My friend Ric and I have spent some time talking about politics and religion lately. Mostly about how our theology should and does effect our view of politics. Ric and I went to high school together. Since then he has graduated from Seattle Pacific, works as a youth pastor in New Hampshire, and is starting at North Park Seminary. He is a supporter of Obama and I asked him about Obama’s stance on abortion. Obama is a hardlined pro choice guy. Planned Parenthood has given him a 100% approval rating. This for me was a big disconnect between the Bible giving life the highest value. So I asked him how he was able to reconcile this. Make sure you head over to Ric’s blog. He is a new blogger and a great one at that.
*Disclaimer- I am more than happy to have someone from “the other side” of this issue to have something posted. Email me something on this or other topics. I know this is a controversial topic, and will probably offend some people. My reasoning for posting something like this is to bring to light political issues that are rarely talked about openly. Christians vote for pro choice candidates every election and it is important to hear some arguments for how they come to this conclusion. For most conservatives, this is the biggest issue. Please keep your comments uplifting to the topic.
“This issue of abortion is really difficult for me to deal with. In nearly all cases, I feel like abortion is totally not in line with the convictions of my faith. However, I’m voting for a candidate who is Pro Choice. It might be a total contradiction, regardless, this is how I get around it:
1. Abortion seems to be an issue of polarization that the Religious Right has used in order to create an “us–them” mentality that makes Christian voters feel like if they must vote for the Pro Life candidate or they will be associated with the godless, deprave Democrat party. In other words, abortion has been more about demonizing certain people for the sake of creating votes for Conservatives/Republicans than it has been about exercising Christian values.
2. Abortion is a big issue, but I see it as a big issue among other, just as significant big issues. The war in Iraq, foreign diplomacy and the environment are all other big issues in my mind. I like what Obama is saying about these issues more than what the Republicans are saying. I guess I can’t allow one issue to out weigh all the other important issues just because of the fear that I won’t be voting for God’s party.
3. There are many attempts to “fight” against abortion outside the “national political arena”. There are a lot of private and church-based organizations that are offering alternatives to abortion for woman that seems to be pretty effective. I think it’s false to assume that the only thing we can do is to vote into office a Republican candidate. For example, I know about a church in Washington that has a great adoption agency. On the other hand, an issue like foreign diplomacy is something that we have less control in the “private sector” and needs to be addressed primarily by our federal government. And since there doesn’t seem to be much that I can do outside of the political realm I need to vote into position the candidate that can effect some change in this area.”
