I have decided to postpone my recent blog series “ID v. Evolution: A Tie for Last Place” to think about some recent Presidential politics. The phrase that I have heard more than any other in the past days in that Sarah Palin’s speech “electrified the Evangelical base.” I was fairly disgusted by the speech, which leads me to wonder what exactly it was in the speech that was electrifying. And since I call myself an Evangelical in the subtitle of this blog (although a bad one), I am wondering where that leaves me.
I’ll just mention two things of which I was suspicious. First was the general tone of the speech. Let’s just admit it: although my complaint here is not specific, there was indeed an unmistakable tone. That familiar, sickening tone of “Git off my property or I’ll git one of my semi-automatic weapons!” I wonder why this tone is so appealing to some Christians. Do they feel that it embodies a Scriptural attitude? What exactly is spiritually praiseworthy about it?
Secondly, and more specifically, I was shocked by her mockery of Barak’s role as a “community organizer.” This was no accidental comment, as it was a clear follow-up to Rudi’s comments. I’m not trying to argue that Obama is a saint or anything, but you can’t dispute the fact that he went to hang out with people in bad economic circumstances even though he easily could not have. Now, it’s one thing to avoid direct contact with poor people. We all know the Republican philosophy: “well, we give tax cuts to the wealthy, and the wealthy are the one who create jobs, so really, helping the rich is actually helping the poor after all.” That’s fine, whatever you have to tell yourself to get to sleep at night. It’s one thing to have this attitude, but it’s quite another to actually laugh at people who are trying to help. Seriously, read Matthew 25 and try to reconcile that with Palin’s attitude. She was not casually pocking fun at his service. She was actually mocking it.
I’ve retained my label as an Evangelical thus far because I thought that this “Git your gun!” attitude was starting to temper within the Evangelical community. But if it is not dying down, but rather coming to life again with Palin (who could be in the White House for 16 years!) perhaps I am living out my faith under the wrong label. I don’t know exactly what I would call myself. At this point I am not calling anyone out, or trying to pick a fight. I am just trying to figure out why things seem so different to me than to other Evangelicals.
