Beatitudes Posts by category: News

I'm often accused of approaching political issues with a left-leaning bias. I plead guilty! Despite this, I do not believe I hold most of my positions out of fealty to a particular political party, but out of core principals that I draw from studying politics and policy in light of my faith.

As such, I often think the positions I hold on moral issues are those that do not cut strictly down the liberal-conservative moral divide. While I may espouse liberalism in the laws passed by the government, this does not mean I believe in an anything-goes world.

I say this because I’m about to tread into an issue where I have been accused of being a softhearted liberal.

A friend responds:

"I don't see how sending more money, nor having the gov't spend more money, is necessarily advocating for the poor given the abysmal efficiency and track record of gov't poverty measures. And, of course, there's that teach a man to fish/give a man a fish thing. The worst thing that happened to the poor (and the church, for that matter) was the gov't takeover of charity."

I wanted to respond on the blog because it taps into something I've been meaning to write about.

I believe that part of social justice is advocating for policy changes with and on behalf of the least, last and lost. However, history shows that social change comes slowly and with considerable effort. Its rare that the powerful will voluntarily make sacrifices when they may not see an immediate benefit.

However, social change has gotten much more difficult in the last three years with the advent of the constant filibuster. Though this supermajority requirement has been invoked over the years, the idea that every piece of legislation requires 60 votes in the Senate is a recent phenomenon. Ezra Klein, a blogger for the Washington Post, demonstrates this:

As a middle class, white, Christian, heterosexual male living in America, I live a life of incredible privilege. There are few scenarios in which my culture is not the dominant culture being expressed. However, because of my small singing career, I get the opportunity to be a “minority” a few times a month when I sing Shabbat services at Park Synagogue.

This morning, the rabbi’s sermon was “Why Jews do not build Cathedrals.” He proceeded to accurately describe that the architecture of the middle ages reflected a Christian theology of honoring the omnipotence and other worldliness of God. When a human enters a great Cathedral...

In our homiletics class, we were challanged to pair what we consider to be a profane text with a sacred one. Those the below is a "mini-sermon", I think it can also speak as a blog post:

One of our central tenants as Christians is that our faith is not some private element to which we devote a small portion of our time, but an overriding calling that shapes who we are, what we do, and the values we hold. There is no doubt that the bible contains a number of moral proclamations- around economics, vocation, diet, hospitality, criminal justice, and yes, sex. It is this final category, and specifically around sexual orientation, in which most of the energy goes...

This is a real and brilliant and remarkable minute and a bit. Watch till the very end, and see how insane this injustice remains:

As you likely are aware, President Obama announced in the SOTU that he would work with the military to end Don't Ask-Don't Tell. Since most of the country agrees with this sentiment, I have been struck by...

In support of service projects

In the wake of Haiti's earthquake, the Christian Right is dead wrong.