Can Christians Be Leftist?
Is Any Ideology or Political Solution Compatible with Christianity?
Can a Christian be a leftist, socialist, or a communist? Of course, a Christian can be anything politically, but in this case I wonder. I believe that the values on the left, of strong central government, high taxes, socialistic philosophies, and the resultant loss of freedom are essentially incompatible with Biblical Christianity. When I read recently, in a CT article on “emergent” Christians, that many young people in the movement like the author “lean left,” I was surprised and troubled. While I accept that postmodernism will affect Christians, especially young ones, it seems odd to me that they would trust government or politicians more than God’s people to do God’s work. As often with other non-traditional, nominally Christian viewpoints, I suspect that the roots of their thinking and the final authority for their convictions come from somewhere other than God.
Other Christians that appear to “lean left” include Jim Wallis, Tony Campolo, and, rather surprisingly, Rick Warren. Kevin McCullough in discussing this says Campolo complains that Christians on the Right are “judgmental” and have “closed minds.” Yet, the Christian Left seems to me to be even more critical, antagonistic, and unbending in their positions. His article also mentions that Rick Warren has accepted the global warming hype and supports ultra-left-leaning Barack Obama. Wow!! Jim Wallis actually gave a Democratic response to President Bush’s weekly radio address.
Of course, Christians assuming a leftist ideology is not new. Catholics in particular took the side of leftist rebels in Latin America, and they developed an entire theology, called “Liberation Theology” to justify, it seemed to me, their alliance. More often than not, such positions share an antipathy toward the United States, the free market capitalism that has generated its prosperity, and even its liberty. Often they are also ardently anti-war, which is not itself inconsistent with Christianity, per se, although the issue has never been resolved theologically among Christians. What stands out, today, is the scorn that “Christians” on the left have for the so-called “Christian Right.” Their contempt and even hatred makes them typical leftists, but it makes them dubious Christians, ironically so, since they often claim to be motivated by compassion. It is also not uncommon for those arguing on the left to refuse to discuss differences of opinion. Instead, they seem to prefer to refuse to allow reasoned debate or discussion, as if their progressive conclusions are settled. Shouting down the opposing view may be acceptable to leftists, but it is not appropriate for the “People of Love.”
I agree that Christians may be inconsistent, at times, in living out their compassion. In our prosperous and consequently materialistic culture, despite blessings that should make us more generous, God’s people can become self-centered and selfish. Nevertheless, according to one study (book reference here), those on the Right are still more directly generous than those on the Left. I suspect the problem comes from one mistaken idea, concerning the proper role of government, but it is tied to others, such as trusting that governments led by imperfect humans can be trusted or that God’s commands to “Do justice,” or “Care for the poor” are government’s responsibility to fulfill rather than the Church or Christians individually.
To turn that around, then, the Lord taught the following. First, he commanded us to love each other and to care for each other, as our first and highest priority. He taught us to love our neighbors as ourselves, but he also told us to love our enemies as well as our friends. Second, beginning in the Sermon on the Mount, he commended peacemaking and reconciliation. Third, he commanded us, his disciples individually and collectively, to feed the hungry, cloth the naked, care for the sick, and visit the imprisoned. However, these are not the duties of governments, whose role is primarily to provide order through laws, police, and necessarily at times, armies. Fourth, he did tell us to “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,” placing us under the government’s authority as well as God’s. Fourth, he has warned us that everyone is a sinner, implying that we must be wise in placing our faith in men, especially as it concerns the hungry, naked, sick, and imprisoned. Plainly, it is not a government’s job to help poor widows, orphans, and disabled people, to provide health care, or reconcile victims to those who have harmed them; we must not turn our responsibilities over to it. We might also want to avoid giving sinners even greater power, which they may well be expected to abuse.
I have always found leftist, socialist thinking to be lazy. It seems predicated on the idea that, since we cannot convince our fellow citizens to do the right thing, whatever we think it to be, we will use government to force people to do it. War, poverty, and injustice provide great rhetorical tools to manipulate a gullible audience, but the results are rarely peace, an end of need, or justice. For example, the enormous redistribution of monies from working people to the poor, supposedly, has not ended poverty. Instead, more dependent poor receive more money and have become a class of perpetual victims.
Such government welfare is not compassionate. Citizens pay for it through taxes but have no direct involvement. Our representatives assess taxes but have no direct involvement. The bureaucrats and employees of the welfare agencies, who are more directly involved, often have little compassion. They may even despise their “clients” since they’re just “doing a job,” and the clients themselves can be a rather sorry kind of people, a mixture of mentally ill, physically handicapped, unskilled and uneducated people, alcoholics, and drug addicts, along with those who are temporarily jobless or homeless. Rhetoric would see this diverse mix as victims of an uncaring society without recognizing the real diversity of some who are capable people suffering misfortune, others suffering the consequences of their own poor choices, and others simply incapable of self-sufficiency. Real compassion touches lives to care for, help, and heal them, as opposed to simply giving them cash.
In the real world, it takes more than “giving a man a fish” or “teaching him to fish.” Some already know how to fish, but need a place to fish. Some were fishing when their lake dried up. Some cannot hold a pole, bait a line, or use a net, and others can never learn how to fish, no matter how hard they try. Some are allergic to fish, and others wouldn’t know what to do with a fish, once they caught it. Treating hunger as a social problem will feed a few hungry people; getting to know hungry people enable compassionate people to find the best ways to assure they always have good, nutritious food. Socialist, progressive schemes don’t do that.
Taking a position on the Right does not mitigate the bad effects of putting government in charge. I am not convinced that many Christians or the “Christian Right” ultimately is aiming for theocracy or “Christianism,” as some on the Left charge (I plan to deal with that more fully, another time). I believe most simply wish to return to an America more like the one created by our forefathers. For example, most prefer judges to be “strict constructionists” in their interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, instead of imposing ideological positions on it, as has been done primarily by judges with a progressive, Leftist orientation. Still, as conservative Christians have entered more into the political area in dealing with issues such as abortion and gay rights, they may at times forget that the government is the ultimate answer to the problems they see. The genius of the founders was creating a system government that prevented oppression and fostered freedom, and I believe that is what most conservative Christians really want.
For many years, only Christians did Christian charity, when the word charity still had a positive meaning. They started schools to teach their children, orphanages to care for children without parents, hospitals to nurse the sick back to health, and ministries of various kinds to serve widows, the homeless, prisoners, and those who suffered other kinds of distress. They organized to fight societal ills such as slavery and alcoholism, but they worked to change minds and serve people, not to create government programs or give the government more power. Since the Reformation, and particularly in the United States, Christians have usually submitted to the government’s authority, as from God, but mistrusted of its power, at the same time.
We can look all the way back to ancient Israel to see a prime example of misplaced trust in government, in their case, a king. After the Exodus, the Jews lived in a theocracy, under the direct rule of God. Yet, they envied their neighbors and wanted a king. God had his own plans for a King, in His time, but He yielded to their insistence and allowed them to pick Saul. He warned them of what might come, and it did. Sinful humans, even the best of them, who get power tend to misuse it. God’s own choice, David, did some pretty evil things because he had the power to get away with them, until God confronted him. God warned then: “Man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.” Only God can dispense true justice, which must wait on His timing, and only God’s government will use its power compassionately.
Lord Acton had it right: “Absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely.” God says, “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit” (in Zechariah 4:6). Do Christians think to invest government, via leftist ideology, with God’s Spirit? Or do they believe that they can expect a government without God’s Spirit nevertheless to do God’s will? They misplace their trust, in either case, and every socialist experiment, to date, proves the case. Either they become ruthlessly oppressive, or they become wastefully ineffective, eventually falling victim to the more oppressive strain. Christians fairly quickly lose their freedom under such regimes, first in small ways, but eventually en toto. Real Christians will always speak out against injustice, and the powerful, however they came by their power, will usually seek to still those who speak against them.
This raises questions regarding ends and means. Good ends never justify evil means to achieve them; but, for Christians, I would argue that the means are as important, if not in fact more important, than the ends. If a person truly believes in an omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent God, then he or she must realize that He doesn’t need anyone to solve our problems.
So, why then does He give us the responsibility to meet the needs of others? I believe He does it for two reasons. First, He does it to change the doer. That is why it is more blessed to give than to receive. Love is the characteristic virtue of mature Christians, and it is learned and refined in helping other people. It is not learned if those tasks are given over to the government, other agencies, or even churches and ministries. Many today believe their worship services are their greatest offerings to God, but God prefers obedience to acts of worship. Service is not a meeting but a loving action, and the government cannot do that for us.
The second reason that God gives us the duty to care for others is that our caring makes us credible messengers of the Gospel. On the one hand, our loving, cooperative unity is the real proof of our discipleship, not our version of orthodoxy. Truth and obedience are not optional, but neither are they excuses to divide, avoid each other, or despise those who disagree with us. One the other hand, compassionately helping people by getting involved, listening to them and understanding their needs, and then meeting their needs appropriately, more than anything else, proves the unique validity of the Gospel’s truth claims and the reality of God’s love. Political rhetoric doesn’t do that! Evangelistic meetings don’t do that either!
In the leftist view, we seek a world of no poverty, no war, and no injustice; but generally Leftists, secular progressives, and humanists seek a world without religion, too. Left-leaning Christians may genuinely seek to end the world’s ills, but I believe their approach would give people the world but deny them eternity. It may seem wrong, especially to prosperous Western Christians, that so many lack so much, but sometimes suffering is what drives people to God; the lack of good things in this life creates the hunger that will be permanently satisfied in the next. In fact, our very prosperity proves the damage it may bring--the decline of faith in the West, nearly to death in Europe and definitely in failing health here in the U.S.
Emergent Christians, not unlike the counter-culture Christians of my generation, object to the failures of the established Church. God bless them. Every generation needs its prophets. Yet, since the Reformation, it has become the pattern to separate rather than call to repentance. One undeniably clear thread of teaching in the words of Jesus, throughout the New Testament, and indeed in the entire Bible is unity among God’s people. We are a family, and brothers and sisters should act like a family. At the same time, family unity is difficult is often challenging. I think the Church needs the prophets of the emerging church movement, but they also need the wisdom and stability of godly men and women in the established church. God’s people need both the old songs of faith and fresh new expressions like “iron sharpening iron.” However, I am not convinced that “leaning left” offers the Church or the world blessings but rather a great risk of oppression and abuse of power. It also asks that Christians relinquish their most effective role, not just as compassionate givers, but also as caring, credible messengers for the Savior, His good news of salvation, and the peace, prosperity, and justice that is eternity.
Can a Christian be a leftist, socialist, or a communist? Of course, a Christian can be anything politically, but in this case I wonder. I believe that the values on the left, of strong central government, high taxes, socialistic philosophies, and the resultant loss of freedom are essentially incompatible with Biblical Christianity. When I read recently, in a CT article on “emergent” Christians, that many young people in the movement like the author “lean left,” I was surprised and troubled. While I accept that postmodernism will affect Christians, especially young ones, it seems odd to me that they would trust government or politicians more than God’s people to do God’s work. As often with other non-traditional, nominally Christian viewpoints, I suspect that the roots of their thinking and the final authority for their convictions come from somewhere other than God.
Other Christians that appear to “lean left” include Jim Wallis, Tony Campolo, and, rather surprisingly, Rick Warren. Kevin McCullough in discussing this says Campolo complains that Christians on the Right are “judgmental” and have “closed minds.” Yet, the Christian Left seems to me to be even more critical, antagonistic, and unbending in their positions. His article also mentions that Rick Warren has accepted the global warming hype and supports ultra-left-leaning Barack Obama. Wow!! Jim Wallis actually gave a Democratic response to President Bush’s weekly radio address.
Of course, Christians assuming a leftist ideology is not new. Catholics in particular took the side of leftist rebels in Latin America, and they developed an entire theology, called “Liberation Theology” to justify, it seemed to me, their alliance. More often than not, such positions share an antipathy toward the United States, the free market capitalism that has generated its prosperity, and even its liberty. Often they are also ardently anti-war, which is not itself inconsistent with Christianity, per se, although the issue has never been resolved theologically among Christians. What stands out, today, is the scorn that “Christians” on the left have for the so-called “Christian Right.” Their contempt and even hatred makes them typical leftists, but it makes them dubious Christians, ironically so, since they often claim to be motivated by compassion. It is also not uncommon for those arguing on the left to refuse to discuss differences of opinion. Instead, they seem to prefer to refuse to allow reasoned debate or discussion, as if their progressive conclusions are settled. Shouting down the opposing view may be acceptable to leftists, but it is not appropriate for the “People of Love.”
I agree that Christians may be inconsistent, at times, in living out their compassion. In our prosperous and consequently materialistic culture, despite blessings that should make us more generous, God’s people can become self-centered and selfish. Nevertheless, according to one study (book reference here), those on the Right are still more directly generous than those on the Left. I suspect the problem comes from one mistaken idea, concerning the proper role of government, but it is tied to others, such as trusting that governments led by imperfect humans can be trusted or that God’s commands to “Do justice,” or “Care for the poor” are government’s responsibility to fulfill rather than the Church or Christians individually.
To turn that around, then, the Lord taught the following. First, he commanded us to love each other and to care for each other, as our first and highest priority. He taught us to love our neighbors as ourselves, but he also told us to love our enemies as well as our friends. Second, beginning in the Sermon on the Mount, he commended peacemaking and reconciliation. Third, he commanded us, his disciples individually and collectively, to feed the hungry, cloth the naked, care for the sick, and visit the imprisoned. However, these are not the duties of governments, whose role is primarily to provide order through laws, police, and necessarily at times, armies. Fourth, he did tell us to “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,” placing us under the government’s authority as well as God’s. Fourth, he has warned us that everyone is a sinner, implying that we must be wise in placing our faith in men, especially as it concerns the hungry, naked, sick, and imprisoned. Plainly, it is not a government’s job to help poor widows, orphans, and disabled people, to provide health care, or reconcile victims to those who have harmed them; we must not turn our responsibilities over to it. We might also want to avoid giving sinners even greater power, which they may well be expected to abuse.
I have always found leftist, socialist thinking to be lazy. It seems predicated on the idea that, since we cannot convince our fellow citizens to do the right thing, whatever we think it to be, we will use government to force people to do it. War, poverty, and injustice provide great rhetorical tools to manipulate a gullible audience, but the results are rarely peace, an end of need, or justice. For example, the enormous redistribution of monies from working people to the poor, supposedly, has not ended poverty. Instead, more dependent poor receive more money and have become a class of perpetual victims.
Such government welfare is not compassionate. Citizens pay for it through taxes but have no direct involvement. Our representatives assess taxes but have no direct involvement. The bureaucrats and employees of the welfare agencies, who are more directly involved, often have little compassion. They may even despise their “clients” since they’re just “doing a job,” and the clients themselves can be a rather sorry kind of people, a mixture of mentally ill, physically handicapped, unskilled and uneducated people, alcoholics, and drug addicts, along with those who are temporarily jobless or homeless. Rhetoric would see this diverse mix as victims of an uncaring society without recognizing the real diversity of some who are capable people suffering misfortune, others suffering the consequences of their own poor choices, and others simply incapable of self-sufficiency. Real compassion touches lives to care for, help, and heal them, as opposed to simply giving them cash.
In the real world, it takes more than “giving a man a fish” or “teaching him to fish.” Some already know how to fish, but need a place to fish. Some were fishing when their lake dried up. Some cannot hold a pole, bait a line, or use a net, and others can never learn how to fish, no matter how hard they try. Some are allergic to fish, and others wouldn’t know what to do with a fish, once they caught it. Treating hunger as a social problem will feed a few hungry people; getting to know hungry people enable compassionate people to find the best ways to assure they always have good, nutritious food. Socialist, progressive schemes don’t do that.
Taking a position on the Right does not mitigate the bad effects of putting government in charge. I am not convinced that many Christians or the “Christian Right” ultimately is aiming for theocracy or “Christianism,” as some on the Left charge (I plan to deal with that more fully, another time). I believe most simply wish to return to an America more like the one created by our forefathers. For example, most prefer judges to be “strict constructionists” in their interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, instead of imposing ideological positions on it, as has been done primarily by judges with a progressive, Leftist orientation. Still, as conservative Christians have entered more into the political area in dealing with issues such as abortion and gay rights, they may at times forget that the government is the ultimate answer to the problems they see. The genius of the founders was creating a system government that prevented oppression and fostered freedom, and I believe that is what most conservative Christians really want.
For many years, only Christians did Christian charity, when the word charity still had a positive meaning. They started schools to teach their children, orphanages to care for children without parents, hospitals to nurse the sick back to health, and ministries of various kinds to serve widows, the homeless, prisoners, and those who suffered other kinds of distress. They organized to fight societal ills such as slavery and alcoholism, but they worked to change minds and serve people, not to create government programs or give the government more power. Since the Reformation, and particularly in the United States, Christians have usually submitted to the government’s authority, as from God, but mistrusted of its power, at the same time.
We can look all the way back to ancient Israel to see a prime example of misplaced trust in government, in their case, a king. After the Exodus, the Jews lived in a theocracy, under the direct rule of God. Yet, they envied their neighbors and wanted a king. God had his own plans for a King, in His time, but He yielded to their insistence and allowed them to pick Saul. He warned them of what might come, and it did. Sinful humans, even the best of them, who get power tend to misuse it. God’s own choice, David, did some pretty evil things because he had the power to get away with them, until God confronted him. God warned then: “Man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.” Only God can dispense true justice, which must wait on His timing, and only God’s government will use its power compassionately.
Lord Acton had it right: “Absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely.” God says, “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit” (in Zechariah 4:6). Do Christians think to invest government, via leftist ideology, with God’s Spirit? Or do they believe that they can expect a government without God’s Spirit nevertheless to do God’s will? They misplace their trust, in either case, and every socialist experiment, to date, proves the case. Either they become ruthlessly oppressive, or they become wastefully ineffective, eventually falling victim to the more oppressive strain. Christians fairly quickly lose their freedom under such regimes, first in small ways, but eventually en toto. Real Christians will always speak out against injustice, and the powerful, however they came by their power, will usually seek to still those who speak against them.
This raises questions regarding ends and means. Good ends never justify evil means to achieve them; but, for Christians, I would argue that the means are as important, if not in fact more important, than the ends. If a person truly believes in an omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent God, then he or she must realize that He doesn’t need anyone to solve our problems.
So, why then does He give us the responsibility to meet the needs of others? I believe He does it for two reasons. First, He does it to change the doer. That is why it is more blessed to give than to receive. Love is the characteristic virtue of mature Christians, and it is learned and refined in helping other people. It is not learned if those tasks are given over to the government, other agencies, or even churches and ministries. Many today believe their worship services are their greatest offerings to God, but God prefers obedience to acts of worship. Service is not a meeting but a loving action, and the government cannot do that for us.
The second reason that God gives us the duty to care for others is that our caring makes us credible messengers of the Gospel. On the one hand, our loving, cooperative unity is the real proof of our discipleship, not our version of orthodoxy. Truth and obedience are not optional, but neither are they excuses to divide, avoid each other, or despise those who disagree with us. One the other hand, compassionately helping people by getting involved, listening to them and understanding their needs, and then meeting their needs appropriately, more than anything else, proves the unique validity of the Gospel’s truth claims and the reality of God’s love. Political rhetoric doesn’t do that! Evangelistic meetings don’t do that either!
In the leftist view, we seek a world of no poverty, no war, and no injustice; but generally Leftists, secular progressives, and humanists seek a world without religion, too. Left-leaning Christians may genuinely seek to end the world’s ills, but I believe their approach would give people the world but deny them eternity. It may seem wrong, especially to prosperous Western Christians, that so many lack so much, but sometimes suffering is what drives people to God; the lack of good things in this life creates the hunger that will be permanently satisfied in the next. In fact, our very prosperity proves the damage it may bring--the decline of faith in the West, nearly to death in Europe and definitely in failing health here in the U.S.
Emergent Christians, not unlike the counter-culture Christians of my generation, object to the failures of the established Church. God bless them. Every generation needs its prophets. Yet, since the Reformation, it has become the pattern to separate rather than call to repentance. One undeniably clear thread of teaching in the words of Jesus, throughout the New Testament, and indeed in the entire Bible is unity among God’s people. We are a family, and brothers and sisters should act like a family. At the same time, family unity is difficult is often challenging. I think the Church needs the prophets of the emerging church movement, but they also need the wisdom and stability of godly men and women in the established church. God’s people need both the old songs of faith and fresh new expressions like “iron sharpening iron.” However, I am not convinced that “leaning left” offers the Church or the world blessings but rather a great risk of oppression and abuse of power. It also asks that Christians relinquish their most effective role, not just as compassionate givers, but also as caring, credible messengers for the Savior, His good news of salvation, and the peace, prosperity, and justice that is eternity.
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