Wednesday, May 07, 2008

An Evangelical WHAT?

This morning at the National Press Club, a group issued what they called "The Evangelical Manifesto." You can read it here at http://www.anevangelicalmanifesto.com/

It is a call for evangelicals to define clearly who they are, to resist becoming "idiots" for a political party (really, their words, not mine) but to have an appropriate role in the public square. Its most noteworth signer is the President of Fuller Seminary; otherwise, I have to say I didn't recognize the other key names. According to USA Today, Richard Land and James Dobson do not agree with it.

It begins with a clear statement of belief (including a belief that the Bible is the literal word of God) and then raises I think some points of the role of faith in public affairs that I would basically affirm. But, their comments about "cosmopolitan secular liberals" and equating what they terms "assaults on the unborn" (I assume that means abortion) with genocide and slavery, surely tip their hand from otherwise reasoned rhetoric.

I read earlier today on Yahoo news that overall conservatives are happier than liberals. After reading this "Manifesto", one can't help wonder how that could possibly be true.

1 comment:

Bill Baar said...

Last time I had a class on law for Hospital Administrators, they told me a patient was literally signing an agreement to allow the surgeon to "assault" them when a patient consented to surgery.

Seems to me the consent for an abortion would amount to the same thing.. a release for the Doc to "assault" both mother and unborn child. I think that's literally the legal reasoning behind it.