Posted on 12/20/2010 11:07:34 AM PST by Libloather
Things Fall Apart
How Democrats gave up on religious voters.
Tiffany Stanley
Edition December 18, 2010 | 12:00 am
When Barack Obama burst onto the national scene at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, he represented—among many things—the shining hope for the religious left. Here was a liberal politician who was not afraid of the language of faith, who just might reclaim territory that the Democratic Party had, willingly or not, ceded to Republicans. Red America did not own religion, Obama declared: “We worship an awesome God in the blue states.
Between 2004 and 2007, when Obama announced his candidacy for president, he became possibly the most prominent Democratic politician who was comfortable speaking about religion—a liberal who gave the impression that his religiosity was heartfelt, genuine, and important to his politics. He spoke with ease about his conversion; of the influence of Reinhold Niebuhr and Martin Luther King, Jr.; and, in a key speech before the Call to Renewal conference in 2006, of the importance of “religion in the public square.” In the 2008 presidential election, Obama’s message seemed to resonate with religious people who had not, in recent years, gravitated toward the Democratic Party. He won more churchgoers than any Democratic presidential candidate since Bill Clinton.
But, in just two short years, the left has become sluggish in its courtship of religious voters, significantly scaling back its faith-outreach programs.
(Excerpt) Read more at tnr.com ...
"Evangelicals in the pews seem to be as conservative as ever, offering little support to the liberal legislative agendas of their ostensible spokespersons." -- Mark Tooley, IRD President
WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 /Christian Newswire/ -- Liberal hopes for increasing political support from evangelical Christians are not materializing, according to data from the most recent midterm elections and issue polls.
Legislation championed by the Evangelical Left, such as global warming regulation, loosened immigration controls and Obamacare, is either stalled or increasingly unpopular among evangelicals in the pews.
Simple. They didn’t have any respect for them.
Despite making abortion and homosexuality the two main planks of the Liberal worldview, the Left has somehow not managed to convince Evangelicals to vote for Democrats. How odd.
While not as open toward abortion, many of those evangelicals are open toward homosexuals in their congregations.
Are they really forgetting about courting the Evangelicals, or just re-grouping to use them again as a potential voting block in 2012? Think of how much easier their lies will be to court Evangelicals when they shut down conservative media outlets. We will see...
Therefore the white men would have to choose between providing for their family and the social liberalism downside (abortion, marriage, immigration) of liberalism and that he would choose the left. The left made moves to make themselves “palatable” to these voters.
Time will tell, not sure the final verdict is in, but I always thought this was a pipe dream. But if times get really tough I guess we will see.
schu
My attitude towards Obummer’s claims of being a Christian goes as follows, I can call myself an Eagle but I still can’t fly.
The Left is saying ‘no’ to religion and ‘yes’ to ‘no labels’.
December 2, 2002: FOX show, Boston Public shows the evil of the Church, and any organized religion as a cult. "At first, it was just wrestling. Then, he began rubbing me," confesses a poor student, victim of the Church. FOX fulfills its New World Order agenda by demonizing religion today.
November 15, 2002: Washington Post, page A02, Prelates Fear Scandal Drowning Out Voice "As the United States moved toward a possible war with Iraq, the leaders of America's largest religious denomination this week questioned the ethical grounds for a preemptive attack. Yet the statement by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops was all but drowned out by the church's sex abuse scandal."
November 13, 2002: Washington Post, page A09, Bishops Preparing Iraq Position "After months at the center of the church's sex abuse scandal, Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston presided over the nation's Roman Catholic bishops yesterday as they began shaping a statement questioning the morality of a preemptive U.S. war on Iraq."
November 12, 2002: New York Times, Bishops Seek to Reclaim Authority "Sadly, even among the baptized," Bishop Gregory said, "there are those at extremes within the church who have chosen to exploit the vulnerability of the bishops in this moment to advance their own agendas. One cannot fail to hear in the distance -- and sometimes very nearby -- the call of the false prophet, `Let us strike the shepherd and scatter the flock.' "
September 8, 2002: NPR hosts "loyal priest," Hugh Bruns, who charges that: "Since January, the Catholic Church has looked more and more like another sleazy reality TV program....Like it or not, our American system...offers Catholics a model... Trust in the Church hierarchy is in tatters right now, nobody wants to hear what the Bishops have to say about anything. Not about war with Iraq..." Go to story or using Real Audio online listen to whole NPR story,
Stupid Christians...don’t they realize how much money Obama could funnel to them if only they would give up their principles and adjust their doctrines to support him?
/ sarcasm
Obama bamboozled them the way he bamboozled everyone else.
Demonrats are UNGODLY!!! They’re from a different kingdom - the below kingdom.
You don’t have to worry about Evangelicals, they are the core of conservatism in America.
That’s what the left is always describing as evangelicals and fundamentalists “voting against their own best interests”. Because they have no moral compass and no principles they wouldn’t sell, they can never understand people who do.
That is because those that tried to claim an Evangelical mantle, from which to promote acceptance of the Left's agenda, NEVER did speak for the majority of Evangelicals.
One would have thought the process of promoting Left-leaning Evangelicals was to show non-Evangelicals that Evangelicals were not really, on the whole "Conservative". That was never what they were doing.
The Left, particular the media wing of the Left, trotted out their Left-Leaning "evangelicals" in an attempt to sell Leftist ideas as NOT RADICAL among Evangelicals themselves - especially from 2004 on - using the fraud that the "Evangelicals" they promoted actually spoke for Evangelicals - as if to say: "see, if you're Evangelical its O.K. to believe as the Left does". Evangelicals themselves were always the target audience in that agenda.
It was always a fraudulent process from the get go.
How did Shakespeare put it? “A skunk by any other name would stink as bad”? Something like that :)
The skunk is the Democratic Party, and the stink is their programs, policies, ideologies, and yes, leaders.
I think most Christians are aware of the differences between God’s commands and the preferences of the Democrats. There is no moral reason for theft, homosexuality, abortion, promiscuity, and the worship of Mammon.
Baby-butchering is pretty hard to evangelize upon....
Why wouldn't they be? Church is where sinners should go. But that doesn't mean they approve of their "lifestyle"
Can’t mix up Obama with progressives. Obama may be religious but the progressives would rather wallow in abortion, homosexual acceptance, DADT, and the like. Progressives seem totally warped when it comes to morals.
Then why is the ELCA, along with other denominations, ordaining homosexuals?
Mark 13:22 (King James Version)
For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect.
NOPE. Republicans pointedly betrayed the Christian Right, subverting Value Voters for SaddleBack, and offering up candidates who, for the first time, did not embrace Life. Without the solid support of Life, there is little in the Republican agenda to attract (keep) Christians.
In their estimation, yes. In yours or mine? No. But they are considered a mainline evangelical Christian Church in this country. They're the largest (at least until they began vomiting members and congregations) Lutheran denomination in the US. Then you have the Episcopalians...
But your question was to why wouldn't they be open to homosexuals. You took the narrow view of that openness. They take the broad (secular) view.
No comment on this thread has said it better.
I take a narrow view of Christianity, too. And of the defintion of an evangelical church. As a mainline church, the ECLA does not meet the criteria that I believe are the correct ones.
This whole phoney baloney attempt to sucker in Christians was doomed to failure. It was a cynical con job based on obama's and others' opinions that the Christian is a credulous boob and easily swayed.
Remember, "clinging to guns and religion and fear of outsiders" is what makes us all tick, right?
What I’m saying is that the ELCA has been an established Christian Lutheran denomination for decades. And, it is the largest Lutheran denomination. That’s mainline.
The fact they’ve fallen in their beliefs and practices makes them unfit in God’s eyes, and the eyes of those such as us who follow God’s Word. But they can still be classified as a mainline denomination. They just ain’t Christian anymore...
I never said they shouldn’t be welcomed. I said they were open toward having homosexuals in their congregations. And by that I meant without their recanting their sin, even to the point of being allowed as clergy. Big difference from evangelizing to the masses...
Trust you? I spent years in the ELCA. I know what they are. They are the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. They call themselves evangelical. They practice evangelism. The balance of your description is spot on. But they have everything to do with evangelism...unfortunately.
And, yes, as you say, they will get their reward...
I agree with you on this issue. What I am saying is that mainline Protestants, all denominations or at least most of them, have fallen away from Christian teachings, and not just recently.
The problem is more with the leadership than with the people in the pew, IMO.
Every church has its struggles. That’s because it’s made up of us mortals, sinners all. Let’s face it, anything we touch will have its good side and bad side. It’s up to us faithful to insure we follow the path Christ has set for us.
Yes, the problem lies mainly with the leadership, but as witnessed in the ELCA and elsewhere, there are many “people in the pew” as you put it who willingly follow. Their faith is weak and unenlightened; often by design these days.
I couldn’t agree more.
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