O Bachmann! My Bachmann!

Former Representative from Minnesota, Michelle Bachmann

The caption of a Ring of Fire Radio story yesterday (10-7-15):

Bachmann Thinks SC Floods are God’s Wrath for U.S. Policies Toward Israel

As usual, Bachmann got it wrong. According to my divine source (or maybe those strange voices in my head), the SC floods are God's punishment for tolerating same-sex marriage, not for US relations with Israel (yeesh--so obvious). Rather, because of the US's insufficient support for Israel, God has decided to double the number of historians teaching that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, as the new Jerusalem.

Two David Bartons "Presenting America's forgotten
history and heroes with an emphasis on our moral,
religious and constitutional heritage."

And for good measure, He's going to quadruple the number of prosperity gospel preachers.

Oh, by the way, the lack of prayer in public schools is what has caused the spate of providentially-permitted mass shootings in recent years. Sure was a long time coming--the Supreme Court declared state school-sponsored prayer unconstitutional way back in 1962--but then, providence is mysterious. If we keep seeing this little imaginary prayer below after a few more mass shootings at schools, maybe we'll finally be convinced to let Him back in. And then all will be well again in our once great nation. It will be like living in a combination of Leave it to Beaver and Have Gun Will Travel !

The Unbearable Lightness of Religious Freedom

Indiana Governor, Mike Pence, a reliable conservative
according to the American Conservative Union, which gave
him a 100% rating in 2012.

A couple of days ago Indiana Governor, Mike Pence, signed the controversial "Religious Freedom Restoration Act." Indiana now joins nineteen other states that have passed similar laws. Reactions have been swift--from the NCAA's "concern" to threats by cities and corporations to boycott the state because of the implications regarding LGBT rights. The law does not mention homosexuality, or any terms invoking LGBT issues, and Governor Pence insists that the law is not about permitting discrimination but rather the prohibition of state laws and rules that force people, organizations, and corporations to violate their religious beliefs. It is aimed at the Affordable Care Act, not a category of people. As he stated in a press release after the signing the law (in private, curiously):

One need look no further than the recent litigation concerning the Affordable Care Act. A private business and our own University of Notre Dame had to file lawsuits challenging provisions that required them to offer insurance coverage in violation of their religious views.

Joe Carter of the Gospel Coalition, an orthodox Christian evangelical organization, provides a useful summary of similar legislation and related Supreme Court decisions, and argues that the Indiana law is not "anti-gay." Like Governor Pence, he relies on Notre Dame--a consistent source of conservative Catholic views on social issues (so ecumenical of the evangelicals!)--to argue that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act does not give anyone a 'license to discriminate.'"  Carter goes on to blame "the media" for hysterically misrepresenting the law.

But even the irascible Janet Brewer, governor of Arizona, vetoed similar legislation a month ago because of its anti-LGBT implications (see The Atlantic's excellent analysis of that veto here).  No matter how much Governor Pence and his allies might poo-poo the discriminatory aspects of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the law's supporters acknowledge that it's a about allowing Hoosiers to discriminate against LGBTers based on religious beliefs. As reported by The Blaze, Glenn Beck's online right-leaning news site:

Conservative groups say the Indiana measure merely seeks to prevent the government from compelling people to provide such things as catering or photography for same-sex weddings or other activities they find objectionable on religious grounds.

Sad how that word "merely" blithely dismisses a significant minority population, denying it the 14th Amendment's "equal protection" clause.

But an Indiana University law professor says not to worry, noting that

courts generally have ruled that the government has a compelling interest in preventing discrimination and that this interest precludes the recognition of religious exceptions. Even in the narrow setting of wedding-service providers, claims for religious exemptions recently have been rejected in various states, including states that have adopted the RFRA test. A court could rule otherwise, protecting religious freedom in this distinctive context. But to date, none has.

"Generally?" "Various?" Hardly an overwhelming put-down of the Indiana law--though the last line provides some comfort for those of us who don't think of members of the LGBT community as second-class citizens (see here for a map of state level LGBT policies).

Mildred and Richard Loving, 1965, denied equal protection
under the law until the landmark Supreme Court decision
Loving vs. Virginia in 1967.

Mark Silk, editor and blogger for the Religious News Service, is more certain of the ultimate outcome. He cites the Supreme Court's 1967 Loving vs. Virginia decision striking down laws banning mixed race marriages and notes a 2014 federal appellate court's declaration that Indiana's ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional. As with mixed race couples, the judicial message to states is that same-sex unions are protected by the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal protection under the law. That is, photographers, caterers, wedding planners, won't get to deny services to same-sex couples on religious grounds.

If the Supreme Court doesn't end discrimination against the LGBT population in the US, time will. As revealed in a recent survey by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), the generational cohort we label millennials, those between 18 and 35 years of age, perceive homosexuality (and presumably all the gradations between homosexuality and heterosexuality) differently than white evangelicals. 55% of millennials say that homosexuality is "morally acceptable/depends on the situation" while 38% declare it "morally wrong," compared to 20% of white evangelicals who accept homosexuality with 78% finding it morally wrong.

Robert Jones, CEO of PRRI, sums up the findings on issues of homosexuality and other sexual morals in this way:

Millennials seem reluctant to make blanket black-and-white moral pronouncements about issues they see as complex,” said Jones. 

They don’t only make legal allowances for circumstances, they also make moral allowances for people in difficult circumstances. It’s more about empathy than it is about autonomy.

Ah, complexity and situational ethics--both anathema to religious fundamentalists. But in a couple of decades, the millennial generation will be climbing into positions of decision-making power vacated by the aging or dead baby-boomers.  Or as the Religious News Services puts it:

...the influence of white evangelicals on public opinion in the future may be muted by their small — and aging — numbers. White evangelicals are the oldest of the major religious affiliations, with 49 percent of them age 50 and older.

And this principled stand by many (certainly not a principle shared by all) white evangelicals, their argument that they are entitled to discriminate against the LGBT population, is not winning many converts among the millennial generation.  According to a Pew survey, 16% of the US population is religiously unaffiliated, and about a third of the unaffiliated are under the age of 30. And as Robert Putnam and David Campbell observed in their magisterial work, American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us:

In the 1960s religious observance plummeted. Then, in the 1970s and 1980s a conservative reaction produced the rise of evangelicalism and the Religious Right. Since the 1990s, however, young people, turned off by that linkage between faith and conservative politics, have abandoned organized religion entirely. The result: growing polarization.

Abandoned church, Detroit, 2013

Well, at least this time we don't have the spectacle of governors blocking schoolhouse doors to gays, or shouting "Homophobia now, homophobia tomorrow, homophobia forever!"  Still, no matter how innocuous the legal language, a law that sanctifies the unequal treatment of a category of people in the name of freedom is not only unjust, but mangles the meaning of freedom. To paraphrase an old saying, one's freedom to swing a bible ends just where another's nose begins.

The Next GOP Card to Drop...

Lee Atwater with Ronald Reagan.

Just checked out the survey results of the Public Religion Research Institute. Wow. People identifying as "unaffiliated" at 22%, the 3rd largest group behind Catholics, who have dropped to 23%. And Protestants at less than 50%. I'm guessing that GOP Presidential candidates catering to the religious right (Huckabee, Perry, Carson, Santorum, Pence) will get favorable attention only in the South (excluding Florida), and maybe Indiana, Kansas, Utah, and West Virginia. That attention will not translate into significant primary votes.

Lee Atwater played the race card to help Reagan and Bush, Sr.. Remember the line from from this 1981 interview? Atwater said: ''You start out in 1954 by saying, 'Nigger, nigger, nigger.' By 1968 you can't say 'nigger' -- that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff." And who from my generation can forget the infamous Willie Horton attack ad?

Karl Rove with George W. Bush

Then Karl Rove played the religion card for Bush, Jr:

NARRATOR: Both Rove and Bush knew that the election of 2000 had depended upon a core constituency, the conservative wing of the Republican Party, particularly the religious right.

DEBATE MODERATOR: Governor Bush, a philosopher-thinker. And why?

GEORGE W. BUSH: Christ, because he changed my heart.

When you accept Christ as your savior, it changes your life.

NARRATOR: George Bush had the genuine faith to appeal to religious conservatives. Karl Rove had the political instincts to see their campaign potential.

WAYNE SLATER, Dallas Morning News: Karl never really talked about religion very much. In fact, I got the clear impression that he was a person who was not religious at all.

DANA MILBANK: Now, where Karl's interest is, is in the mechanics of this. And I think it's fair to say that religious conservatives, evangelical churches, have become sort of the new labor unions (from this 2004 Frontline episode, "Karl Rove: The Architect").

See also David Kuo's Tempting Faith. Kuo was the Deputy Director of the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives from 2001-2003, and claimed that "some of the nation’s most prominent evangelical leaders were known in the office of presidential political strategist Karl Rove as 'the nuts.'

What will be the next card? Those scary undocumented immigrants? Denizens of places outside of Sarah Palin's "real America?" All those treasonous people who don't think the US of A is the most splendiferous country in the history of the universe? NPR addicts? Spongebob Squarepants enthusiasts? We'll soon find out...

One possible GOP card: depict the Democrats this way.
Maybe add some Beanie Babies for good measure.

Patriotic Providentialism

Earlier this year there were rows in the Michigan Statehouse over compelling public schools to abide by the Common Core standards.  Senator Colbeck "expressed concerns about a possible lack of local control over what is taught in Michigan schools."  This same Senator was the primary sponsor of three measures recently passed by the Michigan Senate that instruct our public schools how to teach civics.  I guess "local control" is a very flexible principle.

I'm a political scientist, and am all for bolstering instruction on our country's political system, but these measures seemed to be based on a presumption that public schools aren't already teaching civics.  Indeed, Senator Colbeck "conceded that Michigan's current high school curriculum does a good job of covering the topics envisioned in his bill, but said he believes that this additional instruction is necessary" (you can find the Michigan Department of Education's civics curriculum here).

What is this "additional instruction?"  Well, it's really just an injection of religion and a conservative understanding of our country's political history, á la the faux historian David Barton, I'm guessing.  It's no surprise that the group backing this legislation, Patriotweek.org, passes on lesson plans from The Providence Forum, an organization committed to the following idea:

The Doctrine of Providence declares that the world and our lives are not ruled by chance or by fate, but by God. The Providence Forum demonstrably acknowledges that the Providence of God continues to be at work and calls us to action.

Senate Bill 120 is not so forthright about its political theology, but tells schools that it cannot

. . .censor or restrain study or instruction in American history or heritage or Michigan state history or heritage based on religious references in original source documents, writings, speeches, proclamations, or records.

Have Michigan public schools engaged in routine censorship of religious references in political documents?  I can find no news or report on this supposed perfidy (though if someone out there has plausible evidence, I'd love to see it).  This language invents a problem.  Thankfully, pushback from educators forced Colbeck to drop this language that would have encouraged public school teachers to use sectarian documents as part of civics instruction:

. . .school districts may post documents and objects “of historical significance in forming or influencing the United States or its legal governmental system” and explicitly allows for “documents that contain words associated with religion.”

This law also implies that "original source documents," presumably the US Constitution, Declaration of Independence, Federalist Papers, among others, are chock full of religious references.  They're not--as Senator Colbeck and other "patriots" should know.  That said, I'm all for talking about religion as one element in a fascinating political history, but not as an occasion to paint a picture of Jesus present at the founding of the nation (and I imagine he would have felt a little uncomfortable among all those deists who denied his divinity).

John McNaughton (Mcnaughtonart.com)

Senate Bill 121 mandates schools to "designate and observe 1 week each year as 'Patriot Week," during which curriculum will focus on what is already in the civics curriculum--US foundational documents, political principles, ideas such as the "social compact" and "rule of law," and so on.  Moreover, students are to get the lesson that all of our nation's war making has been about "liberty."

Instruction in the sacrifices made by millions of military personnel and their families in the defense of liberty starting with the Revolutionary War and progressing to current conflicts.  Discussion should address the historic and modern-day significance of Veterans' Day, Independence Day, and Memorial Day.

I have no issue with honoring past and present members of the military, nor with studying the origins and meanings--not one meaning, as the text implies--of patriotic holidays.  But it is facile to equate all US military actions with the "defense of liberty."  Were we defending liberty while butchering Filipinos in what might be called the US's first counter-insurgency war (1900-1913)?  How about military interventionism and occupations in the Caribbean and Central America in the first third of the 20th century?  Or we could think of Vietnam, or, more recently, Iraq, where "liberty" became the cause only after we couldn't locate Iraq's WMDs.

Patriotism doesn't have to be about chest thumping (the US is "the greatest nation in world history," spouts Patriotweek.org).  It doesn't have to an unquestioning stance towards the military and US military actions.  Nor am I arguing that political and military history should be one long guilt trip.  Lessons in patriotism should include sober reflections on how the US has used its power, and the costs of war.  We should want informed students, not uncritical ones.

Huynh Cong "Nick" Ut, 1972 (acquired here)

Senate Bill 423 is a selective mash of lines drawn from the US Constitution and other national and state-level foundational documents.  Seems so redundant to be telling schools to teach students about things like separation of powers, the Bill of Rights, etc, when it's already in the curriculum (whether they are taught or learned well is another matter).  But I think the point of this law is really in the first "core principle" on which public school teachers are to focus.

(A) The core principles of the Declaration of Independence, including, but not limited to, the following:
    (i) We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

This instruction is lifted from Patriotweek.org's playbook, which is based on the idea that rights and liberties come not from government, nor from action by social movements demanding certain rights and liberties, but from God and its creation.  For example, in its explanation of the "First Principle" of equality,

The Founding Fathers embraced the Judeo-Christian understanding that the Creator created all individuals, that each person arises from His handiwork, and that every person embodies His blessing. Regardless of physical, mental, and social differences between individuals, each individual is equally precious in His eyes. While this First Principle originally arose from a belief in the nature of the Creator, the laws of nature lead many to the same conclusion.

At a very, very general level, the argument that the founding of the US rests on a Judeo-Christian understanding of the world is correct (though we'll have to ignore all the anti-semitism in the US history, and that the term "Judeo-Christian"wasn't popularized until the early 1950s).  However, it's questionable that a Judeo-Christian understanding of the world was the crucial factor behind the US's "exceptional" origins.  By the same reasoning, we could say that understanding was also responsible for fascist horrors in Italy and Germany, two countries also resting on the bedrock of Judeo-Christian ideas.  Association is not causation.

I suspect the other thing driving this legislation is the standard conservative jeremiad in which 'we've lost our way, and need to strip away all the extraneous stuff we've wrapped around our origins.'  For some Christian conservatives, this is the "sola scriptura" argument.  For political ones in Michigan, it's the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the Northwest Ordinance, the US Constitution, parts of the Bill of Rights (SB 423 mentions Amendments 1, 2, 9, and 10, omitting 3-8), and the Michigan Constitution.

A lot has happened and changed since the late 18th century.  The world today would likely mystify our founding fathers.  Many were brilliant and we should study them and their works.  But we shouldn't sacralize them, nor turn foundational documents into a holy canon.  If God and nature were behind the "First Principle" of equality, certain social groups still had to struggle mightily to win that equality, against others--including agents of local, state, and federal government--who thought they had divine and natural law on their side.

Patriotweek acknowledges that our nation took some time to grant women and African Americans political equality, and that this "First Principle" is still a work in progress.  But it's telling that Patriotweek does not give a nod to other social groups who have suffered from inequality, e.g., Native Americans, Latinos/as, the disabled, and the LGBT community.  Hagiographic lessons on patriotism are inevitably myopic.

To my mind, real patriots can celebrate our country's achievements, and recognize its flaws.  Real patriots aren't so insecure that they must take the arrogant position that the US is "the greatest nation in world history," and that God is on its side.  Real patriots can love their country without such idolatry.

Values Cruising with Cruz

Oh, another Values Voter Summit, a gathering of social conservatives that stands for "faith, family, and opportunity for all."  Yes, well, it's actually one that stands for a particular strand of Christian faith, a particular kind of family, and opportunity for all except for those who are G, B, L, or T, or those undocumented that do their lawns, build their roofs, or clean their hotel rooms.

Checking out the list of speakers, I saw a number of right-wing has-beens, a symptom of the Summit's growing irrelevance to national politics and the US political culture:

Rep. Michele Bachman (R-MN), under the haze of a Congressional ethics probe, is not running for re-election in 2014.   She recently made the false claim that the Obama administration is arming Al Qaeda in Syria, and added that this was a sign of the end times (yes, please, Jesus, come take her away).  Of the 59 Bachman statements Politifact evaluated, 8 were deemed mostly false, 21 false, and 16 "pants on fire." What an icon of truthiness.

Gary Bauer, head of American Values, and one of the most strident anti-gay guys in the US.  His position has becoming increasingly marginal as a growing number of Americans, even conservatives, simply don't share his homophobia (see, for example, this Pew report).

Glenn Beck, booted by Fox a couple of years ago when advertisers finally could no longer stomach his loony-tunes musings.  He continues his asinine conspiracy theorizing via his Blaze media network, reaching a smaller, but apparently more devoted audience.

Jim DeMint, a Senator (R-SC) who suddenly resigned at the beginning of this year and took the position of president at the conservative think-tank Heritage Foundation.  Evidently he prefers the well-paid bully pulpit to the harder work of governance.  Last May Heritage published a report asserting that comprehensive immigration reform would cost trillions of dollars and grant undocumented migrants that now pilloried status, "amnesty."  Critics on both the left and right panned the report's math.  They also noted that one of the authors, Jason Richwine, has regurgitated the 19th century racist theory of phrenologists who believed in a racial and ethnic hierarchy of intelligence (Hispanics and blacks are on the bottom).  As Jamelle Bouie suggests, his move to "exercise power from a different perch has backfired, and on this issue, [he is] a more marginal figure than he was in the Senate."

Allen West, a one-term Representative (R-FL) known for a host of outrageous comments that probably spelled his failed re-election bid in 2012.  Along with saying that a number of his Democratic colleagues were out and out commies (Joe McCarthy must have smiled in his grave), he said

These Planned Parenthood women, the Code Pink women, and all of these women have been neutering American men and bringing us to the point of this incredible weakness. . . .We are not going to have our men become subservient [see here for more silliness].

But other invited speakers are up-and-coming darlings of the hard right.  Ted Cruz is one.  The Values Voter Summit just anointed him in its straw poll for the 2016 presidential elections.  He took 42% of the votes, with Dr. Ben Carson (who??) in a distant second with 13%.  These straw polls have been good predictors of electoral failures.

2009 Mike Huckabee
2010 Mike Pence
2011 Ron Paul (Tony Perkins sniffed that Paul won only because he bussed in libertarian supporters)
2012 Mike Huckabee

Why do people with the right values--the rest of us have the wrong ones, don't you know--like Cruz so much?  Here's some choice lines from his Summit speech, and why they likely worked for his audience.

http://www.salon.com/2013/06/19/what_if_we_demanded_ted_cruzs_papers/

Cruz tells it like it is.  Obama has dictatorial ambitions:

This is an administration that seems bound and determined to violate every single one of our Bill of Rights.  I don't know that they have yet violated the Third Amendment, but I expect them to start quartering soldiers in peoples' homes soon.

Senator Cruz must be powerful to get around President Hussein Obama's clampdown on the First Amendment right to free speech.

Cruz is a funny guy, even while reminding of us of what we must fear:

So this afternoon President Obama has invited the Senate Republicans to the White House.  So after leaving here, I'm going to be going to the White House.  I will make a request.  If I'm never seen again, please send a search and rescue team.  I very much hope by tomorrow morning I don't wake up amidst the Syrian rebels.

Oh, please be careful Senator Cruz. You've been targeted for oppression, but you bravely accept the risks, all delivered in dark humor. What a non-subservient manly man!

Cruz mocks the French, a sure sign of fidelity to all those who truly love God and the US, and who see the two as joined at the hip:

Our foreign policy is detente, which I'm pretty sure is French for surrender.

Oh, those frigging French.  Please, Senator Cruz, give us Freedom Fries again!

http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/
0,28804,2061530_2061531_2061545,00.html

Speaking of God, you should know, according to the Values Voter Summit, that a "war is raging for the soul of America."

I suspect there's only one group fighting this war, the sponsors of the Summit.  The rest of us are just hoping for reason to reign in DC.

DOMA's Dead, Long Live....What?

The Leave it to Beaver Cleaver Family

 A few nights ago we had dinner with some of our extended family--a sister-in-law of my two adopted nuyorican children, along with her her half-sister, whose mother is Colombian.  This is just the beginning of a complicated skein of relations and social origins that make up my extended family featuring numerous second (or more) marriages, step and half-siblings, adoptions, mixed couples, and so on.  There is not much "normal" in it, if by "normal" we mean the mythical US family made up of a nuclear couple in its one and only marriage, with two children, all the same race or ethnicity, all straight.  Now, we know that this is not always the typical family, but it is the norm--we can see it in the TV families of the 1950s and 60s (think Leave it to Beaver).  We can see this norm invoked in the non-traditional families that began popping up in the 1970s, ones that were edgy (One Day at a Time), comedic (Brady Bunch), or quaintly cute (The Courtship of Eddy's Father). They were--or tried to be--edgy, comedic, or cute precisely because they were not normal families.

Same-sex couple with two adopted children.
From: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/13/
gay-family-photos-project_n_3436299.html

Though less powerful today--this norm still holds a sway over many Americans.  Witness the anger and grief over the Supreme Court's recent rulings dooming the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and California's Proposition 8.  A narrow majority, 5-4, declared DOMA unconstitutional.  Another 5-4 decision, with a different mix of judges, refused on procedural grounds to deliberate a suit regarding California's Prop 8, a ban on same-sex marriage.  This turned the case back to a lower court that had already ruled against the ban.  In effect, this legalized same-sex marriage in California (NPR story).

The narrow splits in the Supreme Court reflect the seeming polarization of the American people on the matter LGBT issues and their connection to marriage and family.  A recent Pew Survey finds that a narrow 51% majority supports the legalization of same-sex marriage.  But I said "seeming" because this percentage shot up dramatically from 32% in 2003.  Moreover, 2/3 of Americans support the idea of civil unions for same-sex couples, and 60% agree that "society should accept homosexuality." So there's a social sea change out there that the Court does not appear to reflect regarding the issue of homosexuality.

In a harsh dissent, Justice Scalia called the ruling a "judicial distortion," but what really irked him was the subtext he saw in it.  The ruling painted pro-DOMA people as "hateful," as an "enemy of human decency," as "monsters" (Politico).  I didn't read the entire 77 page decision, but summaries (e.g. Huffington Post) of the decision can be boiled down to two issues.  The majority found that DOMA violated the the Fifth Amendment's "due process" clause, and that it unjustifiably denied a class of people equal standing before the law.  That is unconstitutional discrimination (it's not surprising that the decision cited the 1967 Loving v. Virginia case that struck down a state law banning inter-racial marriage--Washington Post).

Justice Antonio Scalia
http://www.oyez.org/justices/antonin_scalia

Scalia came up with those terms characterizing those opposed to full equality for homosexuals, exaggerating the language of his judicial opponents.  I think he did so in order to make the point that he should be allowed to be morally comfortable with discrimination.  It is not hateful or indecent to treat LGBT folks as second-class citizens, and how dare you suggest that...

Other reactions were equally visceral.  Mike Huckabee, former governor and presidential contender and current Fox commentator, tweeted "Jesus wept," a curious equation of Lazarus and DOMA (what Christ-like figure will appear to call to DOMA "Come forth!"?).  American Family Association radio host, Bryan Fischer, trotted out the tired saw that the ruling would lead to a sexapocalypse: "The DOMA ruling has now made the normalization of polygamy, pedophilia, incest and bestiality inevitable. Matter of time."  More sedate, the Conference of US Catholic Bishops called it a "tragic day for marriage"  (Tweets at Religious News).  Or you can go over to Rightwingwatch.org and wade through a slew of all sorts of dire predictions and accusations, starting with Focus on the Family James Dobson, who claims that the DOMA ruling "threaten[s] the entire superstructure of society" (Superstructure? Apparently, he doesn't know what the term means, but I prefer to think he's channeling Marx...).

I could go on like this, but I'll just get more sarcastic and snarky.  On this issue there's a gulf between a sizable minority and slim majority of Americans.  Those opposed to full equality for homosexuals depict their discriminatory position as moral or legal while those in favor of that equality see it as immoral or illegal.  There's no easy way over this gulf.  Every advance of equality has involved failed efforts to reason with one another, and ensuing conflict and bitterness.  We'll just have to endure it, and know that people in a generation or two--just as we do now looking back on the civil rights movements--will shake their heads at us, wondering how we could have been so obdurate

By the way--this decision has had immediate consequences here in Michigan, where a

...federal judge has ordered Michigan to stop enforcing a law that has barred community colleges and many other government agencies (though not universities) from providing any benefits to the same-sex partners of employees (Inside Higher Education).

This is perhaps a sign that all states that have passed laws designed to deny government benefits to same-sex couples--that is, trying to DOMA them at the local level--will face legal challenges in the near future.

Why, God, oh why another mass murder? Because He's peeved...

In the wake of the news of the horrific mass slaying Friday in Newtown, Connecticut, I saw this image posted on Facebook:

My reaction was to think that whoever was posing as God here must think God's pretty weak and capricious.  Despite his power, he can't get into secular schools, and since he can't, it's people's fault if they suffer a horrific tragedy.  Talk about 'blaming the victim.'  And it seems grotesque to me to think that God would make the killing and traumatization of a school and community--which no doubt included many of his believers--an object lesson for the rest of us.

But maybe I'm wrong.  The author of the universe, the all-powerful God, according to the far-right evangelical, Bryan Fischer, will not go where his invitation has been revoked, not because he's a vampire, but because he's courteous. There is a strict etiquette, after all, governing divine providence:

We kicked God out of our public school system.  And I think God would say to us, 'Hey, I'll be glad to protect your children, but you gotta invite me back into your world first. I’m not going to go where I’m not wanted. I am a gentleman.  You know, I think back to when I was in elementary school, we had prayer in schools, and we...didn't...need...guns. I'm gonna repeat that. Back when we had prayer, the Bible, and the Ten Commandments in schools, we...did...not...need...guns! (you can find this excerpt here, about eight minutes into the broadcast)

A more well-known and sedate evangelical, Mike Huckabee, agreed, in a Fox News interview:

“We ask why there’s violence in our schools, but we’ve systematically removed God from our schools...Should we be so surprised that schools would become a place of carnage?”

I suppose I should be used to this by now.  Chatting with Pat Robertson on the 700 Club, the late Jerry Falwell blamed 9/11 on "the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way..."  Pastor John Hagee, infamous endorser of John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign, told Fresh Air's Terry Gross that Hurricane Katrina was the "judgment of God" on a city that had a "level of sin offensive to God." And, turning back to the 700 Club, Pat Robertson attributed the devastating 2010 earthquake in Haiti to a Haitian deal with the devil back during the revolt against the French at the beginning of the 19th century.

So the logic here is that when a people disobey God's will--that is, do not follow fundamentalist Christian tenets--then God visits them with natural disasters or mass slayings, or permits them to occur.  Conversely, then, the more prevalent fundamentalist Christianity is in a given community, or among a people, there should be fewer disasters and mass slayings.  There should be fewer violent casualties in general.

If true, then why do Cubans, under a harshly secular communist regime, suffer significantly less from hurricanes and tropical storms then nearby Guatemala, where evangelicalism is flourishing? (See report on Cuba here, and news story on Guatemala here).  Why do Western European countries, far more secular than the US, experience far fewer mass slayings and gun-related deaths than the US?  As the Washington Post's Ezra Klein noted, "15 of the 25 worst mass shootings in the last fifty years took place in the United States. . .in second place is Finland, with two entries."  And as is obvious in the numbers below, there's a lot more bloody gunplay in the US than in countries that former presidential aspirant, Rick Santorum, once described as "dead from a faith perspective."

Country                   Homicide Rate by Firearms (per 100,000)
Belgium                     0.68
Denmark                    0.51
England/Wales           0.07
Finland                       0.45
France                        0.06
Germany                    0.19
Netherlands                0.33
Norway                      0.05
Portugal                      0.41
Spain                          0.20
Sweden                      0.41
United States              2.97
Source: The Guardian "Gun Homicides and Gun Ownership by Country"

I suppose, though, that a theology that poses a vindictive divine providence doesn't require empirical support.  After all, there is that convenient rebuttal: God works in mysterious ways.  And it's not a surprise that this kind of perspective on God's character should be prevalent among some Christians, like Fischer and Huckabee, who take a literalist approach to the Bible.  Think about how Moses had to talk God out of destroying his people for their idolatry (Exodus 32: 7-14), or how God helped the ancient Hebrews slaughter tens of thousands in their conquest of the Promised Land (Jericho, among other examples in the book of Joshua).  Or there's Jephthah vowing to God that, in exchange for divine help in the battlefield against the Ammonites, he will sacrifice the first thing he sees when he returns home.  God helps him win, and the first thing he sees turns out to be his daughter.  And he fulfills his vow (Judges 11: 29-40).  Really, the body-count at the hands of God or his human instruments is pretty incredible.

I know, though, that there are other sides to God's character in the Bible--his mercy and lovingkindness extolled in Psalms 145, for example, or his commitment to what today we would call social justice (see my favorite prophet, Amos), and there is, of course, the God of the New Testament, and the repeated lessons in the Gospels and the Epistles about loving one another, and being vehicles of God's love: "A new commandment I give to you, Jesus said, "that you love one another, even as I have loved you" (John 13:34), "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13), "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Mark 12: 31), or the well-known passage from 1 Corinthians 13, "Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous..."

And I am sure that Christians such as Fischer and Huckabee would not reduce God to moments where his providence allegedly results in slaughter.  I imagine they would agree with this evangelical's take:

It is true that the Bible contains graphic stories of sin, evil, and death. But it also includes the overarching grand story of love, redemption, and grace. It showcases a God who asks us to not criticize Him about His acts of justice, but instead One who kindly encourages us to come alongside Him and grieve over a world that has misused the gift of freedom given it to do wrong instead of right. When that happens, and God acts in His righteousness, the world discovers that consequences exist for evil behavior, which is something the prophet Isaiah speaks to: “At night my soul longs for You, Indeed, my spirit within me seeks You diligently; for when the earth experiences Your judgments the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness” (Isaiah 26:9, excerpt from "Is the God of the Old Testament a Merciless Monster," by Robin Schumacher).

Still, when Christians turn calamities such as the Sandy Hook school massacre into a proof, unverifiable though it is, of their religious critique, I am not chastened, much less edified.  I hear only a self-righteous, smug 'This is what you get and deserve for not agreeing with my particular religion.'

But I am grateful for the many Christians I know who do not share this smugness. I don't share the faith, but appreciate how they live out theirs, and I'll close with words of Paul Duris, a Foursquare pastor and my brother-in-law, posted on Facebook last Friday:

This is a day of mourning for all of us. I feel numb. But I've been thinking about the words from Romans 12:21, "Do not be overcome by evil...overcome evil with good." We can't stop hate, but we can be the ones that do good. We can raise the bar of kindness and love with the next person we talk to. We can be the ones that overcome evil with good.

US Christianity's Cold War baggage

As a plug for the recently released paperback edition of  American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, David Campbell and Robert Putnam published an essay summarizing that book in  Foreign Affairs a few months ago (Mar/Apr 2012).  As the article reveals, the book is not yet another slamming the religious right. It is instead an historical and social scientific analysis of the intersection of religion and politics in post-WWII US.  But their analysis still blames the religious right for politicizing religion, and as "religion and politics have become entangled," they write, "many Americans, especially younger ones, have pulled away from religion.  And that correlation turns out to causal, not coincidental."

Campbell and Putnam rightly begin in the 1950s, when religiosity surged:

more Americans than ever were attending religious services, more churches were being built to accommodate them, and more books of Scripture were being sold and read. But in President Dwight Eisenhower's America, religion had no partisan overtones. Ike was as popular among those who never darkened the door of a church (or synagogue, and so on) as among churchgoers.

But then those tumultuous Sixties came along, and its "aftershocks" in the 1970s, with declining religious adherents among Catholics and liberal Protestant denominations, and a polarization that we now call the "God gap" between liberals and conservatives, and between Democrats and Republicans.

With "In God We Trust" on our currency, dollars could
 not be anything but the truth.  From retronaut.co

But I would say that the early Cold War years really set this all up.  President Truman, and even more Eisenhower after him, linked religion to the struggle against communism--the faithful versus godless atheism.  In 1952, the Senate endorsed the fervently anticommunist Billy Graham's revival on federal grounds.  Eisenhower, with much public fanfare, began his cabinet meetings with prayer (led, interestingly, by Ezra Taft Benson, Agriculture Secretary and and one of the Apostles of the Mormon church).  Ike also started the practice of an annual prayer breakfast (1953), and signed laws adding "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance (1954) and making "In God We Trust" the national motto and a message on currency (1956).  His administration also set up an "Ideological Subcommittee on the Religious Factor" in the National Security Council in order to think up ways to use religion as a "cold war instrument," and it created civil-military training programs like "Militant Liberty" that relied on Protestant evangelicals to instruct soldiers and citizens on the religious foundation of their nation's cold war mission (these programs would soon morph into Campus Crusade for Christ and the Christian Embassy).

Citizens were doing their part, too, with pastors writing sermons on the evils of communism, the Eagle's Club putting the Ten Commandments on courthouse lawns (with the support of Cecil B. DeMille's money), the YWCA declaring that "Christian ideals" were a crucial component of the US's cold war armory, and the fundamentalist International Council of Christian Churches sending bibles over the Iron Curtain on balloons.

This early cold war religiosity was so thorough that in 1954 the New York Times would report that at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, "The President led millions of Americans in observance of a Memorial Day of prayer for peace as the best means of keeping faith with the nation’s war dead..."  The reporter couldn't possibly have known that in fact millions did pray along with the President.  It didn't matter.  The story was so eminently believable.  And it is no surprise that the following year the Republican National Committee would declare Eisenhower the "spiritual leader of our times."

In other words, the courtship between the Republican party and evangelicals really began in the 1950s, and this post-war religious surge was wrapped up in a cold war understanding of the US's mission in the world. Because this took place when the US had just come off a grand victory, and was enjoying unprecedented economic prosperity and military superiority, I'm thinking this cold war religiosity imprinted the WW II and early Baby Boomer generations with a new norm connecting Christianity, patriotism, and anticommunism.

This imprint was so powerful that, for many, that's the way it always used to be, or should be.  However, the "aftershocks" of the sixties and seventies (all those protests and movements--civil rights, women's, anti-war, counter-culture--along with the Kent State shootings, Watergate and the Church hearings) exposed the earlier halcyon years as just a blip of seeming content consensus in a much longer national history. But jeremiads since the "Reagan revolution" in the early 1980s have kept reviving it, along with the other new norms that appeared at the time: nuclear families (heterosexual of course) living in single-family homes in subdivisions, men as breadwinners and women at home, car ownership as necessity and rite of passage into adulthood (meaning we need cheap gas!), and socioeconomic mobility as likely for all rather just possible (at least for working and middle class whites).

And note that the lines of cultural conflict are running through many of those elements of the Cold War supposedly apolitical "civil religion" that the Eisenhower promoted--battles over prayer in government settings, over the Ten Commandment monuments on courthouse lawns; over the prayer breakfast; over the "under God" clause added to the Pledge, and over evangelical activities at the US Air Force Academy.

The slogan for Eisenhower's first presidential campaign was "I Like Ike" (see TV ad here), and some still really long for him and his time, when what are now considered conservative Christian attitudes were dominant, or even national norms.  Thus we still hear some throwing "socialism" or "communism" (or now, "redistribution") at people or ideas they deem evil, 20 years after the end of the cold war.  It's no surprise that presidential candidate Rick Santorum talked about taking the country back to pre-Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) days when states could ban the use of contraceptives.  This imprint is why the crisis in the home construction and car industries was devastating not only in terms of lost jobs and livelihoods, but because the house and the car have been the core of the American Dream since the early cold war years.  The imprint is why Fox's Bill O'Reilly brought on Charles Krauthammer to help viewers understand "the decline of America in the context of the Republican debate."  This was a goofy way to put it--I'm sure O'Reilly didn't mean to imply that the GOP debate was in part reflecting the decline, but the term set up the title of Krauthammer's section "Can any of the GOP candidates restore America?"

Ron DiCianni's Praying for Peace

But in terms of religion, the imprint has weakened, or rather, it appears to have remained with an increasingly smaller slice of the US electorate.  That was clear when efforts by some conservative evangelicals to make George W. Bush another "spiritual leader of our times" did not get farther than the kitschy art of Ron DiCianni.  It was evident in the minor firestorms that broke out over discoveries of a "religious factor" in the global war on terror (President Bush calling the war on terror a "crusade," military intelligence briefings with bible verses on their covers, bible verses inscribed on rifle sights, among others).  It was obvious in President Bush's ultimately failed effort to lure support for his global war on terror by obliquely framing it as divinely sanctioned mission. "Freedom and fear, justice and cruelty," he announced shortly after 9/11, "have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them."  Or a year later, cribbing wildly from the Gospel of John, he declared that

Ours is the cause of human dignity: freedom guided by conscience and guarded by peace.  This ideal of America is the hope of all mankind.  That hope drew millions to this harbor: That hope still lights our way.  And the light shines in the darkness.  And the darkness will not overcome it.

A 2006 Baylor survey reveals one reason why that this framing got so little traction.  Only a quarter of evangelicals agreed with the proposition that "God favors the United States," and overall, less than a fifth of Americans agreed with it.  But it was not just that fewer conservative Christians were buying the notion of a providential role for their country.  As Campbell and Putnam, the entire religious landscape has dramatically shifted.  Since the 1970s, an increasing number of people report no religious affiliation (from 5-7% to 19% in 2011), and this trend is even stronger among the "millennials," those under 30 (33% in 2011).  The reason, according to Campbell and Putnam, is that

. . .To them, "religion" means "Republican," "intolerant," and "homophobic." Since those traits do not represent their views, they do not see themselves -- or wish to be seen by their peers -- as religious.
     Our data support this theory. By tracking individuals for five years, between 2006 and 2011, we found that Democrats and progressives were much more likely to become nones than were Republicans. The religious defections were concentrated specifically among those Americans who reported the greatest discomfort with religion-infused politics, regardless of their own partisan loyalties. In effect, Americans (especially young Americans) who might otherwise attend religious services are saying, "Well, if religion is just about conservative politics, then I'm outta here."

So the "God-gap" is growing, not just between ideological stances and party affiliations, but also between generations.  But the term "God-gap" can mislead us--the dropping number of people identifying with this or that Christian denomination does not necessarily mean religiosity or interest in spiritual matters has dropped precipitously--we can read it as greater religious pluralism.  Its this growing pluralism that has permitted a Mormon to become the GOP candidate for president.  But it also means the Republican party will have a hard time with the growing number of voters who do not adhere to a Christian orthodoxy rooted in a Cold War Manichaeism.

Republicans at play in the fields of the Lord

Jon Stewart showed a clip of Fox News commentators ripping into Democrats for not mentioning God in their platform ("EXTREME MAKEOVER: Democrats lose 'God' from platform").  The clip ended with Bill O'Reilly saying, apparently mystified, "How there can be an entire section on faith if you don't mention God? What do we have faith in?" Stewart replied, "Uhh, I have faith in a God that's not so insecure he doesn't freak out if you don't mention his name enough."

I agree with the Stewart's sentiment, and have long wondered about the God of orthodox Christians who seems to be a petty, insecure old man who insists his believers constantly stroke his ego.  I'm reminded of the well-known passage from Luke--the "seek, and you will find" one--where Jesus says

"Now suppose one of you fathers is asked by his son for a fish; he will not give him a snake instead of a fish, will he? Or if he is asked for an egg, he will not give him a scorpion, will he?  If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?" (Luke 11:11-13, NASB).

I realize this passage is about the nature of God's grace, but I see it also as a way to conceptualize God. If one exists, if God is perfect, beyond our ken, then the best we imperfect people can do is imagine the best kind of character for God.  And for me, that character wouldn't be someone lolling about up there in heaven worried about whether we used its name in a curse, whether we mention its name enough in public, whether we're working hard enough to make others use God-talk in the public square.

However, I still have enough of my Lutheran upbringing in me to think that Stewart missed the point in his rejoinder to O'Reilly. In orthodox Christianity (as with orthodox Judaism and Islam), believers are to acknowledge the presence of God, and God's authorship of the world and their lives.  And they are to confess it.  A consequence of this could be a healthy humility and a source of inspiration to be better vehicles of compassion and justice.  Humans are not sole masters of their fates; their gifts and successes are not just the result of their own efforts; their foibles and failures are evidence of inherent imperfection and a dependence on grace, or undeserved love (". . .all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." Romans 3:23).

But the problem for me is that I just don't see much of this humility or inspiration in the GOP's platform.  I just see god-talk for the sake of demonstrating the party's piety, and a specious argument that to vote for the Republicans is a vote for a party that will do the Lord's work.

Fox News' Gretchen Carlson said God was named 12 times in the GOP platform, but I could find only ten. Still, that's enough to suggest that the GOP wants to make it clear to its adherents that religious belief, and therefore God, undergirds its policy positions--and the United States, if under proper leadership.

Though the US Constitution does not mention God, the platform's preamble links the Constitution to its religious vision of politics. The Constitution is "the greatest political document ever written," it is "sacred," and in the same breath, we must "reaffirm that our rights come from God."  It's no surprise that David Barton, the faux historian who has manufactured an idealized Christian origin of the United States, participated in writing the platform.

The platform repeats that affirmation seven more times:

•We offer our Republican vision of a free people using their God-given talents. . .

•We are the party of the Constitution, the solemn compact which confirms our God-given individual rights. . .

•The primary role of government is to protect the God-given, inalienable, inherent rights of its citizens. . .

•We acknowledge, support, and defend the law-abiding citizen's God-given right of self-defense.

•In assessing the various sources of potential energy, Republicans advocate an all-of-the-above diversified approach, taking advantage of all our American God-given resources.

•As the pioneer of conservation over a century ago, the Republican Party believes in the moral obligation of the people to be good stewards of the God-given natural beauty and resources of our country. . .

•A young person’s ability to achieve in school must be based on his or her God-given talent and motivation, not an address, zip code, or economic status.

The platform mentions God twice more, a pledge to protect the Pledge of Allegiance's "under God" from "activist judges," and a salutation ("May God continue to shed his grace. . .").  But religion comes out in other ways besides the number of times God is mentioned.  In the section We the People: a Restoration of Constitutional Government there is the unsurprising declaration about protecting marriage--between one man and one woman--from an "activist judiciary." The platform also defines the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) as the GOP's "sacred contract" (the word "sacred" appears six times in the platform).  And there is the expected hostility to abortion.

Republicans are also in a spiritual battle. "Liberal elites" are trying "to drive religious beliefs--and religious believers--out of the public square."  The "current Administration" is conducting a "war on religion," with its rules forcing most health care plans, even those at Catholic non-profits, to provide contraceptives to women free of charge (The NY Times succinctly sums up this issue here).  But it is not only President Obama leading this "war."  It's those people forcing counties to remove the Ten Commandments from their courthouse lawns, who oppose public prayer in schools, who lead "hate campaigns" against businesses and organizations like the Boy Scouts for their anti-gay positions.  

Apparently, it's Americans' God-given right to compel all to accommodate their religious imprimatur on the public square; it is their God-given liberty to discriminate against the GLBT community.

The platform finishes with declarations on foreign policy, which the GOP titled American Exceptionalism, "the conviction that our country holds a unique place and role in human history." What this really means, given the religiosity elsewhere in the document, is that the US plays a providential role in the world.  That is, our country does God's work, but, and this is a big "but," only if American voters make the right choice. "Providence has put us at the fork in the road, and we must answer the question [actually, two]: If not us, who? If not now, when?  That is the choice facing the American people this November. . ."

This exceptionalism is an old, old conception dating back to those Puritans who thought they might be the new "chosen people," building the "city on the hill."  Reagan famously made a similar claim, and since Reagan is in the GOP's pantheon of minor deities, it's not surprising that its platform would make it a central point in their presentation to the American people.

The stark, scary choice is also nothing new, but I guess I'm still surprised by such an overt religious framing.  It reminds me of a county commission race in Indiana where I used to live.  During the debate between the candidates, one person answered the question "Why are you running?" with "I believe Jesus wants me to run." My mouth dropped open, and I looked around to catch the reactions of others.  I saw lots of heads nodding 'yes.'  Guess I had missed the divine memo, and, by the way, the guy won, handily.

I suppose this GOP platform is such a memo letting me know that the Republicans are doing the Lord's work and the Democrats are, well, doing hellish stuff.

So, why I think the GOP platform is arrogant for claiming a role as providential agent, those Christians who support the platform likely think I am an agent of evil (perhaps an unwitting one) given that I am an agnostic who opposes many of the GOP policy positions that further the work of God.  That conversation, were I to have one, is dead on arrival.

But I'm guessing there are a lot of others, hostile to Obama from the beginning, or now disenchanted, who simply ignore the religious aspect of the GOP position.  They just want Obama out of the White House. Or they prefer Republican economic and social policies.  I know platforms are wish lists that are never even partially realized, but I hope these voters think about the whole package they will hand us should Mitt Romney win.