greggandcyndi

politics of religion

this is an email that was sent to me...you may have gotten it too...i'll comment on it below.

Yesterday, President Bush released his administration's proposed
2006 federal budget. The $2.6 trillion budget projects a record
$427 billion budget deficit, not including funding for Iraq and
Afghanistan. It includes increases in military spending while at
the same time proposes major cuts to domestic programs that
benefit people living in poverty.

Some of the proposed changes:

*Making permanent the tax cuts of 2001 - 70% of which benefited
the wealthiest 20% of U.S. citizens
*The elimination of block grants that aid poor communities
*Making it more difficult for working poor families with
children to be on Medicaid
*A $355 million cut to programs that promote safe and drug-free
schools
*Cuts to housing and urban development programs
*The elimination of 48 educational programs

Budgets are moral documents. This administration's proposed
budget reflects a set of priorities that stand in clear
opposition to biblical values. Paying attention to the poorest
among us is arguably the most central biblical imperative - not
increased spending on nuclear warheads and tax cuts for the
rich.

When considering a document as important as this one, it is
imperative that our leaders consider its impact on people living
in poverty. Urge your members of Congress to consider this
budget's effect on the poor.

Click here to take action today:

http://go.sojo.net/campaign/budget_06?rk=Gd_-q741WRL9W

maybe it's because i grew up calvinist in a presb. church, but i have always learned that it is the church's responsibility to take care of the fatherless and the widows, the poor and the weak.  why do we want our government to do it for us?  why do we need their money, which is really just our money?  and on top of that, nearly every person i know that complains about social justice and this government funding, has done very little with their own time to have direct contact with those they say need help.  now i have not had much contact with them either, other than giving money to the guy that stands at the end of the on-ramp, but i'm not complaining that the government isn't doing it for me. 

another thing i don't get is the problem people have with the tax cuts.  reagan made huge tax cuts and look at the economy that clinton inherited because of it.  why do we have such a problem with the tax cuts of our current president?  and again, why would anyone want to give up a tax credit that gives them back their own money?  my wife is about to give birth to a baby boy, and i know that we will get a tax break because we will have a child, without the tax cuts, we wouldn't get that same break, and i know that there are a lot of impoverished people out there with kids that could really use that tax break as well.

i hate to see good programs go, and i don't want more warheads either, but it seems to me that this email, related to sojourner magazine, is intentionally provoking. come on really?...."Paying attention to the poorest among us is arguably the most central biblical imperative - not increased spending on nuclear warheads and tax cuts for the rich."  this whole line of rhetoric is stupid.  a great president once said, "don't ask what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country."  how have we gotten so far from that.  how have we gotten to the place that the government spending more money on military is a moral and biblical issue that we must address as christians.  it is our job as the church to "Pay attention to the poorest among us...", not our governments.

let's stop guilting the the christians that voted for bush, and start mobilizing the church that is just sitting on it's "fanny" (this word was changed, personal censoring).

postmodern ancestry

Jos 22:22-27a "The LORD alone is God! The LORD alone is God! We have not built the altar in rebellion against the LORD. If we have done so, do not spare our lives this day. But the LORD knows, and let all Israel know, too, that we have not built an altar for ourselves to turn away from the LORD. Nor will we use it for our burnt offerings or grain offerings or peace offerings. If we have built it for this purpose, may the LORD himself punish us. "We have built this altar because we fear that in the future your descendants will say to ours, 'What right do you have to worship the LORD, the God of Israel? The LORD has placed the Jordan River as a barrier between our people and your people. You have no claim to the LORD.' And your descendants may make our descendants stop worshiping the LORD. So we decided to build the altar, not for burnt sacrifices, but as a memorial. It will remind our descendants and your descendants that we, too, have the right to worship the LORD.

i came across this scripture and it reminded me of the relationship between the existing church and the emerging church. there seems to be a great deal of fear from the church about what will emerge, and in some places there are church leaders doing everything they can to keep new communities from emerging. there are some places where people are encouraged to experiment, but it seems that for the most part, there is little belief in even those wishing to pioneer, that anything will be able to emerge from what already exists. among some of the emergent leadership there is the thought that the emerging will probably be most successful if not initially connected to an existing church. i remember tony jones saying that he didn't know of any emerging church that had emerged from an existing church, and those that had tried, were cut off in one way or another. i told him that if apes can propagate in captivity, maybe there is the possibility that something could truly emerge from the existing church. over the past two years, i think i may have been swayed to his side of the aisle.

when there are emerging churches and communities already being written off by the modern church, will we have to worry about being invited in later? the three tribes that had to go to the other side of the river worried they would be cut off by later generations. do we have to worry about this? if we travel across the river away from the whole and start something new, do we need to build a memorial altar so that later down the road we can prove we aren't illegitimate? or will it be like the reformation and will we be the protestants that separate and choose to never look back and not worry about whether we are still "one body"? will we be like most protestants and evangelicals that look at the catholics and question their salvation?

the people in the scripture explaim "the Lord alone is God!", the Lord our God is one God. and i believe that the church is one body...the division that already exists is sometimes almost too much for me to bear. but i know that sometimes tribes must go across the river. i know we must go across the river. so lets build an altar, a memorial, a symbol to stand for all time so that the divide between the emerging and the existing never becomes like the divide between the existing and the catholic. and may all know that we don't build this memorial as an altar or a shrine that we would worship the change we pioneer, but as a symbol that we too worship the same Jesus, the same God that has created us all, that was born to Mary, suffered unter Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried, rose on the third day and sitteth at the right hand of the Father almighty.

gregg