And then, it didn't happen. Let us ponder why.
First off, I do not intend to do a wholesale exploration of the 2006 elections, something that most here are already familiar with. However, let us consider the issues instead that are of importance to different groups of Christian voters, and then apply those lessons to the last election, and to elections yet to come. As this will be extensive, I intend to tackle only one topic, and report on others in the next few weeks.
The Christian faith, to those who practice it, is one that promises the love of God, but also one that commands love of neighbor. Now, the debate over what this love actually means and how far it extends is one that Christianity has within itself. And I will address some of the controversies surrounding this, here and in later tracts.
But perhaps the single most important issue to the faithful Christian is abortion. There is no getting around this stumbling block. Fifty years ago the Democratic Party could count reliably on the support of Catholics, but now, thanks to the Democratic embrace of the pro-choice position, that support has eroded to where the country's Catholics are split in their partisan support. The numbers are worse in most Protestant sects.
There are many voters who say abortion is their single issue, and they will never support a pro-choice candidate. A coworker of mine feels this way, but that has not stopped them from voting for Democrats in the past. It just so happens that either these Democrats were pro-life (in the case of Bob Casey Sr.) or these for local positions where the issue was irrelevant. Most staunchly pro-life voters will not vote for anyone, regardless of party label, that is pro-choice, which means bad news for Rudy. But there are many who recognize where the real battle for abortion is going to be fought, and that is the courts.
For a long time, the GOP has kept up their pro-life mantra without actually producing anything but noise on the subject. During the Clinton years, the GOP had a complete pass on this subject because they did not have the power to nominate judges, and the GOP effectively blocked many, which kept the partisan pro-lifers happy. It meant a GOP president would be able to put more judges that agreed with them on the bench.
Bush's first term produced no vacancies on the Supreme Court, but everyone knew that vacancies were coming soon. Bush and the GOP congress had done very little during the first four years on the abortion issue (demonstrating my oft stated contention that the GOP big wigs don't actually care about the issue except during elections). But once two seats opened up, the pro-life made their voice heard, and far more effectively than progressives, as it was the pro-lifers, in conjunction with other conservative groups, that torpedoed the nomination of Harriet Miers, someone who's pro-life credentials were suspect.
I think it a forgone conclusion that in 2008, the GOP nominee for President will make this an issue. This needs to be blunted by appeals to other issues present on voters' minds.
So, this brings us to 2006. Why did the pro-life issue disappear? It didn't. Many in the pro-life movement view the dignity of life as an issue that extends beyond the abortion debate to embrace other issues. One of those happened to be the Iraq War. I don't think I need to elucidate any further on the 2006 results.
Such 'Christian' leaders as Pat Robertson, the late Jerry Falwell, and others would have us believe that the only Christian life values are abortion and stem-cell research. These groups gladly support the death-penalty; some even seem to yearn for its employment on criminals. And many are also eager to see the tension in the Middle East increase, and to support war efforts that only add to the toll of human misery and bloodshed. These are not Christian virtues, as the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops made clear in their recent publication 'Faithful Citizenship'.
So what are the values comprising the culture of life (to use the late Pope John Paul II's words)?
- Recognizing the sanctity of human life at any stage,
- Respecting the dignity of the human person, and
- Preventing attacks on innocent human life.
For the Christian, humans are endowed with dignity that is to be uplifted, this dignity conferring an inherent right to self-determination, but also recognizing the need to support the community. In addition, because Christians believe that humans are made in the image of God, every human life is sacred. (In fact, all life is created by God, a subject I'll bring up when I discuss the environmental fissures forming in the Christian community in a later tract).
So what does this mean for the issues?
1. Christians, by and large, will always be pro-life on abortion. The minority who are pro-choice, are probably voting Democratic already.
2. Christians want to save lives. This translates into a significant portion of the Christian community standing in opposition to a war that they feel is unjust. Just War doctrines are a Christian invention, but when, as in the case of Iraq, the reasons for going into war are revealed to be false, and the war continues with no visible signs of improvement, more and more will turn against it, as we saw in 2006.
3. Christians have little toleration for those who kill innocents. Hence, they are natural allies in the War on Terror, as they want to see justice brought to those who view the shedding of innocent life part and parcel of their cause. But this is tempered by many with mercy and forgiveness for those who seek to change, which results in opposition to the Death Penalty by many Christians (such as by Gov. Tim Kaine).
4. The Christian community opposes torture for this very same reason (although there are elements that support it, but these are not the mainstream groups, and we'd never win their votes anyway).
Now, the kinds of Christians most often seen in the political process are those who shout a lot, AKA the Religious Right. This group, while agreeing with mainline Christianity on a few points (such as abortion), diverges everywhere that the Republican Party diverges from Christian teachings. The goal of the Religious Right has always been to tie Christianity to a single party, and through this alliance, gain power to dictate 'morality' to the country, influence foreign policy to hasten the Second Coming, and amass wealth for themselves.
This is why the Religious Right cannot break free from its reflexive support of the GOP even when the GOP has wandered far from what their faith teaches. This is why the Religious Right cannot find fault with Bush for lying to plunge us into an inextricable war. This is why the Religious Right, unable to achieve its many objectives, resorts to louder and more offensive and ostentatious speeches. Only by blaming somebody else for the world's problems can they hope to distract their followers from the sheer incompetence that has been this administration, and also, their own steady stream of failures.
Their influence is on the wane, and while they still have a megaphone, they can only sway the electorate in a handful of states, most of which are strongly Republican already (i.e. the South).
So what does this augur for 2008? What should Democratic candidates do to appeal on life issues to Christian voters?
1. If they are firmly pro-choice, emphasize the other ways in which they support the life agenda. The more Democratic politicians emphasize their pro-choice credentials, the more they turn away this voting block.
2. Focus on issues like the War in Iraq, and putting an end to torture in the US and by the US.
3. Give support to efforts that obviate the need for medical procedures that push the bounds of what it means to be human or destroys human life (for instance, the recent breakthrough in converting adult cells into stem cells).
4. Be genuine in recognizing the value of human life. A human life is never a number, but something sacred that we should all treasure.
Most of these are issues that Democrats already support. But because of the abortion issue, it has been difficult for this message to reach most Christian voters. In 2006, the Iraq War and the bumbling incompetence of the Bush administration in the face of natural disasters made many Christian voters realize that they had a viable choice. To keep this country from being divided over religion, it behooves Democratic candidates all across the country to remember these lessons.
Matusleo
Ut Prosim
If "being a Christian" means being a Baptist, I'm not. If "being a Christian" means that the single most important to me has to be to have a law prohibiting abortion, I'm not. If "being a Christian" means that I believe that the earth was created in 4004 B.C., I'm not.
I am a member of the Christian left. And amazingly, poll data shows that if you ask most of those who attend Christian churches whether they agree with me or with Pat Robertson, I would win that contest.
Most of Mike Huckabee's positions make him a member of the Christian left as well. He believes that we need to take strong action to stop global warming, and that government has a job to do in caring for the poor.
Jerry Falwell would never reach large sections of the electorate because his language was so alienating. But on the other hand, intellectuals and secular people who are consciously resistant to talking in the language of religion and faith have likewise forfeited the ability to communicate with a very large section of the electorate.
I am waiting for a candidate who will consciously ask Christians to embrace Matthew instead of Leviticus; for a candidate who will reach out to preachers in country churches to help them think about issues from a Christian left perspective. And if we can talk to Christians in this fashion -- in their language -- we can marry the socially responsible and responsive Christians to the more secular but still socially responsible and responsive voters.
John Edwards has tried to do that to some extent in this Presidential campaign; in the Fifth District in Virginia, Tom Perriello promises to do that. It's an untapped approach.
Matusleo
Ut Prosim
My professor said with a bit of scholarly doubt that history may prove Tim Kaine to be the greatest political mind of Virginia in this era. Greater than Mark Warner, George Allen, or John Warner. He did not mean to say a more effective governor or stronger leader than Mark Warner, he simply meant politician.
He told me about Tim Kaine's instant self-analysis of his weaknesses when he set out to run for governor. He realized the death penalty was his achilles heel. Instead of quickly tackling the topic and making excuses, he set up the brilliant firewall of personal religious beliefs that, instead of appealing to the masses, would appeal to Kilgore's base. Hence, when Kilgore attacked him on the death penalty at the last minute, Kaine needed only to say: "pastors of Virginia, religious conservatives, do you think it's fair for this man to attack my faith?" And even Kilgore's allies questioned his tactics!
Tim Kaine will not seek further elected office, or so he's said, but it's pretty amazing how he's succeeded on the one track he's had, to become governor, since he was elected to the Richmond city council so many years ago.
Kudos to you, Governor Kaine!
I feel that it is important to make this distinction because we often mix anti-abortionists and pro-lifers together, accusing consistent pro-lifers with the inconsistencies of anti-abortionists, which is unfair to them.
The problem with abortion as it is commonly presented is that it reduces a complex issue into a simple scenario with a simple solution. Figuring out at what point a fertilized egg turns into a human being is a hard philosophical and scientific question to answer. "Life begins at conception" is a cheap co-op that dodges the issues. Our common presentation of abortion also reduces complex social and economical problems that families face when contemplating abortion into a single solution for the unwanted children: adoption.
And this easy-to-handle becomes a distraction in this manner: it is a lot easier to demand children to be born when you are not going to support them. It is easy to demand mothers to give their children away when you are not the one facing the decision. In other words, it is easy to feel holy while doing practically nothing to really reduce the circumstances that push women into contemplating abortion in the first place.
The abortion issue concentrates our attention on beings that may or may not be humans yet, that may or may not be viable if left to gestate. And while our attention is focused on these potential human beings, the vast majority of anti-abortionists ignore the plight of breathing, born children.
It is as if we have already fixed all of the social problems that put born children at risk in the world--poverty, malnutrition, war zones, orphans--so that we can spend our time on protecting hypothetical children.
Christian are aware of the following verse from the 1 John 4:20, which applies to the abortion issue as well:
If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?
Following the same logic, how can anti-abortionists claim that they care so much about potential children that they cannot see when they fail to show the same zeal to protect living children that they can see?
So it is immoral to dedicate most of our time to fight for the rights of would-be humans while failing to protect those who are already alive.
Personally I believe that most pro-lifers have been driven into focusing so much about abortion that many had never pondered how being pro-life extends even after a fetus has been born. Many are realizing that now, and this is good.
After all, if our tax dollars shouldn't pay for abortions because they destroy life, shouldn't our tax dollars not pay for weapons to destroy lives in Iraq?
For that matter, if we are truly pro-life, shouldn't our tax dollars not be spent on tools for killing, period?
Anti-abortionists often have pictures of destroyed fetuses to highlight how it is killing humans. I will put a link of pictures of destroyed humans, to highlight how war is killing humans.
Some pro-lifers have their heart in the right place but their attention placed at the wrong issue. To the ones that are not yet convinced, we can ask what are they going to do: love that which they can see or that which they can't?
Further, if we recall that Jesus stated that man and woman should join and become one flesh, and that they were commanded to be fruitful and multiply, we can discern that the moment when the male sperm and the female egg are joined together in one flesh must be a moment of special significance. In light of this, I have to ask, why isn't conception the moment when life begins?
Otherwise, you are spot on with the comparison between the anti-abortion and pro-life crowd.
Matusleo
Ut Prosim
Since you were so gracious in your respond, I feel that I must be respond in kind and state why conception is a complex issue.
But before I tackle that I will agree that I was too harsh in calling it a "cop-out." Thanks for pointing that out, and I take back such a strong word. :)
Here is my thought experiment on how we identify humanity on a gestating human being.
Imagine that there is a fire in a hospital. You can only save one person, who would you save, a new born baby or a 30 -year-old woman?
Most would probably lean towards the baby. Some will say the woman. The humanity of either one is not disputed here. Let's assume that we believe that we should always save the young human in a room. Then we would save the baby.
Now let's say that we have gestational stations where you can see the fetus through clear glass and that you could pick the station and save it. And let's assume that the fetus has the same chances to survive as if it were in a woman.
Again, under the conditions that I stipulated, would be save an about to be born baby in the gestational station of the woman? Under the rule, we would go with the about to be born baby, since it would be days for it to survive and have a whole life ahead of it.
Now, how about a baby in the station several weeks before full term, but still within the range of surviving premature babies? We can still solidly defend our decision to pick the premature baby in the gestational station.
Now let's go further back to a point where it is known that if the fetus couldn't survive if it had to be born tomorrow. We are now entering a gray area. Assuming that it could be born prematurely within some weeks, we can argue that it has pretty good chances to reach that threshold.
Before this point, we were clearly debating saving two human lives. From this point one, we are know debating saving what everyone knows is a true human being, the woman, versus saving a fetus that is about be become a human being. I say about to become because it may die before it can reach the development that it can be born prematurely. We can assume that the woman will live if we save her. We can't assume that about the fetus.
If we keep moving back, our argument to save the fetus becomes weaker and weaker. The late first trimester fetus sort of look human. It doesn't really, though.
Let's move further back. Many miscarriages happen within the first trimester. We are basically giving up a human life for what may become a human life. We could save the station only for it to die spontaneously the first day. We are preferring a gamble on future human life over the certain human life.
At some point we wouldn't even know that a human was in the gestation station unless we knew this in advance. We could easily see a human in the second trimester fetus, but not in the first trimester one.
At one point, we couldn't even see that there was anything in the gestational station unless we were told that they were there.
Finally, if there were some petri dishes with fertilized eggs on the counter, could we really justify saving the eggs over the woman?
It is the embryo that is the complex issue. We know that it may become human if it doesn't spontaneously die. But we can't see it as human or identify as such unless we have been explicitly trained. Most people can probably identify a human fetus without any training though.
At some point, with the information available at the time, the Church decided to declare that humanity was established at conception. It was probably a good decision at the time. It is a lot better than saying, "with the knowledge that we have today, we have declared that the 4 week embryo is human; this statement may change with new information."