Of Churches and Presidents

I struggle with the right relationship between faith and politics. A motto for me might be, "Progress is not necessarily synonymous with the Democratic Party." Yet, sometimes in progressive church circles I get the sense it's one and the same. I believe that a church or other nonprofit organization cannot (legally, to keep 501c3 status), and should not, endorse a particular political candidate. However, a church has a right and an obligation to speak to the issues of the day out of its values, such as "we are to feed the poor, care for the sick, shelter the homeless, and make peace with our enemies." When a piece of legislation is before Congress and has the power to do great harm or great good to creation, then the church has an obligation to speak to the ethics of such a law. This is how we can be responsible, informed citizens--rather than withdrawing from the needs of the world and our structures of power and governance. That's also where I draw the line between theology and theocracy--even a liberal/left theocracy is something I wouldn't want.

A commentor on our seminary blog questioned the UCC giving the floor to Barack Obama during their churchwide assembly. I don't know (I'm Presbyterian and wasn't there) how I feel about the speech as it happened. However, I have some opinions on what constitutes the just relationship between a church denomination and a presidential candidate. Surely a church denomination shouldn't endorse a candidate simply because he's a member of that denomination--to do so is to so easily overlook areas of that candidate's policy that can be harmful to others, in search of the denomination's own power and fame as much as the candidate's. However, I think it's good for a denomination to hear what a candidate of their denomination has to say, to give him or her space in which to articulate what they stand for, so that each member can make up their minds whether this person shares their values or not. The latter is where I would want to see a candidate given so much berth in a whole-church assembly.