Jesus Could Not Be A Republican ...

An entire conservative Christian political movement in this country has laid claim to the Republican party and its agenda.  They propose unity around several key socio-political issues and wish to translate their own moral beliefs into laws of the land.  They believe they have an obligation to vote for those candidates who share their ideas, and have become so powerful a voting block that no Republican will openly defy their agenda.  Democrats take a beating on this issue as liberal elitism seems to have supplanted a basic faith in God.  Libertarians and Green party members are considered fringe and irrelevant by the majority of conservative Christians.  And perhaps most ironically, the early Christian church that Christ established resembled more communism than any current political party views.  Believers voluntarily sold ALL their possessions and pooled their money to provide for the entire group and the poor; completely absent in any conservative Christian thinking of today in our country.

There is further irony in that people who claim the name of Christ in their corporate designation, approach others in a way that does not resemble that of Jesus in any way.  Throughout His entire life on earth, Christ was always confronted with people caught in various conditions of sin – the woman at the well (multiple sexual partners), the demonically possessed, the adulterous, the proud, etc..  When confronted with these ‘sinners’ He never condemned them.  He did not sentence the guilty to the various punishments the ‘law’ demanded.  He instead loved them, each one.  He healed them from their various problems.  He forgave them ALL.  And they left His presence praising God and witnessing to everyone around them about their encounter with the Savior.  Does this sound like a typical approach of Republicans with those who do not agree with their ideas?

There was also a particular incident when Christ was tested with a no-win scenario.  Asked if He supported paying an extremely unpopular tax rate to Caesar (a foreign invader), or not?  Christ pointed to the image of Caesar on a coin, and directed us to “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are Gods.”  This statement implies more than just obeying laws of the land, or prioritizing God’s requirements above those of the world.  It also makes clear a separation of church and state.  This separation was part of our heritage in our constitution.  It was designed to keep a majority religious view from persecuting minority opinions.  Coming out of the dark ages of more than 1200 years of inquisition, and persecution by the Roman Catholic Church, and on the heals of persecution of the English Anglican church inspiring the pilgrims to seek solace in this country.  Our constitution was written to try to avoid a repeat of religious overbearance.  Yet recent Republican activity would seek to enact laws that support a particular moral viewpoint, even if it does not reflect a majority view.  Going directly against the advice of Christ to keep government separate from religion, Republicans march forward attempting to outlaw behavior they see as non-Biblical such as support for Gay Rights.

God has always preserved the right of every intelligent being to choose their own fates in the form of who they will serve – good or evil.  But understand the choice to serve evil is protected by God with the same ferocity as the choice to choose good.  It is not God’s plan or His desire that we choose against Him.  But we are FREE to make that choice.  God does not make or want robots.  Why do the Republicans?  If the weight of your arguments for making better choices are not enough to convince others, find better arguments; don’t make restrictive laws to enforce your views.  This is not the character or actions of God or Christ.  This is the approach and government of Satan himself.  He would be more than happy to force you into his service.  He would gladly make laws restricting your beliefs, and governing your behavior.  God does not force belief or obedience only Satan does.

Homosexuality was not what God planned for us.  The Bible condemns this behavior just like it does a wide variety of sexual immorality.  But that does not excuse humans to judge each other based on Biblical guidelines.  The Bible is not to be used as a club to beat sinners into submission.  It is to be used as a light to lead people out of darkness and away from pain.  Can a homosexual attend church?  I sure hope so, and I hope they feel comfortable in my own.  Can they be saved?  Yes.  Just like me, a sinner with a different set of issues I contend with everyday, they can be saved too.  Can they preach, or give insights we can learn from?  Yes.  Can they teach our children?  Yes.  Does God condemn them?  No more than you or I.  We ALL engage in behavior that is less than ideal, we make mistakes, we embrace evil knowingly and unknowingly.  We do stupid things.  And sometimes we find ourselves addicted to the evil behavior we have embraced be that homosexuality, or gossip mongering, or judging others, or being sexually promiscuous, or just refusing to give up our pride.  All sin brings pain.  All can be forgiven.  And we may all wrestle to make better choices for our entire existence in this world.  Why is one sin so much worse than another?

The argument is not about what behavior is right or wrong, it is about whether your version of what is truth should be mandated as my own?  Those Republicans who would feel so good as to reverse roe vs. wade, block gay marriage, and enact / enforce Sunday blue-laws – would they equally jump for joy if say a different form of religion came into prominence with a differing set of agendas?  What if conservative Muslims came into power in this country and government.  Would those same Republicans who fight to enforce their own religious views on others submit to a different majority view such as – Fridays off for worship, wearing a birka for all women in public, and giving up all pork products in food of any kind?  There would be a rebellion in the streets if American Muslims formed a voting block than influenced the laws of the land to favor their own religious values.  Even though they may agree with overturning Roe, and banning Gay marriage, these other restrictions would be considered “going too far”. 

The reality is that Christians should avoid the idea of enforcement and embrace the idea of tolerance when it comes to matters of religion.  The most valiant Christian believer will defend the right of the Satanist to believe as he chooses.  Religion can be bound by governmental laws when the rights of others are violated through its practice.  This means, it is not OK to kill, steal, rob, rape, or in any other way, violate the rights of others based on religious beliefs.  But it should be equally forbidden to make any laws restricting the rights of an individual when their behavior does not impose on the rights of others.  A woman should have the choice of what to do with her body for her entire life.  People should be able to gather and worship whatever god they want, in whatever fashion they believe, as long as it does not harm others.  No-one should be forced to pray to any god, in any public situation.  The point is no-one should be forced to accept the moral beliefs of another sect.  Especially those in the minority.  It is the rights of the minorities that are the most precious to protect, and where genuine Christians must be vigilant.

So why couldn’t Jesus be a Republican if He just did not try to enforce His views on others?  Well I guess you just have to take a look at the other things Republicans espouse …

1.)    Against Gun Control (Christ never advocated violence, or hunting, or relying on self for protection)

2.)    Against Government Assistance for the Poor (Christ advocated giving ALL your possessions up for the poor)

3.)    Pro Death Penalty (Christ died for our sins, so we would not have to, advocated forgiveness)

4.)    Pro War (Christ advocated peace, said we should turn the other cheek, love our enemies, pray for all)

5.)    Pro Business / Anti Environment (Christ said ‘love of money’ is the root of all evil)

6.)    Pro Life / Anti Gay (Christ said “love each other” in this the world will know who you belong too)

Christ never tried to govern His kingdom through fear.  The good news of the gospel frees us from fear.  It gives us boldness to serve one another.  It allows us to love each other, as we discover how much we are loved.  We are free to forgive each other as we realize how much we have been forgiven.  We are liberated from the pain of making evil choices, and suffering from addictions based in evil, through the power of our Lord.  All these fantastic gifts have been laid at our table by our Lord.  And all we have to do is accept them.  This is the compelling beauty of our Lord.  This alone is the reason to serve Him.  We need not ever sacrifice our civil liberties to achieve an illusion of freedom or security in our evil world.  We can walk boldly through the valley of the shadow of death because our Lord has defeated death itself.  Our existence is not confined to the limits of this world, but is guaranteed to continue in a paradise of self-sacrifice that will last an eternity.  These reasons are compelling enough to serve God; they do not require legal enforcement to be valid.

Unto Caesar ...

There is a debate in this country regarding the separation of church and state.  Surprisingly the debate is not over the particulars regarding the state encroaching on the rights of a minority religious viewpoint; rather, it is over whether this nation should choose to remain with the powers of church and state separate at all.  Christians at large, believe their rights are trampled on when prayer is eliminated in public schools, or statues of the ten commandments are ordered removed from public courthouses.  Are they right?

We have been called a Christian nation.  Muslims around the world view us this way simply because the overwhelming number of religious people in the U.S. claim Christianity as their basic religion.  Though next in line would be Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu faiths respectively.  Atheists and agnostics make up only a small percentage of the nation.  Occult and Satanist religions even smaller than that (though occult is defined in the eye of the beholder).  So even though Christians make up the majority of the population to date, they are not the fastest growing belief system in the U.S..  Muslims hold this distinction.  It might be better to call us a nation of faith or beliefs than a truly Christian nation.

Going back to our beginning we find that our founding fathers were largely Christian believers.  They applied Christian thinking and morality to the nation’s first set of founding principles and laws.  They publicly talked about their devotion in speeches to both private and public audiences.  In essence, religious speech was not uncommon in governmental bodies as the nation first began to define itself.  They prayed in Congress, put chaplains in the military. and were unabashed about speaking publicly about their faith.  They were not perfect, nor are we, but they did believe.

However with the inquisition a not so far away phenomenon; and having recently emerged from the dark ages, our founding fathers did see the wisdom of allowing for the freedom of religion, by keeping the state out it.  When religious and political power were united (as they were first in Rome, then in England) great persecution arose in the name of God (but more accurately for the greed of gold).  Many died for no other reason than a differing faith or belief system, their wealth forfeited to either state or church or both.

So our nation became founded on Christian attitudes and prevailing morality, but chose to make the distinction between the church and the state.  In point of fact we were the first country to make such an issue of this.  But we were not the first advocate of it.  Christ Himself, while here on earth, answered one of those meant-to-trip-you-up questions by saying … “render unto to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.”  This was the first admonition to separate how we think about government and religion, and was ironically proposed from within Christianity.  Christ Himself laid out for us our proper priorities.  Money was to go to the government, and our hearts were to belong to God.  Oh that we could learn that lesson, rather than so often reversing it.

A study of Biblical prophesy talks a great deal about the Beast, and his image.  Many characteristics of the Beast are articulated throughout scripture, but the most compelling trait was his desire to control the conscience of men on pain of death.  The Beast (an enemy of the church throughout scripture) tried to make men think a certain way.  He wants and demands worship and adoration.  And according to the scripture, a great many people follow after the Beast and his image.  Why is this important?

Because scripture also refers to a new nation that rises up in the world and helps the church.  That new nation is us.  Our country arises across the sea and restores freedom for religion to the world.  Those that believe can live here free from persecution, inquisition, and death.  The church is free to grow here at least for a while.  But alas, we do not remain true to our values according the same sets of prophesy.  Eventually we begin to speak just like the Beast.  Note this does not mean we are forsaking religion, rather the contrary, it means we are uniting with it to compel the conscience of man.  Sound familiar?

It is NOT a gradual slide into liberalism, or atheism, that causes us to become like the Beast.  It is the unification of religion and political power that attempt to control the will.  Christ never compelled anyone to follow Him.  He authored freedom of choice for all creation, even when that creation made the wrong choice back in the garden.  There was no forced will then, and there is no forced will now.  There is an offer extended to man, but nothing to force him to accept it.  Satan on the other hand, is all too happy to enforce his will on your mind, heart, body, and soul.  The very nature of evil is to corrupt and control the mind of man.  And so like its author, the Beast begins to speak like Satan.  Uniting the spiritual with the political under the name of “good” but with every action resulting in pure “evil”.

And worst of all, Christians are driving the truck.  It is the siren call of Christians who want to reclaim our nation’s morality that are responsible for speaking like the Beast and the Dragon that preceded him.  What is it they say about good intentions paving the way to … hell.  And this is the road we are on today.  Republicans, though wounded by the results of the last election have not softened their positions on social tolerance in any way.  Rather they believe they lost because of their LACK of firmness to their values.  Today’s Republican party is emerging from defeat even farther to the right, than to the center.  It’s most popular spokes people prove this point again and again.

Ironically it is not the entire Republican agenda that is a problem.  Fiscal responsibility, small government, strong defense, wide personal freedoms, and local oversight are excellent principles upon which to build a political party.  But mix in extra helpings of hate posing as religious fundamentalism, and you excite a base to take “mob” action, rather than deliberate tolerance.  Homosexuals and abortionists are no more enemies of Christ than are adulterers and gossip mongers.  There is no compelling spiritual reason to single out a particular set of evil for a zero-tolerance policy when this is not universally applied to every other set of bad behavior.  It is the devil’s work to try to legislate morality.

It is not the duty of the Christian to try to stamp out sin in the world.  It is the duty of the Christian to love his enemies, do good to those who hate you, pray for those who persecute you.  In short, it is the duty of Christians to love.  There is no mention of sin in our list of responsibilities.  Those that wish to call sin by its proper name often use this language to hide their true meaning – they wish to call other people sinners, or hold people accountable publicly for their sins.  To truly call sin by its right name would involve only defining it as it truly is – PAIN.  All sin is inextricably linked to pain, whether felt immediately or over a longer term.  To point out the destructive nature of sin, without accusing anyone else or condemning anyone else, is to truly define sin.  Condemnation has never been our responsibility, nor has it ever saved anyone.  Whereas love has done more, and accomplished more than you could possible ever fully define.

Rather than spending our energies in trying to legislate sin out of the world, and God back into our nation.  Why don’t we exert the same energy in submitting our prideful will to God’s control and learn how to truly love each other as well as those who disagree with us and our beliefs.  There is still time to redefine Christian values from out of the mouth of the Beast and back to the source of all love.  Let us learn to emulate our humble leader, who though He was God on earth, He was servant to us all ... 

God's President ...

George W. Bush believes he has been ‘called’ to be President of this country by God.  He rightly points out that God is ultimately in charge of the world, and that since he won the contest, God allowed it.  But does God’s allowance mean God’s endorsement?  Does it matter ‘how’ he won our Presidency?  And at the end of the day, doesn’t the result work backwards into saying … “it must have been God’s will”?  What does it say about us as believers with G.W.’s approval ratings so terribly low, are we again rebelling against the will of God?

So what happens in November of this year?  Assuming McCain wins, will Democratic Christians fall into line and recognize the finger of God in the win.  Republican believers are quick to denounce Bill Clinton as somewhere near the anti-christ and the logic that applies to Bush or McCain is somehow lost on Bill.  Will Republicans fall into line behind an O’bama Presidency?  It makes for an interesting conversation.  But the real question quickly becomes – how “in charge” is God of this world?

When looking around it is easy to spot the evil, and rare to spot the good.  Evil seems to outweigh good by hefty margins; most non-believers take this as evidence that no God exists at all.  Christians are willing to accept that God allows the choice of man to largely affect his own world, but not with absolute consequences lest we all kill ourselves.  But it does beg the question … is there a King, Dictator, or President in charge of a country without the tacit permission of God?  What do you do with Hitler, Saddam, or G.W. at that point?  Maybe we only apply this rule to Christian nations?  But Italy is devoutly Catholic Christian and has suffered fascist dictators like Mussolini.  It is hard to accept any evil leader is tolerated by God.  How could God tolerate Hitler, or Saddam?

Bring it down a notch or two into a situation that affects you even more directly.  Have you ever worked for what appears to be an ‘evil’ boss?  Ever had someone who had control over your career or future who did not appreciate your contributions and actively worked to make your life more miserable?  I think we all have.  So was that person also ‘blessed’ to be in charge by God?  Careful kiddies, that mean-old-boss may well be you, from the perspective of those who have worked for you.

A long while ago there was a young man, handsome, good looking, charismatic.  He had good ideas, liberal philosophies, and was quite interested in gaining knowledge.  But like most of us, he was not perfect.  He was ambitious, ruthless, and the best military commander to have ever lived.  How do I make that claim?  Scripture calls him out.  He was the first King to ever rule the entire ‘known’ world.  His name was Nebuchadnezzar.  He was NOT a Jew.  He was NOT a believer in the one true God.  He was NOT a Muslim.  He was a Chaldean, a Babylonian.  His armies swept west to the Mediterranean, south to Egypt and Ethiopia, north to Turkey, and east to India.  He built a golden city that could not be conquered.  He had no respect for any single God until a simple man named Daniel came along.

Then something really weird by today’s Christian standards occurred.  This pagan, heathen, arrogant, proud dictator king, was given a vision of the upcoming history of the world.  Think about it folks, the Jewish people were his captives.  He killed them by the barrel load while invading their “blessed” country.  He killed God’s chosen people, sparing only the young healthy wise-men types (who he largely turned into eunuchs).  This was the Hitler of his day.  Many of God’s servants died on the end of Babylonian spears and swords.  This was the guy who God chose to reveal the next 4000 years of political forecast to.  NOT to the Jewish prophet who served God daily and prayed to Him 3 times a day out of an open window; no to the pagan King, responsible for the downfall of His nation.

Nebuchadnezzar’s dream showed his own empire as the golden head of a statue, followed by the Medo Persian silver arms, the Greek Brass thighs, the Roman iron legs, and the current state of affairs with mixed iron and clay – some countries weak, some very strong – until Christ Himself returns from heaven as a stone that crumbles the entire statue and replaces it with His own kingdom. 

So how does this pagan king react to learning the meaning of his dream?  Like any good dictator he sends the messenger Daniel away on ‘important’ business and summons every other kingdom leader to Babylon to worship an 80 foot high SOLID gold statue of himself.  Essentially Nebuchadnezzar was sending God a message that he alone would be king forever.  He figured with Daniel away, he could easily get the buy-in from the other leaders of his kingdom, but 3 Jewish servants stood alone on the plain and refused to bow despite the ever present furnace.  On bursting the pride of this king, and reclaiming them from the fire, Nebuchadnezzar recognizes “the likeness of the Son of God” walking in the flames with the 3 other Hebrews.  He saw Christ.  And he knew who He was.

Did God put Nebuchadnezzar in charge?  Or perhaps like your boss, our President, and Hitler – God allowed the affairs of men to work themselves out without much interference and then He approached each of these men to work His will through them, IF they would allow it.  Some would not.  Some there may yet be hope for.  Nebuchadnezzar did.  But this experience did not make him perfect.  His world wide decree to serve the God of the Hebrews was accompanied not with a loving reason to do so, but with a threat to kill any dissenters.  Despite all he had been through he was still a dictator king.  But again, even though the edict he sent out was not the ideals God would have wanted, it did cause the entire ‘known’ world to pay attention to the religion of the one true God.

The book of Daniel in the Old Testament is a love story of how God reclaims the loyalty of a completely pagan king.  It is a love story of a God who wished to open the doors of prophesies to his people both then and now as to what the world would experience before redemption was permanent here.  The people described in the book of Daniel are NOT perfect.  They screw up, just like us.  They react badly.  They misuse power.  They commit grievous sin.  And yet they run the world, interpret the prophesy, and bring the attention of all mankind to a true God.

The question of whether G.W. Bush was called by God to be President, is not nearly as important as the question of how he reacts when God tries to work through him.  I am a devout democrat who believes we have lost more of our freedoms, values, and wealth during this presidency than in the entire history of our country.  And I blame this administration for all of it.  But who am I to judge?  Despite it all, I also know that this same man sent huge amounts of Aids medicine to Africa.  Even if he did nothing else right, millions will live because of this fact.  Is any one of their lives something to begrudge?  Saving one would make G.W. a hero to me, saving millions defines him like everyone else in humanity a mix of excellence and decadence, a mix of infinite potential and unlimited destruction.  He is neither our Messiah nor our Satan. 

G.W. is merely a man, a leader.  And someone who is personally responsible for saving the lives of millions in Africa no matter what else he may be responsible for.  Those lives are important.  He is therefore a hero of the highest regard.  Just like me, he is flawed, but unlike me, he has saved countless lives – on that alone he deserves the designation of hero.  Like his father before him and my favorite President Bill Clinton who worked tirelessly to relieve suffering from the tsunami – those who serve others are heroes to me.  I aspire to do the same.

It is not the power that defines the man, but how he uses it.  It is not the office that man attains that is the mark of his character, it is how his character is reflected in the decisions and actions of his office that matter.  Every man is a child of our God, a brother to each of us.  When we realize this, it makes it hard to fight wars, or torture others.  But it also should impact us more in our day-to-day conversations about others, our interactions with others.  Perhaps we should judge less, ridicule less, and criticize less.  Perhaps despite everything I believe we have suffered as a nation, we should choose to focus on supporting those ideas that save lives, heal wounds, and bring us ALL collectively closer to our Creator God.  After all we are family.  All of us.  By choice if not by blood.

I hope that in my career, in my position of responsibility, great or small, whatever it happens to be – that I allow God to work through me His will.  I hope I allow Him to create in me a servant’s heart, and remove my heart of stone.  I hope when my colleagues and my subordinates look at me they see Bill Clinton or George Bush – not Hitler or Saddam.  This is my hope, and I put my trust in my God to make it so within me …

God Bless America ...

Does patriotism have a place in Christian thinking?  Americans certainly think so.  We have for generations tried to link our passion for country to the will of Divine providence.  There are certainly examples of God blessing our country in times past.  And we have taken each of these signs as indications that God has something special in mind for our country.  Patriotism and Christianity became inseparably linked in our thinking, and so it exists today.

Cynics find many reasons to separate the 2 concepts based primarily on the shortcomings of man.  The simple reasoning that man’s bad deeds must extricate him from the will of God ignores the basic premise of the Gospel as a whole.  It is not our faults that keep us out of heaven, it is our determination.  To blame a country, for the acts of a few of its leaders, or citizens, is to judge the many based on the acts of a few.  This does not seem to follow the gospel either.  And of course even the highly cynical must admit that Israel of old was a nation joined to the will of Divine providence.  They were blessed while following God’s direction, and sometimes cursed for straying from it.  He did call it ‘His’ nation.  So it seems the concept is viable at least.

So what is modern patriotism them?  What does it mean to ‘love’ your country?  And should we ‘love’ it?  Our historical ideas of patriotism seem better defined than our current ones.  Ask someone what patriotism means and they tend to look backwards.  During WW2 for instance, the citizens of this country volunteered for military service, they sacrificed their style of living and many their very lives for the ‘greater good’.  During the great depression, people tried to help each other as best they could, an impoverished nation trying to help itself.  During the westward expansion, citizens braved climate, terrain, ‘hostiles’, and lack of civilization to grow our nation.  During the civil war and before it, those who opposed slavery fought to free those who could not be free.  At our colonial inception, we braved hardship against an established kingdom to promote a new idea in the world, a government for and by the people; Freedom had a whole new meaning.

Modern patriotism it seems then, is perpetuating our historic values while being pragmatic about their implementation.  We value the rights of the individual but will subject them to the greater good of the state.  We espouse the separation of church and state to avoid the establishment of a dominant religion, but we don’t mind using tax payer monies from Muslims, Atheists, Jews, and Hindu’s to fund Christian based schools and charitable projects and vice verse.  We denounce torture but obfuscate what it means to use torture and only reserve it for ‘extreme cases’.  In short Americans still like their ideals but seem to have lost the will to risk their lives to see them implemented fully here and now.  Terrorism or perhaps just the fear of terrorism has made us more pragmatic about freedom than our forefathers.

Still, is it not OK to ‘love’ your country?  After all since God is in charge, one could argue that our president sits where he does with the tacit acceptance of God, therefore with His consent.  Of course this same logic gets a bit murky when applied to Saddam Hussein.  He too sat at the head of his country, and God stood by, apparently accepting his leadership.  Why is Saddam’s reign any more or less blessed than that of G.W. Bush?  Saddam was decidedly a criminal right, he allowed rape rooms, he abused his citizenry, he hoarded power, killed his opposition, and tortured his enemies even if they were citizens.  We at least do not have ‘rape rooms’ (Abu Grihab not withstanding), our torture is less, we only abuse our citizens economically not with nerve gas, and few US citizens are killed by our leaders.  Yup, we are better than Saddam, but fundamentally guilty of all the same abuses.  And don’t make this a case of bashing just G.W., every national leader in every country, tends to do business the same way for the same reasons.  It’s also not a generational thing; this has been going on since recorded time.

So have you ever taken a close look at what anyone could ‘love’ about any country?  North Koreans purport to ‘love’ their fearless leader though not all of them for sure.  Cubans in Cuba are said to ‘love’ Fidel Castro though not all of them for sure.  Is it that we love our leaders?  Probably not.  So then we love our ideals and what we are supposed to, or perhaps used to, stand for?  Freedom and equality are worth loving.  War, not so much.  Crime, not so much.  Greed, not so much.  Cynics, even less.  So I guess if were to define anything about our country that is worth loving it is our intentions, our goals, our ideals, and perhaps our potential.  Reality, we leave up for discussion.

But the broader question is why does love of country seem so tightly linked to love of God?  Might it be that if we can successfully blend these ideas it makes it hard for one to do less for his country?  It is akin to the missionaries linking culture and the gospel, the traditions and styles of men with the pure truth of the Bible.  Our government has fostered the idea of linking patriotism and Christianity to keep us sacrificing for country.  Linking them in the minds of the masses keeps the poor willing to serve, willing to keep on going, avoids them rising up and demanding anything.  It is a form of subtle subjugation.  Even the middle class and believing rich become more pliant when under the spell of God informed patriotism.

But does even the most insidious of reasons for it make it wrong?  Actually, no.  It is not wrong to love ideals that are taught in scripture.  Freedom and equality are taught in scripture.  As are humility, which we deny quite often, leading to all the other problems described above.  It is not wrong to love the ‘hope’ that America can represent to the world.  The ‘hope’ that one person’s moral beliefs will never become the law of the land.  The ‘hope’ that the poor will be taken care of by those who have means, not simply feeding them, but teaching them and lifting them out of their poverty.  To love these ideals, is to love the ideals of heaven.

But to worship at the altar of our flag, ignore the consequence of personal choice by claiming the needs of the greater good, espouse blind devotion to weak men and gloss over their failings for the sake of the nation; this kind of loving one’s country is more idolatry than real patriotism.  Those who believe the end justifies the means, do a great disservice to true patriots.  Patriots who love any country but divorce this devotion from the values that make it worth loving are nothing more than blind tools of evil.  We can fall prey to this evil in this land, when we forget why we love our country, and focus only on the fact that we do love it. 

To ask God to bless America is a simple prayer.  There is nothing inherently wrong with it.  Most of the time the negativity associated with this simple phrase comes because we think of it in terms of God ONLY blessing America.  This of course is not the case.  We are not alone in our world.  We are not really superior.  When in conflict with another nation it is fair to ask God to bless the ideals and the motives that He would espouse – not the homeland of the country the requestor happens to live in.  Of course you want America to win its wars, but you also must ask if each war is absolutely un-avoidable?  Is each war truly for the benefit of ALL mankind, or simply serving OUR own interests?  Are we really alleviating suffering, or are we causing it?  Some of our wars fit these criterion.  Recent ones seem to be a bit lacking.

Patriotism is not a sin.  Love of country is not wrong.  Blind devotion to anything is.  Even God asks that we come and reason together with Him.  Even God does not demand our blind devotion.  He allows us to explore motive, action and reaction, and consequences.  And we love Him the more for it.  When we look at our country, let us love its ideals so firmly that we would risk ourselves to see them implemented to the fullest.  Let us not seek safety and security as reasons to forego our rights, but rather let us live up to the values we espouse, and bear witness to the world of their worth.  Let us neither be Christians or American Citizens in name only, but in beliefs, in truth, in patience, in tolerance, in freedom, in equality, and respecting the rights of others…