Posted by Rachel on: 02.18.2008 /
I’ve been thinking a lot about the quote I posted on Friday from the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. Their statement poses a direct challenge to the political-religious attitudes of the conservative Christian community in which I grew up. In the 1980s, tens of millions of US evangelicals, including my parents, flocked to support Ronald Reagan and his “trickle-down” economic policies. Apparently “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” resonated with many members of the Me Generation.
But how could followers of the Jesus who told us to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and care for the sick have believed that the Christian thing to do was cut taxes for the wealthy, while cutting benefits for the poor? How did followers of the Prince of Peace come to support massive increases in military spending? How did so many US Christians come to treat a divorced Hollywood actor who rarely attended church as the closest thing to an evangelical pope? I was a kid back when this all started and I’m still trying to figure it out. What happened?
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Comment by: Martin Gugino
1 02/19/08 4:29 PM | Comment Link |Lack of prayer? Possibly. Wise in our own eyes. Certainly. Still the scary part may be that even those who seek His face and lean not on their own understanding, are too much in the world, and of it.
Comment by: Herb
2 02/19/08 8:42 PM | Comment Link |Wow, I wish I had more time. I just read this. That is so simpliflied and so lacking historical context I don’t know where to start. Just one tidbit: September 1980-the last few months of President Carter’s only term, I was 28 years old, needing to buy a house because I had taken a job (unemployment was huge) in a small town in Colorado and there literally was no place to rent, people were live in refrigerator crates. It was a boom town and it had the only work available for miles. There was an old trailor house for sale. This is the absolute truth, I still have the paperwork, the recession at the time was so bad, interest rates were 18%. That’s right. My 1968 trailor that cost $8,000 was costing me $700/month and I had a good job at 6.73/hr. People were scared to death because of the fresh Iran hostage situation and the horribly bungled rescue attempt. Gasoline lines. People were sick of the Red Scare. Right? Wrong? Our fault? Their fault? The evangelical pope,he never claimed to be that, promised an end to all of that, which he pretty much did deliver on. In 1984, the interest rates were about 8% and everyone could refinance. Is that bad? I’m not rich. Did it trickle down to me? I don’t know. Sort of seems like something came down whether or not it trickled, I don’t know. The gasoline lines ended, interest rates for everyone fell, the Berlin Wall came down. Am I a Reagan fan? I don’t even know but…. I mean, I understand what you are saying but please give the 20/20 hindsight a break. There are historical contexts for everything, not just Biblical gender issues.
Comment by: Rachel
3 02/19/08 11:07 PM | Comment Link |Thanks for sharing your perspective, Herb! It’s helpful to be reminded of the historical context that led to Reagan’s election.
Comment by: Martin Gugino
4 02/20/08 1:17 PM | Comment Link |Hmm. So when will be able to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and care for the sick, or is the thought that the best way to do that is to cut taxes for the wealthy, while cutting benefits for the poor, and supporting massive increases in military spending?