Buzzflash interviews Rev Jim Wallis author of "God's Politics"

[DARE to HOPE]

Jim Wallis Talks About "God's Politics" and Values...
by Which Wallis Doesn't Mean Hate, Greed, and War Mongering


A BUZZFLASH INTERVIEW

http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/05/02/int05008.html


"...religion has to be disciplined by democracy. That means you don’t enter the public square and say I’m religious so I ought to win. Or God has spoken to me directly and I have the fix for Social Security. You say my faith motivates me. It shapes my convictions or it compels me to act on behalf of the poor, or peace, or whatever."

(snip)


"Lincoln got it right. We don’t claim God’s blessing on our politics and policies. We don’t claim that God is on our side. We worry, we pray, we just always examine ourselves to see if we are on God’s side. And if Lincoln got it right, I think Martin Luther King did it best. With that Bible in one hand and the Constitution in the other hand, he really didn’t pronounce, he persuaded. He didn’t shut people out; he invited everybody in to a moral discourse on politics. And he said we can do better. We can do better than this by our democratic values, by our religious values.

We have to ask what kind of people do we want to be, what kind of nation do we want to have, what kind of world do you want to leave for our children. And when every major progressive social movement in our nation’s history was fueled and driven in part by religion, by faith, by moral values, we have a very powerful, prophetic and progressive religious tradition in America and around the world.

I think of my friends – Desmond Tutu in South Africa and Oscar Romero in El Salvador, the Archbishop there set against the junta and the U.S.-supported military dictatorship – and all these movements around the world where religion has been progressive."


http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/05/02/int05008.html

[kentuck]

1. The question is not : "Is God on our side?"

But rather, "Are we on God's side"? Is God with us in Iraq? Is God with us as we give more and more to the wealthy and less and less to the needy?

[classof56]

2. Jim Wallis is a voice crying in the wilderness these days.

Let us hope he does not lose his head as did the first voice, John the Baptiser.

Thanks for posting!

[KittyWampus]

5. Rabbi Lerner Has Also Been Out There.... He & Tikkun Helped Me

find a way to organize my criticisms of the political Left and its inability to move away from Materialism and towards recognizing the importance of Meaning in people's lives.

[dandrhesse]

3. Jim Wallis articulates what I feel so well

He brings tears to my eyes. He illustrates so well the feelings that so many of us feel!

My husband always says, where in the bible did Jesus get up on a soap box and condemn everyone?

Thank you for posting this, Jim Wallis brings sanity to the dialogue of social responsibility rooted in faith.

[auburngrad82]

4. I'm reading the book now.

Excellent book. I understand the damage the religious right has done to the reputation of religious groups over the last 20 years but I do think that Mr Wallis is right that if the progressives want to start winning elections we need to get the message across that our values and policies are much more in line with what Christianity should be about, ie, ending poverty, caring for children and the elderly, honesty, peacemaking, and on and on.