Leviticus 19:18
“Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people,
but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself: I am the LORD. ...”
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I could go on and on with quotes that suggest that either a vast horde of American evangelicals have not read the Bible, particularly the New Testament, or believe that that Good Book is simply a menu of optional edicts, from which followers can pick and choose, or interpret to suit their circumstances. Whether it is environmental responsibility, taking care of the gifts of abundance that God has bestowed on mankind, to the moral predilections against powerful predators taking advantage of the powerless or the untoward worship of the Golden Calf of wealth at the expense of most other values. How many untrained fundamentalist Christian preachers proselytize that being rich is God’s wish for His followers?
What’s even more amazing is the notion that once having sinned, one merely has to ask God for forgiveness, receive absolution and then continue to commit exactly the same egregious errors (sins) without the slightest change in behavior. And that’s assuming that the sinner has admitted fault and actually asked for forgiveness. It is difficult to understand how these evangelicals – the majority of whom can be found in the GOP base – can reject government programs to support the poor, stand in judgment again everyone from LGBT to immigrants, support tax plans that benefit the rich at the expense of the poor, justify the rape of God’s environmental gifts and vote for sexual predators as their representative leaders.
If you believe in the New Testament and an afterlife for those who adhere to Biblical mandates, then there has to be a vast place in hell for these fallen Christians who, by voice and act, seem to have rejected so many of these core Christian values. But Alabama, where an embattled Roy Moore is seeking to replace Jeff Sessions who resigned from the Senate to become Attorney General, stands accused by a growing list of women of being a sexual predator with a predilection towards teenagers, many years his junior. A lot of women.
Despite Moore’s denials of any untoward sexual violations, with zero evidence that he has admitted fault or asked for forgiveness, many from this segment of the evangelical movement state openly that even if he did offend, Moore must have asked (and hence received) God’s forgiveness. Others believe, citing the timing of these accusations, that the accusers are merely plants, paid to perjure themselves by liberals and swamp-dwelling Republicans in Washington. There is no thought given to the pressure on women to stay silent… until the recent trends have finally made it acceptable for women to come forward (“me too”).
That so many even in the Republican Party claim that these women stand with a lot of credibility against the ranting denials from Moore and his followers, or that most of the major newspapers in Alabama have turned against Moore’s purported immorality, falls on deaf ears among the base. From the Sunday, November 19th New York Times: “It was a trying week for the people of Alabama, a week of dueling pastoral statements, sinful allegations and claims of religious persecution. And so, on the seventh day, their preachers gave it a rest.
“The pastor at the Freedom Church in Gadsden, Ala., who has been friends with the embattled Senate candidate Roy S. Moore for more than 20 years, spoke to his congregation about how God can use one who has failed. At the Living Stones Temple in Birmingham, the black pastor spoke of thanksgiving; at a campus of the Church of the Highlands across town, the white pastor talked of being lost but found by God. But from none of those pulpits was Mr. Moore’s name heard on Sunday morning.
“Mr. Moore, one of the loudest and hardest-line voices on the religious right, has been battling a host of allegations that he hounded, harassed or sexually assaulted women as young as 14 when he was in his early 30s. He has denied all the accusations, and insisted that he was being attacked for his faith. In a statement on Saturday [11/18] he called for his supporters to fight back against “the forces of evil who are attempting to relegate our conservative Christian values to the dustbin of history.”
“But Mr. Moore’s claim that the Senate race has become a religious war, and a Christian one at that, has put one group in an awkward position: Christians… [For] many pastors, the allegations have created a dilemma. They want to denounce what Mr. Moore was accused of doing, but in many cases they want to do so without denouncing Mr. Moore himself… In interviews over the past week, pastors said they did not want to alienate members of their congregation who still support Mr. Moore, and that as a rule, they never endorse or oppose political candidates so that anyone can feel welcome in their churches.
“Yet they did not want to stay silent, because they did not want their congregants — or people watching Alabama from around the country — to think that evangelicals believe it is normal or acceptable for a man in his 30s to molest and sexually harass teenagers.
“‘We cannot ignore the allegations,’ said the Rev. Ed Litton, senior pastor of the Redemption Church, which has more than 3,500 members in two locations near Mobile, Ala. ‘We can’t say, well, that doesn’t matter because some people in the other party do the same thing. These are serious allegations. And our faith, our worldview, demands that we take seriously the victimization of people.’…
“A group of Southern Baptist pastors in Alabama decided at their annual meeting in Huntsville last week to draft a declaration condemning ‘sexual abuse, assault, harassment and exploitation of women.’ The declaration does not mention Mr. Moore by name, but it was prompted by the allegations against him, according to the Rev. Mat Alexander, one of the pastors who worked on writing it. As of Friday [11/17] afternoon, it had been signed by more than 60 Southern Baptist pastors.”
To many in Alabama, the most difficult aspect of withdrawing support for Mr. Moore, effectively suggesting that a Democrat could be elected to represent a deeply red state, revolves around Moore’s commitment to end the constitutional right to abortion (Roe vs. Wade), his clear belief that the United States is a Christian nation. Moore’s powerful populist stance, supported by arch-populist Steve Bannon, is more Trump than Trump himself. But to vote for Moore would seem to be the ultimate exercise of Christian hypocrisy we have seen to date.
Whether you are a Christian or not, the New Testament is a spectacular Book, driven by notions of forgiveness, tolerance, acceptance of all people of all creeds and beliefs, charity and support for the less fortunate and powerless as well as brotherly love. Roy Moore and too many of his supporters seem, for the most part, to be on the opposite side of those values.
I’m Peter Dekom, and the Bible is not a menu!
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