Skip to main content

Election Day and the Poor


It’s Election Day and I intend to vote my conscience. Problem is my conscience is conflicted.

On the one hand, how can I reconcile my Christian faith with support for politicians who justify bloodshed in Iraq, torture for terrorists, hanging for convicted dictators, and trampling on the poor in order to build an Empire? On the other hand, how can I support politicians who engage in negative and vicious campaigns, take bribes, self-serve and corrupt themselves with power?

On the one hand, no President has done more than George W. Bush in 3rd world debt reduction and making AIDS drugs available and affordable in Africa. Prior to 2003, AIDS was an inevitable death sentence. Now, thanks to the Global Fund (which George W. deserve much credit for funding), millions of Africans don’t have to die. ARV treatment has now made AIDS a chronic disease for those who are able to access the protocals.

On the other hand, George W. is not my favorite President…and I don’t want to vote for those who support him.

How best to vote as a Christian in the midterm election? I find some guidance in John Hay’s “Seven Considerations I Make When Voting” on his blog site: http://bikehiker.blogspot.com excerpted below:

1. WHAT DOES IT DO TO THE POOR? Neither domestic poverty nor the impact of American policies on those who are poor internationally factor much into campaigns. Yet it was to the poor who were being crushed by the empire and belittled by religious sects that Jesus of Nazareth primarily addressed himself.

2. BEWARE LITMUS TESTS. Beware: personal piety does not necessarily translate into sound leadership or policies that reflect Biblical integrity.

3. AMERICA AND GOD’S KINGDOM ARE NOT THE SAME. Combining or confusing the two is, to my way of thinking, a potentially lethal mix

4. COMPASSION BEYOND CLICHÉS. I look for a candidate who I think will lead compassionately, not just talk about it. Will the candidate give an ear to those who are vulnerable and dominated?

5. LOOK BEYOND “ALL OR NOTHING.” Neither candidate is as extreme or demonic as the other camp says he/she is; neither is as morally right and righteous as his/her own press indicates.

6. CONSIDER THE USE OF VIOLENCE. I ask “How has a candidate responded to violence or used violence? And how does he/she plan to respond to and use it in the future.

7. AMERICA’S ROLE IN THE WORLD. Finally, I consider how candidates envision America’s place and role in the world. I am very concerned, as are many Christian missionaries, about an emerging aura of “empire” or “Pax Americana” that American actions are foretelling.

It’s Election Day, and at the end of the day, I suspect that I will take the advice of Robin Williams in “Man of the Year” who said: “Politicians and baby diapers are alike… in that they should be changed often and for the same reason.”

Popular posts from this blog

Mother Shalom

South Central, Los Angeles, was the neighborhood in the city where Communities of Shalom began in 1992. I met Marx Gutierrez from El Salvador who was there attending High School at the time. He remembers what happened at the corner of Florence and Normandy Streets in South Central, LA, when Reginald Denny was pulled out of his truck and beaten while the crowd looked on and the police did nothing; and how the Rodney King beating resulted in a not-guilty verdict for the police and resulted in a major, 3-day uprising in the neighborhood, until the National Guard came in and finally imposed law and order. He can still remember the fires, the bright orange night sky, the mass looting, 45 unsolved killings, the social chaos...And how the United Methodist Churches responded by creating a zone of shalom in 7 neighborhoods of Los Angeles. Today, Marx is a community organizer, and married to Jennifer Gutierrez, Conference Shalom Coordinator in the Calif-Pacific Annual Conference, and Rev. Vilma

First Generation Lambs Club Reunion

Fifteen of us gathered Saturday night at the Lambs Club for a 35 th year reunion of those who helped start the Lamb’s Church in Times Square in the mid to late 1970’s, including: Rev. Paul S. Moore , Founder of the Lamb’s Church of the Nazarene, and his wife, Tamara Dr. Michael J. Christensen , charter member and former associate pastor, and his wife Dr. Rebecca Laird Fr. William (BJ) Webe r, former Associate Pastor and Director of the Lamb’s Residency, and his wife Sheila who lived at the Lamb’s Jim and Dustee Hullinger, who were on staff together and made the Lamb’s their home for over 25 years Effie Canepa , who was the church pianist under 3 pastors, and her husband Peter Shirley Close, who attended the Lamb’s in the late 1970’s while studying, performing  and teaching music and voice Carl "Chappy" Valente , former associate pastor Rev. Bob DiQuatto , lead singer of the Church’s “Manhattan Project” and staff member of the Lamb’s, and his son Jason Rev. Gabriel

Liberation Spirituality: Henri Nouwen and Gustavo Gutierrez in Dialogue

Liberation Spirituality: Henri Nouwen and Gustavo Gutierrez in Dialogue Lecture Notes: Presented by Michael J. Christensen, Ph.D.,  Associate Professor in the Practice of Spirituality and Ministry,  Drew University;  and  International Director, Communities of Shalom, The United Methodist Church Introduction “There is a little man in Peru, a man without any power, who lives in a barrio with poor people and who wrote a book.   In this book he simply reclaimed the basic Christian truth that God became human to bring good news to the poor, new light to the blind, and liberty to the captives.   Then years later this book and movement it started is considered a danger by [the USA, or Rome], the greatest power on earth.   When I look at this little man, Gustavo, and think about [the President of the US, or the Pope], I see David standing before Goliath, again with no more weapon than a little stone, a stone called A Theology of Liberation (Henri Nouwen