The Christian Choice In This Election

How could any Christian vote for Obama and feel good about it? One might seem to put it simply that they believe him when he says he cares about the less fortunate, but that alone wouldn't justify their decision. They have to believe something else besides just his words.

They have to believe that government is a viable answer to the problems of critical social inequalities and that volunteerism and other expressions of philanthropy and compassion are inadequate to the task.

To believe that they must also believe either that government can be trusted with more and more power, or that democracy is sufficient to keep an immensely powerful government from abusing its power.

To believe that democracy is a good way to keep a powerful government in check, they must believe democratic majorities are disinclined to oppress minorities, and that they wouldn't disrespect life or property.

Or they believe that the constitution is sufficient to check the immoral potentials of democracy. To believe that they must either be unaware of just how far federal judges stray from the constitution's original intent, or they believe these judges to have god-like character that makes it so we can trust their interpretations of what they see as an evolving or living document. The idea that any significant number would either be so ignorant of history or have such foolish faith in mere mortals is too incredible for me to accept as likely. Thus I am back to the set of beliefs before the 'or'.

The Viability Of Government As The Best Answer To Human Suffering

Any Christian who could vote for Obama and feel good about doing so must either have more faith in government than their fellow human beings, or be foolish. I would want to ask any such Christian where they think Jesus invests most of His confidence.

He no doubt understands the imperfection of individuals but He also understands that governments are worse. Do we forget that God gave a government a chance at redemption once, Israel, and that didn't work out, and it wont, the scriptures indicate, not as long as it's a government of human beings. The means for the redemption of the individual is available now, but the means for the redemption of government is nothing short of replacement of human practitioners with God Himself, and that wont happen until the second coming.

Government is not the answer in our present age, we are.

The Effectiveness Of Democracy As A Check Against The Abuse Of Governmental Power

I know many Christians who think democracy equals respect for individual dignity. Even George Bush has suggested that a world full of democracies would be one where human rights are more respected. While I agree democracies do seem to be less likely to go to war with their neighbors, history does not support the assertion that democratic societies have greater respect for individual dignity. Actually, quite the contrary. Does the name Socrates ring any bells? He was sentenced to death by a democratic government for mere ideas. And what about the Jim Crow laws. They were products of democracy as well. Democracy empowers majorities, but there is absolutely nothing about being a majority that adds virtue to them. A majority in a democracy is just another source of power. How it gets used is no more morally predisposed than how any other source of power may be used.

And more than that, I would suggest, democracy is a source of power that easily deludes its beneficiaries into ignoring both individuals and reality. Unlike say military force or financial power, which both are far more dependent on reality.

Of course I'm not saying democracy is bad. What I'm saying is what the founders said in essence. Democracy is like any other source of power, one that needs to be checked by other forces. It doesn't guarantee rational or moral policy, not even close, and to believe we can allow governmental power to grow, simply because that government answers to a democratic process, is foolish.

We as Christians should be more interested in limiting government power, especially when it's being driven by democratic forces, than in what we think we may achieve with it.

Now What About Romney?

What must a Christian believe to feel good about voting for Romney? First they must believe what has been said about Mitt Romney by his friends and associates, that he is an amazingly decent man. That almost alone could swing it, but they must also believe his ideas about how to govern are moral.

To do that they must believe that maximizing the freedom and opportunity of individuals to make decisions for themselves will allow more good to be done for those less fortunate than would empowering a government subject to the whims of all who seek power over others.

For me it's as simple as Jesus's words (Matthew 22:37-40, emphasis added by me), “'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” You can't love your neighbor as yourself if you seek to solve her problems using a fickle and intrusive government, for is that how you want you're own problems solved? Many of us know people who are so controlling and so likely to be busybodies that we hate to ever be at their mercy, and that is exactly what governmental social solutions become in one way or another. They also inevitably decay into wastefulness and other inefficiencies as a result of becoming too large and too dependent on rules and regulations. One would certainly not refuse a rescue from death just because the rescuer was a wasteful-controlling-busybody, but nor would one willfully expose anyone to such a person in good conscience. That is especially true if one seeks to “love your neighbor as yourself”.

What Could They Possibly Be Thinking?

I'm not sure I see how some of my fellow Christians can miss this point. I honestly suspect they've allowed something to corrupt their theology. They almost seem to think the United States is the Kingdom of God and that for some reason God's decided to retry the whole nation of Israel thing with a bunch of gentiles in North America, many of which don't even share our beliefs.

I've read and heard some of them suggest that we are called to rule today, that the Kingdom is here and now, and thus, some how, that means we should treat governments as though they are there to do our bidding as Christians. Perhaps they get from there to the idea that if the government isn't doing all it can do to look after the poor and needy that reflects on us and our own attitudes on the subject.

The above is nothing short of a perverse argument if that's even close to what it is. If when confronted with human suffering, we hire a wasteful and potentially oppressive third party to deal with it for us, can we seriously think we are doing good? Perhaps if we had no other choice, but we do. In this election that choice will be represented by the place on the ballot with Mitt Romney's name by it. And when we vote for Mitt Romney we wont be voting to delegate our responsibilities toward our fellow human beings in need to him or government.  We will be fully embracing the commandment to “love your neighbor as yourself”. We will be saying to ourselves, 'let's get to work' and to the needy, 'here we come'.