Conflicts with Conservatism

I have always wondered what it was like to feel totally liberated from former beliefs that were so dearly held to be true, as in a matter of morality and salvation. I always imagined that I would never truly feel that way. Growing up in a conservative Christian home, I always believed that the people we were saving were the ones experiencing this ‘mind trip’ for changing their entire paradigm of cognitive thought possessing. You know the whole, “I am a sinner, now I’m free…I used to use profane language without thinking about it, I was given into drunkenness, I had sex with those I was in love with…” and so on. Up until recently I could only imagine what it was like to have such foundational and fundamental changes occur in one’s mind. But, now I believe I am beginning to understand.

In the last four years, I have seen the different side of the fence. I am referring to politics and to my conflicts with religion and to the extreme distaste of the way the Unites States Government has abused and crossed it’s own lines of religious separation, and how the religious right have warmly embraced the politics of their ‘savior’ and have blindly and openly called his war seeking policies and nation building tendencies to be doing the will of God.

I am neither anymore a republican nor am I neither a democrat, I am not an independent, or green, or whatever title you would choose to throw on me. I refuse to be defined by a word. Rather, if I was to be described by a phrase, I believe it would be ‘Imperfect follower of Jesus Christ.’ I can not in this day and age use the term Christian. That term has been so abused and so mis-understood that it is no longer an accurate term culturally to describe who I am and where my allegiance falls.

Now, having said that, I am also not at this time ashamed to be described by another phrase, “Supporter of Barack Hussein Obama”, and at this point I expect more than 85% of all my so called ‘Christian’ friends are currently thinking to themselves that I have left my faith entirely and am only living in a false reality, but have forsaken all sanity by following and placing my political hopes and aspirations in the hands of a Democrat/baby killer/sinner/Hitler feel a like/ over popularized Muslim black man. Only three of these descriptions are accurate about Barack, I’ll let you use your brain to figure it out.

There are very simple reasons that I have chosen to endorse Senator Obama, and for the record it should be noted that I have not, nor ever supported Senator Hillary Clinton or any other democrat in the history of my political awareness, so I am not jumping on the bandwagon of the Democratic Party.

One: The war. I was a very strong supporter in going after Bin Laden in the months after 9/11 and I was blinded by my patriotism to a party and to an idea, that I did not understand the problems and the fundamental issues that existed in my countries choice to go to war and kill this man, and the message of Jesus Christ. These two strongholds in my life have such opposite views; it is astounding to me how much conservative Christians allow the Unites States Government to do what it does, “In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost.” Jesus, according to the bible that I have, never endorsed war or violence of any kind, rather he taught how to effectively protest where no one was killed or harmed just affected and forced to see their errors. He preached about being confrontational not violent oppressors and haters of all things different. Hate the sin, love the sinner. I do not believe that as an “Imperfect follower of Jesus Christ,” I could ever endorse a war, unless you tell me who Jesus would kill. I have endorsed war before, but I do not now.

As a republican, and a very typical one at that, we were taught to hate gays and Muslims and any other county that does anything in a socialized manner. Just the mere fact that we, the People of the United States think that we are the top of the world, the best run country in the history of the world and the best at whatever it is we do…is such a complete arrogance and ignorant view of ourselves, it’s no wonder we are so blinded. My best example for this is the European Union. All those bordering countries who practically demolished each other for centuries, now have open borders and a fairly balanced idea of how their union is helping their economy and their people more and more. And, we the Arrogant of the Unites States can’t seem to get along and open ourselves to the two most passive countries in the world, Canada and Mexico. I’m not saying it’s an easy simple thing to have open borders, but I’m saying Europe make us look real shitty.

Another problem I have with the conservative right, is that it favors the rich. Jesus did not. The poor were his hero’s, as they are mine. I can think of no greater man alive today than Michael Nyangi. He’s a young man in Kenya, born into extreme poverty. He’s grown up and realized that he could help the poor get un-poor. He has taken steps to put himself in a place where he is daily on the front lines of the war against Human Rights Violations and Extreme Poverty, and World Hunger. He is not a rich man by the US standards, but he is extremely wealthy and rich in my eyes. I envy him. From the policies I have seen and heard, the Democratic Party is more focused on the middle class and the poorest of the poor in the US.

I could go on and on about the inconsistencies between the politics of the world and the politics of Jesus, but this is supposed to be a blog, not a book. In short, Jesus is not a democracy man. God is not a democracy God. There is no cabinet; the disciples were not in a democratic relationship with him, Jesus was the King…dictator, only voice of guidance. There was no second guessing his decisions or choices, and they were always right.

I realize that a nation cannot accurately run in this manner if the leadership is corrupt. There will be wars and there will be things that I don’t agree with. But I don’t have to endorse them either.