Obama vs. "Oh, Bomb 'Em" -- Who's the Christian?

Republicans and self-styled "Christians" are agog over what Andrea Mitchell of NBC characterized as the "crisp, immediate, forceful response" John McCain gave to Rick Warren's question about evil during the forum at the Saddleback Church. They dismiss Barack Obama's "more nuanced approach."

"Sen. McCain was crisp, decisive, knew what he was about, knew his values," Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R, Minn.), who is a favorite of the "Christian Right," proclaimed on Face the Nation on Sunday. "Sen. Obama, I thought, was hesitant, halting, and quite wandering in his answers."

Pastor Rick asked the following question of both candidates: "Does evil exist? And if it does, do we ignore it? Do we negotiate with it? Do we contain it? Do we defeat it?"

Here is a portion of Obama's reasoned, considered, "nuanced" answer:

"Evil does exist. I mean, I think we see evil all the time. We see evil in Darfur. We see evil, sadly, on the streets of our cities. . . . It has to be confronted squarely . . . . I think [it] is very important for to us have some humility in how we approach the issue of confronting evil, because a lot of evil's been perpetrated based on the claim that we were trying to confront evil. . . . in the name of good. . . . [J]ust because we think that our intentions are good, doesn't always mean that we're going to be doing good."

Here, in stark contrast, is McCain's answer:

"Defeat it."

One can't get much more "crisp" and "decisive" than that! And it sure sounds like the proper Christian answer to what to do about evil, doesn't it?

Sen. McCain's values, which he knows so well, are based on that revered commandment from Jesus, "Shoot first and ask questions later."

Let's see, that's from . . . uh . . . the fifth chapter of Matthew, isn't it?

Oops. That's where Jesus offers an answer to Pastor Warren's question on what to do about evil that is nearly opposite to Sen. McCain's:

"But I say to you, 'Do not resist one who is evil. But if any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.'" (Matt. 5:39)

Several biblical Proverbs also reject Mr. McCain's "crisp, immediate, forceful response." A few examples:

"He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty." (Prov. 16:32)

"A man of quick temper acts foolishly, but a man of discretion is patient." (Prov. 14:17)

"He who is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who has a hasty temper exalts folly." (Prov. 14:29)

"A hot-tempered man stirs up strife, but he who is slow to anger quiets contention." (Prov. 15:18)

And, from the Christian New Testament's Letter of James: "Let every man be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger, for the anger of man does not work the righteousness of God" (James 1:19-20)

Three years ago, when President Bush was, as he is now and was prior to the 9-11 attacks, on his long August vacation in Crawford, Texas, Cindy Sheehan and other mothers who lost sons in Iraq War staged a protest near his home. One of their signs read: "Who would Jesus bomb?"

John McCain gave a memorable version of his standard answer to that question when he was asked in 2007 about his Iranian policy. He sang, to the tune of "Barbara Ann": "Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran."

In my new book, Grand Theft Jesus, I offer a name for these people who stand Jesus on his head. The person who had the greatest impact in overturning the teachings of Jesus lived 1700 years ago. Constantine won the Battle of Milvan Bridge in AD 312 after a dream led him to have Christian symbols painted on the shields of his soldiers.

Emperor Constantine is usually said to have converted the Roman Empire to Christianity. What he actually did was convert Christianity to the Roman Empire. He gave Jesus the fourth century equivalent of a shot of anabolic steroids and transformed the Prince of Peace into the Prince of War and ally of the rich and the ruler.

The Jesus Thieves who have committed identity theft against the Prince of Peace should be called Constantinians.

In Orange County on Saturday (as he has on many other occasions), John McCain showed himself to be a Constantinian, not a Christian. But this will do him little harm with the Republican "base" of the "Christian Right," because they, too, are Constantinians who shout "JESUS!" at the top of their lungs but ignore his teachings.

The choice in November is Obama or "Oh, Bomb 'Em."

Constantinians will vote for the latter, but Christians who are actual Jesus Followers may prefer nuance to crisp, angry decisiveness.

{Historian Robert S. McElvaine is Elizabeth Chisholm Professor of Arts & Letters at Millsaps College. His latest book is Grand Theft Jesus: The Hijacking of Religion in America .

Comments

[research]

It's time we called these fake Christians!

The don't understand Jesus's words in the Gospel of peace, love, tolerance and forgiveness, but they have revelations and the old testament down pat.

Jesus is a Liberal!

[jbm3]

Continued from the post below:

I don't even know why I'm wasting my time on this issue. McElvaine isn't really advocating this stance. He's just trying to manipulate the religion aspect while it is convenient to the candidate which he supports. I can't help but wonder what Obama would do if faced with a direct attack on this country. I can tell you with 100% certainty that whatever he chooses to do, McElvaine will be right behind him writing another piece in an attempt to justify his actions. If Obama is elected and responds to attacks with force, I want all of you who highly praise this piece to look back on this. I know that won't happen. You'll be too busy telling the rest of us what a brilliant decision it was to attack Iran. How ironic that will be!

Of course this post would not be complete without commenting on this quote: "Constantinians will vote for the latter, but Christians who are actual Jesus Followers may prefer nuance to crisp, angry decisiveness." Priceless. There's nothing like someone writing an article on how his position correlates so well with the Bible and then capping it off with a judgment on the level of others' Christianity.

In the end, McElvaine just wants to kill two birds with one stone. In writing this piece he attempts to further the position, albeit erroneously, of the candidate he supports, while more importantly pitching his new book.

[jbm3]

This is a very poorly written piece. McElvaine is completely blinded by his extreme liberalism and his quest to see Obama elected.

The analysis is weak and incomplete. To sum up the answers of the two candidates, Obama said evil "has to be confronted squarely", while McCain said that it should be defeated. McElvaine goes on to quote biblical passages, namely Matthew 5:39, which says not to resist evil and to turn the other cheek when one strikes you. How does Obama's answer coincide with this? He said that evil should be confronted. Confronting evil would be a resistance of evil and definitely would not be turning the other cheek.

Furthermore, this is not practical. If we were to turn the other cheek in all instances where we were struck, then there would be no United States. We would never have gained independence, and even if we did, we would have been overtaken at several points throughout history. If we were to adopt this as our policy today, as McElvaine would like us to, then we would not survive much longer. You can call this fearmongering or whatever you want, but any realistic, somewhat-informed person knows that countries like Russia and Iran (just to name a couple) would like nothing more than to demolish us. Couple that desire with knowledge that we won't defend ourselves or strike back, and I think we can all predict the result.

[Myrell002]

Oh THANK YOU for writing this!!

I believe that there is no room for Morality and Legislation. Living "right" is personal. If you are not convicted to live a certain way, no law will drive you do to so.

Evangelicals are not rational! A democracy involves doing what's best for the MOST people. Christians have no monopoly over the truth. I am a Christian and I believe that Jesus is the son of God and that he died for my sins. That being said, I am very aware that, that is MY truth. Not a Muslim's truth or Hindu's truth. Just My personal belief. Jesus called us to a live a life of LOVE.

Evangelicals aren't very loving. Occupying a country because they don't believe what you believe is not love. Warmongering is not an expression of Love. Believing that your religion is the supreme religion and forcing others to live to your so called standards of morality is not very loving.

Constantinians are full of themselves. There are no examples of Jesus carrying himself this way in the Bible.

And you wonder why people aren't interested in hearing about Jesus!!

[wingnutslayer]

I thought we were finished with religion as a determining factor in who would be the best president with JFK and the right wing attacks on his Catholicism. After the last eight years of the right using religion (along with patriotism and morality) as their own personal turf it would be foolish to think that America even cares what the founding fathers thought about the religion/state issue anymore. With Rick Warren, a pop pastor whose self-importance is almost as blatant as his obesity, we've hit a new low, and the bar was pretty low to begin with. As someone pointed out in the last year, I'm still waiting for the candidate with enough genuine courage to answer the question of "Who is nearer the God of Me?" with a resounding "That would be none of your business." Sadly, that kind of courage went out with political integrity. It's just so early twentieth century. And if any of these oh so pure Christians really, really believed in the bible, they would be picketting Wal-Mart for conducting business on the sabbath, which as I understand it is a blasphemy in God's eyes. I mean, it's in the Bible isn't it? In God we Trust, but make money we must.

[OliverTwist]

Exactly.

Christ was hijacked for political and especially warlike purposes under Constantine and efforts to return followers to his original message have not been successful.

For all practical purposes Christianity died 300 years after the death of Christ.

John McCain is a follower of the Crusader wing of the Constantinian Religion.

Too bad.

[research]

What country would Jesus invade?

Who would Jesus Torture?

Would Jesus suggest the Georgian president attack Ossetia?

[neurologymatters]

I don't understand why Rick Warren held a question and answer session with the next President of the United States. Our next President needs to understand and address people of different religions. I am a Christian-but I vote according to a candidate's policies. I understand decisions are made based upon religious beliefs or at least influenced by them. What happened to separation between Church and State?

[torrrep]

There is no separation of church and state. It's a figment of the liberal imagination. No where in the constitution do the words "separation of church and state" appear.

[laocoon]

Christians rely on only a few passages in the Bible and ignore or dont understand the rest. the original group referred to in ACTS called themselves followers of the way- as in the way that Jesus taught and lived. Christians have replaced all this with worship of the person of Jesus. An abomination. What are the fruits produced by Christians--- war, capital punishment and a social system that insists on greed as the holiest of motivations. I too believe we are in the end times but it is the fundamentalists who are the new pharisees and support the Beast. The Book of Revelations describes a world where all society is reduced to commerce, a world ruled by absolutist free market religion where we are all reduced to commodities.

[bluesoul]

It is always amusing to see the knee-jerk reaction to informative a truthful posts like these by those who hate Christianity in general (and those for whom atheism is a religion) and are who are ever ready to lump all Christians into the right-wing James Dobson crowd and burn them at the stake. laocoon uses the term Christian no less than three times in the broadest sense, meaning all of Christianity, asks what are the fruits and conveniently fails to included any good (Christian groups give more to charity than any other single religious or secular group. Thanks for perpetuating the myth that all Christians are right-wing idiots. If I thought you were remotely interested in finding out how many practicing Christians believe and behave, I would direct you to any book by Jim Wallis or the Sojourners website http://www.sojo.net/. Perhaps you have become what you claim to abhor, a bigot and by the way Revelation has no S.

[LiberalMathProfessor]

Lewis said, "When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross." We have become victims of the Christianists, the fundamentalist variety who are horrific heretics when it comes to civics (the rights and responsibilities of citizenship sans God since God is irrelevant to simple citizenship and getting along with each other, getting roads and bridges built, etc.) These people are easily seen as traitors, and a danger to the country; the Constitution is their enemy. I've grown so very tired of public wallowing in religiosity. I am so embarrassed by it. It ought to be one's private thing, and not something we all have to care about and tiptoe around and give our approval to. Didn't God instruct us to pray in our closets? I don't give a good damn about anybody's religiosity, and why in hell should they care about mine or my lack of it? What has gone wrong with this country of ours? The reason the Christianists reject "liberals" and Democrats in general is that we, along with Thomas Jefferson, don't want religion mixed with public affairs, whereas the Christianists want this nation to truly become a Jesus Theme Park whether a given citizen likes it or not. This land is Their land, not Our land, or so they so foolishly suppose. OBSERVE ARTICLE VI AND TAKE A LOAD OFF.

[realpolitic]

The author makes a good point about Constantine. So many evangelicals today define Christianity as being one with American exceptionalism and militarism. As Jesus said, when confronted with evil turn the other cheek. I doubt a candidate in modern America would get far with such a philosophy. Fortunately, Jesus was not running for office. The real message of the scriptures is so lost today.

[elbzee]

Fantastic! Thank you for a clear view of the absurdity of the religious right.
OBAMA 08!!!

[fignozzle]

excellent article!

[magen]

In a lot of ways, Obama is a preacher.

He makes inspiring speeches. He has gone to church for 20 years. Betcha he knows a lot of Scripture and Bible stories, and the REAL teachings of Jesus.

McSame is NOT a christian, doesn't go to church is is clearly pandering to evangelicals for their votes. Betcha if you asked him to tell you the story of Noah, he would either make a "gaffe", or get the entire thing wrong.

If Obama started using the REAL teachings of Jesus and some Scripture and Bible stories in his speeches, the evangelicals would hear him, and he could peel more off from McSame. It would also force McSame to try to talk about Scripture, making him look like more of a fool, illustrating to evangelicals (who actually know Scripture) how non-christian McSame is.

[fignozzle]

OR we could keep religion OUT of politics!

[rpete38]

If you truly believe God created all everything, God created Good & Evil. Therefore if you defeat evil, you will be defeating God. The only way left is to confront evil which was Obama's answer. I didn't read all the comments so if I am repeating someone else please forgive me.

[someoneuwontlike]

lol thats funny do you always twist things to the way you want?