Searching for a political home
A long time ago on this blog we discussed the sociology of belief surrounding politics and religion, or more concretely, why it is that so many religious and political beliefs seem to come as a “package deal” (when a person believes x they also tend to believe y, even when there is no necessary logical connection between to the two).
This is something I’ve had to revisit in different ways over the past few years, and I’ve decided that I think the motivation behind the “package deal” mentality is ultimately rational, and probably based on the social nature of human beings: we have to trust people to function, and that includes trusting others in belief formation. At the same time, beliefs formed in this way ought to be held as corrigible if they are only held for that reason: if an individual in such a group comes up against a good argument against the social consensus of that group, then that individual is obligated to look into the issue more directly.
And this brings me closer to my point: I’m not sure where I fit on the contemporary political spectrum. I have a few political issues I’ve made my own through studying them fairly thoroughly (just war theory, abortion, gay marriage), and my opinions would tend to lead me, socially speaking, to support the Conservatives (or, if I were American, the Republicans). But, at the same time, I have seen enough intelligent criticism of the right wing on matters of geopolitics and economics that I find it fairly difficult, cognitively speaking, to just trust the right wing because I agree with them on other matters.
What do I do?
Start studying anarchism.
Hmm… already did that
Try again.
Do your best to determine the truth and stick with it wherever it may lead.
In the US, many Christians were once Democrats, although at the time they weren’t what you would call “liberal” or “progressive”. What happened is that the Democratic Party became coopted by ostensible socialists patterned after the Nazis, both influenced by European existentialism. Of course they couldn’t be overt about it, but they are masters of propaganda. This is why McCarthy’s actions backfired, but this is also why McCarthy did what he did. He saw the infiltration of the US government by people bend on replacing the republican government with a modern oligarchy under the guise of socialism. The platform of caring for the poor and needy has been necessary to retain the votes of the poor and needy. Of course, they need to keep them poor and needy or they stand to lose their vote – and they need to keep a sizable population of poor and needy who believe that capitalism is the culprit rather than the solution. Largely, it’s worked.
Most US Christians who are orthodox in their theology are so because they tend to desire truth above other desires. This desire also allows them to see the truth of the activities of political liberalism as well as it’s connection to theological liberalism and they oppose it. The Southeast US, known as the Bible Belt, started migrating from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party after McCarthy when the sexual revolution hit and they saw the result of liberal politicians confounding the hotter elements of Cold War efforts in Korea and Vietnam resulting the needless deaths of soldiers. Even more switched when the economy tanked under Carter and Reagan clarified the good conservative position.
Today, we’re not particularly pleased with the Republican Party as they are being infiltrated themselves with the same types that took over the Democrats and the Democrats have gone off the deep end openly opposing clear elements of the US Constitution. So we ascertain that we are no longer adequately represented in the US government. The time appears to be coming when there will be no true representation of anyone (leaving only an effective oligarchy that merely appears to be a representative government) and half of the US population has been blinded against the truth of this.
So there actually is a logical connection between conservative Christians and the conservative political ideology in the US, although it may not be apparent to outsiders. What to we do? Keep speaking the hard truth in love and vote according to our conscience. Of course it’s not portrayed that way in the media. That’s part of the propaganda.
The “Bible Belt” started to migrate to the Republican party because of Nixon’s “southern strategy” in other words they were a target market and the GOP snapped them up. At the same time the evangelical community in the US was courted by political forces and has become politicized itself in ways that it never had been before, the damage is evident, I’ll defer to the Internet Monk here since he sees this up close:
(Emphasis added.) The entire post is here: http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/why-electing-palin-or-huckabee-makes-more-sense-to-you-than-reforming-your-church
“But, at the same time, I have seen enough intelligent criticism of the right wing on matters of geopolitics and economics that I find it fairly difficult, cognitively speaking, to just trust the right wing because I agree with them on other matters.”
Why would a person simply agree with a political agenda on all matters? The question is determining what are the biblical principles of a just society and political system, and which of the major political parties has the best chance of putting into practice those principles.
Historically, I am a Republican, I am the at least the fourth generation Republican. My ancestors voted for Abraham Lincoln and risked their lives to end slavery. That being said, I am more a conservative than a Republican. I believe that Bible actually supports the principles of conservatism better than the principles of liberalism (or as they like to call themselves now, progressives), at least the working definitions of those terms in a North American context: this applies both to economics and geopolitics. However, I am quite sure that I would be a liberal if living in Saudi Arabia where conservatism means the exploitation of woman through the Sharia.
So I think the solution is to determine through dialogue, what the Bible says about things like war, governance, taxes, and redistribution of wealth. That should help Christians to determine which of the political parties, if any, are best suited, at least in the context of the Western world.
My family’s wealth has come through risk and hard work; it has not been inherited, and it has not been achieved through the exploitation of the poor: no indeed, we have rather employed and given livable wages to dozens. We were not two generations ago just poor farmers (1 generation ago on my wife’s side). But the freedom and justice in America and Canada has made it possible for us to thrive so that none of us in my generation (either in my wife’s family or mine) are in poverty, despite the poverty of previous generations. So I am a big believer in freedom; and I hate big government and high taxes, especially when it is wasted and/or used to buy votes but ultimately to keep poor people in their poverty. But God doesn’t want people in poverty; but it takes a synergism for them to escape it. Big government synergism creates increasing dependence and entitlement, but does not ultimately help people to escape cycles of poverty. So, as I have already expressed elsewhere, I think that redistribution of wealth is not biblical and it is a violation of the 8th commandment and it feeds on encouraging a violation of the 10th commandment (i.e., class envy).
Greed, err, the maximization of corporate profits is the engine of free market capitalism. I didn’t have to read Marx to get that, Milton Friedman said so himself. I do not see the outworking of unrestricted free markets leading to people not violating the 10th Commandment. I think about the corporate climbers trying to “get ahead” in the “rat race” and don’t really think of people who are free from envy. I see that kind of envy operating much more than I do any sort of envy when it comes to divvying up government revenue.
Whatever the sins of the corporate climbers may be, that is besides the point. Their sins cannot be denied, and it is in many cases found to be systemic and universal. I am not for “unrestricted free markets” but free markets which are regulated to unsure fairness. Yet there is no biblical basis for using force to remove money from one person to give it to another. Class envy is used to get people to vote for socialism, so that the violation of the biblical command not to steal is done in a perfectly legal and democratic manner. How many times have I heard the mantra, “tax cuts for the rich”. Well of course the rich benefit from tax cuts. They pay most of income taxes in the US. At least here in Canada lower wage earners still have to pay some tax. But my point is that the money belongs to whoever earns it. It is not “giving” them tax cuts; it is deciding not to take from them what is theirs. Therefore to appeal to the masses by saying “tax cuts for the rich” so as to get them to vote socialist is to stir up class envy.
As someone who is unpersuaded at this point, PW Dunn, how would you interpret this:
Deut 14:28 “At the end of every three years you shall bring out all the tithe of your produce in the same year and lay it up within your towns. 29 And the Levite, because he has no portion or inheritance with you, and the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, who are within your towns, shall come and eat and be filled, that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands that you do.
Seems like some sort of state redistribution to me. Also, the gleaning laws that forced producers to give (or leave) some of their produce to the poor for nothing. Thoughts?
Levying taxes (or even forcing people to do labour) is not seen as stealing in any Biblical passage with which I’m familiar. If the state has the power over your very life, then surely your chequebook is no big deal.
As far as marketing “socialism” I want to say this: the reality is that envy is used to market everything from cars to paper towels to politics – and that includes conservative politics.
Andrew: The tithe is a voluntary acknowledgment of the God’s gift, produce of the land. Part of it was to support the priests and levites and to support celebrations in the presence of the Lord; thus it was to support the religious not the political system. The tithe is not on wages, mineral wealth, or commerce, but solely upon the produce of the land which the Bible says comes directly from the bounty of God. Part of the tithe was designated for the genuinely poor orphans and widows.
In addition, because crops are from God, the Bible says that Israelites must allow gleaners to come; he provided a welfare system that does not include taking by force from earners and giving it to people who don’t work. Indeed, the gleaners, such as Ruth, had to work hard in the field. A person who allowed gleaners, like Boaz, was acknowledged by the community to be righteous.
Today, I would argue that agricultural wealth is still a gift from God and therefore we squander it by using it, e.g., in our cars (ethanol), or when we dump it into the sea.
I am not against voluntary redistribution of wealth. I practice that. I am against redistribution through force of law and the threat of violence.
Dan: You are describing slavery and tyranny as far as I can see. But when it comes to the Bible, taxes are generally viewed as exploitative and evil, and tax collectors as sinners. Jesus, in order to avoid a rebellion against Rome found an answer to show that it was nevertheless “legal” to pay taxes to Caesar. The Bible views kings with suspicion because of the taxes that they will levy and 1 Sam 8, e.g., warns the Israelites that they do not want a king for this reason. Taxes levied by foreign powers are seen as a curse.
But being a free person with no king, why would I accept voluntarily a government that takes up to 50% of our wealth (here in Canada). We’ve had this discussion before.
I don’t know if you are following the pension crisis as described in the Globe and Mail. I can’t help but feel that all those people out there would be much better off if (1) they could have kept more of their earnings; (2) they knew they had to save for their retirement themselves and couldn’t depend on a company pension, CPP, or OAP; (3) if the government had maintained a stable currency so that they wouldn’t have to worry about inflation — which has led the masses to put their hard-earned money in risky investments. I am a fiscal conservative, and so I abhor inflation.
PW:
Okay on the “voluntary” redistribution, but both those laws are laws… producers could not “opt out” of allowing poor people to glean, and so in that sense it was very much not voluntary.
Further, I’d note that in the tithe-law case, this specific tithe was given to the civil rulers (elders at the gate) to distribute, and so in an anachronistic sense would be a civil, not an ecclesial, tax.
Also, 1 Sam 8 sees as a problem a king taking equal or more than God takes: 10%.
Actually Malachi 3.6 f. would suggest that producers opted of the tithe all of the time. The law of the tithe may have been enforced through social pressure but this would have been mild compared to the penalties for not paying taxes in Western nations. It was up to God to enforce this aspect of the law because He was the wronged party. Much of the law, in fact, was not enforced during the OT. Consider, e.g., the revival of Josiah, and how much of the Torah was not being enforced.
I’d be in favor of a law of gleaning in Canada. To me that would be better than the current forms of wealth redistribution. It would probably lead to a warmer climate and better harvests too.
OK. Interesting thoughts.
Another relevant example occurred to me: Joseph. You are correct in one way that Joseph’s solution to the famine explicitly is to put the nation in slavery to the Pharaoh, but on the other hand all of that is regarded as Joseph saving these people, and in the context of Genesis as a whole is obviously intended as a fulfillment of Abraham’s calling to be a blessing to the nations. Slavery (in the biblical sense, since I don’t want to be confused with supporting American southern slavery) in the Bible is not always treated as pure evil; in fact, in many ways it functioned as a workfare system like the gleaning laws.
As for the gleaning laws: are you saying these should be treated as mandatory by the state, or that they are voluntary too? (in terms of how you would like to see them applied in modern Canada)
I think it would fair to say the Bible and its laws would prefer enslavement rather than death by starvation; it does not share the American “give me liberty or give me death” ethic.
Well obviously most Americans today put up with a lot more slavery than what Patrick Henry would have. I am however very sympathetic with that expression, and I mistrust big government, because (1) it does not care for people better than they can care for themselves, robbing them of their ability to care for themselves and placing them into a dehumanizing dependence; (2) because anti-Christian agendas such as euthanasia and abortion can too easily be promoted through government; (3) because government social programs usurp the authority of local communities, churches and families, putting the wealth and power in the control of government bureaucrats; (4) governments are the biggest threat to freedom, and therefore much more often the problem not the solution to our human problems.
I’d be happy if federal governments in the US and Canada stuck with two mandates: (1) providing security from external and internal threats; (2) nuturing interstate or interprovincial commerce and fair trade between nations. The fact that federal governments have determined that they must usurp every area of our walking lives through education, healthcare, social security, has led to a government bubble which is very much in jeopardy of bursting and leading to widespread misery and instability. It means also that governments have weakened their ability to provide security and justice as well. Neil Postman mentions this in one of his books (I think, Teaching as a conservative activity): every time governments expand their mandate they not only usurp rights of other social institutions but they weaken their own ability to fulfill their own responsibilities.
I’m sympathetic with your fear of creeping totalitarianism, but frankly I think a “bigger” government is unavoidable in a largely non-Christian society. If the church was doing its job, and if the society was either Christian or listening to the church, the state could rightly be chastised for taking too much power. But we don’t live in a responsible society now, for whatever historical reason. I’m not sure its worth letting poor people die from poverty to prove a point about statism.