On Christian Conservatism

There's something terribly amiss within that body of zealous American voters commonly identified as "Christian Conservatives." (Perhaps I'll address the topic of America's "Christian Liberals" another day.)

It's not necessarily either the "Conservative" or the "Christian" part of the label that's the trouble, but the common assumption that "Conservative" is what every "Christian" should be.

Never mind the fact that, its popular "talk" notwithstanding, the "Conservative" movement's "walk" is very nearly as collectivist as its so-called "Liberal" counterpart. They're equally adept at perpetuating the bloated big-government tax-and-spend entitlements, pork-barrelling, and international give-aways of the plundered property of American citizens.

Not so, you think? Then consider...

Over the past 100 years (and especially within the past 50), the federal government has experienced wholesale increases in size (by every method of measurement), power (usurped from the People), massive debt (burdening the People and their progeny for decades), and nearly every constitutional abuse imaginable. Exactly how many "Conservative" Presidents or members of Congress vigorously and successfully opposed all or part of this trend, calling for nothing less than an unmitigated halt, if not a reversal?

Very, very few, as a matter of fact.

"Conservatives" by and large have played much the same role as "Liberals" in pushing the envelope of U.S. federal government well beyond its constitutionally defined limits. In plain English, this means "Conservatives" are by and large explicitly guilty of violating the Law of the Land and spurning the very Rule of Law to which many of them point as an essential principle for sound government policy.

Now to the "Christian" side of the matter. Genuine, Bible-believing Christians are supposed to highly esteem things like truth and moral integrity. What then are we to make of their ostensibly immutable love affair with the patently lawless and morally culpable "Conservative" movement?

Do they think the Bible demands that they limit themselves to the contemporary American "two-party system" wherein one may choose only between two varieties of assisted suicide for the American Republic, but not among alternatives to suicide itself? Are "Conservative Republican" liars, cheats, and tramplers of the Law somehow more noble and worthy of the Christian vote than "Liberal Democrat" liars, cheats, and tramplers of the Law? Does George Bush's profession of (Christian) faith somehow negate the fact that he, together with the party he leads, perpetuates that very system of liars, cheats, and tramplers of the Law, implicitly condoning it by their combined failure (refusal?) to expose, oppose, and dispose of it?

Instead of congratulating themselves for being in the camp that they perceive to be the lesser of two evils, perhaps it's time American Christians recognized that they are under obligation not to choose evil in the first place. Their civic responsibility is to expose and oppose it, all popularly embraced professions of faith notwithstanding.