The annual Religious Left Wild Goose Festival recently convened in Union Grove, North Carolina, to feature, in the words of the group’s website, “the intersection of justice, spirituality, and art”. Activist clergyman the Rev. Dr. William Barber rallied left-wing Christians to confront injustices in American society.
Barber, an ordained Disciples of Christ pastor and 2016 Democratic National Convention speaker, emphasized the need to discuss sin, noting progressive Christians’ hesitancy to do so. Racism, foreign wars, and greedy corporations all evidence the reality of sin and a need for Christians to take part in establishing God’s Kingdom on earth, Barber claimed at the July 13-16 event.
Barber’s emphasis on poverty, lack of living wages, and ecological destruction demand a Christian response. Yet overt partisanship and progressive ideology blunt the North Carolina pastor’s preaching: he attempts to link the modern Republican Party to the Confederacy; he calls on his followers to “win LGBTQ rights” and to stop “religious nationalism”; he asked how America could “give a rapist more power than a woman” in reference to the Supreme Court Dobbs decision; and he calls for “the downfall and complete overthrow of the whole system.”
Barber’s statements highlight a grievous problem undermining American Christian witness; the unholy alliance of one’s faith with sectarian partisanship.
Conservatives and Progressives have a habit of claiming the banner of Christ for their party platforms. This has resulted in each side championing certain principles in line with the Gospel, while neglecting others. Republicans (mostly) fight to end abortion and the degradation of biblical marriage, yet some fail to sustain these through policies such as paid maternity leave. Likewise, many Democrats condemn the assaults on human dignity from racism and war but have no problem excusing the horrors done to human dignity by abortion or body-mutilating “gender affirming” surgeries.
Both parties’ loyalty to Jesus ends where their platforms begin. Rather than bend the knee to the King of Kings, they instead worship at the idols of the elephant and donkey. They conform Christ to their politics, when in reality they should conform their politics to Christ.
If American Christians wish to confront this challenge, there are key facts that require recognition.
The first is the Great Commission. Christ calls us to “go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:18-19). Debates over whether America was founded as a “Christian nation” or not are meaningless; if America isn’t a Christian nation, we are called to make it one.
Secondly, we are not to compromise with the worldly powers, institutions or pleasures that are contrary to what Christ teaches. The Book of Ephesians is crystal clear on the matter: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” (Ephesians 6:12). Our Christianity isn’t supposed to bow to cultural sensibilities or political parties; it’s supposed to sanctify them. When we genuinely follow in Christ’s footsteps, we are not going to get standing ovations from those around us; we will be misunderstood, mocked and persecuted . But Christ didn’t promise to bring comfort. When St. Athanasius chose to stand up against Arianism, he was said to have been “contra mundum”- “against the world”. That’s what we must be. We cannot afford to compromise the Gospel for the sake of convenience. If your party calls on you to reject Jesus, then you must reject your party. Like Athanasius, we must not yield to worldly demands.
Yet just because we are not “of the world” doesn’t mean we ignore it. Reformed theologian Abraham Kuyper said in an 1880 speech that “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!’” We are to live out the Gospel in every facet of our lives, including politics. We cannot follow half of the Gospel and then ignore the rest because it doesn’t match a party line. One cannot cry “Christian Nationalism” when conservatives want to ban abortion and then turn to espouse universal healthcare or immigration reform in the name of Jesus. Similarly, if one wishes to maintain “family values”, they must address all aspects of the problem and follow these principles in their own lives. I cannot take a “pro family” conservative seriously if they fail their own families through adultery or divorce.
We have to reject the false dichotomies set up by the two parties to properly live out the Gospel. At the end of the day, there is no such thing as a “Progressive Christian” or a “Conservative Christian” – there are Christians and there are those who distort Christianity in the name of their political sympathies. If you don’t rebuke all sin, you rebuke none of it. If you put party allegiances before Jesus, then you put the world before Christ. In other words, you must accept all of the Gospel, not just parts of it. To do so is not only to deny the essential message of the Word, but it is to deny the Word itself.
Comment by Tom on July 25, 2022 at 5:32 pm
Still searching my concordance for “paid maternity leave.” Maybe you can help point out to me where the Bible mentions it?
Comment by Giovanni Del Piero on July 26, 2022 at 10:04 am
https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2021/october-web-only/pro-life-christians-should-lead-way-on-family-leave.html I think this article does a good job explaining it. I wouldn’t necessarily need to be from the state, but verses such as Romans 12:13 and Ephesians 5:2 obligate us to help our brethren in love and imitate Christ in his generosity.
Comment by Dan W on July 25, 2022 at 10:40 pm
It bothers me that Reverend Barber would accuse a Supreme Court Justice of rape in an effort to further divide us. Most of the Christians I know are not hard core partisans. The political battles have just become so emotional. Example: Barber tells Christian women there is a rapist on the Supreme Court, that rapist is taking away their Constitutional rights and innocent women will die.
We have a failure of leadership in this country at all levels. Churches, schools and other institutions (example Scouting) used to train leaders. These institutions have been under attack for decades and have faltered. A church near my home has this message on their sign out front – “Come join us and we’ll pray for you. You can pray for us, and we’ll all pray for our country!”
Comment by Dan W on July 26, 2022 at 6:11 am
I should have added, the call to prayer by my local church is a step in the right direction.
Comment by David on July 26, 2022 at 7:50 am
“If America isn’t a Christian nation, we are called to make it one.” How unAmerican! There is a reason why a state religion was prohibited in the Constitution—to prevent religious doctrines being forced on the people. People may like to point to the Puritans in New England, but they were a small minority and many left their colony because of their doctrines. Americans had rid themselves of the colonial official churches by 1833.
Comment by Giovanni Del Piero on July 26, 2022 at 9:53 am
What is un-American about converting people to Christianity?
Comment by Brian Evers on July 26, 2022 at 12:17 pm
“Republicans (mostly) fight to end abortion and the degradation of biblical marriage, yet some fail to sustain these through policies such as paid maternity leave. ”
Paid maternity leave is anti-Christian. It encourages single motherhood, distracts us from the Great Commission, diverts us from “be fruitful and multiply”, and causes women to prioritize their careers over children. We already have short-term disability, long-term disability, PTO, insurance, and sick leave allowances. Paid maternity leave is just another card on top of a large deck. If women don’t prioritize their children then we will raise self-centered Godless…err, well, maybe we have arrived.
Comment by David on July 27, 2022 at 12:50 pm
There was a time when a man by himself could support his whole family. Those days are largely past and women find it necessary to work. It is silly to think that women have children to collect a few weeks of benefits from their employers. The stay-at-home mom was killed by the stagnant or declining real incomes for working men since around 1970. There was also the rise in college education needs and costs. Student loans were not always available. All have conspired to force women into the workplace.
Comment by Tom on July 27, 2022 at 9:18 pm
Sorry, still not buying “paid maternity leave.”
This is the type of argument that takes a very broad Biblical command and tries to force it to fit a prevailing fashionable cause. If “paid maternity leave” were a logical outcome of either Rom. 12:13 or Gal. 5:2, why did it take over 2000 years to find it out?
My wife, and the wives of many men I know, stayed home to take care of the children while we worked. Yes, we made sacrifices. We didn’t live in a McMansion in the fanciest suburb there was. We didn’t eat out every night. We didn’t have the latest model of a snazzy car. Etc. Etc. If you live a fairly simple lifestyle, the wife can easily stay home and take care of the children.
Finally, you do NOT mention childcare after the woman goes back to work. You ONLY mention maternity leave, which typically lasts 3-6 months. After that, there is no application of Rom. 12:13 or Gal. 5:2?
Comment by Diane on July 28, 2022 at 12:02 am
“Republicans (mostly) fight to end abortion and the degradation of biblical marriage”…
Do what? My parents were married 60 years, had a gay son who was never legally permitted to marry his partner of 25 years, a divorced daughter and another daughter who lived with her boyfriend outside of marriage. Republicans don’t need to fight the degradation of “biblical marriage”. My parents never once felt others’ choices of relationships impacted the sacredness of their marriage in any way. They were also Democrats who worshipped in the church where they met and were married in – same denomination as Barber’s, Disciples of Christ. It’s just a tad arrogant if Republicans are under the illusion that my parents’ marriage was made less holy by different choices of freedom-loving Americans.
And as to Republicans fighting for trans children not to be mutilated, it’s Republicans that have written an exception in every anti-trans healthcare law that explicitly gives doctors and parents the authority to have the parents’ intersex child’s genitalia and internal reproductive organs “fixed”, ie, mutilated with medically unnecessary surgery without the consent of the minor child. One intersex child born with ambiguous genitalia was believed to be female before the child could articulate for himself. As a toddler, he was surgically mutilated to appear as a girl. At the time, he was in foster care. He’s now a teenager and his adoptive parents won a settlement on behalf of their son’s suffering due to mutilating without his consent, authorized by SC social services (foster guardians) and the hospital where the cosmetic, medically unnecessary mutilation of their son’s private parts was done. This is fairly recent news.
Last week, the Greece parliament outlawed these medically unnecessary surgeries on intersex minors, except when there’s a court order, legislating that these surgeries must wait until the intersex child is 15 years of age, is truthfully informed and can themselves give assent to the surgery or decline the surgery. Republicans disagree – they advocate for medically unnecessary mutilation of intersex minors’ private parts without the child’s consent. Read the Republican written laws. I’ve read them, apparently the writer of this piece is willfully ignorant, not having actually read these anti-trans laws and just going along with the Republican anti-trans narrative.
And we now know that Republicans are not at all about protecting life. The Republican AG in Indiana is doing whatever he can to intimidate an OB-GYN Indiana doctor who legally performed an abortion for a ten year old child who was impregnated by her rapist at age nine. Keep on intimidating doctors and the next generation of daughters won’t have OB-GYN doctors to deliver their babies. Who wants to enter a profession where politicians play doctor and interfere with healthcare?
Florida has nearly 10,000 open teaching positions and they keep on intimidating teachers, causing some to resign. Intimidating doctors and educators is not a way to recruit needed professionals in those fields. But, then, conservatives don’t care