Christian right vows to stay strong under Obama
by Michelle A Vu, Christian Post
Posted: Wednesday, November 12, 2008, 8:44 (GMT)
Well-known conservative evangelicals such as the Rev Joel Hunter, a megachurch pastor in Florida, and the Rev Richard Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), have embraced the global warming issue and are forging a new relationship with the Obama administration and Democrats.
Both leaders believe in consensus-building and working with those they differ with.
Hunter, while adamantly against abortion, helped draft the Democratic Party's new abortion platform that states its support for a women's right to choose but at the same time, also declares its support for the reduction of abortions in America. Hunter delivered the closing prayer at this year's Democratic National Convention.
It was also Hunter who prayed with Obama by phone last week before the president-elect went on stage in Chicago's Grant Park.
"What really works in this country is not inciting the base, but making partnerships with people with different views to advance your agenda," Hunter said, according to The Associated Press. "Those who don't will marginalise themselves politically. I don't think advancement of a cause primarily by attack is the way of the future."
The politically-engaged megachurch pastor is also against same-sex unions, but supports giving homosexuals some form of legal recognition of their relationship.
Fellow evangelical leader Richard Cizik is likewise optimistic about working with the Obama administration.
Cizik, who has angered the Christian right with his advocacy on climate change, believes the incoming president understands that social problems are morally rooted.
He says centrist evangelicals are in a better position than the religious right to work with the new administration.
"The strategy is very different from the past. The religious right practiced this zero sum game where somebody else has to lose for us to win," commented the Rev Richard Cizik, vice president of the National Association of Evangelicals, during an election analysis teleconference on Wednesday.
"And our [centrist evangelical] strategy is a common good that says we are all in this together," he said. "That means we learned as evangelicals how to collaborate with whom we disagree."
While this emerging breed of centrist evangelicals is finding itself in a comfortable position with the new administration, the Christian right movement still needs to decide how it will approach a more liberal post-Bush White House.
"Do they want to be an oppositional force, lambasting the administration at every turn, which can help their organisations raise money?" said Mark Rozell, a political science professor at George Mason University, to AP. "Or do they find ways to intersect with new leadership and either try to minimise damage to their agenda or move forward issues where they can find consensus? It's an important turning point for the movement."
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Added: Wednesday, November 12, 2008, 22:22 (GMT)
Oh dear... we all thought the dinosaurs didn't make it on to the Ark because Noah couldn't fit them in but in fact they slipped in disguised as rightwing Xtians and are still with us today thriving all over the USA and ensuring the world will vaporise in climate undoings.
Isn't it time they visited their shrinks, took the pills and read some world history to extend their knowledge beyond the village 'welcome' sign?
To even begin to think there is anything the least bit 'socialist' or even 'left wing' about 'the mos-lim guy' is to demonstrate an appalling level of total ignorance, God provided no doubt.
Freedom is not to be found being locked into fairy tales.... but in reading the tales, absorbing the 'moral' if there is one, and growing up to take the responsibility mentioned in the Garden of Edan fairy tale....
Please.... we need to move beyond complete stupidity to ensure the world does not vaporise in some battle between religious halfwits from the worlds two biggest fairy tales.
howard haighter, sydney australia
Added: Wednesday, November 12, 2008, 17:22 (GMT)
God forbid the conservative movement becomes any more "progressive" (to use the liberal coined buzz-word). We compromise too much already! I, as a man in my mid 20s, am part of this younger generation and can say from experience that the reason we don't tend to fit into the traditional conservative movement is not a generational gap issue. It's a spiritual issue. The people in my generation are not conservative because they're not saved, period. Also, one of the worst things we could do is embrace the global warming hysteria. As a professional scientist myself, I have examined the evidence for man-caused global warming and found it to be complete BS and pseudo-science. Evidence currently suggests we're at the beginning of a cooling trend if anything as a result of the current sun-spot cycle. Many pastors have lost my respect by jumping on that bandwagon. Some conservatives are so concerned about appearing ignorant and backward to the world that it ends up being a self-fulfilling prophesy of sorts. God gave us brains and he expects us to use them. If the conservative movement wants to add a "global-warming" plank then count me out. I'll go it rogue and continue fighting for what I believe in on my own. And I am sick and tired of all the PC rhetoric coming from the body of Christ. "President-elect Obama himself is not the issue"? BS. He sets the party agenda! The most radical elements are HIS agenda. He is the enemy and its not un-american or un-biblical to say that! To all the wishy-washy tip-toeing conservatives in the church I have three words: "Grow some b*lls." Don't compromise with the world.
Brent, Durham
