Vote for Bush!
This post is not making a political statement. I want to address the recent hubub (I can’t find a headline right now. If you have one, I’d be glad to have one here, but I don’t even know what search terms I’d use.) about the church where the pastor told everyone they had to vote for Bush. Eventually, he created enough pressure that the members voted out members who openly opposed him on this.
On one hand, it does seem a bit extreem. We aren’t used to this kind of mix of politics and religion. Whatever the political leanings of members of the church in different parts of the world, the church has maintained a policy of political neutrality in terms of party politics (though it has made no bones about how it stands on what we view as moral issues, gay marriage, gambling, etc.). We are very used to being left to vote as we will, and I don’t think that will change.
On the other hand, some of the congregations have decided to get the government involved. They see it as an infringement of separation of church and state. They want the government to force the pastor to step down. I don’t know how this has played out so far, and like I said, I would be happy for any information. I think this idea is actually quite scary. While we might disagree with this pastor’s stance, I think he should be free to preach what he wil, even if that means taking a political stand. I even think that the church that he represents should be able to make membership decisions on whatever basis it wants to.
My reasoning is that if they can say that you can’t take a political stand, then there isn’t much to stop the government from saying that we can’t take a stand on things like gay marriage or gambling, since they are certainly as political as they are moral. They sould say that we can’t take a stand on abortion, pornography, or a host of other issues that we feel are very important, but that become the center of political life.
I think the tendency here is one I’ve heard a lot, the idea that religion is spiritual and shouldn’t tell us what to do. While I don’t agree with this pastor’s teachings, I also don’t want to tell him that he shouldn’t be telling his congregation what to do. I certainly think that religion has a lot with telling us what to do. Don’t commit murder or adultery, don’t lie, don’t steal, give ten percent of your income as tithing to support the work of the Lord. God doesn’t command us in all things, but he does command in some, and I don’t want to start having legal restrictions on what we can teach as a moral imperative.
Well, the church can say whatever it wants if it is willing to pay taxes. The argument isn’t over whether you can talk about political issues over the pulpit, but whether you can endorse a specific candidate.
Here’s an update from msnbc. Apparently the pastor has stepped down.
Comment by Bryce I — 5/16/2005 @ 9:33 am
yes, the issue is that to maintain tax-exempt status, churches are not supposed to endorse a certain candidate in an election. Although MoveOn.org can do it, I suppose. Unless they were sneaky and never actually said vote for kerry.
Comment by yes — 5/16/2005 @ 11:31 am
I don’t know wether I will make any sense, not having any legal training. It seems that a church could limit membership on belief. E.g., belief in a certain type of marraige or the sinful character of abortion. But as soon as the religion requires a vote for a specific candidate, it has become a political organization and no longer a religious organization. Even the Republican Party won’t kick you out for voting democrate.
Comment by J. Stapley — 5/16/2005 @ 2:26 pm
1. The pastor did step down, left…and took half the congregation with him.
2. I’m not sure this is really news; except the liberal NYT thinks it will make Bush and the “religious” right look bad somehow.
3. Church’s are free to define who can/can’t be a member of their organization; they are free to discriminate in any way they choose to.
4. Church’s are not 100% banned from political activity. First, they have a fabulous argument that their First Amendment rights are being violated. Second, the ban is only on “lobbying” a legislature or “endorsing” a specific candidate. Hence, BYU/LDS Church can run a non-profit with lobbies the UN w/o problem. Third, churchs may “lobby” or “endorse” to a certain, albeit very limited, extent. I forget the exact language, but if the activity is “minimal,” there is no penalty. Also, there is at least one IRS case suggesting that as long as 5% or less of the Church’s revenue goes to political activity…there is no problem. Finally…the only sanction open to the IRS is revoking the tax exempt privilege of the Church and the tax deductibility of contributions by members to said church. However, for many churches…this isn’t a problem. Why? Because they can simply dissolve the existing legal structure of the “offending” church, start a new one, and they instantly have tax exempt status again.
Frankly, Church’s should have a tax-exempt, voice to say whatever they want to.
Comment by lyle stamps — 5/16/2005 @ 3:16 pm
Churches do have to be very careful to avoid endorsement or they will loose tax-exempt status. And the IRS does keep its eye open.
However, did you hear about the boss who fired his employee after he gave them all a Pro-Bush speech and she came to work the next day with a Kerry sticker on her car and refused to remove it? Kerry hired her to his staff. I like that story. Except I wonder if she’s out of work again. Poor thing, sounds like some sort of stupid thing I would do.
Comment by lisa — 5/16/2005 @ 4:31 pm
“Church’s are not 100% banned from political activity. First, they have a fabulous argument that their First Amendment rights are being violated.”
I would have to agree, and I think the issue is bigger than what would play out in the courts. That is to say, there is a big difference between public endoirsement–that is, here, we will give you money or spend our time out door to door convincing those not of our faith that they should vote for you, and feeling that there is a moral issue at stake in the act of voting for particular candidates and realying that message to those who are members of the congregation, perhaps even basing membership decisions on it.
My mom actually asked me what I would do in a similar situation. I told her that I would vote for Bush because if the prophet told me that this was important, he must see something that I don’t see that would be important enough to risk the notoriety. I don’t think this will ever happen, mind you. I think our religion stays out of most politics for reasons that are bigger than public feelings about separation of church and state. (Actually, the constitution just states that congress cannot make any law regarding the establishment of a state religion. It never says anything about religion affecting government.) But I would comply without feeling in some way violated.
Comment by S. Hancock — 5/16/2005 @ 5:35 pm
But I would comply without feeling in some way violated.
This is foreign to me, because I believe that it is impossible. I also think it is impossible for God to ask me to pull an Abraham. Really, nothing is impossible for God, but it doesn’t change the fact that if he asked me to do something I felt was wrong (I’m not saying voting for Bush was wrong, but some people clearly believe that it was), I would struggle over it and maybe feel violated. Or maybe I would praqy about it and change my mind. The bottom line is that I have never been in a comparable situation, so I have a hard time predicting my behavior.
Comment by J. Stapley — 5/16/2005 @ 6:06 pm
God has given us the heart and the mind and the connection to him to know things for ourselves. Even more amazing than these gifts he has given us the agency to choose for ourselves how we will act upon this knowledge. This is why I would not trust anyone who would tell me I have to do this or else.
Of course, if this pastor were a running a taxable institution, he would have every right to tell his congregation who to vote for. In turn I would hope that they would excercise their right to vote their conscience and be kicked out if the command differed from it.
Comment by Rachel — 5/17/2005 @ 12:18 am
J,
I’ve never been in a comparable situation either. I think, however, that your comparison to Abraham is quite interesting. Abraham’s trial had to d owith sacrificing what was most central to his world, what he lived for. I’m not suggesting that anyone values separation of religion and politics like they value their child, but it has, perhaps become a vry central tenet of our cultural beliefs, and the violation of it might be one of the hardest things for many to imagine. For whatever reason, I never really had that sort of outlook on my vote–that it has to be a pure expression of me. I simply see it as a tool for making sure the society doesn’t go to pot unless at least a majority of the people are off the track.
Rachel et. al.,
As far as taxes are concerned, I don’t know how I feel about it. Certainly the politicians who get elected do a good job of lobbying for moral concerns one way or the other. I’m not so sure that the churches shouldn’t be able to effect that. Most moral issues get decided by our representatives. That’s part of republican government. I think the church just recognizes that for the most part, politics itself isn’t the answer, so why fight the battle on that front, especially when the parties, here and abroad, are rarely if ever fighting in a coherent way for the values we espouse. The real way of remedying the ills of society is teaching the gospel, so that people generally will govern themselves correctly. I think the best evidence for the unimportance of most political races on the presidential level to the spiritual well-being of the country–or at least of our individual votes in those races–is the degree to which faithful members of the church who pray about thier vote end up on different sides of the campaign.
I do think that the church is liable to let us use our own wisdom in voting, and as I said, it would take an extraordinary reason for there to be a declaration to vote a certain way—though of course this will not happen. It would have to be something so big that the church would be willing to give up tax-exempt status. Small example—the church can’t let its members use church buildings to pack food without paying taxes on the property. While I was in Indiana, we were told that if there was no other way for members to get food supply together, they would pay taxes on that building and let people use it for canning. We didn’t do that, but it was important enough that the option was open. Like I said, there would have to be something tied to that election that would be important enough to supercede the church’s position on staying out of political races. I don’t think that will happen. The point is, I don’t think it should be something the Govt. should worry about, whatever the legality.
Comment by S. Hancock — 5/17/2005 @ 2:38 am
It may sound extreme to you, but I happen to know some people in the bloggernacle who, if they were in charge, would have probably excommunicated those who did not vote for Bush.
You’d be able to read about that yourself on their old site, mormons4bush.com, but it has been deleted.
Thank heavens they weren’t our bishops! We can’t have people being banned from worshipping simply because they have different political ideas.
Comment by Jordan — 5/17/2005 @ 10:38 pm
I think a lot of people prayed about voting for Bush, but then did nothing to educate themselves any better about the issues. I don’t think we can expect to receive revelation about these sorts of things unless we study things out in our minds, and work hard to find out the answer ourselves. Only then, will God enlighten us.
Incidentally, I don’t know how any mormon who actually pays attention to the issues could have voted for Bush in good conscience. Unless we mormons believe in lying, hypocrisy, greed, murder, etc. — which we don’t.
Comment by Rich — 5/26/2005 @ 8:57 pm