So my little liberal buddies, Jesus Christ is a Republican, and
our Republic just became officially “Christian”
again. This might be mind-boggling for us in the campus bubble, but
take a look around. We’re outside the Bible belt, which now
is securely fastened around the bulk of the United States.
I can’t help but recall when “Fahrenheit 9/11″
smashed the box office, and Time Magazine put Michael Moore on the
cover with a question that asked, “Is this good for
America?” I don’t imagine Time would ever do that to
the “Christian” right, bible in one hand and a
ballot in the other ““ but it should. It’s a good
question.
I remember waking up “the morning after,” slightly
drunk, with a little pizza crust on my shirt, staring at the
television in disbelief. A triumphantly re-elected Bush presiding
over enlarged Republican majorities in both houses of Congress was
saying he was going to spend his newly earned “political
capital.”
I was slightly frightened by this, so I called the White House
to see what he meant.
Bush never returned my phone call. Kind of like God.
I’ll just state the obvious through CNN exit polls. There
is an irrefutable direct link between the rate of churchgoing
voters and Bush voters. More church, more Bush vote. Less church,
more Kerry vote.
As fourth-year religion and history student Aaron Slosberg
pointed out brilliantly, “If you didn’t vote Bush, you
were a bad Christian.”
There was also a direct link between Bush voters and people who
approved of the Iraq war and believed it was part of the war on
“terra”. What’s the connection? God, Bush, war?
Hmm.
Then I remembered talking to my sister about the Osama bin Laden
videotape that surfaced right before the election. She said a
bearded madman threatening the American “Goliath” from
a cave was kind of “biblical.” Fascinating.
Could it be that Sept. 11, 2001, awoke the
“Christian” sleeper cells in people’s brains?
Call it the next Great Awakening. The “Christian” base
was energized by an apocalyptic war against
“evildoers.”
Can you imagine what the now Christian-mandated war in Iraq will
do to energize al-Qaeda? Our war for democracy just became
officially holy in the minds of many.
It’s a nice marriage between politics and religion in the
altar of fear. Impending doom is a popular “Christian”
rallying cry and defines not only Bush’s re-election campaign
but his entire presidency. (Remember Cheney’s attitude
““ a vote for Kerry is a vote for doom.)
As Scott Bartchy, the director of the UCLA Center for the Study
of Religion, pointed out, there is a similar scare tactic used by
many “Christian” proselytizers which degrades religion
to a kind of afterlife “fire insurance” and inspires a
form of shallow self-interest motivated “save-your-butt
piety” ““ converting just in case.
By Christianizing the language of war, the Bush administration
consciously linked the biblical war of good against evil with the
war on “terra” and by extension the war in Iraq. I
think this explains to some extent why “moral values”
became a key election issue.
When an ongoing war becomes an endless advertisement for the End
Times, for those who believe in it, it’s like getting an
inspection notice from God ““ time to clean up your act.
Everything takes on a moral fervor.
Meanwhile, we witness the resurrection of issues we thought were
long dead and the births of new ones. Responding to popular demand
by “conservative” parents, the state superintendent in
Georgia is considering striking the word evolution from the science
curriculum. The “conservative” parents criticized the
proposal for not going far enough. Instead, they want creationism
instead for the entire state.
The city school board in Grantsburg, Wis., revised its science
curriculum to teach creationism because, like evolution, it’s
just a “theory.”
Or how about the passage of all 11 state referendums banning gay
marriage this election, and Bush’s ban on embryonic stem cell
research out of respect for the life of the fetus. And with
Bush’s “political capital” it is only a matter of
time before Roe v. Wade gets overturned, the Supreme Court rules
that teaching creationism does not violate the separation of church
and state, and a ban on gay marriage becomes the 28th
amendment.
So are “Christians” good for America? In my opinion,
not these “Christians.” But there are other Christians
with whom I agree and who I’m sure agree with me. The
“Christians” of Bush are not the only ones. There are
roughly 65 million to 90 million active “Christians” in
the United States and about 62 million Catholics.
The fact that exits polls show Kerry received 40 percent of the
Protestant vote (but only 21 percent of the Evangelical vote) and
47 percent of the Catholic vote gives me hope.
Professor Bartchy reminded me that there is a “Christian
left” (civil rights school of Martin Luther King) that he
predicts will be heard from in the next four years. I think
he’s right.
The apocalypse works both ways. While it is energizing the base
on both sides, the rise of the right is the secular equivalent of
the apocalypse for liberals. The promise of that kind of apocalypse
gives this atheist some faith.
Lukacs is a fourth-year history student who sometimes
forgets where he left his intelligence. If you spot it anywhere on
campus, please contact the owner immediately at
[email protected].