What if Pat was Right?
During the election of 2004 Joe and I would get into heated (but friendly) discussions about Kerry and Bush. On one such occasion we started to discuss whether a President who is a Christian would be able to govern based on his Christian convictions. I insisted that he could, and Joe insisted that he couldn't. Joe's position was that it would be impossible to be President and adhere to a Christian ethic and sense of morality. After thinking about it, Joe listen up, I think your right.
Fast forward to the beginning of the summer. I am having this same discussion with some friends at a reunion in Glen Rose, TX and now the roles are reversed. I am advocating the position that Joe had taken seven months earlier and some of my friends were taking my original position. We didn't get to finish the conversation (with 10 kids running around most conversations were impossible to finish), but I see in this Pat Robertson situation an illustration of the accuracy of my view point.
Contributing to the outrageousness of Pat Robertson's comments is the fact that he is supposed to be a Christian Pastor who exemplifies a Christian life and ethic. Calling for the assassination of people on TV where you know your word has influence is not exemplifying anything Christian. There is a great commentary about this in the On-line edition of Newsweek written by President Reagan's daughter. You can read it here.
Lets hypothesize that Robertson's assessment of Chavez was right and in order to maintain the security of the United States and it's people, President Chavez needed to be taken out. Imagine you're the President of the United States. You have taken an oath to defend it's citizens to the best of your ability utilizing everything within your power to fulfill your responsibilities. Yet you find the idea of directly ordering the assassination of another person to be at odds with your Christian faith. What are you supposed to do? Honestly, what would you expect a President to do?
Say the President did nothing, and Chavez instigated an event that killed a lot of people in the US and threatened it's economy. Then the President gets on TV and says, "It has been reported that I had an opportunity to authorize an assassination of Pres. Chavez, but did not take it. This is true. I didn't take it because my faith in God wouldn't allow me to do such a thing." Not sure that would sit very well even with Christians out there.
In reality, we have had a President faced with that decision, and he did side with his faith. President Carter signed an executive order in 1978 banning the assassination of foreign leaders. This policy is still in place even in this administration. Although in the early hours of the Iraq war we did try a preemptive strike against Saddam, but we had declared "war" before hand so he was fair game.
I don't mean to get into a debate about the pro's and con's of assassinations, but I think it illustrates the point that a President who is sworn to protect and defend the interests of the United States will inevitably be forced to decide to do things that are counter to his or her faith in major ways. Especially a Christian faith. I believe that a President can be profoundly influenced by his faith in their personal life, and that faith can tint the way they form some of their policy decisions. But on the whole, when faced with being loyal to God or to the US, a President will most certainly choose the US interests over Gods. Of course that is being slightly generous since most politicians are mainly loyal to their financial supporters, lobbyists, party ideology, ego, citizen's, and then faith.
Ok, so what...Well it just serves a point that isn't necessarily being argued anymore, but is still there. GWB isn't the first or last President to claim that faith plays a major role in his life. He also won't be the last to use it for political gain. But Christians shouldn't use a politicians personal Christian believe as one of their supportive arguments for that particular politician. One of the reasons I liked Bush was because of the transparency of his faith. But as time has gone on I just see too many contradictions in having the job of President and being a man of Christian ethic. That has ceased to be an attractive point for me. Bush's supporters are kidding themselves if they think that now we are finally being led by a Godly man who listens to the word of God to decide the direction of this Nation. Bush's detractors are being too paranoid in believing that Bush wants to install a Christian theocracy in the US government. What we in fact do have is a sincere believer who uses his faith as a personal guide for his personal life. But we also have a person who is charged with strengthening the Empire of the United States. And that job certainly requires a person to go against the a number of Jesus' teachings and ethics.
9 comments:
From the perspective of Christian ethics, why should there be a difference between ordering the killing of a man who is the leader of a country and a man who fights in his army? I find it strange that Pat Robertson's comments would get attention in this way -- prominent Christians have been supporting the war in Iraq for some time. Is "assassination" harder to swallow than "strategic bombing"?
What if Jesus chose to stay on the cross and not assassinate those who were killing him? Oh wait a minute, he already did that. One of the most convicting aspects of Jesus's life was how he never dealt in What Ifs?? There were not what ifs? for Jesus. It was love your enemies period, no exceptions.
It is frustrating when people use these what if? situations to prove their point which have no basis in reality. For the Christian, these what if? situations are asking the wrong questions. They are asking how would a Christian respond in the heat of the moment in the terrible event they describe.
What Christians need to be asking is, how should a Christian respond BEFORE such events arise? Too many Christians in America allow their ethic to change with the situation presented to them. Loving my neighbor is ok, but loving my neighbor who physically attacks me is something I can't do.
Christians, like Jesus himself, need to decide how they will act before a crisis arrives, and not base their decision in the heat of the moment or after the fact. Because it is in the heat of the moment when Christ is denied three times and betrayed for 30 pieces of silver.
This is why I will never run for President.
BTW, excellent comment, Chris.
Who is Pat Robertson, really? I grew up in the northeast USA in a Christian household and I didn't even know the 700 club existed until I was almost out of college. Does he really represent a large population of Christians in the USA? Is he big in the south? I'm not sure who he thinks he represents, but as a Christian American he and his club do not represent me. I'm a little uneasy about the fact that he - or Dubya for that matter - could be seen as representing me, a Christian...
I've been waiting all week, going from blog to blog, for one of you to comment on this. I find the whole thing outrageous. Christian or not, it is entirely inappropriate and irresponsible for a public figure to call for the killing of a nation's leader.
The fact that Hugo Chavez has socialist leanings makes his country just another victim of bad U.S. foreign policy. The United States has a record of sponsoring coup after coup in South America, overthrowing a socialist government and putting in place a dictator who is then responsible for the death or disappearance of thousands of people.
How it is that a nation founded on Christianity, with professed Christian leaders, can justify destroying the economy of yet another country for a source of oil and cheap labor? Communism is not contagious.
How long, Oh Lord, will Christian Republicans be represented by the likes of Pat Robertson? Deliver us, we pray.
Brandon makes a good point. The president does make decisions that result in death. The decision to assinate may be different than the decision to go to war (it is in my book) but death is still the result and the decision is gravely serious.
However, I still believe that an honest, Christian president can govern based on his/her convictions. Unfortunately, in a broken world, at times his/her decisions result in death; death for the sake of life, death that ultimately preserves life. This concept is not antithetical to Christian ethics.
In response to the comment above, "death for the sake of life" only occurs in the context of Jesus' death which has resulted in our life. Beyond that, we are called to lay down our own lives for the sake of the Kingdom of God. Try "Mere Discipleship" by Lee Camp for a thorough treatment of this conflict between nationalism and discipleship.
-Russ
This is totally random and has nothing to do with your post, but I had this really weird dream about you and Alison last night. I'll tell ya about it sometime.
Post a Comment