Why I'm Not A Republican nor Democrat

This post is a response to two posts by my Father-in-Law, Jackie. You can read his posts on "Why I Am a Republican" at Jackie Speaks. Jackie has a two part post describing why he is a Republican. To be honest, it is probably the clearest and best articulation of why anyone should be a Republican I have ever heard. This post starts as a direct response and becomes a more generic comment on my own political philosophy. It will help you understand the first half to read Jackie's post.

Feel free to leave comments and let me know what you think. Like I say below, my opinions are still being formed!

Why I'm Not a Republican nor Democrat

First, you have done an excellent job of explaining your point of view. As you pointed out in Part I, there may be some who would disagree with you. However, what strikes me as significant is that you have written in such a way that anyone who disagrees with you and wants to have any meaningful conversation will be forced to debate at the foundational levels of political and theological philosophy rather than simply stating, "I'm in favor of increasing tax on the rich" or "I support a government funded medical plan."

Personally, I find many areas of agreement with you. You list seven foundational points in Part II. I completely and whole heartedly agree with points 1-5 and 7. As one of my professors used to say, "Humans are good by nature, but sinful in nature." That is, we are made for great things and great good, but we have become broken through the Fall and are now subject to the effects of our brokenness. That is what makes the Christian faith so powerful: the ability to recognize and celebrate the beauty and goodness of humanity but still have a category for explaining why and how such evil can be done.

Point 6 ("freedom is a fundamental right and human responsibility") I also would agree with, especially the ways in which freedom is a responsibility. I am hesitant theologically to ascribe to humanity "rights." Rights are about entitlement. I don't see God through Scripture giving us rights. I see Him give us gifts. I see Him bestow on humanity great worth and dignity. I see God make promises to/covenants with humanity. However, you have wisely coupled rights with responsibility which is essential and since we need to engage the world on these issues, a more non-religious term like "rights" may be required.

If the Republican Party acted and lived out what you are describing, I would be very glad indeed. My concern is that it may be presuming too much to ascribe these foundational values to all or ever a majority of the Republican Party. The economic theory is definitely and decidedly distinct between Republicans and Democrats. However, voting for the Republican Party is not the same as voting for these principles, sadly.

Larger picture, my political philosophy is still be formed. My greatest sadness is that both Democratic and Republican Christians have sat back and looked to the government to fix problems in society. By all means, I hope and pray that government will be able to help alleviate suffering and fight for justice. The reoccurring fault in the Church, though, is that we look to the government first, then to the Church.

Government is by nature self-seeking. It promotes what is best for itself. As you pointed out, one of the goals of government is "ensuring the safety and security of the nation’s citizens." Such an aim will at times automatically lead a government into situations where the mentality is "us-them." To me, this is decidedly un-Christian. Any time the lives of some people are valued more highly than the lives of others, that is evidence of the fallen human condition.

Christians first call should be to BE the solution rather than to VOTE for a solution. It's not enough to vote for candidates to fix social problems. Instead Christian's must jump in to actually serving like Jesus did. Of course, such service will ultimately lead to political involvement.

I Christians' participation in government should be much more highly focused on advocating for justice, the poor, oppressed, the unborn, and any other issues that are near to God's heart rather than spending so much energy in partisan politics. When was the last time any of us (including me!) wrote a letter to our Congressperson or Representative letting them know how we feel they should vote on certain issues? Politicians want to be re-elected. If Christians (who still technically are a majority in the US, depending on how you define "Christian") simply starting advocating, we'd see more justice take place than if we all voted for any certain candidates.

We've sometimes been called "Sunday Christians" meaning that we only act like Christ on Sundays and the rest of the week we're just the same as the rest of the world. Politically, it's even worse. We're "election year Christians." We care when it's time to vote, but the other three years, we don't really do anything.

I'm a citizen and voter who is passionately pro-life (in all cases) and believes in an ideal world that economically conservative policies would produce the best long term results. I am also in favor of government that helps provide health care for those who cannot get any and social services to those who need them and allows immigrants and refugees to get citizenship.

In conclusion, I am not a member of either the Democratic or Republican party. At first this was simply because I had not decided which party to join. Today, it has become the intentional decision to join neither party. I simply cannot get away from the fact that if Jesus were still walking the earth today as he did in Palestine 2000 years ago, He would not be a Democrat or a Republican. I have a feeling He would have some very strong reproves for both parties, not to mention His church.

Pray for me that I would be able to follow Christ and live up to my ideals. Pray also that I would have wisdom in the upcoming election as there truly is no perfect candidate. Above all, pray for God's will to be done--and not just during the election, but each day.

Bitter Sweet

Karisa and I had a great weekend. The best part was, without a doubt, getting to see our dear friend, John. I lived with John for a year after graduating college (along with two fine other men, Joe and Brett). John is one of the most fun people I know. He has an excitement for things that I can't even compare to. Not to mention that he has a knack for telling stories (not to mention getting into situations that make GREAT stories)!

John left last Christmas to do things that I am jealous of. He spent months up in Alaska working at a fish hatchery. Then he went to Europe and traveled around for four weeks seeing all sorts of amazing things. He spent time with family in New England and Virgina. Then he went and built log cabins in New York.

"John," I said, "I look at your life and wonder what I'm doing with mine! I don't have nearly as much excitement or adventure."

"I look at your life and am jealous of the stability you have," he answered.

So I guess we're both living good lives... just different ones!

Karisa and I have said to each other many times that we wish John was still in Chicago. It's hard to explain how great it is to watch a movie with John or how he can make the most mundane of meals become enjoyable. There aren't many people you meet who will drive all night after work to come to your wedding after only knowing you a year. John is one of those people.

John is driving to Denver today. He's pursuing a career with the Fire Department, going to Paramedic school, and making plans to start his own log cabin building business. I know without a doubt that he will do well at all of those things! Karisa and I will be looking forward to visiting Denver sometime so we can hang out with John.

So while it was bittersweet to have John leave, it was mostly just sweet to have him here for two days!

Pancake Breakfast!

Labor Day came and went too fast. I have to admit that I am not really ready to be back at work, but I will persevere! We had a great weekend though. Alethea, Karisa's sister, came up to visit us. Karisa took Alethea to a number of different shopping venues. I selflessly offered to stay home. (Yes that is selfless because even though I do not enjoy shopping, they would have enjoyed having me shop with them even less!)



On Labor Day, we threw a community Pancake Breakfast. Karisa and I had been talking with our good friends Joe and Keane who live in the same complex. We decided that we'd like to get to know our neighbors and build some real community. So we threw a free pancake breakfast. Karisa gathered the food. Joe cooked. Keane made posters. I don't really know what I did, look at Joe in action:



We had regular, strawberry, blueberry and chocolate chip pancakes. I, of course, followed my golden rule: any opportunity to have chocolate in the morning, take it!

There was a pretty good turn out for our first community event. We had about 18 people or so. Lots of kids that I had gotten to know came with family (moms or grandmoms). We had a few people come that none of us knew before too, which is great.



(This is Lynne and Keith. Lynne is the grandmother of three beautiful girls that live in the complex. Their parents weren't able to make it unfortunately. Keith is an 8th grader at the local middle school. He's into art.)

We're planning a community BBQ for later this month. I hope and expect even more people as we had a number of people say "Oh, you did that? I would have come if I'd known it was you."

The picnic table turned up broken that morning, but I cobbled it back together enough to do our cooking on. We borrowed this electric griddle from a neat family at Resurrection, the Carlson.



We set up a few extra tables so everyone would have a place to sit:



One of the kids in our community, Garrett, was there. Karisa and I have helped watch him sometimes when his mom is at work. He's pretty cute.

Church Picnic

Church of the Resurrection had a picnic on "Holy Hill" yesterday. That is, we are hoping to buy land to build our own building (finally!) and so all the people who have made pledges to the building project got to come onto the land to have a picnic. The hill is called "Holy Hill" by the current land owner whose father was a man of faith.

Unfortunately, Karisa came down with a fever. She was feeling warm Saturday night, but woke up Sunday with a temperature of over 100. So she stayed home all day! I did everything I could to help but there's not much I can do to make her feel better. At the picnic, I got some friends to help me tell her how much she was missed:





















In order, they are: Alyana, our dear friends' daughter. Joe, one of our old Sunday School kids. Matt, deacon at our church who did our premarital counseling. Abbi, one of the youth from our church. Janet, our Family Pastor. Keith, our good friend and Alyana's dad. Tegan, another one of our former Sunday School kids.

It was a fun picnic but I missed Karisa! I spent a lot of the picnic trying to recruit for a logistical nightmare that fell into my lap Saturday afternoon. But I managed to have some fun. Here's me and Ella (though she refused to smile!):

Sacramentalism and Community

(While I was traveling last week, I did some writing on my new iPhone. Here's one of the things I was thinking about)

While traveling the west coast to do college fairs I brought a couple of books with me for reading material. A smart traveler will bring light reading to help pass the time. Sadly, I am not the smart traveler. I brought to serious books:

The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne



and

For The Life of the World by Alexander Schmemann



Revolution reads easy enough, but confronts the reader with such challenging ideas that it is not possible to breeze thru. Life of the World, on the other hand is an inspiring book but so dense that it requires sustained concentration to benefit from and even begin to understand.

Neither book has made for the easy plane reading that would be my usually fare for such trips. Somewhere in the air between San Fransisco and LA, though, I realized that it was highly significant that had these two seemingly very different books together in my bag.

Throughout my trip my peers have been asking me about plans for the future. I have said seminary is my plan. But the truth is that I am still very unsure about what I want to do.

I love the church and the sacramental world that is the topic of Schmemann's book. I also am captivated by the depiction of community and a life of "ordinary radicals" that Claiborne writes about.

I realized is that these two books represent what I want to do with my life. Or at least the vision for my future that I find most captivating. I want to do is bring together the ideas and visions of these two very different books just like the two books are physically stashed right next to each other in my carry on.

What would a sacramental, charismatic, evangelical community among the under-served and poor look like? Could I learn what it means to bring the joy and beauty of what we have at Resurrection to the intentionally loving community that strives for justice?

That is a life calling that I would love to walk. Seminary, internships, overseas and even loving and living in our apartment now can be training and preperation for that sort of calling.

We're landing now and even though I didn't have an easy-to-read, page-turning novel to read, I think this flight was well worth it.

West Coast Travels

From August 1 until August 7 I got the chance to travel to some amazing places. In order, I went Seattle, Portland, San Fransisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Denver. This was an especially neat trip because I had never been to Seattle, Portland or LA before (and my only visit to San Diego was an ill-fated trip in high school to see my girlfriend which shoudln't really count for many many reasons, but that's another blog entry all together).

Sadly, the way that the trip was structured was that I saw all these cities in only five days. That made for a crazy lot of travel, rushing between hotels and aiports. I did get to go to La Jolla while we were in San Diego and saw some seals. Here's one of them:



The other great thing is getting to know the people you travel with since we're all doing the same crazy schedule together. Sometimes I'd end up on the same plane or taxi with someone, but the main way we'd get to know each other is through our meals together after doing a college fair.

One guy I got to know especially well was the counselor from St. Johns (Santa Fe), Garret. Garret and I had been on a fair tour in the Mid-west last year. I didn't expect to see him out west but was pleasantly surprised to find him searching for our fair location the first morning (something that I had just done 5 minutes earlier!)



Garret and I connected pretty well. It sounds too junior high to call him my "favorite counselor" on the tour, but I did enjoy hanging out with him. He's a great guy, fun to chill with, and is anal like me about getting to the airport with time to spare!

Our last night of the tour we went out to a northern Italian restaurant. I have to admit, I felt pretty embarrassed the whole night because I didn't drink wine (not allowed to on college dime) and didn't recognize hardly anything on the menu. I ended up ordering bruschetta (got corrected on my pronunciation though) and a Caesar's Salad because I knew what they were. I would have preferred to just order pizza (as my wife can attest to), but that didn't feel cultured enough. Here we are all:

Golf Victory, of a Sort

Last Friday night, Karisa and I went mini golfing with a good friend of ours: the ever lovable and consistently enjoyable Meghan Cahill.



Notice how excellent of a golfer she looks like. Needless to say, we were up for a challenge. And it proved to be true as Meg was the first one to get a hole-in-one!



I did pretty well for myself in the first half. On all of the first nine holes I managed to putt for exactly 2 strokes every time. I was in the zone! Unstoppable! I was especially excited because they had a "best score of the day" board and it was only 38 by some guy named Nathan or something like that. 38? Piece of cake. I was on track for 36.



Then the wonderful women I married jinxed me. On hole 10 she said it was all over. I proceeded to putt for 3 and 4 strokes on the next 5 holes or so. But then something AMAZING happened! I went first and made a nice putt that put me about 4 inches from the hole. On track for a hole in 2 again. (Finally!) Then Karisa went. Her ball hit my ball and knocked me into the hole! Not only that but her ball's spin allowed it to curve with the green and she ALSO got a hole in one!!! That means she got two hole-in-ones with one stroke!!!!



That made our night. It was awesome. As a result of her stellar play and my second half collapse, Karisa and I ended up tying for the win:



To celebrate the fact that we all got hole-in-ones (though mine was really Karisa's but if you looked at the scorecard you wouldn't know it) we went to the local DQ. We thoroughly enjoyed the background on the wall there:



And thus:



Good times were had by all! Thanks for hanging out with us Meg. And Thanks to DQ for their awesome wall decorations.