Hypocrite or just paradoxically principled?
I got into a bit of hot water with one of my professors last week when I commented on this article during a class discussion. My position was that so-called “liberals” (a term which certainly is not synonymous with atheism, by the by) do not have a problem with religion; it is the hypocrisy of the religious right, which is constituted by many Evangelical Christians, that tends to stick in the craw of most “liberals” I know. The author of this article, which is an op-ed in The New York Times, stated that it’s acceptable for East Coast liberals to lambast Mike Huckabee’s Christianity while being painfully PC about Clinton’s gender and Obama’s race.
First of all, we are forgetting that technically, Huckabee is not the only Christian running for office. Everyone who runs for President claims to be some kind of Protestant or another. There was an enormous kerfuffle over John F. Kennedy’s Catholicism and Irish heritage, for chrissakes. Both Clinton and Obama–particularly Clinton–make reference to their religious faith during rallies and speeches. I wonder if way too often, we allow the media to dictate party affiliation by religious affiliation, shoving born-agains under the Republican mantle and everyone else under the Democratic.
Having grown up in an extremely fundamentalist Christian household, graduating from an extremely fundamentalist Christian “school” (the quotation marks are because it wasn’t state-accredited; I’m still amazed that I was able to get into college), and then attending college in an area of Southwest Missouri known to be an Assemblies of God stronghold/snakepit, I feel–perhaps erroneously, but oh well–that I am uniquely qualified to comment on the Evangelical experience. Of course, there was no way for my professor to know that. I wonder if I am alone in my thinking. It is not spirituality per se that I have a problem with–in fact, I have several Christian friends who are nothing short of awesomatronic and socially aware to boot. It’s really just hypocrisy: the pro-life thing, the anti-gay thing, the pro-war thing, the uber-politicization of Christianity, the conflation of Christianity with consumerism, Promise Keepers, the Quiverfull movement, the Creation Museum, the anti-woman stuff, the chastity pledges to Daddy, and on and on. I am aware that there are plenty of Evangelicals who either hate this stuff too or do not seek to impose their faith on the rest of us who are frolicking and fornicating and making cornholes.
Everyone is a hypocrite to some degree. As a vegan, I would venture a guess that I am often scrutinized for possible hypocrisies: are those leather shoes? wasn’t that shirt made in a sweatshop? doesn’t that have honey in it? It’s no secret that we love to catch other people being hypocrites. For instance, I cackled with glee when the story broke about Ted Haggard, the Colorado megachurch fire-and-brimstone pastor who resigned in 2006 after his meth-fueled gay sex romps were discovered. If Ted hadn’t been an Evangelical minister, I’m sure I would have found the media’s coverage of this story appalling and intrusive (which it certainly was). So much for the love of Jesus; so much for the open-mindedness of a social worker. Point: no one.
My particular truth is that the Evangelical thing never made sense to me. I found the principles of Christian dogma to be at odds with my understanding of Jesus’s teachings; so much of the church appeared to be about repression, oppression, and judgment, that I grew up pretty disgusted by it all. No doubt my understanding of Evangelicals is now informed by a damaged religious upbringing (also bitterness over the fact that I was once dumped for Jesus). Also, I think the whole speaking-in-tongues thing is creepy. Yet I’ve found that among discussions about Christians with my friends of other persuasions, the discourse tends to be overly simplistic in its disparaging speech: Evangelicals are “crazy”, they’re “ridiculous”, they’re “ruining our country”, they’re “stupid”, they’re “HYPOCRITES”. It’s occurred to me belatedly that these labels have been slapped on pretty slipshod; after all, there isn’t exactly one homogeneous mass of Evangelical Protestants just as there is no template for Orthodox Jews. I think the dialogue needs to be reframed. WHY do I think Evangelicals like Mike Huckabee* are hypocrites? Perhaps I am imposing my standards on them, just as I accuse them of attempting to impose their standards on me.
I would like to hear what others think about Evangelicals. Hypocrites? Paradoxically principled? Misunderstood?
*I do think this is a little different because he is running for public office, therefore I feel no shame in slinging mud and calling him a total wackjob.
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February 21st, 2008 at 11:42 am
Yesterday at work I transported a pregnant girl named Chastity.
PS: Sorry to digress.
PPS: I love your blog.