Beware of virtues
The Political Pulpit
Of course, Christians should be good citizens! That is just common sense, most
Americans think. We want to expose our kids to religion so they'll turn out good and
learn values. Side-by-side this point of view is the belief that the key to improving our
nation is to teach our members Christian virtues. A lot of our nation's problems would be
addressed, it is said, if we had more virtuous citizens. That is why the church needs to
concentrate on (prioritize) teaching virtues, on nurturing good citizens, and not on
advocating particular political-structural solutions.
The Pew Research Center conducted a poll in 2006, which supports the impact of this line of thinking among the majority of American Christians. White American Christians, it seems, have a very different approach to politics than the nation as a whole. When asked to name what they consider the most pressing national issue to be, 29% of the public named the war in Iraq and 21% named the economy. By contrast, only 17% and 10% of white Evangelical Protestants named these issues respectively as the most important issues for our nation. Scores were different when value issues like gay marriage and abortion were considered. While only 19% of the public deemed these topics the most important national issues, a whopping 45% of white Evangelical Protestants prioritized these matters.
The biblical literalist as well as the political liberal in me gets awfully nervous about these numbers. It bothers a Christian sister, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend (eldest child of Bobby, and a former Lieutenant Governor of Maryland), in her new book, Failing America's Faithful. In essence, she argues that American churches (both Protestant and Catholic) have forfeited their traditional role in this country (to promote the welfare of the poor, sick, and those in need) in favor of offering prescriptions for what one ought not to do (become gay or have an abortion). As Kennedy Townsend puts it, we have seen in her lifetime (she is a member of the Baby-Boomer Generation) the American church move from understanding that the purpose of faith is to improve the world, to its present posture in which faith has become more about just improving our lives. Religion has become privatized (pp. 2, 3, 5, 18-19). This is a privatizing that does not just focus on the individual's faith and virtues. In her view the privatizing of faith has effectively closed the faithful off from those in the world who need our help, because we are so busy building walls to keep out the threatening ways of the world (p. 3). The same Barna poll just cited further confirms these fears. While only 6% of the American public is focused on the problems of illegal immigration, twice that percentage of white American Evangelical Protestants are preoccupied with erecting barriers to "keep those people out."
One problem with an emphasis on preaching virtues and morality, even for those who claim to be concerned about social holiness, is that such a political strategy entails that until the majority of Americans become holy and virtuous, our nation will not change for the better. Do we really want to tell the poor to wait for us until we get enough converts, until you and I become virtuous enough? This is a formula for advancing the Republican laissez-faire, small government if I've heard one. You may not be as politically neutral as you think you are in your preaching. Keep that in mind the next time you decide not to address one of the big structural problems in American society and instead turn to some homily on the subject of personal ethics or morality. Even colleagues who say they are concerned with social holiness are likely to devote more energy to the sexuality of our politicians than to ending the war in Iraq or finding ways to provide decent standards of living for the poor. That kind of preaching has helped the Right co-opt American Christianity to serve its aims.
In the African-American church that I serve as a seminary faculty member, there is a widespread proverb. It is commonly said of some religious people that they are "so holy that they're of no earthly use." Preaching that focuses primarily on individual salvation or on inculcating virtues and responsibility will nurture holy Christians, virtuous citizens, who are of not much political use. Of not much use, because these types of faithful people your church may inadvertently be nurturing will be so concerned with the respectability of their own personal lives that they won't have much energy left to try to set things right in America about the war, about the ever-growing wage disparity, about the lack of health insurance for a growing number of their fellow citizens, about the environment, or about the remaining vestiges of discrimination that plague us.
There are a number of assigned pericopes in July and August that will allow you to make these points. They present us with portraits of Jesus and of the biblical faithful, which make it clear that God is not so concerned about the appearance of public virtuosity as he is with having faithful followers who will stand up to the authorities and social conventions of the day for the sake of common good and the welfare of others. These texts also challenge those among us who would understand the task of preaching primarily in terms of nurturing virtue and individual responsibility. The second lesson for July 1 (Galatians 5:1, 13-25) reminds us that God has made us free, given us a freedom that does not submit to the sake of slavery that might be imposed on our neighbors. Christian freedom creates people not just concerned to avoid fornication, drunkenness, and carousing, but those who will do what it takes to become agents of freedom.
The theme of God's faithful people called to stand up for the sake of the common good is a theme that the first lessons for July 15, July 29, and August 26 proclaim (Amos 7:7-17; Hosea 1:2-10; Jeremiah 1:4-10). Amos defies the directives of the religious establishment of his day, of the High-Priest Amaziah who had directed him to remain silent about injustices in the nation. Hosea marries a prostitute because God intends that such a counter-cultural lifestyle may help to change the people of Israel's social life, and Jeremiah was called to "pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow...." At first glance, these prophets do not appear to be very virtuous citizens. But in that counter- cultural style of living there is a witness to its being characterized by a prioritizing of aiding the poor and those in need. The first lessons of July 22 and August 12 (Amos 8:1- 12; Isaiah 1:10-20) offer that testimony. This set of commitments presupposes a vision of the unity of all God's people. A sermon on the second lesson for August 5 (Colossians 3:1-11) and its testimony to the unity of Jew and Greek, of slave and free, affords pastors the opportunity to proclaim that we are all in this together, that the Christian life inevitably draws us to a concern for our fellow human beings and their welfare.
In planning your sermons for these months, do not overlook the references to Jesus' preoccupation with the caring for those in need as reported in the gospels for July 15 and July 29 (Luke 10:25-37 [the story of the good Samaritan] and Luke 11:1-13 [the formulation of the Lord's Prayer, which includes a petition that the hungry be fed]). The gospel for August 26 (Luke 13:10-17) testifies to the fact that in accomplishing these aims Jesus was not a model citizen. In fact, he even broke the laws about sabbath observance.
Nowhere in these texts do we find anything about sexual abstinence, homosexuality, patience, or the evils of abortion and the like. These are pericope texts with a lot more to do with structural change in society than about individual holiness and virtues. If you really believe in a literal reading of scripture, these texts can't help but draw you into a political pulpit, leading you to preach more sermons about the socio-political issues of our day than delivering ethical exhortations.
Besides the legalism (Pelagianism) associated with mostly preaching on how to become a virtuous person, Barack Obama (in his recent best-seller, The Audacity of Hope) has pointed out that such preaching can lead to a spiritual life detached from the world. In fact, Obama points to the way that the historic Black church in this country has functioned. He praises its heritage of nurturing a faith that does not entail that you don't still have weaknesses or that you relinquish your hold on the world. The typical Black sermon, he notes, freely acknowledges that Christians do not always achieve virtuous living, that the lines between saints and sinners are fluid, that the sins of churchgoers are not much different from the sins of everybody else. You come to church not to get away from the world, but because you are of this world (pp. 207-208). Maybe we could all learn from the Black church as Obama portrays it. Sure, there's a place for exhorting virtues and values sometimes. But the primary task of preaching is not so much to inculcate world-denying virtues as it is about reminding people of their fallibility, and to proclaim that their need for God will be answered lovingly by the loving Lord who sets them free to get back into the world in order to change it!
Neither Obama nor I would want to leave you with the impression that we are against the cultivation of virtue, that responsibility and character are of no interest to the church and of no use in politics. The point of this column is where you place your emphasis, whether the holiness you preach is of any use. Thus, if you're pro-life and pro-family, how much are you willing to pay in taxes to ensure that the poor receive health care, meals, and can find jobs? Sociologists have documented that decent standards of living help marriage and family life. True pro-life and pro-family advocates should also challenge our government about what kind of foreign policies best nurture life and family. For government budgets and foreign policies are moral postures, opportunities to exercise public virtues of love and justice. As Obama puts it, we need government action along with a concern about values and virtues (p. 63). If you and I are serious about a style of preaching that is faithful to Jesus, Paul, and the prophets, dare we de-emphasize these issues in the pulpit?
When you are moved by the assigned texts and the Spirit to mount a political pulpit, keep these lessons in mind. If you find yourself concerned that this sort of preaching might just be the agenda of liberal politics and liberal Protestantism, keep in mind Chet's reference to William Wilberforce, but don't get the impression that his career was devoted to preaching virtues, because most of it was devoted to working for legislation to end slavery in England. Also take the time to read the historical sections of Kathleen Kennedy Townsend's new book. She will teach you about the precedents for American Christianity's addressing the structures of society, reminding you that it was not just integration that was realized as a result of the American church's political intervention, but that the child labor laws, women's suffrage, the forty-hour work week, and the recognition of labor unions were at least in part brought to fruition by the American pulpit (especially p. 105). Will you link yourself with that inspiring heritage during July, August, and the upcoming months? Or would you rather preach about private virtues for "good" citizens who are not of much use to American society?
Mark Ellingsen is a tenured associate professor on the faculty of the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta and the author of hundreds of articles and thirteen books.
The Pew Research Center conducted a poll in 2006, which supports the impact of this line of thinking among the majority of American Christians. White American Christians, it seems, have a very different approach to politics than the nation as a whole. When asked to name what they consider the most pressing national issue to be, 29% of the public named the war in Iraq and 21% named the economy. By contrast, only 17% and 10% of white Evangelical Protestants named these issues respectively as the most important issues for our nation. Scores were different when value issues like gay marriage and abortion were considered. While only 19% of the public deemed these topics the most important national issues, a whopping 45% of white Evangelical Protestants prioritized these matters.
The biblical literalist as well as the political liberal in me gets awfully nervous about these numbers. It bothers a Christian sister, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend (eldest child of Bobby, and a former Lieutenant Governor of Maryland), in her new book, Failing America's Faithful. In essence, she argues that American churches (both Protestant and Catholic) have forfeited their traditional role in this country (to promote the welfare of the poor, sick, and those in need) in favor of offering prescriptions for what one ought not to do (become gay or have an abortion). As Kennedy Townsend puts it, we have seen in her lifetime (she is a member of the Baby-Boomer Generation) the American church move from understanding that the purpose of faith is to improve the world, to its present posture in which faith has become more about just improving our lives. Religion has become privatized (pp. 2, 3, 5, 18-19). This is a privatizing that does not just focus on the individual's faith and virtues. In her view the privatizing of faith has effectively closed the faithful off from those in the world who need our help, because we are so busy building walls to keep out the threatening ways of the world (p. 3). The same Barna poll just cited further confirms these fears. While only 6% of the American public is focused on the problems of illegal immigration, twice that percentage of white American Evangelical Protestants are preoccupied with erecting barriers to "keep those people out."
One problem with an emphasis on preaching virtues and morality, even for those who claim to be concerned about social holiness, is that such a political strategy entails that until the majority of Americans become holy and virtuous, our nation will not change for the better. Do we really want to tell the poor to wait for us until we get enough converts, until you and I become virtuous enough? This is a formula for advancing the Republican laissez-faire, small government if I've heard one. You may not be as politically neutral as you think you are in your preaching. Keep that in mind the next time you decide not to address one of the big structural problems in American society and instead turn to some homily on the subject of personal ethics or morality. Even colleagues who say they are concerned with social holiness are likely to devote more energy to the sexuality of our politicians than to ending the war in Iraq or finding ways to provide decent standards of living for the poor. That kind of preaching has helped the Right co-opt American Christianity to serve its aims.
In the African-American church that I serve as a seminary faculty member, there is a widespread proverb. It is commonly said of some religious people that they are "so holy that they're of no earthly use." Preaching that focuses primarily on individual salvation or on inculcating virtues and responsibility will nurture holy Christians, virtuous citizens, who are of not much political use. Of not much use, because these types of faithful people your church may inadvertently be nurturing will be so concerned with the respectability of their own personal lives that they won't have much energy left to try to set things right in America about the war, about the ever-growing wage disparity, about the lack of health insurance for a growing number of their fellow citizens, about the environment, or about the remaining vestiges of discrimination that plague us.
There are a number of assigned pericopes in July and August that will allow you to make these points. They present us with portraits of Jesus and of the biblical faithful, which make it clear that God is not so concerned about the appearance of public virtuosity as he is with having faithful followers who will stand up to the authorities and social conventions of the day for the sake of common good and the welfare of others. These texts also challenge those among us who would understand the task of preaching primarily in terms of nurturing virtue and individual responsibility. The second lesson for July 1 (Galatians 5:1, 13-25) reminds us that God has made us free, given us a freedom that does not submit to the sake of slavery that might be imposed on our neighbors. Christian freedom creates people not just concerned to avoid fornication, drunkenness, and carousing, but those who will do what it takes to become agents of freedom.
The theme of God's faithful people called to stand up for the sake of the common good is a theme that the first lessons for July 15, July 29, and August 26 proclaim (Amos 7:7-17; Hosea 1:2-10; Jeremiah 1:4-10). Amos defies the directives of the religious establishment of his day, of the High-Priest Amaziah who had directed him to remain silent about injustices in the nation. Hosea marries a prostitute because God intends that such a counter-cultural lifestyle may help to change the people of Israel's social life, and Jeremiah was called to "pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow...." At first glance, these prophets do not appear to be very virtuous citizens. But in that counter- cultural style of living there is a witness to its being characterized by a prioritizing of aiding the poor and those in need. The first lessons of July 22 and August 12 (Amos 8:1- 12; Isaiah 1:10-20) offer that testimony. This set of commitments presupposes a vision of the unity of all God's people. A sermon on the second lesson for August 5 (Colossians 3:1-11) and its testimony to the unity of Jew and Greek, of slave and free, affords pastors the opportunity to proclaim that we are all in this together, that the Christian life inevitably draws us to a concern for our fellow human beings and their welfare.
In planning your sermons for these months, do not overlook the references to Jesus' preoccupation with the caring for those in need as reported in the gospels for July 15 and July 29 (Luke 10:25-37 [the story of the good Samaritan] and Luke 11:1-13 [the formulation of the Lord's Prayer, which includes a petition that the hungry be fed]). The gospel for August 26 (Luke 13:10-17) testifies to the fact that in accomplishing these aims Jesus was not a model citizen. In fact, he even broke the laws about sabbath observance.
Nowhere in these texts do we find anything about sexual abstinence, homosexuality, patience, or the evils of abortion and the like. These are pericope texts with a lot more to do with structural change in society than about individual holiness and virtues. If you really believe in a literal reading of scripture, these texts can't help but draw you into a political pulpit, leading you to preach more sermons about the socio-political issues of our day than delivering ethical exhortations.
Besides the legalism (Pelagianism) associated with mostly preaching on how to become a virtuous person, Barack Obama (in his recent best-seller, The Audacity of Hope) has pointed out that such preaching can lead to a spiritual life detached from the world. In fact, Obama points to the way that the historic Black church in this country has functioned. He praises its heritage of nurturing a faith that does not entail that you don't still have weaknesses or that you relinquish your hold on the world. The typical Black sermon, he notes, freely acknowledges that Christians do not always achieve virtuous living, that the lines between saints and sinners are fluid, that the sins of churchgoers are not much different from the sins of everybody else. You come to church not to get away from the world, but because you are of this world (pp. 207-208). Maybe we could all learn from the Black church as Obama portrays it. Sure, there's a place for exhorting virtues and values sometimes. But the primary task of preaching is not so much to inculcate world-denying virtues as it is about reminding people of their fallibility, and to proclaim that their need for God will be answered lovingly by the loving Lord who sets them free to get back into the world in order to change it!
Neither Obama nor I would want to leave you with the impression that we are against the cultivation of virtue, that responsibility and character are of no interest to the church and of no use in politics. The point of this column is where you place your emphasis, whether the holiness you preach is of any use. Thus, if you're pro-life and pro-family, how much are you willing to pay in taxes to ensure that the poor receive health care, meals, and can find jobs? Sociologists have documented that decent standards of living help marriage and family life. True pro-life and pro-family advocates should also challenge our government about what kind of foreign policies best nurture life and family. For government budgets and foreign policies are moral postures, opportunities to exercise public virtues of love and justice. As Obama puts it, we need government action along with a concern about values and virtues (p. 63). If you and I are serious about a style of preaching that is faithful to Jesus, Paul, and the prophets, dare we de-emphasize these issues in the pulpit?
When you are moved by the assigned texts and the Spirit to mount a political pulpit, keep these lessons in mind. If you find yourself concerned that this sort of preaching might just be the agenda of liberal politics and liberal Protestantism, keep in mind Chet's reference to William Wilberforce, but don't get the impression that his career was devoted to preaching virtues, because most of it was devoted to working for legislation to end slavery in England. Also take the time to read the historical sections of Kathleen Kennedy Townsend's new book. She will teach you about the precedents for American Christianity's addressing the structures of society, reminding you that it was not just integration that was realized as a result of the American church's political intervention, but that the child labor laws, women's suffrage, the forty-hour work week, and the recognition of labor unions were at least in part brought to fruition by the American pulpit (especially p. 105). Will you link yourself with that inspiring heritage during July, August, and the upcoming months? Or would you rather preach about private virtues for "good" citizens who are not of much use to American society?
Mark Ellingsen is a tenured associate professor on the faculty of the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta and the author of hundreds of articles and thirteen books.
