The days when evangelicals were like the "all for one and one for all" Musketeers clearly is over. Dr. James Dobson's recent attack on Barack Obama has stirred up several of his conservative colleagues, most notably Dr. Kirbyjon Caldwell, a Methodist pastor of a 15,000-member church in Houston. (That's him hugging President Bush in the photo at right, with Dick Cheney in the background.) Despite his close ties with the Bush conservatives, Caldwell does not want to be lumped in with the Dobsonites. (Caldwell was most recently in the news when he performed the wedding for President Bush's daughter, Jenna, at their Crawford Ranch.)
Caldwell and some other colleagues who part company with Dobson politically have revved up a new Web site called jamesdobsondoesntspeakforme.com. The Web site addresses Dobson's distortions on Obama's statements, point by point. What do you think?
Caldwell is a powerful speaker, and I sure wouldn't want to square off with him. I was at a conference on church leadership a few years ago at the Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, and he gave an amazing address, speaking nonstop for 45 minutes, without a single visible note. Perhaps he had something scribbled on his shirt cuffs, but I sure didn't see anything.
I'm sure this won't be the last of the dustups. Seems religion is going to be a major issue in this election, though I confess I'm far more worried about the candidates' work on health care, defense, the economy and energy than their personal spiritual lives. It seems to me that both John McCain and Barack Obama are men of faith who've been through a lot in their lives, and my focus will be on judging them for their leadership capabilities. My pastor does a fine job, thank you very much, and I'm not leaning on the president to be my minister. I do want him, however, to be an expert on politics and public policy. That's a big enough job for one man.
I think Dobson is getting a bit desperate, as he feels his power slipping away. As you noted, the evangelicals are no longer a monolithic political movement. Dobson has exercised extraordinary influence over the last 8 years, even vetting potential Supreme Court nominees. It looks like he will say anything to try to keep Obama from winning the White House, and ending Dobson's influence over national policy.
With the anti-gay initiative behind in the polls in California, and Obama leading McCain in the national polls, these must be gloomy times in Colorado Springs.
Mike: You might be right. My friend, Kim Leslie, another Methodist pastor, just passed on this item posted on beliefnet. The author says there is a generational change happening not just in politics, but also in religion. The Old Guard, represented by Dobson, is perhaps being gently put in its place by the younger generation.
"Older Religious Right leaders are now being passed by a new generation of young evangelicals who believe that poverty, "creation care" of the environment, human trafficking, human rights, pandemic diseases such as HIV/AIDS, and the fundamental issues of war and peace are also "religious" and "moral" issues and now a part of a much wider and deeper agenda. That new evangelical agenda is a deep threat to Dobson and the power wielded by the Religious Right for so long. It puts many evangelical votes in play this election year, especially among a new generation who are no longer captive to the Religious Right. Perhaps that is the real reason for Dobson's attack on Barack Obama."
Read more of Jim Wallis' essay by going here: http://blog.beliefnet.com/godspolitics/2008/06/dobson-and-obama-who-is-delibe.html
Let’s all remember that James Dobson doesn’t have to answer to the drive-by media, a denomination, a party, or even the lib’s political correctness. Final accountability exists on a much higher level. I’m not even sure that he cares what the liberal non-believing, latte-swilling, Birkenstock-wearing, pot-smoking, eco-wacko, riffraff are saying.
BTW, Dobson does speak for most evangelicals. If that scares some libs, good! There are a lot of us out their who are refusing to roll-over and follow the anti-American policies of liberalism. Sorry, about that comrades!
BTW, Jim Wallis, Tony Campolo and their ilk swing to the left in political and theological matters. No serious student of religion or theology considers them evangelicals.
FYI: The Barna Group - pollster to the evangelical community defines an evangelical as : "'Evangelicals' meet the born again criteria plus seven other conditions. Those include saying their faith is very important in their life today; believing they have a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs about Christ with non-Christians; believing that Satan exists; believing that eternal salvation is possible only through grace, not works; believing that Jesus Christ lived a sinless life on earth; asserting that the Bible is accurate in all that it teaches; and describing God as the all-knowing, all-powerful, perfect deity who created the universe and still rules it today."
http://www.barna.org/FlexPage.aspx?Page=Topic&TopicID=17
And I am singing: "...be faithful and have charity, that's the way to live successfully. How do I know? The Bible tells me so...."
I have always thought that Rev. Caldwell is more in tune with the teachings of Jesus and the Dobsons, Falwells and Robertsons of this world teach who to hate and why.
Referring to the 6/26/08 post by T.C. Morgan: I am increasingly dismayed by the lack of civil discourse in our society. If T.C. Morgan is an evangelical, one can assume he/she purports to be a Christian. I fail to understand how evangelicals who use the the school-yard tactic of name calling as in "liberal, non-believing, latte-swilling,Birkenstock-wearing, pot-smoking,eco-wacko riff-raff" reconcile the use of that tactic with their commandment to share the 'Good News'of Christ. It is generally accepted that most such people resort to name-calling because they lack the necessary goodwill and factual resources to present their beliefs in a cogent manner. The result of their diatribe is that the people they are addressing recoil from, and reject, the views of someone who is filled with such great disdain for others yet claims to be a disciple of a loving God. Most people would never stoop to caddressing that name-calling evangelical as a 'religion Nazi'. BTW,I have known liberal, latte-swilling, Birkenstock- wearing people who live by the Word and share their great joy in that Word to enrich the lives of their fellow man. How could you possibly "love thy neighbor" and vilify him/her at the same time?
Only in America does this type of discussion carry any kind of currency. Evangelism and personal relationship with God types have taken over and brainwashed so many that we are rapidly becoming an oligarchical state. Just as the Ayatollahs run Iran, the high priests of Christian evangelism have wormed their way into the government of this country and now have a strangle hold on it. No atheist could possibly be elected to office in this country. Why is that?
The constant whining of the Christians that God has been taken out of the schools, out of government, etc. etc. is so disingenuous. In fact it is just the opposite.
But my whole point before I got so wound up was that this country continues to be obsessed with the silliness of religion at such a level that we are starting to appear more like a two bit nation along the lines of Iran and Iraq instead of a world power and an exemplar of a free country.That is what Christianity has done for America.
Occasionally, my moribund believe in the goodness and/or sanity of homo sapiens,(especially the American Christian fanatic sub- species) gets a palliating shot in the arm by the words and philosophy of people like "Dave"; "R.Wheeler";"Scot" of this Blog et. al.
tsk tsk they,now, too will have to join the evangelically dammed.
Hades! Here we come!
Cerberus! Make room for us, the legions of the
"...liberal, latte-swilling, Birkenstock-wearing, pot-smoking, eco-
whacko riff-raff..."
Now levity aside. American liberty as in "We the People" is indeed being threatened
by the Christian Right. "Dave" in his post already had pointed out the inherent dangers of Oligarchy. Especially when the power is in the hands of the clerics.
People should have learned that lesson from the history of the Middle Ages in Europe,and the Puritans in America. I saw a print in an American textbook; Puritans whipping Quakers along the streets of Boston. (Bettman Archive; Library of Congress.)
Governor Schwarzenegger's native country became a democratic republic
on Nov 12, 1918. It took less than 10 years for the Christian Social Party
(Christian Right) to size power. The blue collar workforce demonstrated
against the Banking Industry and Heavy Industry's measures to reduce wages, increase working hours and nullification of the social contract the
republic maintained with the people. The head of State, a prelate of the
Catholic church ordered the police to shoot into the people and 90 of them
were killed on that fateful day of July 15, 1927. May 14, 1933 the country found its dictator, dissolving parliament and suspending the constitution.
To oversimplify, it became a Catholic dictatorship, thus setting the stage
for the takeover by Hitler on April 20, 1938. There was no armed resistance
because the people really did not care that a Nazi dictatorship replaced
the cleric driven dictatorship.
Not for a moment must we underestimate the determination of the Christian Right to make this a "Christian Nation" of their own design.
R Wheeler:
"The insistence on civility in the form of our debates has the perverse effect of cannibalizing our principles, the very essence of a civil society.......By yielding to a FALSE FORM OF 'CIVILITY,' we sometimes allow our critics to intimidate us....Active citizens are often subjected to truly vile attacks; they are branded as mean-spirited, ..... racist, homophobic, sexist, etc. To this we often respond (if not succumb), so as not to be constantly fighting, by trying to be tolerant and non judgmental - i.e., we censor ourselves. This is not civility. It is cowardice, or well-intentioned self-deception at best......Today, as in the past, we will need a brave 'civic virtue,' not a timid civility, to keep our republic." Hon. Clarence Thomas in a speech, 2/13/2001.
Mr. Morgan, you may have your precious values that command death to women who are not virgins when they marry, and an angry God who whips his forces into shape with fear and intimidation. I'll defend your right to be a believer in the unbelievable, but I'll fight like hell to keep you and your ilk from taking over my secular government and forcing your irrational beliefs down my throat.
"...death to women who are not virgins when they marry..." ("Dave" June 30) would be one surefire way to stem the tide of overpopulation. Ergo: Stop development in its tracks and conserve our precious farmland, conserve water and so many other blessings espoused by the eco-whackos.
But with today's mostly un-virgin womanhood beginning in Junior High,the nation would have to turn gay. Is that not a free pass to hell as well?
Those religious diatribes signed T.C. Morgan, are laid on so thick, that
I believe we are being put on. Nobody, outside a TV script can be that fanatic
and/or weird.
Ms. Lawson:
Well, now that you mention it...
TC
Thank you for quoting “Long Dong Silver.” It confirms Ms. Lawson’s remarks.