Michigan State Senator Mallory McMorrow has gone viral and become a hero in the battle against the hard-right Republican party's unhinged and cruel public statements. McMorrow's political opponent, Lana Theis, made ridiculous accusations in a campaign ad that McMorrow was "grooming" and "sexualizing" small children. It was an accusation that comes from a place of fear, and that was designed to trigger the fears of right-wing religious voters. McMorrow answered the accusations with a speech that highlighted her own down-to-earth and Christian values. In the context of today's politics, McMorrow's was an appropriate response.
But I have a problem with much political argument today: liberal Christians respond to right-wing fundamentalist Christians by arguing over who is a Christian and who isn't. The ongoing battle between right- and left-wing Christianity does little to address the subject the argument is about. Should we, on the basis of what we know about a given subject (in this case, LGBTQ rights), argue facts, or should we be arguing about what we think Jesus would have said about it?
"Men tend to have the beliefs that suit their passions. Cruel men believe in a cruel God and use their belief to excuse their cruelty. Only kindly men believe in a kindly God, and they would be kindly in any case." - Bertrand Russell
When Christians go church shopping, they try to find a church that suits their temperaments and their political leanings. There's a church for any pre-existing belief. Some choose hellfire and brimstone; others choose the lovingest God they can find. And there are passages in the Bible that support both camps. Historically, religious belief has, for example, been used both to support slavery and to call for abolition.
"The gods conform scrupulously to the sentiments of their worshippers." - Anatole France
The point to be made here, one that should be obvious but apparently isn't, is that more than two centuries have passed since the time of Jesus, and the things we have learned in the interim make using the Bible's teachings as a guide to life less than ideal. I will be plain: Jesus was a human, a man of his time, and in spite of all of his apparent fine qualities, we know more than he did. We know that homosexuality is not a choice, but a way that very many people are wired, and have been since before the dawn of history. We know that Blacks are human and not some subhuman beings to be ruled over by whites. We know that slavery was a cruel and monstrous practice. We should be trusting ourselves to make arguments about moral questions without having to refer to the moral conditions that existed more than two thousand years ago. Arguments over religion have gotten us nowhere, and will continue to get us nowhere, on questions of how we should treat each other.
If we need to believe in anything, let us believe in our own ability to decide what is right. Morality is not founded in religion.
“Every time the scientists take another fort from the theologians and the politicians there is genuine human progress.” - H.L. Mencken
