Truly equal rights
The 2008 race for the Presidency is barely underway, but there's already two pieces of information which, in combination, have me concerned.
- Mitt Romney, a very qualified and conservative Republican candidate, is being eyed with suspicion primarily because he's a Mormon.
- The very liberal Senator Barack Obama had a recent upswell of support since revealing that he's a born-again Christian.
In short, I'm worried that many Christians will vote for Obama because he's a Christian ("Rah, rah, we got another Christian in the White House!") over Romney because he isn't, without thinking about the real consequences.
Most people, when asked about Romney say, "I like him, but I'm not sure about him being a Mormon." Make no mistake: this is illegal discrimination, just as if they had said "I like him, but I'm not sure about him being Black", or "I like him, but I'm not sure about him being Gay". Religion, race, and sexual preference are all protected class, and none of them directly affect his ability to serve as President.
Sidebar: discrimination is not illegal, only discrimination on the basis of a protected class. Discrimination on the basis of other factors (i.e. past history, evidence, a person's stated point of view) is very legal, and more commonly known as "thinking".
Not electing Romney on account of his religion, or electing Obama because of his -- either way, it's discrimination on the basis of religion and it's illegal. If Christians want the protections against discrimination on the basis of religion, then we must stand up for that same freedom for all religions. Yes, even the nut jobs. (Though of course, I'm not referring to your particular religion, gentle reader.) God himself gives us all the right to make wrong choices - we know that right as "free will" and the result of exercising that right as "sin". And yes, I think this means we have to make it a point to stand up for a person's right to be homosexual or Moslem without being persecuted.
However, it's equally important that as Christians we don't confuse standing up for rights with agreeing with their position. This is not a call for unbounded ecumenism. Absolute truth still exists, Jesus is still the Way, the Truth and the Life, and we have the same obligations as before to share that with those who don't have a personal relationship with Him. I also make a big distinction between the freedom to believe and the freedom to blow up onesself in a crowded marketplace based on that belief.
As election day gets closer, it'll be tempting to go the easy way out and just pick the person who "identifies with our team" the most. Don't fall for it. The wrong Christian in the White House can do a lot more damage than a candidate who is a good leader with good policies and respect on the world stage, but who happens to be an atheist.
7 Comments:
At 6:24 PM CDT , Anonymous said...
THis post is nothing if not incredibly stupid.
If someone doesn't want to vote for Romney because of his religion, they have that right.
Its illegal for the government to forbid him to run becuase of his faith. Huge difference there.
People are going to vote for him soley because he is Mormon. People are going to vote against him for that very reason too.
At 6:43 PM CDT , 206isCancer said...
“Religion, race, and sexual preference are all protected class, and none of them directly affect his ability to serve as President.”
I could not disagree with you more strongly. None of these are protected classes when it comes to elections. The only thing mentioned in the Constitution is that a religious test will not be required to run for office. A court cannot tell a candidate they he or she is disqualified because he or she is a Mormon, an Atheist, a Catholic, or a Buddhist, etc. But the Constitution guarantees no protections based on “sexual orientation” at all. Some states have, and Congress has in some areas too, but not the Constitution. When it comes to voting, “qualified” voters are allowed to choose the people whom they will support based upon whatever criteria the voters deem appropriate however idiotic an individual voter’s reasons might be. My friend actually has told me that she liked a candidate more because she liked her hair or because she thought that a male candidate was “hot”. There are many reasons for voter participation that denigrate our entire election process such as the motto “Just Vote”, but voters still have the right to make bad decisions and elect very bad candidates to any elected office for any reason that voters choose however horrible these reasons might be.
When you say the word “illegal”, you are removing the sacred principle of secret ballot. I would hope that we do not start carting people off to jail because the government was able to figure out what people were thinking when they exercised their right to vote. I agree that not voting for a person because of his or her religion could be a very bad reason. It could even be immoral and wrong. But I also would openly oppose any person who was a devout devil worshiper running for office, and I would hope that my vote wouldn’t be considered “illegal” and get me carted off to jail by the thought police. At the same time, I would not vote for an open homosexual because the deviant lifestyle of this person is something that I believe is sexually perverted and quite possibly should be illegal. As a voter, I have the right to believe this.
To get to my point, the problem with not voting for Romney because he is a Mormon (and an area with which I agree with you) is more of a question of whether a person who might agree with Mitt Romney otherwise would be causing more harm to his or her own principles by voting for a Barrack Obama or another candidate who might oppose this agenda more. And that is a question for the voting booth. I am not willing to tell a person that he or she is forced to vote for anybody or anything. People can choose to throw away their votes if they want or even not vote at all. And honestly sometimes, I wish that some people (you know the ones who don’t care enough to actually educate themselves before they show up to the polls) really wouldn’t vote.
At 4:02 PM CDT , Anonymous said...
I believe that Romney himself said that he was running for President, not for Saviour.
At 7:45 PM CDT , Anonymous said...
I think lots of folks like you are misinformed. Romney walks, talks, lives like a Christian to me. The dude is Christian.
At 8:41 AM CDT , Bruce said...
anonymous #1: You're correct, some people are going to use "Mormon" as the only test to decide whether to vote for him. The point of my post is there's more to a candidate than any one factor. Anytime a person votes, if they use a single test and ignore other important qualifications, they may be doing more harm than good. It's not right, but it happens.
Thanks for your comments.
At 8:53 AM CDT , Bruce said...
206iscancer: You have correctly singled out an area where I spoke incorrectly. There is nothing illegal about choosing who to vote for according to any issue, whether it falls into a "protected class" or not. My experience with "protected classes" comes from employment issues, which has nothing to do with voting rights.
206iscancer> "I would hope that we do not start carting people off to jail because the government was able to figure out what people were thinking when they exercised their right to vote."
That is my hope too, and I certainly didn't intend to imply that voters were answerable to the government in how they vote. (I believe Christians are answerable to God, though.)
206iscancer> "To get to my point, the problem with not voting for Romney because he is a Mormon (and an area with which I agree with you) is more of a question of whether a person who might agree with Mitt Romney otherwise would be causing more harm to his or her own principles by voting for a Barrack Obama or another candidate who might oppose this agenda more."
You have said it much more clearly than I did.
206iscancer> "And honestly sometimes, I wish that some people (you know the ones who don’t care enough to actually educate themselves before they show up to the polls) really wouldn’t vote."
I feel that way too, sometimes. On some candidates/issues, I even wonder if I'm doing it myself.
Thanks for your comments. You really made me think more about what I said.
At 9:03 AM CDT , Bruce said...
anonymous #2: True enough - he's not going to be our spiritual leader anymore than Clinton was. (Thankfully!)
However, the person who serves as President does make decisions that can strengthen or undermine the freedoms we have in this country. From what I know so far, I think Romney would do much more good in this department than would Obama.
Unless I'm mistaken, Mormons consider themselves part of the greater Christian movement, except that they have an extra revelation from their founder. (Most Protestant and Catholic groups would consider them a "cult" because they believe something in addition to the Bible.) The principles that allow Mormons to worship freely are the same ones that allow all other Christians and other religions to worship freely. Those protections must be preserved for all, and harboring or fostering bad feelings against an otherwise qualified candidate based on his religion does more to undermine than foster, in my opinion.
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