There's a new table up on the American Religious Identification Survey website showing changes in the proportion of Baptists, Methodists, and Lutherans in all states from 1990 to 2008. Although Baptists are down in 43 states, they're up in the upper Mountain West (ID, WY, MT), Louisiana (Catholics in steep decline), Delaware (Methodists in free fall), and--most strikingly--Maine. Baptists have been rising steadily in the Pine Tree State, such that given the decline in Catholicism, there are now nearly as many of them (19 percent) as Catholics (22 percent). Indeed, Maine now has a higher proportion of Baptists than any state outside the South (counting Missouri). Make of that what you will.
March 2009 Archives
There's a new table up on the American Religious Identification Survey website showing changes in the proportion of Baptists, Methodists, and Lutherans in all states from 1990 to 2008. Although Baptists are down in 43 states, they're up in the upper Mountain West (ID, WY, MT), Louisiana (Catholics in steep decline), Delaware (Methodists in free fall), and--most strikingly--Maine. Baptists have been rising steadily in the Pine Tree State, such that given the decline in Catholicism, there are now nearly as many of them (19 percent) as Catholics (22 percent). Indeed, Maine now has a higher proportion of Baptists than any state outside the South (counting Missouri). Make of that what you will.
Today Vermont's House Judiciary Committee voted 8-2 in favor of allowing same-sex marriage--with one additional supporter (a Republican) not voting. To get one GOP vote, an amendment was added strengthening protections for religious organizations that oppose gay marriage. I'd say passage with sufficient votes to override Gov. Jim Douglas' promised veto is likely.
We've long known that Catholics have roughly the same views on social issues like abortion and homosexuality as the rest of the population. What is so striking about yesterday's Gallup survey is the liberalism of observant Catholics--those who attend church regularly--compared to their non-Catholic counterparts. Indeed (look at the moral acceptability of homosexual relations), they're way more liberal.
To be sure, the regular-attending Catholics are less liberal than the nonregular-attending ones. But there's really only one issue where the Catholic church's teaching seems to have a distinctive impact: the death penalty. Where two-thirds of all non-Catholics and nonregular-attending Catholics find the death penalty morally acceptable, only a little more that half of regular-attending Catholics do. On that, the church has managed to move the needle--in a liberal direction.
Otherwise, there's precious little here to make the bishops feel good--and that goes double for the conservatives who believe that a smaller, more with-the-program church is just what the doctor ordered. When a quarter of your regular attenders think abortion is morally acceptable and just half or less are with the program on all other social issues, you're in big trouble. Especially when you realize that all those non-Catholic clergy are, by your lights, doing a much better job.
To be sure, the regular-attending Catholics are less liberal than the nonregular-attending ones. But there's really only one issue where the Catholic church's teaching seems to have a distinctive impact: the death penalty. Where two-thirds of all non-Catholics and nonregular-attending Catholics find the death penalty morally acceptable, only a little more that half of regular-attending Catholics do. On that, the church has managed to move the needle--in a liberal direction.Otherwise, there's precious little here to make the bishops feel good--and that goes double for the conservatives who believe that a smaller, more with-the-program church is just what the doctor ordered. When a quarter of your regular attenders think abortion is morally acceptable and just half or less are with the program on all other social issues, you're in big trouble. Especially when you realize that all those non-Catholic clergy are, by your lights, doing a much better job.
In today's WaPo, Ken Woodward makes the case for inviting President Obama to give the commencement address at his alma mater, Notre Dame. The president is the president, after all, and it's a longstanding tradition for Notre Dame to invite presidents. Catholicism is no isolated sect that declines to engage the world. Offering the commencement speaker an honorary degree is merely customary, signaling no endorsement of his policy positions. While I'm not entirely convinced by the last point--an honor is an honor--it's not entirely unreasonable.The larger issue has to do with the question of invited speakers on Catholic campuses, and the increased tendency in conservative Catholic circles to treat abortion dissenters as pariahs who must neither be seen nor heard. Twenty-five years ago, Gov. Mario Cuomo of New York went to Notre Dame to deliver an address justifying his own opposition to legal restrictions on abortion, including efforts to bar Medicaid from paying for the procedure, even though, as a Catholic, he embraced his church's opposition to abortion. While Cuomo's speech did not lack for critics, his going to the nation's premiere institution of Catholic higher learning to engage the issue was generally regarded as right and proper--in the spirit of scholastic debate that was the glory of the medieval (Catholic) university.
Nowadays, however, not only is the very appearance of a prominent "pro-choice" Catholic on a Catholic campus considered an offense by conservatives, but even the appearance of a prominent Catholic like Douglas Kmiec, who supports the Church's position on legally proscribing abortion but nevertheless is prepared to justify support for pro-choice politicians on other grounds. What makes this so peculiar is that the Church does not regard opposition to abortion as not an article of faith that Catholics are obliged to believe. Rather, the claim is that the pro-life position derives from the nature of things, and is thus accessible to all humankind through the exercise of natural reason. Under the circumstances, open discussion and debate of the issues at hand ought to be encouraged as a matter of principle on Catholic campuses. Instead, extending invitations to speak not only to prominent Catholics who dissent from "the magisterium" but also to prominent non-Catholics like Obama, is regarded as a scandal.
Kmiec, like a latter-day Luther, has now taken to Dan Gilgoff's God & Country blog to post a series of questions on abortion and related issues for public debate. They are framed for all comers, but aimed at getting his conservative co-religionists, including the keepers of the magisterium, to start ponying up some real argumentation. Let's see if they do.
One hates to dump on people of good will, but it's time to recognize that talking about common ground on abortion is creating more ill will than just going ahead and staking out some territory. A few days ago, progressive Catholics Simone Campbell and John Gehring contributed an op-ed piece to the Cleveland Plain Dealer chastising both secular left and religious right for refusing to heed the calls for truce in their pro-choice v. pro-life culture war. This has elicited a tough rejoinder from the redoubtable Fred Clarkson over at Talk To Action, wherein (among other things) he makes the point that in addition to the secular rights community, the pro-choice side also includes actual religious folks who believe that abortion can be a moral choice. Those in the pro-life community interested in making alliances with pro-choicers need to learn to acknowledge that.
But mainly, they ought to stop talking about the need for common ground and tell us what they consider the common ground to be. When the prominent conservative Catholic law professor Doug Kmiec signed on with the Obama campaign last year, he made the case for an approach to "abortion reduction" based on social policies intended to make it easier for abortion-tempted women to carry their pregnancies to term. Not surprisingly, some of his erstwhile allies in the pro-life camp considered this a betrayal, but he had a real case to make. Do Campbell and Gehring agree with it? If not, what about it is insufficient, from their point of view? Let them make their own case, and let's see who they can persuade to embrace it.
It's possible, of course, that the commongroundniks would just like to take the abortion issue off the table, so they can enlist pro-life Catholics and evangelicals to support a progressive social agenda that includes, say, universal health care and a war on poverty. But such pretextual politics is unworthy of people of good will, so I will decline to entertain that possibility.
But mainly, they ought to stop talking about the need for common ground and tell us what they consider the common ground to be. When the prominent conservative Catholic law professor Doug Kmiec signed on with the Obama campaign last year, he made the case for an approach to "abortion reduction" based on social policies intended to make it easier for abortion-tempted women to carry their pregnancies to term. Not surprisingly, some of his erstwhile allies in the pro-life camp considered this a betrayal, but he had a real case to make. Do Campbell and Gehring agree with it? If not, what about it is insufficient, from their point of view? Let them make their own case, and let's see who they can persuade to embrace it.
It's possible, of course, that the commongroundniks would just like to take the abortion issue off the table, so they can enlist pro-life Catholics and evangelicals to support a progressive social agenda that includes, say, universal health care and a war on poverty. But such pretextual politics is unworthy of people of good will, so I will decline to entertain that possibility.
Last June, when Pope Benedict yanked Archbishop Raymond Burke out of St. Louis and put him in charge of the Vatican's canon law office, there was some speculation that it was to make him a noncombatant in the wafer wars of the impending general election campaign. As the most consequential of the "no-communion-for-pro-choice-politicians" prelates, Burke had the capacity to create far more commotion than, some supposed, Rome wanted. In the event, some bishops--Scranton, Kansas City--made a Burkean show of it, but for the most part the communion issue was kept where most bishops seem to want it, quietly within the Catholic fold.
Now we have a little more insight into what Burke's episcopal brethren, if not the pope, had reason to be concerned about. In a sequence of events that has the Catholic blogosphere a-twitter, Burke granted a videotaped interview to pro-life provocateur Randall Terry in which he, among other things, egged on the Catholic faithful to agitate against bishops who fail to stop pro-choice politicians from taking Communion.
And what, pray tell, does Burke think the right use of the videotape would have been? For Terry just to have shown it to his own folks, quietly using the archbishop's authority to put pressure on those of Burke's brother priests and bishops who are not with the program? If I were Wuerl or Loverde, I'd certainly think so--and recognize that Burke was in no way apologizing for that. In May, Burke will be in Washington for the annual National Catholic Prayer Breakfast. It will be interesting to see if Wuerl turns up, or makes time to see him.
Now we have a little more insight into what Burke's episcopal brethren, if not the pope, had reason to be concerned about. In a sequence of events that has the Catholic blogosphere a-twitter, Burke granted a videotaped interview to pro-life provocateur Randall Terry in which he, among other things, egged on the Catholic faithful to agitate against bishops who fail to stop pro-choice politicians from taking Communion.
And so I would encourage the faithful when they are scandalized by the giving of Holy Communion to persons are publicly and obstinately in sin, that they go to their pastors, whether it's their parish priest or to their bishop, to insist that this scandal stop. Because, it is weakening the faith of everyone. It's giving the impression that it must be morally correct to support procured abortion, in at least in some circumstances, if not also generally. So they need to insist that their parish priest and the bishops, and for the rest...to my brother bishops and brother priests...simply to say: the service of the Church in the world today has to begin first and foremost with the protection of the life of those who are the most defenseless and the most innocent, namely the unborn...Terry promptly proceeded to release the video at a press conference at the National Press Club, as part of his campaign to get Washington D.C. Archbishop Donald Wuerl and Arlington Bishop Paul Loverde removed from office because of their refusal to take the anti-Communion hard line. Whereupon, Burke issued a pseudo-apology, as in: "I am deeply sorry for the confusion and hurt which the wrong use of the videotape has caused to anyone, particularly, to my brother bishops."
And what, pray tell, does Burke think the right use of the videotape would have been? For Terry just to have shown it to his own folks, quietly using the archbishop's authority to put pressure on those of Burke's brother priests and bishops who are not with the program? If I were Wuerl or Loverde, I'd certainly think so--and recognize that Burke was in no way apologizing for that. In May, Burke will be in Washington for the annual National Catholic Prayer Breakfast. It will be interesting to see if Wuerl turns up, or makes time to see him.
Vermont Republican governor Jim Douglas's decision to veto the state legislature's impending bill permitting gay marriage has been taken by the bill's supporters, including the Burlington Free Press, as some kind of violation of legislative due process, a bombshell defacing the gentle lawmaking landscape of the Green Mountain State. Sure, it's a departure for Douglas to announce an intent to veto prior to a bill's passage, but so what? The notable thing about his announcement, in the world of national anti-gay marriage discourse, is its lack of "the end of civilization as we know it" rhetoric, its appeal for civility: For those on either side of the vote to sternly judge the other's morality and conscience is the only true intolerance in this debate and is a disservice to all Vermonters. I have Republican friends who will vote for this bill and Democratic friends who will vote against -- and regardless of their vote, they will still be my friends and have my respect when this issue is resolved...Call me a sap, but I think that's pretty nice.
I respect the passionate opinions of individuals on both sides of this debate and hope that when the Legislature makes their decision, whatever the outcome may be, we can move our state forward, toward a bright future for our children and grandchildren.
So Southern California moneybags Howard Ahmanson, the Christian Reconstructionist supporter of the Discovery Institute and Proposition 8, has withdrawn the hem of his garment from the Republican Party and joined the Democrats. "The Democratic Party in California," he writes, "is now so big and diverse
and all-inclusive that it has ABSOLUTELY NO PRINCIPLES WHATSOEVER." Dismissing the GOP because of its single-minded opposition to taxes, insisting that he has changed none of his opinions, Ahmanson is, like Diogenes, in search of a few like-minded Democrats to support. This strikes me as an exercise in Orange County idiosyncrasy, signifying very little beyond the continuing implosion of California Republicanism.
Whatever happened to the president's Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships? After being created with considerable fanfare and three-fifths of its outside advisory council on February 5, it retreated into the White House woodwork. Director Joshua DuBois, administration factotum for all things religious, was charged with helping the First Family find a church. (Still waiting on that one.)But OFANP is about to reemerge. The rest of the advisory council will be announced shortly, and the full body will gather at the White House early next month. Together with selected others, it will be divided up into task forces dealing with each of the office's specified areas of concern: the role of community organizations in economic recovery; fatherhood and healthy families; reducing the "need for abortions"; and international interreligious dialogue. There is also expected to be a task force relating to energy and climate change, and (yes) one that will take up the thorny legal groundrules under which the Obama faith-based programming will operate. Let the faith-based committeework begin!
I've always thought it was dopey for Catholic institutions of higher learning to bar on-campus appearances by prominent people who are pro-choice--sort of the spiritual equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and shouting la-la-la-la. But it's not clear to me that giving President Obama an honorary degree, as Notre Dame proposes to do, is the same sort of thing. An honorary degree is, well, an honor--in a way, to cite Tom Reese's example, that Cardinal Egan's invitation to the Al Smith dinner is not. As a non-Catholic, I can think of various reasons for Notre Dame to honor Obama. And I can think of reasons for it not to. There is, in short, something here to fight about. And they're fighting about it.
In his order reversing the Bush administration's restrictions on federal funding of stem cell research earlier this month, President Obama received some undeserved criticism for minimizing the role of moral values in shaping science policy. Yes he did, in his signing statement, insist that promoting science "is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed
to serve a political agenda--and that we make scientific decisions
based on facts, not ideology." But this came after his citing of the "difficult and delicate balance" involved, the moral objections of "thoughtful and decent people," and the evident public consensus in favor of stem cell research. The president was not suggesting that science is just about facts separated from values.
And if anyone doubts that ideology and a political agenda were not at work in the Bush administration's biomedical decisionmaking, I would suggest reading through yesterday's decision on the Plan B "morning after pill" by U.S. District Judge Edward R. Korman, in which this Reagan-appointed jurist lays out (as he puts it) "the extent to which impermissible political and ideological considerations influenced the FDA's decisions."
And if anyone doubts that ideology and a political agenda were not at work in the Bush administration's biomedical decisionmaking, I would suggest reading through yesterday's decision on the Plan B "morning after pill" by U.S. District Judge Edward R. Korman, in which this Reagan-appointed jurist lays out (as he puts it) "the extent to which impermissible political and ideological considerations influenced the FDA's decisions."
Plaintiffs have presented unrebutted evidence of the FDA's lack of good faith regarding its decisions on the Plan B switch applications. This lack of good faith is evidenced by, among other things, (1) repeated and unreasonable delays, pressure emanating from the White House, and the obvious connection between the confirmation process of two FDA Commissioners and the timing of the FDA's decisions; and (2) significant departures from the FDA's normal procedures and policies in the review of the Plan B switch applications as compared to the review of other switch applications in the past 10 years.To be sure, the usual suspects have sought to turn tables on the decision. Thus, the Family Research Council declared, "This ruling jeopardizes girls' health and the ability of parents to care for their daughters' physical and emotional well-being. Judge Korman has accepted lock, stock, and barrel all of the claims of a political ideology promoting sexual license for teens." But there's no question that the Bushies ran roughshod over longstanding FDA policies and procedures in order to limit Plan B's availability. And that they had no legal right to do so.
When the pope, ah, misspeaks, the Vatican press office will adjust his remarks to express what it was that he really "said"--a move facilitated by the fact that it's often possible to claim that the translation from whatever language he happens to be speaking at the time was not quite right. Such an adjustment was made in Benedict's incendiary remarks about Islam at Regensburg in 2006. Likewise, as the estimable Religious Connections blog notes, regarding his 2007 suggestion that Mexican officials who supported legalization of abortion had been excommunicated. And it appears that it happened again last week after he created a firestorm by (being quoted as) saying that condom distribution could not help solve the AIDS crisis in Africa.
At least, that's what the London Times reported Thursday, under the headline, "Vatican backtracks over Pope's condom stance." According to the Times, the text of the pope's answer in Italian to a reporter's question on the plane to Cameroon was changed from identifying AIDS as a "tragedy that cannot be overcome by money alone, and that cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems" to "...which risks aggravating the problems." In a word, not no but maybe.
If that happened--and why should we doubt the London Times, at least in this instance?--the pope has now backtracked on the backtrack. Here's the straightforward Italian text as it appears on the Vatican website today: "...non si può superarlo con la distribuzione di preservativi: al contrario, aumentano il problema--which is to say, "[AIDS] cannot be defeated with the distribution of condoms; on the contrary, they increase the problem." No beating around the bush there. Let the outrage recommence.
At least, that's what the London Times reported Thursday, under the headline, "Vatican backtracks over Pope's condom stance." According to the Times, the text of the pope's answer in Italian to a reporter's question on the plane to Cameroon was changed from identifying AIDS as a "tragedy that cannot be overcome by money alone, and that cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems" to "...which risks aggravating the problems." In a word, not no but maybe.
If that happened--and why should we doubt the London Times, at least in this instance?--the pope has now backtracked on the backtrack. Here's the straightforward Italian text as it appears on the Vatican website today: "...non si può superarlo con la distribuzione di preservativi: al contrario, aumentano il problema--which is to say, "[AIDS] cannot be defeated with the distribution of condoms; on the contrary, they increase the problem." No beating around the bush there. Let the outrage recommence.
In an interesting and possibly consequential move, the Obama administration is working to get its campaign volunteers to re-up for the coming struggle over the president's budget as well as to work, as today's WaPo story puts it, "for legislative reform on health care, climate change, education and taxes." But what about the less politicized volunteer agenda that seemed so central to the Obama campaign?
A good deal of Candidate Obama's appeal, above all to young people, was his ability to link his ambition to their readiness to give of themselves. His stump speech featured that offer of college money contingent on community service, and the more teenagers there were in the hall, the more enthusiastically it was applauded. Last July, he laid out an ambitious plan in a speech entitled "A New Era of Service" at the Universtiy of Colorado, Colorado Springs. As detailed in this campaign white paper, it included expansion of the Corporation of National and Community Service and the Peace Corps; a range of service learning initiatives for college and high school students; and investments in the nonprofit sector.
Obama dedicated the day before his inauguration, Martin Luther King Day, to volunteer service, and he personally did some. But since taking office, the volunteer agenda has been sitting on the shelf. The New Era has yet to dawn.
A good deal of Candidate Obama's appeal, above all to young people, was his ability to link his ambition to their readiness to give of themselves. His stump speech featured that offer of college money contingent on community service, and the more teenagers there were in the hall, the more enthusiastically it was applauded. Last July, he laid out an ambitious plan in a speech entitled "A New Era of Service" at the Universtiy of Colorado, Colorado Springs. As detailed in this campaign white paper, it included expansion of the Corporation of National and Community Service and the Peace Corps; a range of service learning initiatives for college and high school students; and investments in the nonprofit sector.
Obama dedicated the day before his inauguration, Martin Luther King Day, to volunteer service, and he personally did some. But since taking office, the volunteer agenda has been sitting on the shelf. The New Era has yet to dawn.
Newt, partying like it's 1980: "I am very sobered that my grandchildren might live in a secular society
that might drive God out of public schools in such a way that they are
now antireligious centers of propaganda."
My take on where it is, where it isn't.
The customary way to read the headline, "Cardinal George Meets With President, Gives Message on Conscience," would be that the cardinal gave the president his message (on the conscience clause) at their meeting. But the conservative news service knows no such thing. The meeting and the message were two separate events.
Let's put the grumbling about President Obama's corralling of clergy to give vetted invocations at his Beyond-the-Beltway town meetings together with the grumbling over his choice of Federal District Judge David F. Hamilton to ascend to 7th Circuit. The invocations, according to Gilgoff's sleuthing, have got to be inclusive. And Hamilton's most controversial decision--at least to the religious grumblers--is his declaring unconstitutional pervasively sectarian (as opposed to "inclusive and non-sectarian") invocation-giving in the Indiana House of Representatives. Coincidence? Over at my temporary blogging home on Belief, I've outlined why I think it's perfectly OK for the White House to screen invocations for inclusivity. Here I'll just make the point that Obama's sense of the role of religion in society is of the let's-get-together-and-raise-the-barn variety. This, as I've argued elsewhere (see here and the last chapter of One Nation, Divisible), is a classical Midwestern Methodist disposition, and very much congruent with classic American civil religion. Oh, and perhaps not coincidentally either, David F. Hamilton is the son and grandson of Midwestern Methodist ministers. Not to mention a nephew of former Indiana congressman and current Obama foreign policy eminence grise, Lee Hamilton.
Yesterday, New Mexico governor Bill Richardson signed legislation doing away with the death penalty in that state. The Catholic Church had lobbied strongly for him to do so, as in this March 16 letter from the USCCB citing longstanding papal opposition to the practice. Richardson's a Catholic, and he called the decision "extremely difficult," so maybe the bishops' efforts pushed him over the edge. Will Bill Donohue will be applauding this manifestation of fidelity to church teaching? Don't hold your breathe. Not a peep issued from the Catholic League in 2007 when New Jersey became the first state to abolish the de since the Supreme Court permitted reinstatement of the death penalty 33 years ago. Bill doesn't go to that part of the cafeteria.
Many hackles have been raised by Pope Benedict's statement that AIDS "is a tragedy that cannot be overcome by money
alone, and that cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms,
which even aggravates the problems." Not, of course, Bill Donohue's:
And if, according to the best evidence, it turns out that condom distribution can indeed reduce HIV infection, then the stand-up thing for them to say is: "Yes, the distribution of condoms does help prevent AIDS in this fallen world. Nevertheless, we oppose it as encouraging immoral behavior and violation of natural law. We believe that the way to solve the AIDS crisis is for people to engage in sex only within marriage, and for married couples in which one of the partners is infected with AIDS to remain celibate." It would be dishonest for them to do otherwise.
Anyone who thinks that condom distribution, education and/or research is going to solve a problem which is mostly a function of behavioral recklessness is positively clueless. Not only that, such persons unwittingly contribute to the problem by diverting attention and resources away from that which works.For a review of the situation in Africa, based on medical reports from the field, see here. The point is that the effectiveness of condoms in preventing AIDS is an empirical question. The pope and his minions are entitled to oppose condom use on moral and/or theological grounds. What they're not entitled to do is twist the evidence to suit their morality and theology.
And if, according to the best evidence, it turns out that condom distribution can indeed reduce HIV infection, then the stand-up thing for them to say is: "Yes, the distribution of condoms does help prevent AIDS in this fallen world. Nevertheless, we oppose it as encouraging immoral behavior and violation of natural law. We believe that the way to solve the AIDS crisis is for people to engage in sex only within marriage, and for married couples in which one of the partners is infected with AIDS to remain celibate." It would be dishonest for them to do otherwise.
Beginning tomorrow and through next Tuesday I'll be impersonating Steve Waldman over at his essential Beliefnet blog. I expect still to be blogging here, cross-linking and -referencing as the spirit moveth. But you'll never know what you're missing unless you check out both sites. Ahem.
David Brody, tipster of the religious right, sent out an alert yesterday that thunderclouds are gathering over President Obama's first big judicial nomination--federal district judge David F. Hamilton of Indiana to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. The source of the problem is a 2005 ruling (Hinricks v. Bosma) in which Hamilton turned thumbs down on the pervasively sectarian (i.e. Christian) prayers with which the Indiana House of Representatives had taken to opening its sessions. As in:
In the event, a panel of the 7th Circuit overturned Judge Hamilton's decision, not on its merits but under the U.S. Supreme Court's 2007 Hein decision, which held that taxpayers have no standing to challenge government action under the Establishment Clause unless the action involves the outlay of government funds. (Follow the legal trail here.) Hein would, as I understand it, prevent (for example) evangelical Christians from challenging the Dharma County (CA) Commission's resolution acknowledging the spiritual lordship of His Holiness the Dalai Lama because the resolution involved no expenditure of county funds. (Uh, no, there is no Dharma County in California.) This seems perverse.
Judge Hamilton enjoys the backing of both Indiana senators, and my guess is that, barring some other legal casus belli, his nomination will not enounter serious opposition. But the Hinrichs case points to the increasingly problematic issue of prayers at government events. Once upon a time, these were understood to be exercises in inclusion--and over the years that evolved such that the canopy was unfurled to cover anyone who didn't feel offended by the national motto, In God We Trust. (Of course, some do feel so offended.) But more recently, as evangelicalism has returned to the main arteries of the culture, the prayers have come to be used as an opportunity for witnessing.
Such witnessing sails under cover of the Free Exercise Clause, but Judge Hamilton's reference to the Supreme Court's Allegheny Courthouse decision is worth considering here. If a governental body shows a persistent preference for prayer-givers of one kind, then it can reasonably to understood as endorsing that kind of religion. If the prayer-givers are sufficiently varied, then--like holiday displays on the town square--the sectarian character of the prayers might pass constitutional muster. Lacking sufficient variety of clergy in Indianapolis--not enough Tibetan Buddhist monks, perhaps--then the praying should be non-sectarian. Or forget the whole thing.
Update: Hamilton commotion, Day 2.
To summarize, the evidence shows that the official prayers offered to open sessions of the Indiana House of Representatives repeatedly and consistently advance the beliefs that define the Christian religion: the resurrection and divinity of Jesus of Nazareth. The Establishment Clause "means at the very least that government may not demonstrate a preference for one particular sect or creed (including a preference for Christianity over other religions). 'The clearest command of the Establishment Clause is that one religious denomination cannot be officially preferred over another.'" County of Allegheny v. American Civil Liberties Union, 492 U.S. 573, 605 (1989), quoting Larson v. Valente, 456 U.S. 228, 244 (1982). The sectarian content of the substantial majority of official prayers in the Indiana House therefore takes the prayers outside the safe harbor the Supreme Court recognized for inclusive, non-sectarian legislative prayers in Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U.S. 783 (1983). Plaintiffs have standing as Indiana taxpayers to bring their claims, and they are entitled to declaratory and injunctive relief. This relief will not prohibit the House from opening its session with prayers if it chooses to do so, but will require that any official prayers be inclusive and non-sectarian, and not advance one particular religion.Naturally, this is being taken as evidence that Hamilton, the son and grandson of Methodist ministers, is anti-Christian. (Dan Nejfeld's got a good account over at Bold Faith Type.)
In the event, a panel of the 7th Circuit overturned Judge Hamilton's decision, not on its merits but under the U.S. Supreme Court's 2007 Hein decision, which held that taxpayers have no standing to challenge government action under the Establishment Clause unless the action involves the outlay of government funds. (Follow the legal trail here.) Hein would, as I understand it, prevent (for example) evangelical Christians from challenging the Dharma County (CA) Commission's resolution acknowledging the spiritual lordship of His Holiness the Dalai Lama because the resolution involved no expenditure of county funds. (Uh, no, there is no Dharma County in California.) This seems perverse.
Judge Hamilton enjoys the backing of both Indiana senators, and my guess is that, barring some other legal casus belli, his nomination will not enounter serious opposition. But the Hinrichs case points to the increasingly problematic issue of prayers at government events. Once upon a time, these were understood to be exercises in inclusion--and over the years that evolved such that the canopy was unfurled to cover anyone who didn't feel offended by the national motto, In God We Trust. (Of course, some do feel so offended.) But more recently, as evangelicalism has returned to the main arteries of the culture, the prayers have come to be used as an opportunity for witnessing.
Such witnessing sails under cover of the Free Exercise Clause, but Judge Hamilton's reference to the Supreme Court's Allegheny Courthouse decision is worth considering here. If a governental body shows a persistent preference for prayer-givers of one kind, then it can reasonably to understood as endorsing that kind of religion. If the prayer-givers are sufficiently varied, then--like holiday displays on the town square--the sectarian character of the prayers might pass constitutional muster. Lacking sufficient variety of clergy in Indianapolis--not enough Tibetan Buddhist monks, perhaps--then the praying should be non-sectarian. Or forget the whole thing.
Update: Hamilton commotion, Day 2.
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press
Secretary
_________________________________________________________________
For Immediate
Release
March
17, 2009
Today the President met in the Oval Office
with His Eminence, Francis Cardinal George, O.M.I., Archbishop of Chicago and
President of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.
The President and Cardinal George discussed
a wide range of issues, including important opportunities for the government
and the Catholic Church to continue their long-standing partnership to tackle
some of the nation's most pressing challenges. The President thanked Cardinal
George for his leadership and for the contributions of the Catholic Church in
Randy Forbes (R-Va.) strikes again.
Mike Kinsley takes after NYT conservative columnist-designate Ross Douthat for wooly thinking on stem cells--specifically, for focusing on the federal-research-funding issue while ignoring all those frozen embryos being destroyed or awaiting destruction in fertility clinics. This again proves, for Kinsley, that the anti-stem-cell forces "aren't morally serious." Nothing annoys social conservative intellectuals more than the charge that they aren't morally serious.
This is an old argument of Kinsley's, and the only thing wrong with it is that, in the wake of President Obama's revocation of the Bush stem cell order, efforts are under way in some states to, in fact, address the fertility clinic issue. At the moment, the action is in Georgia, where both houses of the legislature have passed bills on embryonic life. Far be it from me, as a former Atlanta newspaperman, to accuse the Peach State Solons of moral seriousness. But they tried, Lordy, they tried.
Under pressure from the leaders of their religious base, House Republicans got up a bill to declare every embryo in a petri dish "to be a child in the eyes of God, though not the state revenue commissioner," as my old colleague Jim Galloway put it. A provision forbade citizens to claim a tax deduction for an unborn embryo, which would have made nothing certain in Georgia except birth and taxes. Then, in order to get the sucker passed, the bill was effectively gutted.
Next up was the Senate, which went ahead and passed a bill of its own, which seemed to prohibit at least some forms of stem cell research in the state. To get it passed, the Republicans had to strip it of all penalties both civil and criminal, leaving open the possibility that research would proceed unhampered. What the House would do with bill was anyone's guess, and that went as well for Gov. Sonny Purdue, who twice last week expressed his opposition to embryonic stem cell research but didn't officially communicate that opposition to the state board of regents, which meant that grants could be pursued.
The religious rights leaders pronounced themselves delighted that they have gotten so far. Academic and business interests are up in arms, believing that the net effect will be to keep the money and the biotech companies out of state. Normally, business opposition would probably be sufficient to ensure that, in the end, nothing untoward happens. But in contrast to, for example, the teaching of evolution, embryo legislation engages a public generally supportive of the scientific agenda as well as a passionate fourth force--the couples seeking to get pregnant by in vitro fertilization.
In the scramble last week to pass some bill, any bill, the Georgia senators made sure that in vitro fertilization as presently conducted would be fully protected. Call it Kinsley 2.0.
Update: Reuters roundup of anti-stem cell research state action.
This is an old argument of Kinsley's, and the only thing wrong with it is that, in the wake of President Obama's revocation of the Bush stem cell order, efforts are under way in some states to, in fact, address the fertility clinic issue. At the moment, the action is in Georgia, where both houses of the legislature have passed bills on embryonic life. Far be it from me, as a former Atlanta newspaperman, to accuse the Peach State Solons of moral seriousness. But they tried, Lordy, they tried.
Under pressure from the leaders of their religious base, House Republicans got up a bill to declare every embryo in a petri dish "to be a child in the eyes of God, though not the state revenue commissioner," as my old colleague Jim Galloway put it. A provision forbade citizens to claim a tax deduction for an unborn embryo, which would have made nothing certain in Georgia except birth and taxes. Then, in order to get the sucker passed, the bill was effectively gutted.
Next up was the Senate, which went ahead and passed a bill of its own, which seemed to prohibit at least some forms of stem cell research in the state. To get it passed, the Republicans had to strip it of all penalties both civil and criminal, leaving open the possibility that research would proceed unhampered. What the House would do with bill was anyone's guess, and that went as well for Gov. Sonny Purdue, who twice last week expressed his opposition to embryonic stem cell research but didn't officially communicate that opposition to the state board of regents, which meant that grants could be pursued.
The religious rights leaders pronounced themselves delighted that they have gotten so far. Academic and business interests are up in arms, believing that the net effect will be to keep the money and the biotech companies out of state. Normally, business opposition would probably be sufficient to ensure that, in the end, nothing untoward happens. But in contrast to, for example, the teaching of evolution, embryo legislation engages a public generally supportive of the scientific agenda as well as a passionate fourth force--the couples seeking to get pregnant by in vitro fertilization.
In the scramble last week to pass some bill, any bill, the Georgia senators made sure that in vitro fertilization as presently conducted would be fully protected. Call it Kinsley 2.0.
Update: Reuters roundup of anti-stem cell research state action.
O to be a fly on the wall when the Concerned Women of America and allies meet with Joshua DuBois and the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships gang at the White House. Brody's got the story, and via a CWA email to him it's clear that these paladins of the Religious Right will come loaded for bear. As in:The Obama administration says they want to be inclusive and represent all Americans. The White House faith-based office is now tasked with reducing the number of abortions - something that pro-life groups have very good experience in accomplishing. Pregnancy resource centers and regulations on abortion have a terrific track record in helping women choose alternatives to abortion. Funding abortion or abortion providers is one of the worst things that could be done. What the government funds, we get more of. We hope to begin a dialogue that results in policies which actually work, not just financially benefit certain interest groups like abortion providers.
For the record, OFANP is not "tasked with reducing the number of abortions." According to the president's February 5 announcement, "It will be one voice among several in the administration that will look
at how we support women and children, address teenage pregnancy, and
reduce the need for abortion." You don't exactly reduce the need for abortion via regulations that reduce ability of women to get one.
And while we're on the subject, that "one voice among several" is worth noting. As in the campaign, the faith folks will be duking it out with the, ah, non-faith folks in the administration. And if the struggle over the abortion plank in last year's Democratic platform is any guide, the latter have the bigger swat.
And while we're on the subject, that "one voice among several" is worth noting. As in the campaign, the faith folks will be duking it out with the, ah, non-faith folks in the administration. And if the struggle over the abortion plank in last year's Democratic platform is any guide, the latter have the bigger swat.
The recent uproar in Connecticut over a bill that would have taken financial control over Catholic parishes away from the Church hierarchy and given it to the laity harks back to the bad old days of rampant ant-Catholicism in these parts. The subsequent deep-sixing of the constitutionally dubious effort has led to some cogitation on the changing role of the church in Nutmeg State politics. What's worth bearing in mind about this odd episode is that, like a good number of recent offenses against Catholicism (in the arts especially), the perpetrators are themselves Catholics. In the present case, frustration with an inability to be involved in financial oversight led some parishioners to persuade their legislators (themselves of Catholic background) to introduce the bill. In contrast to the 19th-century public schools controversy pictured above by the virulent anti-Catholic cartoonist Thomas Nast, this was largely an intra-Catholic affair.Next up for the Church is a bill to bring state statutes into line with the state's newly instated allowance for same-sex marriage. The CT Catholic Conference has been lobbying for provisions to permit florists, justices of the peace, photographers and other such wedding merchants to decline to peddle their wares to same-sex couples if they have religious scruples against doing so. This, of course, is much more than an intra-Catholic affair. And while the Church was able to get the legislature to stand down quickly on the financial management affairs bill, this is a whole 'nuther story.
On this eighth Sunday of the Obama Administration, props to NYT's Laurie Goodstein for ferreting out the pastors that the still churchless president prays with on a regular basis: Caldwell, Hunter, Jakes, Moss, and Wallis. Conspicuous by its absence is the name of Rick Warren, the inaugural invocator who three months ago seemed to be bidding fair to replace Billy Graham as presidential pastor-in-chief. Either Obama is no longer checking in with Warren or he still is and Goodstein couldn't discover it. As noted in this space a couple of weeks ago, the Sachem of Saddleback seems to have dropped out of public view since the Inauguration, at least so far as national affairs are concerned. Since the serial presidential "debate" at his church last summer, his encounters with Obama have produced more controversy than harmony. I'd say the relationship has cooled.
Pope Benedict cannot have been exactly heartened by Saint Pius X Society head Bernard Fellay's embrace of his letter of regret on the SSPX affair.
The Church lives, in fact, through a major crisis which cannot be solved other than by an integral return to the purity of the faith. With St. Athanasius, we profess that "Whoever wants to be saved should above all cling to the Catholic faith: Whoever does not guard it whole and inviolable will doubtless perish eternally."This is the language of someone who expects Rome to come to him, not vice versa.
Are more people going to church in these hard times? First Gallup and now Pew says no way. Cathy Grossman, bless her ARIS-loving soul, buys their line, but I'm skeptical. Why? Because they didn't ask the right question.
Gallup asks, "How often do you attend church, synagogue, or mosque--at least once a week, almost every week, about once a month, seldom, or never?" Pew asks, "Aside from weddings and funerals, how often do you attend religious services... more than once a week, once a week, once or twice a month, a few times a year, seldom, or never?" Gallup gets an almost flat line at 42 percent weekly attendance; Pew, at 39. Gallup, indeed, has been asking just about the same question since the late 1940s, and the answers have never varied more than a few points north and south of 40.
So what's wrong? Not only do such questions call for a characterization of customary behavior, but weekly attendance has long been the gold standard of Christian observance in America. And we know from on-the-ground studies that actual weekly attendance in America now runs in the low-to-mid 20 percent range. There's very little chance that asking about attendance in this way will reveal changes in behavior of a few months' duration.
I have no fixed opinion on whether attendance is up or not. Last December, the NYT's Paul Vitello reported that it was, based on interviews with a number of pastors--and got beaten up by some Gallup-quoting folks for doing so. For more solid empirical results, some survey might usefully ask, "Have you been attending worship services more frequently in the past few months?" It's worth bearing in mind that American culture is always on the lookout for signs of religious revival. And always ready to report the bad news that it hasn't managed to happen. Based on available evidence, we should suspend judgment.
Gallup asks, "How often do you attend church, synagogue, or mosque--at least once a week, almost every week, about once a month, seldom, or never?" Pew asks, "Aside from weddings and funerals, how often do you attend religious services... more than once a week, once a week, once or twice a month, a few times a year, seldom, or never?" Gallup gets an almost flat line at 42 percent weekly attendance; Pew, at 39. Gallup, indeed, has been asking just about the same question since the late 1940s, and the answers have never varied more than a few points north and south of 40.
So what's wrong? Not only do such questions call for a characterization of customary behavior, but weekly attendance has long been the gold standard of Christian observance in America. And we know from on-the-ground studies that actual weekly attendance in America now runs in the low-to-mid 20 percent range. There's very little chance that asking about attendance in this way will reveal changes in behavior of a few months' duration.
I have no fixed opinion on whether attendance is up or not. Last December, the NYT's Paul Vitello reported that it was, based on interviews with a number of pastors--and got beaten up by some Gallup-quoting folks for doing so. For more solid empirical results, some survey might usefully ask, "Have you been attending worship services more frequently in the past few months?" It's worth bearing in mind that American culture is always on the lookout for signs of religious revival. And always ready to report the bad news that it hasn't managed to happen. Based on available evidence, we should suspend judgment.
Here's what he had to say yesterday by way apology.
I am actually grateful for this first opportunity to publicly speak about my crimes, for which I am so deeply sorry and ashamed. As I engaged in my fraud, I knew what I was doing was wrong, indeed criminal. When I began the Ponzi scheme I believed it would end shortly and I would be able to extricate myself and my clients from the scheme. However, this proved difficult, and ultimately impossible, and as the years went by I realized that my arrest and this day would inevitably come. I am painfully aware that I have deeply hurt many, many people, including the members of my family, my closest friends, business associates and the thousands of clients who gave me their money. I cannot adequately express how sorry I am for what I have done. I am here today to accept responsibility for my crimes by pleading guilty and, with this plea allocution, explain the means by which I carried out and concealed my fraud.
Over on Religion Dispatches, co-editor Gary Laderman, chair of the Emory religion department and an old acquaintance, takes the ARIS survey (and its ilk) to task for missing the boat--not providing an adequate account of religion in America. Or, as he puts it:
On the one hand we can thank God for polls and surveys that monitor how Americans identify their religious preferences and identities. But on the other, who really needs God to be religious anyway? And do these polls really capture the spiritual landscape in all of its complex, contradictory, and confounding realities? It would be neat and easy if a simple question, like "Do you believe in God?" had the ability to get to the heart of religious life for most Americans. But in fact the spiritual realities are simply not reducible to these narrow questions and a facile, multiple-choice perspective.
Here's an open letter in response.
Dear Gary,
Of course, a telephone survey of 54,000 adults, conducted by non-specialists at $1 per short-answer question per respondent--cannot hope to capture all the complexities of American religion. And no one should expect it to. What such a survey does is provide a bird's eye view of how Americans identify themselves religiously and something of what they believe, and of how those identifications and beliefs match up with various other demographic characteristics of the population.
The results can point researchers such as yourself to
conduct more in-depth--anthropological, if you will--inquiries. I notice, for example,
that you claim that "the sacred" is a force "that now more than ever is
free-floating and disconnected from conventional anchors, like specific texts
such as the Qur'an or particular institutions like the church." How do you know
that this force is more disconnected than once upon a time? ARIS provides some statistical
evidence to undergird such a claim--showing not only that twice as many adult Americans
claim no religious identity as did in 1990 but also that 27 percent do not expect
to have a religious burial. Presumably, the more people there are floating free
of traditional religious institutions, the greater likelihood of a more
free-floating sense of the sacred.
In this regard, it seems somewhat perverse for you to criticize us for "facile" questioning about God. Previous surveys have simply asked people whether or not they believe in God--and come up with affirmative answers in the neighborhood of 90 percent. By probing further, we have for the first time discovered that less than 70 percent of Americans embrace the conventional Judeo-Christian idea of a personal God.
Continue reading Which Boat?.
Pastordan, good UCC clergy that he is, laments the ARIS news on shrinking Mainline Protestantism. This is hardly new news, but there has been an acceleration in the shrinkage during this decade--down from 17.2 percent of the adult population in 2001 to 12.9 percent today. The good pastor stresses the importance of the Mainline maintaining and strengthening its distinctive vision of progressive morality (leave us not say moralism). The latest Mainline Protestant clergy survey, released a few days ago by Public Religion Research, shows a modest liberalizing trend among this already pretty liberal group. The question is whether they became just the voices of a few crying in the wilderness--whether there will be enough fannies in the pews to make anyone else pay attention. In this regard, it's interesting the most liberal of the mainline denominations, Pastordan's own United Church of Christ, has actually increased its (modest) numbers (and percentage of the population) since 1990. So maybe there's a public out there waiting for a prophetically energized Mainline.
But there's another possiblity. The late, great church historian Bill Hutchison always used to point out that what came to be called the Mainline was historically always being replenished by the civilizing, so to speak, of evangelicalism. The main case in point was Methodism, which evolved from circuit riding revivalism to central Mainline pillar in a couple of generations. There's a real possiblity that a good segment of the new non-denominationalism will take on enough of the socially conscious, community-building role of the Mainline to be, to all intents and purposes, part of it. This is the ecclesiastical equivalent of the "common ground" politics that is exercising some of us, for better or worse, these days. While it may not make the lefties happy, it may be their salvation.
But there's another possiblity. The late, great church historian Bill Hutchison always used to point out that what came to be called the Mainline was historically always being replenished by the civilizing, so to speak, of evangelicalism. The main case in point was Methodism, which evolved from circuit riding revivalism to central Mainline pillar in a couple of generations. There's a real possiblity that a good segment of the new non-denominationalism will take on enough of the socially conscious, community-building role of the Mainline to be, to all intents and purposes, part of it. This is the ecclesiastical equivalent of the "common ground" politics that is exercising some of us, for better or worse, these days. While it may not make the lefties happy, it may be their salvation.
Pope Benedict regrets:
One mishap for me unforeseeable, was the fact that the Williamson case has superimposed itself on the remission of the excommunication. The discreet gesture of mercy towards the four bishops ordained validly but not legitimately, suddenly appeared as something entirely different: as a disavowal of the reconciliation between Christians and Jews, and therefore as the revocation of what in this area the Council had clarified for the way for the Church. The invitation to reconciliation with an ecclesial group separating itself had thus become the opposite: an apparent way back behind all the steps of reconciliation between Christians and Jews which had been made since the Council and which to make and further had been from the outset a goal of my theological work. The fact that this superposition of two opposing processes has occurred and has disturbed for a moment the peace between Christians and Jews as well as the peace in the Church I can only deeply regret. I hear that closely following the news available on the internet would have made it possible to obtain knowledge of the problem in time. I learn from this that we at the Holy See have to pay more careful attention to this news source in the future.Unforeseen, maybe, but unforeseeable? His Holiness--the Vatican II peritus, JPII's watchdog of orthodoxy--wasn't aware that the Society of Saint Pius X as a whole had a problem with Nostra Aetate?
One of the challenges in achieving "common ground" on abortion is that pro-lifers have a very difficult time acknowledging that those who reject their views may have moral grounds for doing so. Case in point: Michael Gerson, former chief speechwriter for George W. Bush and someone who is regarded as susceptible to the common ground appeal. In his column in today's WaPo, Gerson makes the following statement:
Sure, there are staunch pro-lifers, like Douglas Kmiec (here interviewed by Dan Gilgoff), who are prepared to support a pro-choice president like the the present one on prudential grounds. Kmiec, of course, has been subjected to no end of obloquy from the pro-life movement. A Gerson will not be moved.
If developing life is merely protoplasmic rubbish, it has the legal claims of a cyst or a toenail. But if a politician believes life is sacred, the destruction of more than a million lives a year cannot be merely one issue among many.But what about a politician who believes life is sacred but whose religion teaches that "sacred life" does not commence until the embryo is implanted in the womb--such as the Mormon Orrin Hatch, who therefore supports embryonic stem cell research? Or the Orthodox Jew who believes life is sacred and who opposes abortion at will, but whose religious law mandates abortion to save the life of the mother--that the "legal claims" of "developing life" must give way before the mother's right to life?
Sure, there are staunch pro-lifers, like Douglas Kmiec (here interviewed by Dan Gilgoff), who are prepared to support a pro-choice president like the the present one on prudential grounds. Kmiec, of course, has been subjected to no end of obloquy from the pro-life movement. A Gerson will not be moved.
The new ARIS strongly suggests that a kind of generic evangelicalism is fast becoming the normative form of non-Catholic Christianity in America. By far the fastest growing segment of American Christendom are the "non-denominationals," who were only .1 percent of the adult population in 1990 and are 3.5 percent now. Combine them with those who insist they are just "Christians" or just "born again/evangelical" and you've got about as many of these generics as you do those who identify with the mainline denominations. Or looked at another way, there's the 34 percent who say yes when you ask if they identify as born again or evangelical--including 18 percent of Catholics and 39 percent of mainliners. Whatever exactly they mean by that, most seem to be taking on the coloration.
Being the default mode means, of course, that you tend to lose your edge, and within the evangelical world there's been a certain amount of hand-wringing about this evangelical regression to the mean. It means that lukewarmness is taking over and, yup, we better have revival. This gene is part of American Protestant DNA. In 1958, Union Seminary's Henry Pitney Van Dusen wrote an article about the Pentecostals he'd discovered in the Caribbean (identified as the "third force" in world Christianity) that was as much as anything else a critique of the allegedly plump, bland, suburbanized Protestantism of the postwar Eisenhower era.
It is in the spirit of Van Dusen that Michael Spencer's article in yesterday's Christian Science Monitor, "The Coming Evangelical Collapse," should be seen. Just as in all American jeremiads, it not only denounces the backsliding but also holds out hope for the future, if we would just get back to the original program. Pay no attention to the reaction of Andrew Sullivan, whose grasp of American evangelicalism is, as usual, very weak. Sullivan charges it with failing to "engage modernity." Spencer and company's critique is just the opposite--that evangelicalism has embraced modernity only too thoroughly, losing the gospel in the process.
American evangelicalism today may be a big fat blob. But on the verge of collapse? Don't kid yourself.
Being the default mode means, of course, that you tend to lose your edge, and within the evangelical world there's been a certain amount of hand-wringing about this evangelical regression to the mean. It means that lukewarmness is taking over and, yup, we better have revival. This gene is part of American Protestant DNA. In 1958, Union Seminary's Henry Pitney Van Dusen wrote an article about the Pentecostals he'd discovered in the Caribbean (identified as the "third force" in world Christianity) that was as much as anything else a critique of the allegedly plump, bland, suburbanized Protestantism of the postwar Eisenhower era.
It is in the spirit of Van Dusen that Michael Spencer's article in yesterday's Christian Science Monitor, "The Coming Evangelical Collapse," should be seen. Just as in all American jeremiads, it not only denounces the backsliding but also holds out hope for the future, if we would just get back to the original program. Pay no attention to the reaction of Andrew Sullivan, whose grasp of American evangelicalism is, as usual, very weak. Sullivan charges it with failing to "engage modernity." Spencer and company's critique is just the opposite--that evangelicalism has embraced modernity only too thoroughly, losing the gospel in the process.
American evangelicalism today may be a big fat blob. But on the verge of collapse? Don't kid yourself.
The Connecticut legislators who introduced a bill to give parishioners control of the finances and management of Catholic churches have decided to ask the state attorney general to rule on the constitutionality of the sucker before proceeding any further. I suspect there is indeed a problem here "respecting an establishment of religion." Meanwhile, the Catholic demonstrations against the bill are still on.
Even as President Obama was signing his revocation of the Bush rule on stem cell research, the Georgia state senate was getting set to vote on the Ethical Treatment of Human Embryos Act, which would define a living human embryo as a person and prohibit the destruction of an embryo for any reason, including embryonic stem cell research. What about those embryos that couples pursuing in vitro fertilization are keeping frozen in fertility labs? Suppose in these hard times a couple can't afford the $500 to keep them frozen? The senators haven't figured that one out yet.
The Georgia medical establishment and my old colleagues on the Atlanta Journal Constitution editorial board are agin it, even as Georgia Right to Life and the Georgia Baptist Convention and the Catholic Church are fur it. My guess is that the bill never makes it into law. Why? There are three lines arguments on these kinds of issues in Georgia. There's the moral values line, the Enlightenment line, and then there's the "what will this mean for Georgia's economy?" line.
Back in 2004, when the Georgia Department of Education tried to deep-six the word "evolution" from its science education standards, a University of Georgia Ph.D. candidate in genetics wrote in the AJC, "At a time when the state is desperately trying to court the biotech industry, these science standards encourage companies to look elsewhere." Sure enough, the DOE backed off.
This time, the argument is much stronger and it goes like this:
The Georgia medical establishment and my old colleagues on the Atlanta Journal Constitution editorial board are agin it, even as Georgia Right to Life and the Georgia Baptist Convention and the Catholic Church are fur it. My guess is that the bill never makes it into law. Why? There are three lines arguments on these kinds of issues in Georgia. There's the moral values line, the Enlightenment line, and then there's the "what will this mean for Georgia's economy?" line.
Back in 2004, when the Georgia Department of Education tried to deep-six the word "evolution" from its science education standards, a University of Georgia Ph.D. candidate in genetics wrote in the AJC, "At a time when the state is desperately trying to court the biotech industry, these science standards encourage companies to look elsewhere." Sure enough, the DOE backed off.
This time, the argument is much stronger and it goes like this:
Religion may count for a lot in Georgia, but bidness is bidness.Charles Craig, president of Georgia Bio, a private nonprofit that promotes Georgia's life sciences industry, said the legislation would hurt Georgia's ability to recruit biotech firms.
"It would embarrass the state," Craig said. Georgia is trying to use an international biotech convention in Atlanta in May to showcase the state as a good place to do biotechnology business.
Kenneth Stewart, commissioner of the Georgia Department of Economic Development, listened to the committee debate but did not offer an opinion. All he would say was that during the upcoming biotech convention, "The eyes of the world are going to be on Georgia."
Tom Daniel, senior vice chancellor for the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia, said the university system opposes the bill. "We're concerned it would have a damaging effect on research being done now and our ability to successfully do that in the future," he said.
In a mano a mano between Franklin Graham and Desmond Tutu, I confess a strong rooting preference for Tutu. Nonetheless, last week's dueling op-eds in the NYT has given me pause. Tutu argued strongly for African leaders to support the arrest warrant for Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir about to be issued by the International Criminal Court, while Graham made the case that the warrant would be counterproductive and that, in this case, peace was preferable to justice. In the event, Bashir has, in response, ordered the evacuation of 13 humanitarian aid groups from Dafur, ratcheting up the crisis in that tragically troubled region of his country. Meanwhile, the NYT's man on Darfur, Nicholas Kristof, has weighed in on Tutu's side, with this report on the opinion of the Darfuris themselves:I was on the Chad-Darfur border a couple of weeks ago, talking to Darfuri refugees, and they worried that Mr. Bashir might lash out after an arrest warrant. But they still rejoiced at the prospect, as a sign that the deaths of their loved ones mattered and as a sign that impunity for murder and rape might be coming to an end. Not a single Darfuri I spoke to favored a delay in International Criminal Court proceedings.Kristof associates himself with a recommendation from Merrill McPeak, a former general close to the Obama administration, that a no-fly zone be established.
What to do? In this moment of retreat from the high moral certitudes of the Bush administration, there is renewed interest in the theological realism of Reinhold Niebuhr, as evidenced by this article by Brian Urquhart in the New York Review. It's worth recalling that a signal moment in Niebuhr's evolution from pacifist to interventionist was Italy's invasion of Ethiopia. In response, he called for a boycott of Italy. I say he's be with Tutu and the no-fly zone. And maybe more.
Is R. Allen Stanford to the Baptists what Bernie Madoff is to the Jews? Not exactly, but this is suggestive. Investing requires lots of trust, and what better way to build trust than via religious connections?
The new American Religious Identification Survey is out--for our overall take, see the press release after the jump. The summary report will be is up on its website shortly, but in the meantime, check out and don't miss USA Today's very cool graphics.
Among the most significant news politically is that 18 percent of Catholics and 39 percent of those belonging to Mainline Protestant denominations say yes when you ask whether they consider themselves born-again or evangelical Christians. That's the same question the exit polls ask, and the one that gives us the results for "the evangelical vote." But we now know that about 25 percent of those "evangelicals" are Catholics and Methodists and Presbyterians etc.--that is, they do not belong to "evangelical" churches. To be sure, mainline churches in the South, Methodist ones especially, are often pretty evangelical. But it's going to take a while to run the cross-tabulations to determine whether these non-evangelical evangelicals are more like other Catholics or mainliners, or more like "true" evangelicals in their beliefs and practices.
Among the most significant news politically is that 18 percent of Catholics and 39 percent of those belonging to Mainline Protestant denominations say yes when you ask whether they consider themselves born-again or evangelical Christians. That's the same question the exit polls ask, and the one that gives us the results for "the evangelical vote." But we now know that about 25 percent of those "evangelicals" are Catholics and Methodists and Presbyterians etc.--that is, they do not belong to "evangelical" churches. To be sure, mainline churches in the South, Methodist ones especially, are often pretty evangelical. But it's going to take a while to run the cross-tabulations to determine whether these non-evangelical evangelicals are more like other Catholics or mainliners, or more like "true" evangelicals in their beliefs and practices.
Continue reading ARIS!.
For the third time, the Obama White House has taken the quiet approach to hot-button Life Issue by making its intentions known late of a Friday afternoon. On January 23, there was its decision to reverse the so-called Mexico City policy of not funding international agencies that provide abortions or information on obtaining them. On February 27, there was the announcement that it would review the so-called Conscience Clause, permitting health care workers to refuse to provide care on religious grounds. And two days ago came the expected announcement of its reversal of the Bush administration's ban on federal funding of embryonic stem cell research. Yep, there's a pattern here.
Naturally, the pro-life community hasn't missed what's going on and isn't happy about it, but the larger ongoing question for all of us has to do with how much deference the state owes religious scruples. We've long since had to respect religious scruples when it comes to children saying the Pledge of Allegiance and conscientious objectors serving in the armed forces. But religious pacifists don't get to withhold that portion of their federal taxes that go to the Defense Department. Political, ethical, and prudential judgments are involved as well as points of constitutional, statutory, and common law.
In the stem cell case, two Obamaite religious figures, Thomas Reese, S.J. and Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite of the Chicago Theological Seminary, offer common ground approaches in today's WaPo "On Faith" chatathon. Meanwhile, on hand for the White House ceremony announcing the reversal tomorrow will be Sen. Orrin Hatch, the conservative Republican whose support for embryonic stem cell research has been staunch. Like most other Mormon politicians, Hatch is untroubled by religious scruples because LDS doctrine holds that ensouled life does not begin until the above-pictured agglomeration of cells known as a blastocyst implants in the womb, and embryos used in stem cell research are obtained prior to implantation. This is annoying to Catholic and Protestant pro-lifers, but hey, that's Mormonism for you.
Naturally, the pro-life community hasn't missed what's going on and isn't happy about it, but the larger ongoing question for all of us has to do with how much deference the state owes religious scruples. We've long since had to respect religious scruples when it comes to children saying the Pledge of Allegiance and conscientious objectors serving in the armed forces. But religious pacifists don't get to withhold that portion of their federal taxes that go to the Defense Department. Political, ethical, and prudential judgments are involved as well as points of constitutional, statutory, and common law.
In the stem cell case, two Obamaite religious figures, Thomas Reese, S.J. and Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite of the Chicago Theological Seminary, offer common ground approaches in today's WaPo "On Faith" chatathon. Meanwhile, on hand for the White House ceremony announcing the reversal tomorrow will be Sen. Orrin Hatch, the conservative Republican whose support for embryonic stem cell research has been staunch. Like most other Mormon politicians, Hatch is untroubled by religious scruples because LDS doctrine holds that ensouled life does not begin until the above-pictured agglomeration of cells known as a blastocyst implants in the womb, and embryos used in stem cell research are obtained prior to implantation. This is annoying to Catholic and Protestant pro-lifers, but hey, that's Mormonism for you.
David Gibson had a good post yesterday on Kansas City Archbishop Joseph Naumann's campaign against his parishioner Kathleen Sebelius' confirmation as secretary of HHS. And today Dan Gilgoff weighs in with an interview with Deal Hudson, who for a while ran Catholic outreach in the 2004 Bush campaign. Hudson makes an interesting admission about the failure of the anti-Sebelius forces to marginalize the liberal Catholic groups supporting her.From a political point of view, those groups made a big difference. When you can get what is taken as a Catholic organization in the mainstream press supporting your guy, that adds a whole new element. We were successful in 2000 and 2004 in keeping the [liberal Catholic groups] Voice of the Faithful and Call to Action at bay because we were able to label them dissident. We haven't been able to do that with Catholics United and Catholics in Alliance.Hudson doesn't say why his folks haven't been able to do that, but I'd suggest a couple of reasons. Catholics United and Catholics in Alliance are tougher, more connected characters, and they've been able to get on board some Catholic insider big shots--sisters and priests and professors: Kmiec Skywalker, Obi-Tom Reese, Princess Lisa (Sowle Cahill)...
Continue reading The Empire Strikes Back.
We're busy getting ready for the roll-out of the 2008 American Religious Identification Survey. Conducted between February and November of last year, ARIS
2008 is the third in a landmark series of large, nationally representative
surveys of U.S. adults in the 48 contiguous states conducted by my colleagues Barry Kosmin and Ariela
Keysar. Employing the same research methodology as the 1990 and 2001 surveys, ARIS
2008 questioned 54,461 adults in either English or Spanish. With a margin of
error of less than 0.5 percent, it provides the only complete portrait of how
contemporary Americans identify themselves religiously, and how that
self-identification has changed over the past generation. There's heaps of really interesting new info. Any journalists who want an embargoed copy of the summary report should contact me at mark.silk@trincoll.edu or 860-297-2352.
Since Ronald Reagan, Republicans have thought of themselves as residing on a three-legged stool. In Reagan's day it was free-market economics, a strong defense, and family values. More recently it has been free-market economics, a liberationist foreign policy, and religion. But however formulated, the ascendancy of Rush Limbaugh points to the collapse of the latter two legs.Limbaugh covers a variety of subjects, but at the end of the day, the only policy issue that ring his chimes are economic. As in the following, from Zev Chafets' NYT Magazine profile last July:
Recently, I sent Limbaugh an e-mail message, his preferred means of long-distance communication, asking what his own presidential agenda would look like. His answer reflects his actual concerns. A Limbaugh administration would seek to:
1. Open the continental shelf to drilling. Ditto the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
2. Establish a 17 percent flat tax.
3. Privatize Social Security.
4. Give parents school vouchers to break the monopoly of public education.
5. Revoke Jimmy Carter's passport while he is out of the country.
6. Abandon all government policies based on the hoax of man-made global warming.No. 5 was a joke. I think.
In the wake of Bushian adventurism, the defense/foreign policy leg of Republicanism has more or less disappeared. And, pace Dionne, the party seems to have little interest in family values/religion. (Where's the senatorial movement to block the Sebelius nomination?) What remains is the old standby, free-market economics. In the midst of the economic distress of the moment, it is not hard to understand how the Republicans got here. The point is, however, that Limbaughism is all they have left.
Rick Warren, the new Big Dog of American religion, seems to have dropped out of sight since the Inauguration. Does he have any considered opinions on his friend Barack Obama's efforts to rescue the economy, first steps in foreign policy, or (drum roll) remixed faith-based initiative and designation of Kathleen Sebelius as HHS secretary? Who knows?
Yesterday's decision by Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony to ban Holocaust-denying SSPX bishop Richard Williamson from setting foot in any Catholic church in his archdiocese (announced in a joint letter with two American Jewish Committee officials and published in the archdiocesan and local Jewish papers, h/t Paulson) in effect re-excommunicates Williamson within one cardinal's jurisdiction. Well, strictly speaking canonically, not, But as Gibson notes, the letter goes so far as to deny that Williamson is now a "member" of the Catholic Church--which would seem to contradict Pope Benedict's action.Mahony, one of the few American Catholic bishops who understands how the media work, might be accused of a bit of grandstanding here. But he's shown how to push Rome in public. Without criticizing the pope, he's seized on Williamson's Holocaust foot-dragging to take the next step and send him back into outer darkness. It will be interesting to see if any of his peers follow his lead.
I like it. The red, the white, the blue, the green. The flag thing. The plant thing. The manufacturing cogs thing. But, uh, what about that cross? OK, it's maybe where the big cog sits on whatever it is that it sits on. But it's also a Red Cross. RX for the economy? Money transfusion for the financial sector? Health care reform? Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships? Is there a semiotician in the house?
Colson really really wants to be able to hire only his own kind, with government money. Christ is all he's got to offer, sezee. Your tax dollars at work? See Gilgoff's report.
You've got your Bill Donohues, calling HHS secretary designate Kahleen Sebelius "one of the most extreme pro-abortion zealots in the nation." But then you've your Catholics for Sebelius (including Cahill, Hollenbach, Kmiec, and Reese) making the case that she represents the new approach to to abortion reduction. On the evangelical side, you've got your Family Research Councils and Traditional Values Coalitions denouncing, while Faith in Public Life rounds up applause from Joel Hunter and some other center-right (and center-center and center-left) types. So far, the Sebelius nomination is shaping up as a bit of a vindication for the common ground strategy. The Religion Industrial Complex strikes. Rep. Chris Smith grinds his teeth. Take that, Pastordan!
Maybe I'm missing something here, but I find it noteworthy that Mike Huckabee only managed 7 percent in the CPAC straw poll, coming in sixth behind Romney, Jindal, Paul, Palin, and Gingrich. Sure, Huck had to split the social conservative vote with Jindal and Palin, but those two didn't even show up for the event. Huck did. He's been humping away for Republican candidates. He's said nothing unorthodox by conservative standards in maybe a year. And in last year's Republican primary, he showed he could carry the evangelical base of the party--effectively killing off Romney's candidacy. So what's the problem? My guess is that the hard-core CPAC types still don't trust him--think he's still soft on immigration, still considers the Club for Growth the Club for Greed, and remains altogether too genial towards the enemy.
President Obama's choice of Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius as HHS secretary is a poke in the eye of pro-lifers, and they are reacting accordingly. Bad enough that she's a pro-choice Catholic, but as governor of a pretty pro-life state, she's regularly vetoed legislation that would make it more difficult for women to obtain abortions. Such as requiring the licensing of abortion clinics and allowed relatives to petition a court to stop a late-term abortion and mandating that doctors who perform late-term abortions report a reason for the procedure. At the same time, the governor claims to have reduced abortions in the state because of her support for adoption and sex education.
What do the common-groundniks think about the appointment? Perhaps we'll find out. In the meantime, this seems to me a smart move for the president on his own abortion-reduction front. It reassures the pro-choice community while sending this message to the pro-life one: "We are committed to reducing the number of abortions but not by doing anything to make it harder for women to get them. Join us in creating better adoption services, sex education, and access to contraception, neonatal care, and daycare. Or don't."
What do the common-groundniks think about the appointment? Perhaps we'll find out. In the meantime, this seems to me a smart move for the president on his own abortion-reduction front. It reassures the pro-choice community while sending this message to the pro-life one: "We are committed to reducing the number of abortions but not by doing anything to make it harder for women to get them. Join us in creating better adoption services, sex education, and access to contraception, neonatal care, and daycare. Or don't."
The main thing wrong with Susan Jacoby's broadside against faith-based initiatives is that, when it comes to the history of faith-based social service provision in America, she doesn't know what she's talking about. At the top, she asks:
So what's new? The so-called Ashcroft Amendment to the 1996 welfare reform act represented a center-right effort to get more religious institutions into the act, and especially conservative Protestant ones that had, often for theological reasons, tended not to get involved. Followed by President Bush's initiative, this effort was premised on a couple of dubious propositions: 1) that faith-based social service provision is more effective than its secular (governmental or otherwise) counterpart; and 2) that because of secular bias, religious organizations were systematically disfavored in the awarding of government contracts. Neither of these has been shown to be the case.
Who anymore can imagine that the United States managed to exist for over 200 years without the government providing any direct aid to faith and its works?And she wraps up with:
Yet we are moving blindly ahead with faith-based federal spending as if it were not a radical break with our past. If faith-based initiatives, first institutionalized by the executive fiat of a conservative Republican president, become even more entrenched under a liberal Democratic administration, there will be no going back. In place of the First Amendment, we will have a sacred cash cow.No and no. The fact is that the United States did not manage to exist for over 200 years without government-funded social services run by religious institutions. Such services, run by Lutheran, Catholic, Jewish, and other sectarian agencies, date back to the 19th century, and as public funding of social services grew in importance in the 20th, they were in many places the institutions that got the grants to do what needed to be done for the hungry, the homeless, and the parentless. In the 1960s, the Great Society relied heavily on black churches to create elder housing and other programs to help African Americans in inner cities. One of the fundamental misunderstandings about the whole faith-based initiative thing is that it is something new under the American sun. It ain't.
So what's new? The so-called Ashcroft Amendment to the 1996 welfare reform act represented a center-right effort to get more religious institutions into the act, and especially conservative Protestant ones that had, often for theological reasons, tended not to get involved. Followed by President Bush's initiative, this effort was premised on a couple of dubious propositions: 1) that faith-based social service provision is more effective than its secular (governmental or otherwise) counterpart; and 2) that because of secular bias, religious organizations were systematically disfavored in the awarding of government contracts. Neither of these has been shown to be the case.
Continue reading No radical break.
The sharpest point Matt Bai makes in his NYT Magazine profile today is to note that while Gingrich likes to place himself in the grand tradition of Republican progressives, he lacks their readiness to rethink party doctrine.
In 1995, Reaganism was still relatively fresh and Gingrich was Speaker of the House. Can Think Tank Newt lead the GOP out of the much deeper wilderness in which it finds itself today? I doubt it.
And yet, at the same time, Gingrich pointedly declines to do what Roosevelt and La Follette did, which is to directly confront the Republican orthodoxies of their day. Those reformers demanded their fellow Republicans make a choice between ideas and ignorance. By contrast, Gingrich doesn't really challenge any core ideological precept of the Bush era -- only the strategy of "base mobilization" that underlay it...Underneath the bluster, Newt is still the chubby little myopic nerd who collects reptiles and wants to be loved by his peers. That's why he was so successful at unifying the long-suffering GOP members of the House in the early 1990s, and also, I suspect, why he succumbed so readily to the charms of Bill Clinton.
At a moment when the role of religious fundamentalism in the party is a central question for reformers, Gingrich, rather than making any kind of case for a new enlightenment, has in fact gone to great lengths to placate Christian conservatives.
In 1995, Reaganism was still relatively fresh and Gingrich was Speaker of the House. Can Think Tank Newt lead the GOP out of the much deeper wilderness in which it finds itself today? I doubt it.
