Friday, November 05, 2004

The Title of this blog explained

After my introduction, it is probably necessary to explain why I've titled my blog, "Page 132". It references a page in a fabulous book about Christian spirituality, "Blue Like Jazz" by Donald Miller. On page 132, Donald Miller has a profound realization, "I felt like, by going to this particular church, I was a pawn for the Republicans. Meanwhile, the Republicans did not give a crap about the causes of Christ."

I couldn't have said it better myself! Let me give you a fabulous example. On Newsnight on the BBC last night, they did a piece on Karl Rove. If you are interested, you'll need to click on "Watch Newsnight". The piece is at 40:13 into the show. Sorry I can't find a transcript online yet. However, I have the important parts here.

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, stated that Karl Rove was concerned prior to this election that 4 million evangelical Christians did not vote in 2000. Tony Perkins explains, "I expressed that to Karl was because the President had not staked out clear positions on key issues that was important to the evangelical community." The Newsnight reporter says of the 2004 election, "the big value issue which most outraged evangelist was gay marriage so Karl Rove ensured amendments banning gay marriage appeared on ballots in 11 key states. George Bush duly won 10 of them."

Tony Perkins states, "It was the marriage issue that, I believe, pulled this election off for the president."
Reporter, "Did you say to Rove, 'look this is what angers us?' 'this is what is driving us?'"
Tony Perkins, "We did back in February of last year. It was a very tense period of negotiation in getting the president to come out in support of a marriage amendment. In fact, Karl seemed very resistant to that and ultimately did come out, but it was not as front and center in the campaign as we would have liked to have seen."
Reporter, "So Rove knows, presumable for electoral terms, how far he's got to go and where he has to press the message?"
Tony Perkins, "Yeah, I think that is what Karl is very good at. He is able to calculate and go just as far as he needs to go to get the results that he wants."

So there you have it from the man that "negotiated" with the White House on the gay marriage amendment. Bush and Rove don't believe in a gay marriage amendment. They just used it to get re-elected. It wasn't important to them, in fact, Rove was resistant to the idea. The evangelical community cares a lot about this issue (I'll get to it later), but clearly the Republicans in power only care about staying in power. The evangelical community is a means to an end. I don't think this is what Jesus had in mind for his Church.

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