Posted by
Dave The White House Slave on Wednesday, September 16, 2009 12:00:00 AM
In many recent debates, especially when it comes to health care and immigration, God is now playing for the liberal team. Catholic Charities are now officially a sponsor of illegal immigration. Catholic policy on social justice calls on the government to "help" those in need. That's interesting. Why doesn't the rich and powerful Church have their own free health care program for illegals? The same with the rest of the uninsured. The Church should set up their own program to help all the uninsured rather than calling on those, many of whom already have health insurance to fund a government option with more of their tax dollars.
Barack Obama made the rounds to these left leaning religious institutions in '08 on the campaign trail. People like Jim Wallis and Bill Moyers became allies in Obama's plans to co-opt the faith community into thinking his way was the right way. Wallis began writing books on this topic about two years prior to Obama's ascendancy. You can view all the liberal hand wringing at www.sojo.net. And of course, the poor are mentioned countless times in the Bible. We are to take care of them, offer them shelter, food and a new life in Christ. The problem for people like Moyers is that nowhere in Scripture does it say we as the collective are to lobby our governing bodies to forcibly take money from one group in order to care for another. We are to act individually and within the Church to create a more heavenly earth in the here and now.
And I have to say that both the liberal mainline church and the conservative evangelical church have both dropped the ball. Mainlines preach a social gospel around the notion of lobbying the government to spend more on illegals and free health care. Evangelicals preach a way more inward gospel that rarely challenges the congregants to worry about more than their own salvation. Some evangelicals do take their calling seriously and make a point of setting up a homeless shelter or collecting food for the poor. And that is what the church should be doing in relation to it's calling. This new emphasis on health care and immigration is through government coercion and is a new phenomenon that the Obama people have used to co-opt religion and make it more mainstream for those of us with traditional views.
Many in the faith community have gone soft. Either they don't want to get political, or they want to follow the Obama model. Those who resist are branded as racists and religious fanatics. While those who follow are serving God honorably. The church needs it's own poor people health care model. They could sign on with Wal-Mart to cover the estimated 11 or so million who need insurance but can't afford it. There is a compassionate way to fix this without the government taking it over. And without the Church lobbying the government to do their job. The Good Samaritan was a person who did the right thing on his own as an independent problem solver. We should all be Good Samaritans in our approach to those in need, so there's no need for a government option.