The Duty for All Christians

Christians have a solemn duty.  The reason will become clear.



Recently, there was a strong reaction in the Blogosphere about Governor
Mitt
Romney's " href="http://www.mittromney.com/News/Speeches/Faith_In_America"
rel="tag">Faith In America" Address.
 I noticed in particular the posts on href="http://scienceblogs.com/effectmeasure/2007/12/freethinker_sunday_sermonette_76.php">Effect
Measure, href="http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/12/romneys_terrible_speech.php"
rel="tag">Matthew Yglesias, and href="http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2007/12/romneys_constitutional_confusi.php">Dispatches
from the Culture Wars.  There were many
others, but the point is that Romney pushed everyone's buttons; some
favorable, others not.



Personally, I though it was a confusing speech.  Of course,
there was the perplexing assertion that "freedom requires religion."
 That simply makes no sense.  But what I found really
odd was that he would make a big deal out of religious freedom at all.
 In a way, it is like a Republican giving a speech about
health care: it simply plays into their opponent's strong suit.



After all, if someone really wants freedom of religion; if someone
thinks that is a a really high priority; if someone is going to vote on
that issue alone, then the last person they should vote for is Romney.



It is perfectly obvious that the best proponent for true freedom of
religion, of all the candidates, is href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_Kucinich">Dennis
Kucinich.



Now, I can't prove this, but I believe it, and I am putting it in this
post because I think it is important: Romney's view of "freedom of
religion" is really the freedom to impose religion on others.
 Or at least, to impose religious influences upon others by
means of government.

Romney is not alone in this, obviously.  He would not be
dangerous if he were alone.  There are many who share this
goal.  Some operate together; some individually; some in a
loose consortium.  Some are shadowy, like href="http://www.harpers.org/archive/2003/03/0079525">The
Family.  Others, like the href="http://christianexodus.org/">Christian Exodus,
are forthright.



Notice that I am not saying Romney is a member of such an organization.
 However, he made it clear in his speech that he does not
believe in complete separation of church and state.  Sure, he
said he believes in such separation.  But he also said (at
much greater length) that some people carry the separation too far:

We separate church and state affairs in this country,
and for good reason. No religion should dictate to the state nor should
the state interfere with the free practice of religion. But in recent
years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken
by some well beyond its original meaning. They seek to remove from the
public domain any acknowledgment of God. Religion is seen as merely a
private affair with no place in public life. It is as if they are
intent on establishing a new religion in America – the
religion of secularism. They are wrong.

Romney fails to understand the seriousness of the threat of theocracy.
 There are people, lots of people, powerful people, who
believe that we should have a religious government on a permanent
basis.  That is every bit as radical as the notion that we
should have a permanent Republican majority.  It is
horrifying.  



I usually vote for Democrats, although not always.  But I
never would support someone who advocated a permanent Democratic
majority.  Or a permanent Green majority, or any other
permanent majority.  I was appalled when Bush was reelected in
2004, precisely because it was known at that time that the Republicans
were making a concerted effort to establish a permanent majority. How
could anyone support such a thing?



What we all need to do is to press for structural changes in our
government to make such things less likely.  That includes
strict separation of church and state, as well as separation of powers,
and checks and balances.  Those traditions must be upheld.
 But it is not enough.  We need more safeguards.
 Examples would include href="http://www.instantrunoff.com/">instant runoff voting,
proportional
representation, and greater transparency of lobbying efforts.
 Personally, I would like to see all lobbying efforts recorded
and posted to the Internet.  I would also like to see a href="http://scienceblogs.com/corpuscallosum/2006/09/what_linus_could_teach_congres.php">system
for complete transparency in the writing of legislation.  



Christians need to understand that when they band together as
Christians, they are lending their power to others.  They have
a
responsibility to not lend that power to those who would abuse it.
 It
is analogous to lending a gun to a habitual felon.  Having a
permanent
majority of any group, whether a political party, a group of corporate
shills, or a religion, is putting too much power in too great of a
concentration.  The responsibility to prevent this is not
unique to Christians, of course, but at present, the threat of
theocracy is particularly pressing.