Hey Gary---sure, I agree with most of your politics. I also have the complex life experience of having grown up in evangelical culture, which I fell out of love with sometime around the time I hit adolescence when the message was clearly conveyed to me that listening to Amy Grant & Petra albums was "better" (more Christian? more...? I dunno, they never really explained, they just implied) than listening to the Police, U2, or Howard Jones. Although I chose not to back away from my commitment to Christ, my commitment to individual Christians, and certainly to Christian culture as a whole has been challenged again and again. For example: Heidi, a dear Christian friend I've known since 1983 (who incidentally will be visiting the Village this Sunday), is a conservative evangelical, although her world view was a complicated a bit by the fact that she spent her childhood in the Phillippines & Venezuela. We respect each other, often agreeing to disagree, and we live in the tension of having different points of view on many things. Very many. But we also do connect on several things that matter. And there is a certain richness when you do connect with someone "different" from you. As I'm sure will be true for my relationships with several of you at the Village.
Russ, your point about getting to know the grandmother is well taken, but the trouble is that it takes effort, grace and gentleness from both sides to interact honestly across a cultural-life experience divide. It also requires opportunity, because our society has become increasingly factioned off to the point that it's bloody hard to get to know a grandmother if she ain't yours, if you don't "already" know her. I do know a couple of "prayer warrior grandmothers," I suppose... one is the aforementioned friend's mother ;-) Another is Emily & Benji's mom. And don't forget Mary Kay! (I've known Mary Kay--Mrs. Wodrich--since the time my high school youth group used to swim in her & Tom's pool.)
Same topic, different angle: I was watching the election results w/my family last night. My mother had already gotten irritated with her pastor's e-mailed implications that the faithful Christians should vote for W. Then there was Ralph Reed being interviewed, saying that Republicans in exit polls claimed to be voting for Bush because they "cared about moral issues." She almost hit the roof, the implication of course being that the Democrats don't.
When I vote, it's not a clear case of, that guy's a twerp, my guy's great; I vote a certain direction because my priorities, my life experience are leading me there. For me, these things are paramount, and have (at least in my lifetime) been emphasized more by Democrats: civil liberties/human rights issues, public education receiving more than lip service (i.e., the Federal government's increasing demands need to be increasingly funded), and public health & environmental issues should be addressed by the government, not just left to the CEOs. But if you don't share my priorities, I will still be happy to eat dinner with you (especially if you cook for me), as long as we can agree to disagree ;-) I think that ultimately, our country's true strength lies in our ability to express and discuss our conflicts & disagreements rather than stuff things or bash each other upside the head (PLO vs Israeli style).
I'm also thinking about how many American Christians have, from time to time, taken the WRONG side. Yes, sometimes there really is a wrong side. And we should always be willing to examine our hearts to see if we're taking the wrong side (which usually has to do with buying into our fears). Check out Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Letters from a Birmingham Jail"--http://almaz.com/nobel/peace/MLK-jail.html--in which he specifically addressed the theological-political attacks of conservative clergymen who accused him, point blank, of doing the "unwise, untimely" thing. He was, on the other hand, going for the godly thing.
Going along with your main point (as I understand it) Russ, it's crucial for Christ followers to keep in mind Paul's admonitions to hold to unity in Christ: neither slave nor free, neither Jew nor Gentile, neither male nor female. These were HUGE distinctions in the 1st century world, much greater than the Republican-Democrat divide, as awkward as it may feel to some of us sometimes. |