Centerfield

I think you nailed it to a large extent, Rick, in noting that the visible religious left is in large part the "faith-based" side of the anti-war and international socialist movement. Religious pacifists, tending to the very left-liberal.

All too much of it is an outgrowth of the "Liberation Theology" movement that sprang up in Latin America during the Cold War. It's a (very) selective melding of Marxist doctrine and militant Christian theology, and was heavily funded by the Soviet Union and Cuba. It continues to receive major support from various international Marxist and Stalinist outfits, though the military support for armed revolution has largely been choked off over the last decade by the fall of the USSR.

Traditionally pacifist sects such as the Mennonites and Quakers are also in the mix.

I agree with Tully that you've nailed the deficiency in the religious left.

But I have my doubts that a reasonable counterpoint to religious conservatives will emerge from the religious left. To the extent that this group is composed of hardcore pacificists and socialists, it's going to be extremely resistant to moderation, which is anathema to the ideology.

IMO, if a reasonable counterpoint to the literalist and aggressive subset of religious conservatives is going to emerge, it will emerge from a different group.

That group will have to come primarily from two sources:
1) enlightened religious conservatives who appreciate the virtue of dissent and religious freedom of choice enough to eschew dictatorial tactics
2) centrists and libertarians of faith who are tiring of remaining silent while a vocal minority tries to dictate social policy

Traditional religions are more or less incompatible with the far left because they define certain behavior as immoral or sinful. To the far left there is no sin or immorality just different points of view. The only sin to a leftist is voting Republican. Just about anything else is okay.

The religious right and far right believe in something, whereas groups like UU tend to believe in either everything or nothing. It’s hard to get a sound bite out of that. Traditional religion is much easier to sound bite so it is more often associated with politics.

Let's mix it up...what do you call someone who is ardently conservative socially, but outspokenly pacifist?

Rick;
A few of thoughts. 1) It may be sheer numbers. Given that religious/political liberals tend come from the mainline denomination and religious/political conservatives tend to come from certain mailine denomination and non-denominational/evangelical churches which are seeing the biggest church growth, I bet there are more religious conservatives in sheer numbers than liberals 2)This is a touchy one but I wonder if more religious/political liberals come to their churches based on their politics and so at their core are more political (at least in terms of how they couch their positions) than conservatives. On the flip side I wonder if their are more religious/political conservatives who come to their politics based on their religion. therefore they draw from a larger pool. Personally, I see this phenomenom a lot (i.e. "I'm an evangelical Christian, of course, I'm a conservative). I've really tried to fight this if only because it tends to marginalize blacks in the church (who tend to vote Democratic) 3) some of the denominations whose beleifs may be in sync with more liberal politics (i.e. Mennonite) tend to shy away from politics and government issues (with the Amish being the classic example). 4) Jews tend to be Democratic but a much smaller number seem to be "religious" (i.e. attend Synagogue regularly) Note the enthusiasn for Joe Lieberman's candidacy among the "churchgoing" left AND right 5) I would echo the sentiment of the silent relIgious moderates. This is a large untapped reservoir. But then again centrist in all walks of life tend to be quieter, less strident.

Finally, I 've previously mentioned that there is movement with religious conservativism to broaden their politics and to challenge the assumption that if you're an evangelical you must be a conservative or at least for the war in Iraq, more defense spending, smaller government, etc.

Let's mix it up...what do you call someone who is ardently conservative socially, but outspokenly pacifist?

Hmm, maybe Limbaugh or an ardent neocon would call them a commie, or a traitor. Maybe a leftwinger would call them comrade. Maybe Rick would call them a member of the religious left.

Is this a riddle? Is the answer to call such a person too principled to fit into readymade political categories?

It's instances like this that remind me of an idea from Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. He suggests using the eastern word mu when someone asks a bad yes or no question. (not that you're doing this, AH). Mu means to say "unask the question, for the scope of any accurate and honest answer I can give you is larger than the context your question implies."

Let's mix it up...what do you call someone who is ardently conservative socially, but outspokenly pacifist?

Lonely? :-)

Seriously, the terms "religious left" and "religious right" by definition only include those whose faith subsumes their politics, who claim/beleive/whatever that their faith dictates their politics. It's a big darn assumption that one's faith and one's politics MUST mix, and in a predictable way at that.

I think what's a lot more instructive and useful is to draw a distinction between those who are naturally dogmatic, intense, and inflexible (see my many comments on the psychology of "True Believers") and those who exploit same. TB's can't handle cognitive dissonance, and must rationalize it in all areas of experience. So a True Believer type is inherently more inclined to assume that their politics must be divinely ordained. Would God lie to them?

So while the blindly religious factions of the left and right may be scary, in classical political terms they fall more in the category of what Lenin called "Useful Fools." As long as you can convince them your political agenda confroms to their beliefs, they are useful. But it's a rare movement that lets them run things at the senior level, as compared to simply using them.

AH;
I'd call them a Mennonite or a Jehovah's Witness; maybe a Buddhist but I don't know enough of their theology to tag them as being socially conservative...

OH, you were speaking politically.

The reason I asked the question....a close family member. He's socially as conservative as you can get, but also a pacifist. He votes Republican because they are anti-gay marriage, anti-abortion...but doesn't believe in any type of military action that is not defensive in nature. (P.S. He doesn't buy the weapons of mass destruction bit...even if they were there, he wouldn't have supported an invasion of another country.)

I guess I just used him as example of someone who is very conflicted when religion beliefs dictate their votes. Which beliefs win out?

I wonder about these categories, "religious left" and "religious right." I'm an active and regularly attending member of my Church (UCC). I'd call myself liberal but most of my progressive friends call me moderate - and in fact I used to be a criminal prosecutor (no problem with personal responsibility agendas). I don't think my politics drove me to my church, since I've attended church regularly since childhood. Indeed, I would say that Christ's teachings have shaped my politics. The church I was baptized in, however, drove me of its membership because I'm gay. Dismissing my religio-politial identity out of hand as "pacifist and socialist" seems silly. Indeed, I doubt a credible argument could be made that anyone who claims to be a socialist has any influence whatsoever in American politics today. I'm not anti-war (I supported US intervention in Bosnia to the horror of my pacifist friends, for example), but I objected to the Iraq war on constitutional and factual grounds and I would suggest the historical record has been kinder to those who took my position in the debate than those who took another. I have never voted a straight ticket. Now, do the self-styled religious moderates who want a DLC (which helped Clinton, in my opinion, far more than it helped the Democrats) for the religious left, consider me one of their number based on my theology (belief in the trinity, the resurrection, in the real presence of christ in the eucharist, and in the promise of salvation) which is fairly conservative, my sexual identity, which is gay or my politics, which are moderate and pragmatic. If the moderates refuse me, on what grounds I wonder.

Speaking only for myself, I accept you as a moderate on the basis of your sounding like you are capable of having a reasonable discussion.

To hark to Tully's chat about TBs, I think centrists can pitch a pretty big tent by mostly excluding the TBs.

If you understand what is meant by consistency being the hobgoblin of fooolish minds, you're in the club, IMO.

Pudentilla,

I would consider you very much a moderate, much like myself. As Brian says, Tully has a point about TB's. God knows I've spent enough of my life around a lot of them (Southern Baptist ministers kind of run in my family), and the main problem I have always had with them is that "their way is the right way." In their eyes, there is no other interpretation than the one they have been "given." I guess that's why I find this alliance in the Terri Schiavo case so interesting. I confess that if I was a journalist, I'd probably have asked Jerry Falwell if he thought Terri Schiavo (a Catholic) was going to heaven. Can you imagine the sputtering and spitting that would ensue?

AH - (I confess that if I was a journalist, I'd probably have asked Jerry Falwell if he thought Terri Schiavo (a Catholic) was going to heaven.)

This is first order genius - I hope you don't mind if I shamelessly steal it.

Pudentilla;
Would you please get back in your cubby hole and stay there. This blurring of the lines is giving me a headache. ;-)

Pudentilla,

LOL! Feel free. I thought that one up during an Easter sermon...lol.

Oops...might want to substitute "James Dobson" or "Pat Robertson" for Jerry Falwell. I'd hate to hit the guy while he's down. (Although he has frequently tied calamaties to "sin" on the part of Americans, I wouldn't tie his sickness to any sin on his part.)

Pudentilla,

Could you explain more about "personal responsibility agendas?" That's one area where I see the religious left falling down. They buy into this notion that its "blaming the victim" when you demand righteous behavior from the "disadvantaged."

On one hand, the right sees both gays and muggers as sinners. On the other, the left tolerates gays, but also shifts the blame for crime from the criminal onto society. That's why many people buy the right's package instead of the left's. I'd like to see a middle ground where gays are tolerated, but muggers are condemned.

Well, what I mean by "personal responsibility agenda" has two parts: on the one hand, you do the crime you do the time [and when you've done the time, I don't get to treat you like a leper]; on the other hand the fact crime is a morally unacceptable response to a social structure that is morally flawed, does not relieve folks in that structure from working mightily to change it. I've both sent criminals to jail and sued jailers who did not maintain constitutional standards. I don't feel bad about sending criminals to jail, but I do feel bad and try to do something about the fact that in some communities the relative lack of resources for health and education help create a culture of poverty in which what I (and the legislature) would call crime seems rational.

As for the the issue of being a queer Christian, I really don't think its a question of "tolerance." I find the arguments particularly when considering the Christian gospels, that Jesus considers homosexuality a sin not particularly compelling. My position is that God loves me as he made me and he had a clue about which way I'd go - he knew me from the womb, as they say. I guess I'd ask those who insist that homosexuality is a sin, is it so much greater a sin than all the others that we should struggle against? What justifies putting such emphasis on homosexuality rather than say the usurious rates credit card companies charge or the deplorable conditions in many county jails in this country? When I think of the extraordinary energy the "religious right" can harness and the good that energy could do in the world, I'm deeply saddened that it so limited and mis-prioritized (admittedly by my standards) in its focus. And I get angry when I see that extraordinary animus the "religious right" can summon against gay folks create a climate in which violence against gays is too common. I often see picture of the "rev'd" Phelps in the news asserting what must be the most blasphemous version of "religious right" theology - "God, hates, fags." I never see mainstream christian leaders demonstrating outside his church with the message, "God loves fags - as he loves everyone." - Although to be fair, I have heard about churches in communities targeted by Phelps that have used his presence to raise money for ministries that do outreach to queers.

I find the arguments particularly when considering the Christian gospels, that Jesus considers homosexuality a sin not particularly compelling.

Amen! You can search the Gospels endlessly and find absolutely nothing at all about homosexuality. All those items in the NT that refer (or are interpreted as referring) to homosexuality are in later writings, such as Paul, not the Gospels. And I have real trouble with anyone who wants to very selectively apply Leviticus in modern times...and those who want to non-selectively apply Leviticus in modern times should be locked up.

Which all reminds me of that wonderful "Dr. Laura" letter that has circulated on the internet the last few years.

EX: My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? (Lev 24:10-16) Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)

I happen to be very fond of that letter. I found out about it after the West Wing episode.

I love it! Somehow I had missed that. Since we are on this topic...I've always wondered about those NT references... We know that they appear in the King James Version, the edition commissioned by King James, son of Mary, Queen of Scots. It is widely believed that James was gay, as was his father. I've always wondered if the translators slipped Paul's comments in as an "in your face" move. It may seem far-fetched, but crazier things have happenned.

Abel,

Nope, the NT references are there, but the way they were translated from the original Greek and Latin is somewhat suspect (as is much
in the OT, after jumping from Hebrew to Greek to Latin to English). They're kinda ambiguous. And Paul was always a bit shaky in my book anyway. He was a late-comer.

Of course I'm an agnostic, so no points of doctrine or dogma are involved in my case. Which makes it even more fun to research the history of the Canon and what was accepted and what was rejected.

I remember opening up some random early page in the Old Testament and realizing that, if one takes the Old Testament too seriously, one would have to believe that Bush will probably be spending time in hell for not enslaving the Iraqis. I wish I had noted the verse.

Tully,

I'd be fascinated to hear some of what you have found in your research. I was raised to believe the the Bible (King James Version only...lol) was the inspired word of God. I questioned a lot of things, but never that through my high school years. After I went to college (to a Bob Jones University clone), I started having some questions. For starters, how could the KJV be the inspired word of God when it's only roughly 400 years old? Yes, I realize that they say it's translated from the original texts, BUT any time there's translation by men, isn't there room for error? I guess it's all been downhill from there...lol.

The KJV wasn't translated from the "original texts." It was translated from early sources and the Catholic canon, adjusted to fit the dictates of the monarchy. But the "original texts" of the NT pretty much don't exist (Look! A signed first edition of Matthew!) and the early existing texts aren't always in agreement.

The Canon wasn't established until (traditional dating) the Council of Nicea in 325 AD. And parts of it were added later. Many books that didn't fit the church's fancy were discarded, others were altered to conform, and the battles over heresy and orthodoxy in those first three centuries were fierce. There's evidence to suggest that early Christians altered and destroyed Roman records from Judea to put on the best face for their texts.

The KJV scribes handled all the problems by simply claiming divine inspiration and infallibility, backed by the King. "We're definitive, so don't **** with us!" And we know what questioning the King's divine backing got you!

The historicity of the Bible is a fascinating subject.

There's a good brief history of the writing of the KJV here. Note that the "original" KJV underwent further revision, and that the original 1611 KJV edition claimed to be more definitive than those evil misleading "Popish" versions.

The need for an official English Bible grew partly out of the poor translations previously available, partly out of the various Reformist (Protestant) translations floating about, and partly out of the split with Rome over divorce doctrine during the reign of Henry VIII. The Church of England and its offshoots still claim to adhere to Catholicism, just not to Rome. Catholic opinion differs.

My favorite tale of Bible bibliography is still the KJV printing of 1631, where printers Robert Barker and Martin Lucas accidentally dropped the word "and" out of the Seventh Commandment. This printing is quite rare, and is known as the "Adulterer's Bible." Contrary to popular legend, Barker and Lucas were not struck down by a bolt of lightning, or beheaded. They were fined 300 pounds sterling. One wonders about the divine infallibility of that edition....