Michael Long
Washington Will Never Understand Religious Faith
http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com |
The Brookings Institution has invited me to a noon-time panel discussion on "Moral Values, Politics, and the Faith Factor." They didn't bother to mention if lunch will be served, thus lowering the probability that I will attend, but they did note with some disdain that President Bush "infuse[s] the political process with his personal set of values." Like that's unusual— who can forget all those Presidents who infused the political process with somebody else's values?
Anyway, the panelists are, by and large, inside-the-beltway types (save Dr. Richard Land, a Baptist preacher fairly well known out in the pews). They are going to discuss whether "common ground can be found on the role of religion in public life." Among the souls shedding light on why personal faith is so darned inaccessible to the politically inclined will be Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne; that shepherd of the truth John Podesta (late of the Clinton administration); Marian Wright Edelman, president of the famously tradition-friendly Children's Defense Fund; and Sojourner Magazine founder Jim Wallis, the "Christian leader for social change." Rounding out the group is Rev. J. Bryan Hehir, the former head of the $2.5-billion budget Catholic Charities.
Anyone who believes an informed conversation about practical Christian faith in America will take place, stand on your head.
When typical Americans talk about Washington being out of touch, this is exactly what they picture: professional intellectuals sitting around a "panel discussion," guessing what people they don't know, think.
The American left doesn't understand prosaic religious life because many of them know only a caricature of it, and consider it beneath them. They see themselves as sophisticated non-believers, or as enlightened Christians more concerned about food banks and race relations than what the majority of Christians call saving souls.
The American right doesn't have a lock on things, though. The right promotes a set of values that produce stable cultures and economic prosperity, and those values happen to be traditional Christian values. Religious people aren't magically married to the Republicans; they just go where their values are endorsed.
According to the invitation, Mr. Wallis will argue that "the political right has hijacked the language of faith for its political agenda." Yes, sirs, nothing like coming to a big, open-hearted meeting of the minds with open-hearted words like "hijacked" and "political agenda."
As long as Washington insiders see religion as something to be parsed out like an Oprah title at a book club meeting, they will never understand the central role that faith plays in so many lives.
Those of us in Washington intellectualize everything. But that sort of examination does not reward with an understanding of living faith, let alone religious faith itself. Faith is a whole, a single thing in itself; it is a spiritual understanding, and a divine confidence. It is subject to intellectual examination— that's how most of us acquire it— but not in pieces. You cannot forgo understanding the whole and successfully leverage its political cogs.
Whatever success any policies and politicos find will depend to a great extent on the ability to understand-not merely connect with or hijack the language of- religious people. The way to do that is to tell the intellectuals to listen, not talk. Give the floor to the small-town pastors and their flocks, people with real jobs who live outside the cocktail party circuit, people who know where Wendy's is but couldn't find The Palm.
Some on the left talk about repackaging their ideas about social justice as religious values to attract Christians. But they are buying into the great misconception of the unchurched, that Christians have to rack up good deeds to get into heaven. Most Christians know— and most politicians apparently do not-that G-d asks first for faith, not works. These "mysterious" Christians live the way they do to enhance their relationship with Jesus.
More Americans attend church every week than watch the Super Bowl once a year— they're easier to find than free-range chickens at the Whole Foods market. The Christians that so puzzle politicians demonstrate their faith in how they treat their neighbors, where they let their thoughts go, how they raise their children, how they react to pain. They don't think about what to do, it just "infuses the process," to borrow Brookings' phrase.
If intellectuals would ask a child in Sunday school about religion, they would get more insight than they'll get from this upcoming meeting. But they won't ask. And they wouldn't like the answer, anyway. Too simple.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in Washington and in the media consider "must reading." Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
JWR contributor Michael Long is a a director of the White House Writers Group. Comment by clicking here.
01/05/05: Top cultural events and trends predictions for 2005 — based on more than wishful thinking
12/30/04: Iraq: Where We Stand
08/05/03: The California Virus
07/24/03: A Few Thoughts on the News
07/10/03: How To Win By Losing: It's much smarter to let this one go
06/20/03: Dems turn a sensible question into pure politics
03/19/03: Another thing for Bill Clinton to Zip Up: his time, it's his mouth
02/25/03: The Cradle of Civilization, Again
01/31/03: Silencing opponents because you can
01/28/03: You can't always eat what you want ... But you still can, for a while
01/10/03: What They Believe For The Moment
12/06/02: Federal Spending: Look At It This Way … And weep
11/15/02: On the radio: What really happens behind the scenes at talk shows
11/08/02: Coming Soon: 1972
10/31/02: The Election Goes Republican: Election 2002 finds Democrats alienating nearly everyone
10/22/02: What if we never catch the terrorist-sniper?
10/04/02: A Few Thoughts On The News
09/27/02: Goodbye To All That: The terrible, wide war that must be fought
09/20/02: The Florida Lesson: We need better voters, not better machines
09/13/02: A few thoughts on the news
09/06/02: Give Them What They Want
08/13/02: The Dangerous Lull on Iraq ... And how today's delay proves why 9/11 had to happen
07/26/02: Where's Honest Debate on Judge Owen?: NOW members should demand better of President Kim Gandy
07/19/02: A Secret No One Can Keep: Why Osama bin Laden is still alive
07/09/02: Don't forget why Bush was elected
06/28/02: The bravest pop culture icon in the war on terror
06/14/02: Five Thoughts On Father's Day: Personal Stuff
06/06/02: Stay Awake, Grads, I'm Almost Done Talking: Life, and How to Live It
05/31/02: See This Movie: "The Sum of All Fears" is a wake-up call
05/24/02: Richard Simmons for President? What really motivates the fat-taxers
05/13/02: The Carnival at the FAIR: "Unbiased" acquires a new definition
04/22/02: Bottled And Sold: Economic Confidence Under a Screw-top
04/12/02: McGovern's Respectful Dissent
04/02/02: The Right to Do Wrong: The Creator, A Clockwork Orange, and war
03/26/02: The Big Story No One Talks About: Why isn't Washington serious about airport security?
03/18/02: Worlds Away: A snapshot of anti-Semitism in the Moslem world
03/08/02: The safest place in the world --- for now
03/05/02: Some Animals Are More Equal Than Others
02/22/02: And Then What?: Fear and Loathing Around the Corner
02/15/02: Al Gore and the real root cause of terrorism
02/08/02: A few thoughts on the news
02/01/02: Ready, Aim, Cloud The Issue: An irresponsible report on "terrorism" from the Brady Center
01/28/02: Discretion and Art, Part 2
01/16/02: Discretion and Art
01/08/02: Desperate Dems
12/18/01: Politics and Holidays
12/07/01: A war bigger than we know: Changing the future, slowly and surely
11/28/01: A Mid-Winter Night's Dream: A play in one fun act
11/20/01: A Lot of War Left To Fight
11/13/01: Guess who Clinton's apologizing for now: I'll bet you guessed right
11/02/01: Rules for Wartime: Rule Number One: Remember what's true
10/26/01: The Moral Case For Torture: Dirty hands don't always mean dirty souls
10/19/01: Questions for the Anti-War Crowd, Part II: What if someone took them seriously?
10/16/01: Questions for the anti-war crowd: If they question you, ask these back
10/12/01: The Jason Problem: Sometimes they only look dead
10/08/01: A little hindsight: A letter for readers in the future
09/28/01: Calling Bono: A plea to the pop culture elite to speak out
09/20/01: Encouragement from the Heartland, by mail
09/13/01: Bleeding time
09/07/01: The trailer-park taste of the public radio catalog
09/04/01: BRAVE NEW FREUD: Internet-based psychiatry may mean relief for those who have shunned
treatment
08/17/01: First Amendment: Chickens home to roost
08/10/01: PRESS RELEASE: UNREPENTANT SHARK MURDERER LOUNGES IN HOSPITAL
07/27/01: Dispatch From The Front: The Gun Control War
07/20/01: Summer song
07/03/01: It's a Wonderful Recount