Faith: Another Word Hijacked

It was bad enough when the extreme conservatives gave Christianity a bad name (see my first blog), but now they threaten to discredit all religious persuasions. According to a report in The New York Times, the Family Research Council has put out a flier advertising a meeting to be held at a Kentucky megachurch that reads, "The filibuster was once abused to protect racial bias, and it is now being used against people of faith."

Any person who already holds a dim view of organized religion could read that statement and conclude that all, or maybe most, people of faith want the Democrats in the United States Senate to be deprived of the historic power of the minority to protect the country from the tyranny of the temporary majority. People of faith appear to be those who have been duped into demanding a judiciary that would add to the wealth of the corporate elite, the Texas billionaires, and the Wall Street insiders.

The thoughtful citizens of the United States are perfectly aware that the big money people care little or northing about abortion, gay rights, or end of life issues. The big money people give lip service to such issues because there will never be enough of them to control the democratic process. They figured out a long time ago that they needed to forge an alliance with some other sector of society to gain and keep power. They chose the extreme conservatives among the Christians. The federal judges the big money people want to put on the bench are ideologically disposed to supporting the agenda of the extreme conservative Christians, but they would also support the big money agenda.

To enhance their political clout, the big money people have decided to claim that the only faith that matters is fundamentalist or evangelical Christianity. Anyone who does not agree with their social agenda is by definition not a person of faith. Like most other adherents to a religious tradition, I object. First, they hijacked the word "Christian" and made it unusable without a qualifying adjective, and now they seem bent on seizing and twisting the term "faith" in a similar fashion. I wonder, will faith become a term that liberals and progressives will have to abandon in fear of being misunderstood? Or can we add a modifier to separate ourselves from the ranks of Christians with whom we have serious disagreements and identify ourselves as "people of progressive faith"?

Whatever we do, I think we must object to the use of religious language that in the long run will undermine any hope of institutional religion being a respectable and constructive component of a democratic society.

Comments

[Chuck Watts]

The Rockridge Institute is a non-partisan, non-profit, think tank focused on the reframing of progressive ideas & values. Their staff is made up of cognitive scientists and linguists. It seems to me that progressive Christians and progressive scientists would do well to get together. When I go to the Rockridge website, their menu of items include a whole list of subjects, except, oddly enough, religion. Their website is http://www.rockridgeinstitute.org. Check it out.

[sA]

Rev. Daniel Schultz has started The 'Affirmation Project' so religious liberals, progressives, and democrats can express their faith and religious devotion to God so as to contradict the republican claims of our ‘godlessness.’ Please, see http://www.faithforward.blogspot.com/ to see the gathering of affirmations or to leave an affirmation of your own.