Democrats Need a Religious Left

[Cannikin]

Democrats Need a Religious Left
Values that the Left already holds, like loving your neighbor and turning the other cheek, need to be embraced politically.

By Michael Lerner

snip..
For years the Democrats have been telling themselves "it's the economy, stupid." Yet consistently for dozens of years millions of middle-income Americans have voted against their economic interests to support Republicans who have tapped a deeper set of needs.

snip
Sure, they will admit that they have material needs, and that they worry about adequate health care, stability in employment, and enough money to give their kids a college education. But even more deeply they want their lives to have meaning--and they respond to candidates who seem to care about values and some sense of transcendent purpose.

snip
the talk about being conservatives while meanwhile supporting Bush policies that accelerate the destruction of the environment and do nothing to encourage respect for God's creation or an ethos of awe and wonder to replace the ethos of turning nature into a commodity,

snip..
Imagine if John Kerry had been able to counter George Bush by insisting that a serious religious person would never turn his back on the suffering of the poor, that the Bible's injunction to love one's neighbor required us to provide health care for all, and that the New Testament's command to "turn the other cheek" should give us a predisposition against responding to violence with violence.

http://www.beliefnet.com/story/155/story_15583_1.html

[xultar]

1. We have one we just beat the shit out of them and force them into

silence...here @ DU.

[vi5]

9. Nobody is being silenced....

Our values should speak for themselves. If someone is a christian who believes that we should take care of the poor and not start wars, and enact policies that help people lead better lives then that is great. But the religious aspect of it should come separately and individually. If the democratic party is a political party (and last I checked it was) then there's a little thing called separation of church and state which has to be fundamental to this. Our policies should speak for themselves without us having to pander to one religion or another.

To me liberalism and democracy means standing up for the little guy, the minority, the ones without a voice. I don't think anyone can say that christianity DOESN'T have a voice in this country or that it is in the minority.

[Cannikin]

12. Nobody is talking about establishing a religion.

[vi5]

23. Then what are they talking about?

The fact is that the ideals of liberalism and the democratic party (at it's base) ARE the same as those of christianity. It's Christians who have to decide what is more important. Being pandered to and made to feel warm and fuzzy about the label they apply to themselves, or actually fighting for and belonging to the political party that (should) fight for those ideals.

[greenohio]

27. "ideals of liberalism ...ARE the same as those of christianity."

Should we be forcing our religion on everyone else then? Sounds like a church-state separation problem. Gonna have to think about that for a while.

[vi5]

28. Huh? Explain that one....

Those ideals are the same as most religions. My point is why should we have to pander to Christianity? Or any religion.

The values of liberals are political values and humanist values that also happen to coincide with those of christians, buddhists, jews, and many other religions.

[greenohio]

34. What is your point?

That because there is overlap in some major religions that the smaller religions have no right to have their faith protected?

People who do not subscribe to any religion then should be force to follow the tenants of a religion they do not practice, just because it is shared with other religions?

[vi5]

39. I'm totally lost here on this...

I'm saying NO religion should be forced on ANYONE. My point is that common HUMAN values are the same across all religion (respect others, do not kill, etc) and even those of us who are atheists and have no need for religion believe these things as well. My point is why the hell do we have to bring religion into it.

Human values can and should be those which respect others and treat all people fairly and with humanity and kindness. My point is that if someone is religious and adheres to the true tenets of their religion then the democratic party and the liberal philosophy should sell itself and not have to pander to ANY religion.

I don't know how I of all people got misinterpreted as DEFENDING religion. I don't bash it but I'm the last person to defend it or feel that it should have ANY role in government.

[greenohio]

40. It sounds like we are in violent agreement.

Yes, making a case based on religion is what I was posting against.

"HUMAN values are the same across all religion (respect others, do not kill," I disagree with this statement, however, as respectfully, it is not true. Some religions believe in a caste system where the poor belong poor and the rich belong rich. Others still, to this day, believe in human sacrifice. There are atheists I know who believe in every "man for himself." Some religions believe in the subjugation of women. I don't think that these fall into Democratic "Human values".

[vi5]

41. Hahah...."violent agreement"...I like that....

I guess I was trying too hard to be somewhat concilliatory so as not to get accussed of religion bashing. Like I said I'm an atheist who has zero use for religion or faith and do believe that people's differing interpretations of the meaning of life and the world are responsible for many of the world's ills throughout history.

I guess the "poor, poor, persecuted me" set on here has gotten me believing their hype and making me question my own motivations..

[greenohio]

44. I am religious and my Democratic values come from that.

and I'm not sure there is any problem with that. I believe all law is based on a belief of right and wrong. We believe something to be wrong, and so it should be regulated or banned. We believe something is right, and so it should be protected or supported. I just think we should be careful when we begin to assume that our values are universal (often because we haven't happened to come across those who differ). I do not think we should make our case based on our belief system.

In short, we have to choose our positions based on what we "believe is right", but we have to make the case based on the practical.

[demwing]

45. Shhh!

quiet you!

[Radical Activist]

36. self delete

[aquart]

2. We're reduced to this? Jesus!

[janx]

3. Another person advocating that we become more like

the right wingers, eh?

There are plenty of religious Dems already. While I agree with some of this guy's points, I don't think we have to trumpet our beliefs the way the Pharisees do.

[xultar]

6. Is that what homeboy is saying that we need to do? n/t

[janx]

15. I don't know who that is.

So I don't understand your question.

[Cannikin]

4. Republicans have made us out to be a 'godless' people

with great effect. I think what the article is suggesting is that we let our spiritual side show, since it is there already.

[ZanZaBar]

5. Hey, I've been sacrificing goats for YEARS...

It just hasn't caught on yet with the average american : \

[jandrok]

13. Cabrito.......YUM!

Got some good recipes if ya want 'em!

[peacetalksforall]

7. The only way is separation

take your choice:

separation of church and state - or
separation from fundamentalists - let's split the country in an amicalble way - show the world how to do it using diplomacy.

[ginnyinWI]

8. The Dems embrace all sorts of religious views, and

since we also want separation of church and state, it isn't a religious left we need, we need to become identified with true American Values. We need to be seen as the ones who are united by our traditional American values of truth, of justice, of mercy, fairness, and opportunity for all.

[Cannikin]

10. that would include freedom of religion , but not the establishment of one.

We could show the moderates that we have better values than those on the right who wear their faith like jewelry and think 'Happy Holidays' is an infringment on their rights.

[jandrok]

11. Religion is neither "left" or "right"

"Imagine if John Kerry had been able to counter George Bush by insisting that a serious religious person would never turn his back on the suffering of the poor, that the Bible's injunction to love one's neighbor required us to provide health care for all, and that the New Testament's command to "turn the other cheek" should give us a predisposition against responding to violence with violence."

Kerry still would not have had the support of the Christian Right. These folks are not motivated by traditional Christian values. They are more interested in creating the conditions for Armageddon and hoarding money than thay are in promoting ethical-religious-spiritual action and thought.

There are plenty of progressive churches and Christian organizations out there, they have just been marginalized by the bully pulpit of the Christian Right.

I appreciate the idea that the progressive movement needs a spiritual center, but I see no need to make it a Christian one. It has to be a bigger umbrella. These are not simply Christian values, but HUMAN values we're talking about here. Co-opting a religion and grafting it onto a political platform is antithetical to the entire idea of separation of church and state.

[kamqute]

48. Religion is LEFT, honey

[txaslftist]

14. Like a hole in the dam head.

We need a left.

All this crap lately about we need to rethink our position on abortion, we need to rethink our opposition to social security deform, we need to rething our opposition to Iraq...

Gee whiz, why don't ya just say we need to attract more republicans?

What we need are smart, politically savvy speakers and reps who can take the air out of the republican noise machine.

[janx]

16. I agree with you. There is so much reactionary behavior

going on right now that it borders on panic. It's not very effective.

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

17. Attract Republicans?? Remember there are different species of...

As a moderate Republican alienated by the crazy zealots who took over my party of registration, a zealot-controlled Democratic party offers no appeal for the moderates. Sounds like a plan for a single political party structure complete with its own version of Pravda.

[Cheswick2.0]

18. I agree

I go to a Presbyterian church full of moderate republicans who are not going to be attracted to democrats just because they pander to reactionary religious views of the dumbed down religious right.

I think many of them voted for Kerry this year or stayed home on election day.

[InvisibleBallots]

31. should we privatize Social Security to get the "moderate" Republicans?

How much further right are we going to go to appeal to these so called "moderate" Republicans that want to privatize Social Security, bust Unions, and export jobs? Why not just become Rockefeller Republicans?

[BurgherHoldtheLies]

33. Your assumption is incorrect...

I do not support privatizing SS which will require the govt to "borrow" 2 trillion dollars. Social security was put in place as a safety net and I believe that the govt has no business playing it in the stock market with huge payouts to their Wall Street cronies. You also assume that I want to bust unions, although I did see unions as part of the reason for the collapse of of the steal industry and I agreed with Kerry that companies should NOT be rewarded for outsourcing jobs. Sure, companies can outsource to India/etc. but taxpayers should not subsidize this practice.

I believe PAYGo is a GOOD policy that has been virtually trashed by the current administration/Congress. Fiscally irresponsible and socially repressive are the polar opposite of my views.

Am I still a "bad guy" to you?

[ZanZaBar]

20. Uhhh

Yeah heh, I'll get the unicorns on that task right away..

[txaslftist]

26. okay, THAT was funny...

[Lydia Leftcoast]

24. The religious Left is

(mostly) pro-choice, supportive of the social safety net, including SS, and opposed to the war in Iraq.

Religious does not always equal conservative.

There's a delicate line to be walked here. On the one hand, you don't want, say, the Unitarians becoming the official church of the Democratic Party, in the way that the Southern Baptists are practically the official church of the Republican Party.

On the other hand, there are a lot of naive people out there who are not hard-core fundamentalists or End Times freaks and are receiving no political messages of any sort in their churches, but who are being brainwashed daily by right-wing media.

There has to be a way to get out a message somewhat like this: "Instead of trying to make the teachings of any one religion into national law, we stand for the principles that are supported by all the world's great religions and moral philosophers: treating other people as we would like to be treated, helping the unfortunate, letting people exercise their free will in their private lives, etc."

[HamdenRice]

19. We used to have a religious left ...

One of its leaders was named Martin Luther King. Mohatma Ghandi also embodies a religious left perspective, as does Bishop Tutu.

I've been thinking about this a lot, because I grew up in the black Baptist Church during the civil rights movement and am horrified at what the Protestant evangical denominations have become. I am not religious now, but I think my politics are informed by left religious ethics, which is different.

I think that it actually is impossible to make the left case without resort to left religous principles. If we only rely on economics, one of economics' main principles is that each economic actor should pursue his self interest. How can you make the case for assisting the poor or striving toward peace without a set of ethical postulates taht really cannot be explained? In other words, without some unjustifiable primary principles that just seem right, but cannot really be explained, how can you defeat the notion that, say, the Iraq war is justified because we are "kicking their ass and taking their gas?"

I guess the Rawlsian justification is the only non-religious left justification I can think of for left policies -- namely, that if we did not know the circumstances we would be born into, what kind of society would we want to create? But that argument falls victim to the retort that in fact we know what circumstances we are born into and let's accordingly maximize our interests under those circumstances.

It has frequently been noted that at bottom, Marx himself was simply a moralist, who dispensed with religion as the origins of his moralism. But can anyone explain progressive policies without some underlying non-justifiable principles of treating people the way you would like to be treated?

[FormerDittoHead]

32. What happened to it?

I remember marching in an anti-war march in 1971. For people from out of town, one of the churches in the city let people bunk out in their third floor.

There were many preists and ministers marching back then.

I think the problem is that they've been given no respect in the party (just look at some of the msg subjects above) and decided to go where they CAN get respect...

"we're reduced to this" - nice attitude.

"another person advocating we become more like the Republicans" - No, he's advocating we become more like WE USED TO BE, and LESS than the Republicans who use religion as some 'litmus test' of membership...

"like a hole in the damn head" - While we look at Bush not reaching over to our side, look what we're NOT doing. How does this make them any better than THEM?

There ARE some good comments, however, I just wanted to agree that, in order to win back this country, we can not let anyone out of the picture who is otherwise honest, sincere and good, just because they believe in God or Jesus. (note: i'm not talking the bastardized "religion" of tele-evangelism)

[freedom_to_read]

21. We need to REDISCOVER the religious left

The Left used to cultivate much closer ties to religious groups and to use religious speech much more openly. Think of the Civil Rights movement, or earlier the Progressive movement. Both tied political goals closely to an overarching ideology of fairness and justice, and couched their goals in self-consciously religious language. When MLK got up and said, "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream" he didn't make those words up, he was quoting the Bible (Amos 5:24).

I disagree with people here on DU who think that religion and politics cannot mix. It is religion and government that should be kept separate. When the founding fathers set up the constitutional wall between church and state, it was not intended to remove the power of religion in the political landscape, but to make sure that no single religion became an Established Church.

The problem is that the Left has allowed the Right to define what "religion" means in the public sphere. And they've done so, by and large, in a very narrow and parochial way. And George Bush, who in my opinion has not a sprititual bone in his body, has been very adept at using religion to his own, quite secular and thoroughly evil, ends.

We on the Left have allowed, perhaps even enabled, this by shying away from the use of religion in the public sphere. We allow ourselves to be called "secularist" or even "godless" because we feel that to fight back, to try to make the discourse our own, would mean we would have to surrender supposedly "secular" values such tolerance and open-mindedness. Yet it is only the Right that make these values seem "anti-religious."

For people on the Left to be more open about their religious views does not necessarily mean a shift to the right. People who think so are being taken in, already, by the Christian Right's arrogant self-annointed claim to speak for "religious values." If you look at history, religion has been as a great catalyst for change and upheaval as for reactionary preservation of the +status quo ante.

[maxsolomon]

22. how about starting with a religious CENTER?

there is no LEFT left in the democratic party. if there ever was. when will people stop saying that there is? michael moore is NOT a "leftist". "liberal" does not mean "leftist". The SWP, PETA, ELF, earth first, and the tribal anarchists in eugene are NOT democrats.

the "american left" has been marginalized through 100 years of vilification, slander, ridicule, political imprisonment, & assassination.

[youngred]

25. A religious left would help, but it's not enough

we need to change our image and stop letting them define us on these issues

[Cheswick2.0]

29. the biggest influence the religious left could have

is boycotting churches where they are preaching right wing rhetoric. If you are in a church where they are preaching about the poor unborn babies or the evils of homosexuality then leave that church and let them know why.

If you have a local Bishop who is suggesting with holding communion because someone is pro-choice leave that church. They are playing politics.

This goes for Catholic and protestant democrats. If all religious people of the leftist variety would do this the church would shut up about politics in no time at all.

Around here we don't have many fundamentalist churches. Those we have are full of republicans. But the Catholic churches are 80 percent democrats. If they all walked out and joined more liberal denominations, that would be the end of the right wing influence on politics in this area.

[realvirginian]

30. We do

I'm sure you have heard of Revs Sharpton, Jackson, etc.

[genius]

35. I agree. We need a left equiv of Pat Robertson

Jackson is good but he doesn't use religion in his political discussions the way Robertson does. We need a bunch of liberal religious leaders who will talk religion and show how the right-wingers are Satanists.

[Radical Activist]

37. Jesse Jackson, Quakers, UU, Al Sharpton

We do have one. They are marginalized by other Democrats.

[txaslftist]

38. Well, since we're all going to be LEFT behind....

I guess we'll be in gravy once end times hits.

[The Flaming Red Head]

42. Yeah, but what religion? There's more than one, ya know. nt

[OnionPatch]

43. I think there is a huge religious left out there

I'd say more than half of my friends (all liberals) belong to some sort of church and attend regularly. They are Unitarians (including myself), Lutherans, and Episcopalians. Several belong to The Church of Christ and a church called Unity. As long as you are a moral person, I couldn't care less what religion you practice (or don't) and I think that's the big difference between us and the right.

By nature, the right wing is authoritarian and their religious institutions reflect that. You see it in their proselytizing and the big efforts to convert and "save" everyone. You also see it in their narrow definitions of spirituality and the constant accusations they make on the rest of us. This is why you hear so much more about them. It's their IN YOUR FACE attitude that makes them stand out. That and the patsy media perpetuates the myth of the religious right and does not talk about the religious left.

I don't think it's a bad idea for the religious left to speak out more and make their presence known. "We're here, we're many and the right does not speak for us, nor do they have the lock on morality in this country."

[proudbluestater]

46. www.sojo.net Religious Left site

[kamqute]

47. Religious Lefty Here!