Four years ago I wrote a series of posts about our political landscape and probed my own platform on a mix of issues and concerns.
I was still a novice in the political arena. I had spent just a year as Vice President of Government and Social Policy for the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania. It was a new role, not fully defined, and I was learning as I went. I had also just recently helped start a fledgling coalition, Fair Districts PA.
I was still a novice in the political arena. I had spent just a year as Vice President of Government and Social Policy for the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania. It was a new role, not fully defined, and I was learning as I went. I had also just recently helped start a fledgling coalition, Fair Districts PA.
In the summer of 2016 I was studying prison gerrymandering and nervously preparing for a first appearance in a legislative hearing. I remember meeting for a northern PA breakfast with Representative David Carter, prime sponsor of a bill we supported. We prayed together, over pancakes and eggs.
I wrote a blogpost that summer asking “which Way am I called to follow? Whose priorities should I pursue?” The following is from that post. It seems even more relevant now.
Before Christians were called Christians, they were called Followers of the Way. The Way was Jesus: simultaneously the path itself, guide and example, companion on the journey. Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life.”
But he also said “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23).
The way to relationship with God, to the full life Jesus promised, is through Jesus himself, but also through following the path he shows us, walking with him the road of sacrifice and self-denial.
I’ve been listening to Christian leaders tie themselves in knots trying to explain why followers of Christ would also follow Donald Trump, who knows less than any potential leader I've seen about sacrifice and self-denial. I’ve read carefully the explanation that while Donald Trump may not be as pro-life, pro-family, pro-faith as Christian leaders might want, the fact that he’s the Republican nominee makes him “the only hope.”
That sounds a little blasphemous to me.
Following the Way of Christ starts with a willingness to set our habits and loyalties aside.
Jesus said again and again: "leave your nets, your fields, your money, your life, and come, follow me."
The early believers understood that the first step of the Christian journey was a step away from all prior allegiance, including allegiance to self, to comfort, safety, the right to be right, the mistaken idea that somehow we, on our own, are good people, better than those others.
Allegiance to party platform.
Even national pride.
The followers of Christ proclaimed a new loyalty, a contradiction of the Roman good news. The Christian gospel was not about the political rule of a forceful human leader, but the unexpected narrative of Jesus’ birth, death and resurrection and the announcement of a risen savior who would bring peace for all, not just the Romans favored by Caesar.
Jesus said, “Peace I bring to you, but not as the world (Rome) brings.” New life in Christ was by definition in stark opposition to empire, power and violence.
Several centuries later, Athanasius of Alexandria (ca. 296-298 – 373) described the visible influence of the Way of Christ on the surrounding culture:
While they were yet idolaters, the Greeks and Barbarians were always at war with each other, and were even cruel to their own kith and kin. Nobody could travel by land or sea at all unless he was armed with swords, because of their irreconcilable quarrels with each other. Indeed, the whole course of their life was carried on with weapons. But since they came over to the school of Christ, as men moved with real compunction they have laid aside their murderous cruelty and are war-minded no more. On the contrary, all is peace among them and nothing remains save desire for friendship. (from On the Incarnation)
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| Come Inherit the Kingdom, Meinrad Craighead, Stanbrook Abbey, England, 1970s |
The Way of Christ leads us away from the longing for an earthly savior, away from allegiance to a political gospel of physical power or personal prosperity or the need to "win" at the cost of integrity and witness.
It leads us away from slogans, mockery, hostility toward the opposition, nostalgia for comfort and ease at the expense of others unlike ourselves.
It leads us deeper into humility, deeper into the longing for wisdom, the repentant awareness of our own lack of love, our own inadequacy in the face of complex, overwhelming need.
And along that Way, as we read the words of Jesus, as we pray to hear and know his voice, as we ask to see with his eyes, to love what he loves, we find our hearts changing.
This weekend, July 2020, I find myself praying for a last chance effort in our state legislature. Bills we supported in this legislative session never received a vote. Two constitutional amendments will be given a final vote this week. Prime sponsors of our bills will be introducing amendments to those amendments in an attempt to force a vote on the measures we support.
Confusing, right? Yesterday, a July Saturday, I fielded a call from a state representative and from a chief of staff of a state senator. They have amendments filed. My job is to ask our list of 60,000 contacts to call their legislators and ask their support.
I sometimes marvel at the path God has led me on: deeper and deeper into the complex world of legislation, political intrigue, partisan manipulation. I have seen professed Christians act with great meanness and deceit, and have watched and given thanks for faithful followers of Christ on both sides of the aisle.
I sometimes marvel at the path God has led me on: deeper and deeper into the complex world of legislation, political intrigue, partisan manipulation. I have seen professed Christians act with great meanness and deceit, and have watched and given thanks for faithful followers of Christ on both sides of the aisle.
I have learned much about God’s great love for this broken, grieving world.
I have learned much about my own inadequacy and God’s amazing provision in times of need.
I’ll be writing about this in the weeks ahead as I revisit my 2016 series in preparation for the 2020 election.
And I’ll be holding these words close:
He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
And what does the Lord require of you
But to do justice and to love kindness
And to walk humbly with your God.
