An Independent Perspective

I'm fascinated by politics.  I've been known to have a CNN addiction, though I fight the urge these days.  I'm a little hesitant to talk about politics, so I won't, at least not exactly.

Something that bothers me these days about current political discourse is how Christianity is used these days, as a tool for one-upmanship.

Uh-oh.  I might step on some people's toes.  But we I think we really need to think about how the Church is portrayed on the national stage these days.  I should say though, I am not writing this blog to present answers in anyway.  Most of what I'm doing here is presenting questions.

So here's one:  Didn't Christ tell the disciples that he wanted them to be known by their love [John 13:34-35]?  I'm pretty sure that what Christ means by that is that we're called to live in such a way that people just know who we are as Christians - without us telling them who we are.  And by that, he ment live in a good way.  Not a judgy one.  We live in a country where the candidates have no way out other than to trumpet their faith, you know, before the other guy does.

Didn't Christ express to us also, that only 2nd to our love of the Lord God, we are to love our neighbors [Matt 22:34-40]?  I say this, not just because it's a huge foundation to the Christian faith, but also, when our politicians talk of their faith, do they ever talk about loving their neighbor?  Not in recent memory.  Though, I could be wrong.  Christianity often seems to be used as a weapon with which to judge other people, to the point where if a candidate doesn't want to talk of their own faith, they're labeled as a Muslim.  And labeled a Muslim as an insult.

Our nation has some super important decisions to make in the next year, and I'm proud to have the right to be able to cast my vote.  I just want candidates to leave the faith I choose to follow out of the equation, because what they have to say certainly isn't doing anything to help the Church ... We shouldn't forget the Christ started a love movement that was meant to reach a global scale; go and make of all disciples, He said.  We are meant to grow disciples by showing them how much we love them, not by showing them how much better we are because of it.  Case in point: Christ's view on the Pharisees, in Matthew 6.  This is the Gospel passage every Ash Wednesday for a reason, y'all.

This is just my independent perspective.  How do you feel about how the Church is portrayed in politics?