The Evangelicals & the repubs, what a rocky marriage it's been

[Philosoraptor]

They were so starry eyed and deeply in love when first they met in that blissful embrace of politics and religion during Saint ronnie's reign under the silky light of the 80's moon.

Vote for ron, he's got family values, vote republican, they've got Christian morals and principles, they fight against ungodliness and secularism, they've got the love you've always missed out on, the political representation you've always craved deep in your lonely hearts, come, come unto the fold of the warm embrace of the republican party you vast herds of voters.

The last few years though have shown the trials and tribulations of a love affair tossed by the stormy seas of hypocrisy and deceit, love torn asunder by outside influences and lusty distractions. A love like this cannot live on, it is doomed to sink beneath the hoary waves of despair and regret.

It's interesting after 30 years of observing the Christian conservative movement, all the ebbs and flows of the parasitic relationship between the falwell's, the robertson's and the followers and the dangerous blending of church and state, the obvious pandering to the 'base' voters, the bamboozling of the true believers, how it's all converging now in an inevitable disaster.

I wonder if their marriage can survive this terrible trend?

[malaise]

1. I suspect that the Haggard marriage has

a better chance of survival.

[Hubert Flottz]

2. Teddy has taken up the one eyed serpent!

And it bit him on his ASP!

[Philosoraptor]

3. Temptation (Satan) takes many forms,

this time as a hot hunk of a man whore, my god the temptation!

[Perky]

4. I think you are refering to fundamentalists not evangelicals

There is a substantial difference between the two.

[Philosoraptor]

6. but of course

I have no truck with anyone's religion, just their repubican hypocritical politics.

[Perky]

7. Thanks

Essentially by interchanging the two terms you are saying (by exmaple) that Jerry Fallwell and Jimmy Carter have the same beliefs/philosophy

[Dob Bole]

8. Not necessarily...

A majority of evangelicals vote Republican, period.

In the worst of times, Democrats get 40% of the vote.

[Perky]

9. Does not necessarily mean they are fundies

also understsand that pollsters will not do a good job at delineating the difference

[Dob Bole]

11. No, fundies are a subcategory of evangelicals...

When Billy Graham first came on the scene, or Jimmy Carter was president, evangelicalism was considered to be a movement against fundamentalism. Now, they have merged a little. Fundamentalism is a part of evangelicalism.

[Perky]

12. You really think so?

My sense more and more is that Fundamentalism ir really about groups of Christians demanding relevance in a post modern world and using political machinations to achieve those ends. The bogeyman in their world are Godless liberals and ACLUers. Ic reasingly there is little to be said about the Ministry of Christ but rather the requirments of God. Again it is not about Jesus it is about raw political power and having a seat at the table.
It is not about Christ...it is about culture wars.

It is modern-day phariseeism that believes we get righteousness through the ballot box rather than revival.

Evangelicalism on the otherhand recognized that the underpinnings of changed culture can only occur through the transformation in Christ. They understand that the dictates of Scripture can not be forced on those who do not know Christ. It is folly to think you can imbue Christian values and culture across the greater society without CHrist at the center of everything that you do.

Now the fundies do agree in the suffiency of Christ. No doubt. But they frequently will adopt other means to get to what they think is the same result. More often than not they think protest and politics are approporiate substitutes for prayer and revival.

[Dob Bole]

13. You're right

I was simply saying that fundamentalists and evangelicals are not completely different any more, because fundamentalists like Falwell have had influence on evangelicalism as well. There has been some merging.

But there is definitely a difference. I'm an evangelical, and there is a definite evangelical left- Jim Wallis, Tony Campolo, Jane Fonda, to name a few. Fundamentalism, by contrast, can't be said to have a "left" (except maybe Jesus-people style socialists) because it reacts against any sort of modernism.

[FernBell]

5. they'll slowly become politically disaffected

[wishlist]

10. Abramoff, Ralph Reed, Foley, Rove plus Bush's many failures are causing

disillusion among some right leaning evangelicals who have a growing realization of the dishonesty, hypocrisy, and lack of integrity and fiscal responsibility shown by Repubs. Hopefully the Repub lock on the Christian right support has started to loosen.

Several friends and relatives of mine who used to blame everything bad on the Dems and advocated putting all Repubs in power have now changed their tune and are saying how disappointed they are with Repubs in power.