In two articles appearing in
Sojourners this morning
Jim Wallis, who had a standing room only event at Calvin College back in April 2005, and
David Domke join the fray on critism of President Bush and radical-right misusing religion and religious language for political gains in the wake of protest letters and demostration marches of hundreds at Calvin College.
You heard it here first.
Previous Diary“Christians of Conscience Stage Insurrection at Calvin College”
Those of Faith, ask yourself:
If Karl Rove is willing to attack the church of his own grandmother (and father actually), who then is safe?
Bush's Calvin College surprise
by Jim Wallis
http://www.sojo.net/
5/26/05
As I've traveled the country this spring - 82 events, 48 cities, and hundreds of media interviews since January - I've witnessed a new movement of moderate and progressive religious voices challenging the monologue of the Religious Right.
An extremely narrow and aggressively partisan expression of right-wing Republican religion has controlled the debate on faith and politics in the public square for years. But that is no longer true.
At packed book events around the country these days, I often make an announcement that elicits a tumultuous response: "The monologue of the Religious Right is finally over, and a new dialogue has begun!" Smiles light up the faces of thousands of people as they break out in thunderous applause.
That new dialogue was visible recently at Calvin College. Karl Rove, seeking a friendly venue for a commencement speech in Michigan, approached Calvin and offered President Bush as the speaker. The college, which had already invited Nicholas Wolterstorff of Yale to deliver the speech, hastily disinvited him and welcomed the president. But the White House apparently was not counting on the reaction of students and faculty. Rove expected the evangelical Christian college in the dependable "red" area of western Michigan to be a safe place. He was wrong.
The day the president was to speak, an ad featuring a letter signed by one-third of Calvin's faculty and staff ran in The Grand Rapids Press. Noting that "we seek open and honest dialogue about the Christian faith and how it is best expressed in the political sphere," the letter said that "we see conflicts between our understanding of what Christians are called to do and many of the policies of your administration."
The letter asserted that administration policies have "launched an unjust and unjustified war in Iraq," "taken actions that favor the wealthy of our society and burden the poor, " "harmed creation and have not promoted long-term stewardship of our natural environment," and "fostered intolerance and divisiveness and has often failed to listen to those with whom it disagrees." It concluded: "Our passion for these matters arises out of the Christian faith that we share with you. We ask you, Mr. President, to re-examine your policies in light of our God-given duty to pursue justice with mercy...." One faculty member told a reporter, "We are not Lynchburg. We are not right wing; we're not left wing. We think our faith trumps political ideology."
On commencement day, according to news reports, about a quarter of the 900 graduates wore "God is not a Republican or a Democrat" buttons pinned to their gowns.
The events at Calvin, along with the growing crowds at our events around the country, are visible signs that the Religious Right does not speak for all Christians, even all evangelical Christians. What I hear, from one end of this country to the other, is how tired we are of ideological religion and how hungry we are for prophetic faith. The students and faculty at Calvin College are the most recent sign of that hunger.
**AND**
God-talk in the GOP
by David Domke and Kevin Coe
http://www.sojo.net/
5/26/05
George W. Bush is delivering two commencement addresses this spring. One will be Friday at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland - an unsurprising venue. The other took place last week at Calvin College, a small evangelical Christian school in western Michigan. The latter is the latest attempt by the administration and the Republican Party to use God for political gain.
In the past two months alone, GOP leaders have invoked God in public discussions about the medical care of Terri Schiavo, judicial-nominee votes in the U.S. Senate, and the treatment of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay over charges of unethical conduct.
Welcome to the new world of religious politics, made successful by President Bush and increasingly adopted by other Republicans.
For some time now there has been a heated debate regarding whether Bush is different from other presidents in his religious rhetoric. Here's the answer: He is. What sets Bush apart is how much he talks about God and what he says when he does so.
In his inaugural and State of the Union addresses earlier this year, Bush referenced God 11 times. This came on the heels of 24 invocations of God in his first-term inaugural and State of the Union addresses. No other president since Franklin Roosevelt took office in 1933 has mentioned God so often in these high-state settings.
The closest to Bush's average of 5.8 references per each of these addresses is Ronald Reagan, who averaged 5.3 in his comparable speeches. No one else is close. Jimmy Carter, considered as pious as they come among U.S. presidents, only had two God mentions in four addresses. Other also-rans in total God-talk were wartime presidents Franklin Roosevelt at 1.8 and Lyndon Johnson at 1.5 references per inaugural and State of the Union address.
Bush also talks about God differently than have most other modern presidents. Presidents since Roosevelt have commonly spoken as petitioners of God, seeking blessing, favor, and guidance. This president positions himself as a prophet, issuing declarations of divine desires for the nation and world. Among modern presidents, only Reagan has spoken in a similar manner - and he did so far less frequently than has Bush.
This striking change in White House rhetoric is apparent in how presidents have spoken about God and the values of freedom and liberty, two ideas central to American identity. Consider a few examples: In a famous 1941 address delineating four essential freedoms threatened by fascism, Roosevelt said: "This nation has placed its destiny in the hands and heads and hearts of its millions of free men and women; and its faith in freedom under the guidance of God."
Contrast this statement with Bush's claim in 2003 that "Americans are a free people, who know that freedom is the right of every person and the future of every nation. The liberty we prize is not America's gift to the world, it is God's gift to humanity."
Bush's is not a request for divine favor; it is a declaration of divine wishes. And now his Republican Party colleagues are adopting the same strategy.