My Testimony, My Vote

Christian leaders on the far right have been supporting conservative, mostly Republican candidates for decades. At her Florida parish a few weeks ago, my mom said they were all handed fliers during Mass with instructions from the diocese about how to vote on various issues (read here "candidates").

Well, this video message from Bart Campolo popped up in my inbox this morning:

What do you think about what Bart has to say?

What are you wondering about and/or struggling with during the last days of this campaign season?

How is your faith shaping the way you look at the issues and the candidates this election season?

How are you putting your faith into action?

My mom was so disturbed by those fliers that she went home from Mass and wrote a letter to her bishop. Then, for the first time ever, she emailed the Obama campaign to ask how she could help - they gave her a list and she's been making phone calls to her neighbors encouraging them to vote for her candidate - go mom.

I've been hearing from some of my conservative friends and readers that Christians shouldn't be getting their hands dirty working for particular candidates and that Christian leaders don't have any place in politics, that we all need to be "non-partisan." I don't know if I just wasn't listening but I'll tell you what: I didn't hear conservative Christians beating the "non-partisan" drum until the rest of us started to get into the game. But people like my mom, I think, are really upsetting the status quo. In other words, they're making it clear that Christian and conservative (much less Republican) are not synonyms.

Can we finally all just agree, please, that there isn't a "Christian" way to vote, think, look at things, etc? Please? Until now, mainstream and progressive Christians have refused to talk about how their faith is informing the way they vote, think, look at things, etc., and so a lot of people just assumed that "THE" Christian voice in our culture is the conservative one. Some of us have always known that's just not true. Now most of us know better. And I think this is a good thing.

The way forward isn't to make sure NONE of us is talking about how our faith informs our politics.

The way forward is to make sure we ALL do.

Nothing will level the playing field faster and prevent one side or another from playing the "I'm more Christian than you are" card.

So, what about me? Well, here goes: I'm not only going to vote for Barack Obama on November 4th, I've given money to his campaign and have been out doing door-to-door canvassing for him in the swing state next door. On election day I've volunteered to drive people in northwest Indiana to the polls. 

Why?

Well, I believe that part of what a president does is help us decide exactly how our money (i.e., our taxes) gets "spread around." This isn't socialism. This is America. Our taxes get used for everything from sending our kids to war to sending them to college. And I believe that Senator Obama is the best candidate to take my money and spread it around in a way that best reflects my values...in health care for everyone, for example, and in the opportunity for every kid who wants an education to get one.

That's not the only reason I'm supporting Senator Obama, however. I agree with General Colin Powell, a Republican, who said he has been "troubled" by the tone of Senator McCain's campaign, on the one hand, and inspired by the way Obama seems to inspire people and bring us together, on the other.

As a Christian, I believe that a new kingdom has come into our world through Jesus Christ, a kingdom in which all the walls that separate us from each other and from God have been broken down. Because of sin, we don't always recognize this kingdom or live like it's true. But that doesn't mean it isn't. And when I answer the call to follow Jesus I think one of the things I'm asked to do is to SEE this new kingdom and to be a WITNESS to it in the things I say and do. It isn't my job to build a world with no walls; that's God's job. But it IS my job to be useful to God in this work.

So, here is my testimony about what I have seen and heard:

I grew up in a town where blacks and whites hated each other. Back in the early 1970's, as racial tensions exploded, my family wasn't immune to these feelings. Jobs were scarce. The culture was changing. It was easy to blame "them." But my mom, who also grew up in that town, sent me a birthday card yesterday - one of those funny ones with a picture of Obama on the front.

The card itself said: "Can you have the greatest birthday ever? YES! YOU CAN!" On the inside it said: "Did I buy you a present? NO! I DIDN"T!" (Which is funny because she did, in fact, give me a present.)

Anyway, my mom's handwritten note on the bottom of the inside of the card said:

"Don't know why I chose this card. Perhaps it will be a collectors item for your great-grandchildren. The story might go like this: 'This was the 1st black man in the White House back in 2009. My granny and President Obama were both born in 1961.' Love today and always - Mom."

I know this might sound goofy to some of you, but I'm totally serious when I say that, in Barack Obama's campaign I have caught a glimpse of a world with no walls, the kind of world God has dreamt for us, the kind of world Jesus came to announce and to bring in and to promise is on the way. I am seeing something happen in people, something that I think is good for this country and good for the world, something that I believe is...well...holy. It has happened in my mom. It has happened in me.

Do I think Obama is the messiah? No, don't be ridiculous. Do I think that if he's elected all of our problems will disappear and the kingdom will come? Well, that'd be nice. But, no. Do I think voting for him is the only "Christian" option? No. Unequivocally, no. There is no such thing as a "Christian vote." There are, simply, Christians (of all kinds) who vote. And if your values as a Christian are leading you to vote for the other guy, I support you and your decision.

But my faith, my values, and my kingdom-perspective as a follower of Jesus are - without a doubt and without apology - shaping the way I view this campaign.

And they are informing my vote.

P.S. Thanks for the gifts you've given me, mom - all of them.

Comments

[Tom in Ontario]

I've never told people in my congregation how to vote. What I've done is encourage people to vote and to decide based on the issues and the platform of the candidate or party and how their vote would best live out loving their neighbour.

Too often I think that we go into elections with the mindset (and politicians fish for our votes knowing our mindset) of "what's in it for ME?" or "how is it going to help ME?" or "how will it affect MY bank account?" etc. I try to go into the voting booth thinking "what's in it for 'the least of these'?" or "how will it affect my children's and grandchildren's generations?"

I've come to see that a vote for the party on the "right" tends to be a vote for "ME" and a vote for the party on the "left" or closer to the centre is a vote for "WE."