This was an excellent exchange. On the eve of the elections, if you’ve ever entertained the question “should Christians identify with political parties?” you ought to give this a listen.
Julie Roys is a fabulous host at Moody Radio, demonstrating both intelligence and charity. On Saturday, she hosted a debate between two people I know pretty well–my congressman, Randy Hultgren (R) of Illinois’ 14th Congressional District, and Ellen Painter Dollar (D), blogger at Patheos.com and author of No Easy Choice. During this very well-mannered sparring match, they each explained their views on the interplay of faith and politics and why they identify with their particular party.
There were no real surprises in this debate. Congressman Hultgren defended the notion of smaller government in part to an appeal of the institutions ordained by God including the church and family, essentially his argument for smaller government. Dollar defended the idea of a more significantly involved government by appeal to the words of Jesus and his emphasis on caring for the poor and society’s otherwise more vulnerable members. Again, no real surprises here.
Since I’m quite familiar with the work of Ellen Painter Dollar, I was eager to hear her response to a question posed by a listener. She was asked to explain how it is she could identify with the Democrat party when they are the party that promotes and seeks the public funding for abortion. Her response was fairly expansive, but was the answer to a different question. Instead of giving explanation for why she identifies with a party that locates women’s equality in the death of a million babies each year, she expounded on the statistics that she believes makes abortion necessary, an argument rooted primarily in economics. Though stopping short of celebrating abortion, she didn’t seem to be breaking any new ground in her views of the worth and dignity of the unborn.
My answer to the question, “should Christians identify with political parties?”, is as follows. As American citizens we have the responsibility to live prophetically, serving as agents of moral change in this declining culture whenever possible. One need not identify with a political party to engage in the public debates over abortion, reproductive technologies, sex trafficking or care for the poor and homeless, but there is no biblical mandate to avoid such participation through the active involvement in a political party, either. Let’s get a handle on what it means to be a partisan–it refers not to party membership in general but to party loyalty no matter the cost. I think this is the real question, should Christians be so partisan that they are blinded to truth? The answer is obvious.
The post Hultgren, Dollar: Up for Debate with Julie Roys appeared first on SarahFlashing.com.
