Sleeping With The Devil

I could never figure out what the attraction is for Christian conservatives to the Republican party, other than that the latter obviously gives lip service to the former. These conservative Christians know it too, you just know they have to. Really, now, these are not stupid people. Well, okay, let me correct myself somewhat. Their leaders aren't stupid people.

Well, okay, most of them aren't stupid people. Jerry Falwell,for example, is certainly no idiot, nor is Doctor James Dobson. Perhaps one could make a case for questioning the sanity, and even the overall intelligence, of Pat Robertson, but for the most part, these people are manipulative, media savvy, and quite well educated.

Bu do they really believe in the Bible? Are they actually true Christians, in the sense that they truly believe in the values of the Bible? Never mind whether or not they actually take its more fantastical mythological stories literally or not, the point is, do they really, truly, honestly believe in the spiritual precepts of the Bible. That is the real meat and potatoes of Christianity, the myths are what the Apostle Paul might have referred to as the "milk of the word", something that an infant must of necessity feed on in the beginning, before growing enough to transistion into a more meaty and substantive diet.

I don't see how they actually could believe in this kind of thing, and at the same time throw their lot in with people whose values are, to put it kindly, anything but spiritual. But they do. Perhaps an explanation is to be found in the attitudes of their parishoners. In a general sense, most Bible believing Christians seem to be the type who pride themselves on their patriotism and their loyalty to God and country and family and all the other buzz words by which your typical average American identifies himself.

They also have a deep mistrust of government, or at least the federal government, and also a deep fear and mistrust of foreigners, especially those from the Third World. Yet, they support missionary work to these countries, and private donations and charities to the dispossessed and distressed from the world, though balk at tax monies being spent for the same purposes.

And when there is a war, typically, they can be counted on to rally behind the flag, and display the most ardent patriotism, and at the same time disdain, and even revulsion, for those who dare exhibit the slightest skepticism of national policy in this regard. Suddenly, the very government they in ordinary times distrust and revile, they suddenly become the most ardent supporters of. Small wonder then that war is entered in too many times haphazardly-some might suggest, as in the present case, unnecessarrily.

Small wonder as well that those in government who wish to tap into this great reservoir of mass power are all too willing to placate them as to their most ardent desires and fears, and do so shamelessly. As exploitive as it is, it is a wonder that so many blindly fall into this trap, seemingly without question. It seems they simply do not know any better.

But the preachers, priests, ministers, and rabbis do, or at least should, know better, and I submit they certainly do know better. They could put a stop to this nonsense, could have done so a long time ago in fact before it ever got started. I would suggest that they have misused and abused their roles as the so-called shapherds of their flocks by leading the sheep into the lair of the wolf. But what do they get out of it?

It doesn't take much intellectal exercise to perceive that they are getting some degree of power and influence to a greater extent than they would ordinarily have. They have enough as it is, but by tapping into this vast reservoir of anger, frustration, fear, and in way too many cases, I am afraid, prejudice and hate, they are magnifying their power and influence, and thus their wealth, two or three or even more times.

This is not unusual, religous leaders have always done this, throughout world history. But it wasn't suppossed to be that way here. This was suppossed to be a country where religous power over government was kept in check, and government influence over religion, all religions, was likewise kept to a minimum. Supposedly, that is. Churches, and politicians as well, have always gave a wink and a nod, the usual lip-service, to the philosophy of seperation of church and state, from the earliest of days, until it got to the point where it really wasn't an issue, in fact, it was actually so all pervasive it was not even noticed.

The sixties, seventies,and early eighties changed all that, as churches and religous leaders felt their power andinfluence dwindling and lessenning it seemed with each passing year, until to some it seemed the survival of Christianity itself was threatened. By casting his lot in with the Reagan Revolution, it was Jerry Falwell by way of his so-caled "Moral Majority", who fired the first real volley in the religous cultural wars and brought the government right into lock-step with him.

Falwell became the first of many powerful religous kingmakers. And they have pervaded all areas of political and public life, and have sought to control the ideologies of both parties. The Left Wing Christians, when you get right down to it, have been every bit as much of an all pervasive power over the Democratic Party as the Conservative Christians have been over the Republicans. One is every bit as dangerous as the other,and in fact the Liberal Chrisitans may be as much of a danger as the Conservatives, precisely because their influence is not as recognized. They do not shout and wave their arms from the rooftops, rend their clothes in despair, rant and rave about the threats of hell-fire and damnation, and so they are just not as obvious. Until, that is, you see the results.

I would like to see religion kept totaly seperated from government policy making. Religions seem to have the effect of limiting progress, when they are at their most benign. At worse, they keep progress to a complete standstill, and maybe in some cases even serve to turn back the clock. I'm not saying, of course, that religous people shouldn't vote, or that they shouldn't vote according to their values. But leaders like Falwell should stay out of the business of trying to influence public policy. At most, they have the right to stand up for the rights of their parishioners to make sure their religous rights are protected, and that's about it.

But of course, it is ridiculous on my part to even hope that htis ideal will ever be realized. As long as religous leaders hold sway over their parishioners, they can and will use this influence to wield political power and influence, and thus gain even more wealth, inflence,and power for themselves.

In fact, I think I'm going to write a song aboutthis. I've gotten into a song writing mood lately, thanks to Green Day. I'm going to call my song by the title of this post "Sleeping With The Devil". It shouldn't take me that long to write it, in fact, I'e been working on it some sinc elast night. Here's the chorus-

"I'm Sleeping With The Devil
I'm Sleeping With The Devil
I'm Sleeping With The Devil
And I'm Nothing But The Devil's Whore"

Or something like that. I'll post the whole song in a later post, hopefully in the next dya or two. Who knows, maybe I'll find a good group to record it, and it will be a big hit, and I'llmake mucho money. Or more than likely not, but it would be fun trying.