continues at The Washington Post
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