Bush, Freedom and Theology

Today I ran across this interesting post on Christianity Today's blog.  It's worth reading the actual post, but basically its about a backlash Bush has experienced lately regarding a recent comment he made about freedom.  Here's the quote:

The other debate is whether or not it is a hopeless venture to encourage the spread of liberty. Most of you all around this table are much better historians than I am. And people have said, you know, this is Wilsonian, it's hopelessly idealistic. One, it is idealistic, to this extent: It's idealistic to believe people long to be free. And nothing will change my belief. I come at it many different ways. Really not primarily from a political science perspective, frankly; it's more of a theological perspective. I do believe there is an Almighty, and I believe a gift of that Almighty to all is freedom. And I will tell you that is a principle that no one can convince me that doesn't exist.

A number of prominent bloggers have taken issue with this statement (Rich Lowry from National Review Online, Rod Dreher from Beliefnet, and Andrew Sullivan and Ross Douthat from the Atlantic Online).  While I might quibble with individual points in their arguments, I also am quite disturbed by the quote.  Some people don't think that a politician's religious beliefs should affect their policy decisions--I'm not one of those people.  My religious beliefs inform every decision I make, and I'm not sure why it should be different for politicians.  Unless one was to compartmentalize their beliefs as something separate from other areas of their life, I'm not sure how they could keep their religious beliefs from influencing their decisions.  With that said, I think there is a fine line to be walked--in a democracy and a pluralistic society, there are necessarily other voices besides the Christian voice that need to be heard.  Still, I believe that the Christian voice needs to be heard.

But I digress.  While I believe a politician's religious beliefs will inevitably influence their decisions, I find Bush's statement above highly suspect from a theological perspective.  Bush's claim seems to be that, because the gift of God to all is "freedom," this means that America should export its particular brand of freedom to the rest of the world.  The implication is that western democracy is somehow a part of the "freedom" which is God's gift.  And you simply cannot defend that position from the biblical text.  The "freedom" associated with being a Christian is freedom from slavery to sin--it is emphatically not political freedom.  If it was, Jesus would surely have worked for the overthrow of the Roman empire--instead, he tried to defuse Jewish nationalistic fervor which was focused on revolt against Rome.

Of course, this does not mean that it is necessarily bad to bring western democracy to other nations (although I think we need to be very careful in assuming that everyone else in the world does or should want our political system).  It does mean, however, that the spread of western democracy cannot be justified on the basis of Bush's vague "theology of freedom."  His attempt to do so completely misrepresents the kind of "freedom" Christ died to provide.

Christians: Revolutionaries and Barbarians or Not?

My wife is going to camp next week with her home church as an adult volunteer. One of the books they are reading in preparation for the week is "The Barbarian Way" by Erwin McManus. First, I have not read the book, so the following is not a critique (though my wife does not seem very impressed so far). Instead, I would like to point out the notable trend in Christian discourse to adopt the vocabulary of war as a means of discussing the role of Christians in the world. This includes phrases like "be a solider for Christ" or references to Jesus as a "revolutionary" along with admonishments to follow Him as revolutionaries. The other day I watched a video of a presentation by Dr. Alan Keyes where I noted his frequent references to the war against the family and the war against religious freedom (there were a number of notable points in this presentation which I plan to address in a future post).

The question this raises is whether this trend is a positive one. Are Christians meant to be "barbarians" or "revolutionaries?" Certainly many of those who adopt these words hijack and nuance their meanings for specific purposes, but the question remains whether one can completely redefine words which already have meaning within our social discourse. As July 4, Independence Day, just past, it reminds that the word "revolutionary" has great significance in the American tradition. The American Revolution was a violent and bloody affair. Most revolutions are. Further, the language of war suggests fighting, strife, and death. Jesus' call, however, is different. While He was clear that violence against his followers would be a real possibility, perhaps even a likely one, He was equally clear that they were not to respond in kind.

So are we at war? Should we be revolutionaries or barbarian? The answer is both "yes" and "no." As is made plain by the words of Paul, if Christians are at war, it is a spiritual one and not one against other people. The problem then, is that when we talk about our various "Christian" causes (e.g. abortion, gay rights, marriage and the family, posting of the Ten Commandments, etc.) using the language of war, it tends to be groups of people (e.g. "those liberals") or organizations (e.g. the ACLU) we reference. Is this truly reflective of the kind of grace under which we live? Is this truly reflective of the salvation being offered to those people and the members of those organizations?