31.Mar.2010 at 31 | xn
I WANT to support the "Christian Left". Really. But…
Example? This article I just read from Evangelicals for Social Action (Ron Sider et al), about “mountaintop removal”. (Incidentally, this is the same issue that Brian McLaren used to kick off the “Everything Must Change” event I attended in San Diego a couple years ago. As much as I like a lot of his writing, I have to admit that the heavy-handed presentation was a turn-off.)
Friends who support “social justice” policies: Isn’t there room to discuss these issues without using charged language and painting the other party as villians? Why don’t you focus on THAT aspect of Christian charity in addition to the more tangible aspects – feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, etc. Until you are committed to that principle, you will never truly harness the full power and passion of the body of Christ.
What can this look like? Just take a look at the motto of Acton Institute: “Combining good intentions with sound economics.” While believing the best about others’ intentions, they add their economic expertise and seek solutions for the long-term benefit of “the least of these”. They are my model. Can I get an amen?
Below is a letter I sent to ESA. I’ll post any response I get from them. I don’t know enough about “mountaintop removal” to have an informed opinion yet, but I DO know that things are never as clear as they initially seem, there are always two sides to an argument, and there are important (competing?) principles at work: stewarding what God has given us, property rights, employment, wealth creation, loving your neighbor, etc.
Dear ESA:
I continue to subscribe to your newsletter, because I want to take in a wide range of thought on social issues. As a thoughtful, politically active follower of Christ, I want to continue to learn, even from people I disagree with.
That’s why your recent newsletter was painful to read. In the same issue that you lauded the “Civility Covenant”, and affirmed the power of the language we use (“Stop ‘textual’ abuse of children”), you included an article on mountaintop removal that was neither civil nor judicious in its wording.
Nowhere did you quote anyone from the mining industry, and the article was full of charged language – “violence”, “hyper-violent”, “barons”, etc. For a publication that seems to appreciate the nuances of the abortion argument, your environmental commentary is surprisingly nuance-free, with no hint of another side to the story.
In this respect, you are no different from the “right-wing” narrative that you criticize. Until you are willing to civilly engage ALL the issues, showing the same respect to the “evil” mining companies that you show to those in the “pro-choice” crowd, you will continue to suffer a credibility deficit. It’s this kind of communication, not environmentalism per se, that the Glenn Becks of the world rail against.
The irony is that I WANT to agree with you. I WANT to be a good steward of the environment. But just as thoughtful atheists are loathe to “check their brain at the door” and embrace Christianity, I can’t get past the awful argumentation and poor philosophical principles present in much of your writing.
PLEASE sharpen it up, get rid of the negative language, make an effort to present a rational case, not an emotional one, and you will attract, rather than alienate, readers like myself.
Thank you,
Christian Henderson
Thoughts?
Yeah, I have to agree with you on this one. I read the article, and at first I was wondering “What is he so upset about?”
Then I got to the part about “raping & pillaging” and it all became clear…
One other thing I noted: it seemed to me that they couldn’t make up their minds whether mountaintop removal mining was good or bad. On the one hand, they claim that it’s “hyper-violent,” yet on the other they note that this method requires 90% fewer workers. Isn’t that a good thing to have less people working in the mines?
Inflammatory language rarely changes anyone’s opinion – whether you’re Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter or Rusty Pritchard, if you can’t learn to present your views in a rational, reasonable, and inviting way, then you’ll only and always be preaching to the choir while the pews sit empty.
I agree with you. I like pieces of Christian socialism, for example, but do we really want a sprawling authoritarian government worse than we have now? No.
I like security, clean water/food, and healthcare and we certainly can have all of that, if we can defeat the libertarians and neo-conservatives that believe all social safety nets should be dismantled and everyone that isn’t an orphan child or an aged widow that is disabled, deformed, sick, etc… pushed into the street to live with a tin cup (they have to find a way to get their own tin cup too) until their painful agonizing death AND the Marxist state atheists that are responsible for 262 million dead by democide in the 20th century and MUCH human suffering and destruction, then we might have a chance.
Geesh. We need to find a way to have a humane society without government sprawl and PC authoritarianism. So far we haven’t.
Hi UC– Thanks for joining in! Sorry I failed to catch your comment before now!
You make a good point: the ideologies based on “from each according to his means; to each according to his need” have been responsible for more death and destruction than the “heartless” capitalists.