Responding to Hugh Hewitt

When I did my post yesterday on "Political Blogging," I was thrilled to see that LaShawn Barber picked it up and did a post on it. I was thrilled again this morning when I saw that Joe Carter had picked it up on the Evangelical Outpost. But I couldn't believe it when Hugh Hewitt picked it up and commented on it this morning. That's the next best thing to getting an Instalanche. Thanks to Hugh I've gotten more traffic today on my blog by double than any other day I have blogged.

If you read Hugh's post you may get the impression that we are at odds on some matters, but I don't think we are. In fact, in several places he summed up my ideas better than I did. There is one issue he took a bit of exception to that I want to address.

Hugh says:

he objects to a question I have myself raised with my radio audience: "Can a Christian be a Democrat?"

and then

But the question is not illegitimate, as Jollyblogger seems to think. In fact, it urgently needs asking again and again.

I e-mailed Hugh back and let him know that I was taking the question at face value. At face value that question is way too general. I know people who are Christians and democrats. Some are too lazy to switch their party affiliation although they have been voting against the democrats for decades. I have heard of others who want to stay in the party to work for change. They are there to get the inside scoop on what is going on, but they don't support the party platform and vote against it, all the while seeking to influence change. I wouldn't for a minute want to call their commitment to Christ into question.

This is why I agree with Hugh's answer to the question when he says "It depends." John Mark Reynolds says this about the democratic party:

There is no room in the Democrat party for people who oppose abortion, who find a role for religion in the public square, and who support rational family structures. The party is utterly dominated by abortion extremists, by secularists, and by libertines.

As such, I have no problem with a Christian who wants to work within the party to undermine its platform, but I can't see anyway a Christian could endorse such policies.

In any case, the meat and potatoes of my post really dealt with where the Christian places their hope. I do think that many Christians have chicken-little syndrome and I do think that many Christians place too much hope in human governments. So, while encouraging Christians to be involved in the political sphere I want to warn them against misplaced hopes.

I think Hugh agrees with this and says as much in the following words which I am all too happy to agree with:

I went looking for the exact text of historian Herbert Butterfield's admonition to "[c]ling absolutely to Christ and to all other things be relatively committed," and found instead this appropiate remark: "But the greatest menace to our civilization today is the conflict between giant organized systems of self-righteousness -- each system only too delighted to find that the other is wicked --each only too glad that the sins give it pretext for still deeper hatred and animosity." Butterfield's comments, and Jollyblogger's analysis, warn about the over-emphasis on politics to the point that political positions displace or become necessary parts of genuine faith. Good admonitions.

But the fear of politics overpowering faith should not prevent faithful people from examining politics closely for the genuine dilemmas that faith forces upon politics.