About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Events occurring and how they relate/affect Anabaptist faith and culture.
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Jazman
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by Jazman »

I've been perplexed by the About face! as well, but I'm wondering if it didn't exist in a kind of hibernation long before trump came along...? There's lot's of talk/writing about his pied-piper abilities and I agree with that, but is there some deeper, even theological foundations in american evangelicalism that make us particularly susceptible to About facing! like this? (and remember, this isn't the first time... it's been noted that love-for-Reagan instigated (or revealed) other About faces!)
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Wayne in Maine
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by Wayne in Maine »

In the end isn't the support of Trump by American Evangelicals just an expression of Luther's Two Kingdom doctrine? Whether they would see it that way or not, Evangelical Trump supporters voted for the person whom they thought would provide the best governance of their nation-state and who would serve their own needs and wants (which are not always bad) in their country. Quite frankly, Christians who voted for Hillary or Stein or Johnson are no different, even if they assert that they voted for the candidate that would institute policies that are "more Christian" or assert that their candidate was morally superior (or however they would phrase it).

It is very common in any case to ignore the moral failings of our "heroes", whether we lean left or right in our political, social and religious inclinations. Dozens of examples could be cited from Gandhi to Ronald Reagan. Those pointing a finger at the American Evangelical Right should note that there are three finger pointing back at themselves.
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Bootstrap
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by Bootstrap »

Wayne in Maine wrote:It is very common in any case to ignore the moral failings of our "heroes", whether we lean left or right in our political, social and religious inclinations. Dozens of examples could be cited from Gandhi to Ronald Reagan. Those pointing a finger at the American Evangelical Right should note that there are three finger pointing back at themselves.
That's why I don't anoint political figures as heroes, join political parties, or donate to them. I was once part of the American Evangelical political movement, ran for precinct delegate as a Republican, lobbied for Right to Life, and was very involved politically. And yes, those three fingers are pointing back at me, we all have to consider any political involvement, or even getting involved in the political debates on MN, and I wrestle with what is right there. This thread is about us, not about them. And yes, self-examination is important.

I'm probably less of a hero worshipper than some. The political figures are rarely saviors or demons who will save or doom our country. We've survived every presidential election so far, some presidents have been a lot better for us than others, none has been all powerful or all wise.
Wayne in Maine wrote:In the end isn't the support of Trump by American Evangelicals just an expression of Luther's Two Kingdom doctrine?
To me, that's really a different topic. There were no great choices in this election, I can imagine some people deciding Trump was the better choice. That's different from condoning or excusing blatant immorality. You can vote for someone and still see their flaws - and still have real concerns about what they might do in some domains. And let's face it, there are some people who do not vote, but still sign up for this kind of hero worship and blind partisanship.
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Bootstrap
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by Bootstrap »

Jazman wrote:I've been perplexed by the About face! as well, but I'm wondering if it didn't exist in a kind of hibernation long before trump came along...? There's lot's of talk/writing about his pied-piper abilities and I agree with that, but is there some deeper, even theological foundations in american evangelicalism that make us particularly susceptible to About facing! like this? (and remember, this isn't the first time... it's been noted that love-for-Reagan instigated (or revealed) other About faces!)
I think some of this may be related to something I said in the fake news thread. I think there are strains of American Evangelical culture that are extremely vulnerable to this kind of stuff:
Bootstrap wrote:Here's the short version of that last post. If you want a larger, more loyal audience, here's what you do:
  • Don't bother with the facts - "fact free" is even better than "mostly false" if you want an audience
  • Make up something really emotionally compelling to draw people in
  • Attack someone along partisan lines, playing to our uglier emotions, stirring up division and polarization - that gets you loyal readers
Of course, each of those is completely against what we stand for as Christians. Yet we Christians often sign up as loyal and gullible foot soldiers in the culture wars.
Incidentally, this is pretty much the textbook definition of propaganda. Propaganda is often much more interesting and compelling than boring truth. If we're going to have political discussions or even political opinions, I think it's really important that we understand this, and respond in some specific ways.
  • Facts matter. Not everything is a matter of fact, but anyone who makes up their facts on the fly or distorts facts should not be trusted.
  • We are all gullible and easily manipulated by our feelings. We are surrounded by people who are expert in manipulating us. That means it is really important for us to step back from the fight, disown the culture wars, and decide when it's worth having an opinion. If we need to engage on a topic, we need to devote enough time to understand it. If you don't know how to recognize propaganda techniques, you need to learn.
  • When our feelings are ugly and hateful towards some person or group, sin is not far away. We need to avoid spewing hatred and division in our speech. Our fundamental attitude should be compassion, if we want to follow Jesus.
Jesus never talked about "left" versus "right" or "conservative" versus "liberal", but that's become the central battle in the mind of many Christians. And the Kingdom of God has become secondary. The salt has lost its savor.
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by temporal1 »

Wayne in Maine wrote:In the end isn't the support of Trump by American Evangelicals just an expression of Luther's Two Kingdom doctrine?

Whether they would see it that way or not, Evangelical Trump supporters voted for the person whom they thought would provide the best governance of their nation-state and who would serve their own needs and wants (which are not always bad) in their country.

Quite frankly, Christians who voted for Hillary or Stein or Johnson are no different, even if they assert that they voted for the candidate that would institute policies that are "more Christian" or assert that their candidate was morally superior (or however they would phrase it).

It is very common in any case to ignore the moral failings of our "heroes", whether we lean left or right in our political, social and religious inclinations.

Dozens of examples could be cited from Gandhi to Ronald Reagan.

Those pointing a finger at the American Evangelical Right should note that there are three finger pointing back at themselves.
The moral failings/appetites of leaders.
i first thought of Alexander the Great, and, Ghengis Khan.
it seems, we in the U.S. continue with our Puritan roots, not frequently recognized, but, in reality?
i believe it runs deep, even amongst those who claim to be "free" of all such silly matters of morality.

(for me) it boils down to worship of insideous false gods; all are vulnerable.
too many are just absolutely ignorant such a horrifying thing exists.

that's the problem i most pray on: absolute ignorance.

by Jesus' instruction, that's our problem. their ignorance is our failure-to-communicate. :(
i fear this failure maybe more than any other one.

post-election, many are in emotional free-fall as we speak, they were given nothing but false gods, they do not know to whom to turn. it's gut-wrenching sad to witness. it's harder to witness than the prior false pride their false gods would "never fail."

"never fail," what is that?! lies.
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by Szdfan »

temporal1 wrote: post-election, many are in emotional free-fall as we speak, they were given nothing but false gods, they do not know to whom to turn. it's gut-wrenching sad to witness. it's harder to witness than the prior false pride their false gods would "never fail."

"never fail," what is that?! lies.
I think that there's certainly an element of "we lost" grief that's been going on, but I'm also hearing fear from those who belong to the groups who were demonized and scapegoated by the Trump campaign during the election. There's been an uptick in intimidation and harassment towards minorities since the election. On the Friday following the election, my co-worker's husband was accosted, called the "N" word repeatedly and told to go "back home." This past week four mosques received letters threatening that Trump will "do to you Muslims what Hitler did to the Jews."

Some of the emotional free fall is not just because of hero or idol worship, but because something incredibly nasty has been emboldened and legitimized by this election. Certainly all of us worship false gods in some way or another, but what I'm hearing is something else as well -- fear from marginalized people who feel targeted by Trump's campaign rhetoric.
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by MaxPC »

Szdfan wrote: Some of the emotional free fall is not just because of hero or idol worship, but because something incredibly nasty has been emboldened and legitimized by this election.
This is exactly what was being said when the Democrats targeted Christians and their businesses after Obama's election.

All political parties are guilty of this, let's be realistic. No political party is a hero nor should it be. Our hero is God, our savior is Christ and rather than being caught up in political rhetoric and arguments which steal time from our Christian walk, let's put our faith into action at the personal level and let God deal with the rest. Every person will be judged by God on their actions: we are called by Scripture to be working on our discipleship walk not our political cred.
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by mike »

To say that this election was an about-face for evangelicals is an overstatement in my opinion. I tend to agree with Jazman that this attitude of evangelicals toward public morality has been around awhile. No matter, I would add, whether they vote R or D. I have never been able to understand how a Christian can vote, period. Democrat-voting Christians have long been accustomed to voting for wealthy playboys (Kennedy, Clinton, et al). Republican-voting Christians have voted for plenty of candidates that didn't follow biblical morality. Trump is just the most recent example; maybe one of the more egregious. But there's nothing new about this.
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by Bootstrap »

MaxPC wrote:All political parties are guilty of this, let's be realistic. No political party is a hero nor should it be. Our hero is God, our savior is Christ and rather than being caught up in political rhetoric and arguments which steal time from our Christian walk, let's put our faith into action at the personal level and let God deal with the rest. Every person will be judged by God on their actions: we are called by Scripture to be working on our discipleship walk not our political cred.
Amen.
temporal1 wrote:[post-election, many are in emotional free-fall as we speak, they were given nothing but false gods, they do not know to whom to turn. it's gut-wrenching sad to witness. it's harder to witness than the prior false pride their false gods would "never fail."
If you look at the MN archives or the MD archives, I think most of us were painfully aware that neither candidate in this election represents the Kingdom of God. Some of us did vote, others decided it was simply not possible to vote in this election, given the candidates. Before this election, no candidate had ever won the presidency with unfavorable ratings as high as either of them. So I think it's silly to pretend that most Americans saw either of these figures as their god. Looking at the archives, I really don't think many people on MN did.

You keep painting this picture of non-Trump voters being in emotional free fall. I don't think I am, but I do have concerns about Trump. You seem to be painting this as Trump supporters versus those who support false gods and are now devastated. I don't think you are listening very well to the brethren who did not vote for Trump or are critical of him. Our unity is based in Jesus Christ, not in Donald Trump. On MN, "we" versus "they" is not about which presidential candidate you voted for - or didn't, since so many don't even vote.
MaxPC wrote:
Szdfan wrote:Some of the emotional free fall is not just because of hero or idol worship, but because something incredibly nasty has been emboldened and legitimized by this election.
This is exactly what was being said when the Democrats targeted Christians and their businesses after Obama's election.


Fact checking is always a good thing. As Christians, we should oppose nastiness. We should also be aware that there's a lot of propaganda on both sides. Can we agree to avoid attacking each other so that we can carefully examine the facts and see what is going on?
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Re: About face! - Evangelicals and public morality

Post by Jazman »

Wayne in Maine wrote:In the end isn't the support of Trump by American Evangelicals just an expression of Luther's Two Kingdom doctrine? Whether they would see it that way or not, Evangelical Trump supporters voted for the person whom they thought would provide the best governance of their nation-state and who would serve their own needs and wants (which are not always bad) in their country. Quite frankly, Christians who voted for Hillary or Stein or Johnson are no different, even if they assert that they voted for the candidate that would institute policies that are "more Christian" or assert that their candidate was morally superior (or however they would phrase it).

It is very common in any case to ignore the moral failings of our "heroes", whether we lean left or right in our political, social and religious inclinations. Dozens of examples could be cited from Gandhi to Ronald Reagan. Those pointing a finger at the American Evangelical Right should note that there are three finger pointing back at themselves.

And many, including myself, did not vote for Hillary, Stein or Johnson or that Utah guy.
I take your point about ones that did...but I suspect those that did have been voting that way and justifying it for a long time and will consistently do so in the future - it may be wrong, but frankly I have more respect for someone who's authentic and committed (despite it being a wrong principle) than I have for a lot of supposedly Bible-believing, Jesus-loving, Moral Character-valuing evangelicals who flip-flop and seemingly jettison principles because their sacred cow, the GOP flip flops too. (I do give a pass to those mentioned by Boot, who "vote for someone and still see [acknowledge] their flaws" The evangelicals I'm calling out here are the loud/proud trump voters/supporters)

Yes, their gate-way drug was Reagan, but this time was much, much worse... I mean this moral-character-in-our-leaders has been a rock, at least verbally, for 30-50yrs and now suddenly it's not! Frankly I can't think of too many political/cultural/religious entities that have done something like that in such a short space of time...can you?

What if 60% of registered Democrats in the space of about a year, in polls, public leader hem-haws, etc came out against abortion and that the switch seemed to be mostly to gain some political goal? Do you think you'd trust them more or less after that? Would you jump on board their "campaign"? I doubt it...
With respect, I think the attempt at equivalency falls short. Imo this About face! (and it's antecedents) will be regarded as one of the most egregious sell-outs in recent church history. And speaking of emotions, this apparent About face! saddens me more than anything to do with who won or lost some elections for public office. But I'll do my best to love these About face! american christians and continue to point them to the true King with the unassailable moral Character who can do so much more for them than a GOP strong-man who says he cares for them...
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