My good friend Heath did not like yesterday’s post about Pulpit freedom day. However, instead of doing what so many people on the Internet do and flame me in the comments section and fly off the handle, he provided a well written and thought out criticism of the post. It’s nice to have friends like this who can disagree with you in a polite way. Thanks for your comment Heath. I really mean that.
Instead of posting my response in another comment, I’d like to explain myself a little further in another post. This serves two purposes. One, it makes the discussion of this issue visible to people who may not read the comments and second, it furthers my goal of posting a new article every day for a month.
I would like to address the issues that Heath brought up in his comment one at a time instead of posting the entirety of his comment. His first point was about the IRS violating a church’s first amendment rights; he said this to say.
1) First ammendments rights are being violated by IRS rules. It is not even close to fair to hold a church’s tax exempt status as leverage against that church participating in free political speech. The constitution is clear that Congress shall pass no laws abridging freedom of speech. They have. It is a violation of the bill of rights.
I am not a first amendment lawyer or a legal expert of any kind but I think that the IRS is the entity that declares a group a tax-exempt 501(c)3 organization for tax purposes. This means that the IRS writes the rules about who can and cannot get this designation of not paying taxes on their income. The rules, as they stand today, don’t say that churches cannot engage in political campaigning, they say that any non-profit 501(c)3 organization cannot campaign for a political candidate. A pastor of a church can say whatever he or she wants from the pulpit legally. However, their status as a non-profit organization my be revoked by the IRS since that pastor has chosen to ignore the rules that the IRS set up. The rules about non-profits do not effect just churches. They impact things like the United Way, the American Red Cross, Goodwill, libraries, literary groups, sporting organizations and other community groups who accept tax deductible contributions. It’s not just churches who live with these restrictions, it’s all groups that fall under the 501(c)3 banner.
Now that I’ve addressed the issue to the extent that my qualifications allow, I would like to address a couple of other items from Heath’s criticism. He begins his second point by saying the following.
2) Saying that a pastor is abdicating his or her reposnsibilty as a shepherd by engaging in political speech is a broad stroke that cannot be supported. While it may not be clear to all which candidate in the current situation should be supported, this is not always the case. Shepherds such as Detrich Bonhoeffer, Justin Martyr, Polycarp, Stephen, and Jesus have placed their lives on the line to engage in political speech.
I could not agree more with what Heath says here. Each one of these martyrs, and Jesus himself, died because of the way that they lived their lives. Throughout the New Testament, we see Jesus avoid taking up sides in the political arguements of his day. However, this didn’t stop the Romans and Jews from killing him. Stephen was stoned because he spoke God’s truth directly to the religious tyrants who used God to keep people in line. Polycarp and Justin Martyr refused to take part in the Roman civic religion and did not acknowledge Caesar as a god and they were killed for it. Bonhoeffer, too, was killed by the Nazis because of his actions, not his sermons. Yes, each of these men did engage in political speech but it was their actions that led to their deaths. Those who are put in a position of authority in the body of Christ are called to live a life that exemplifies Christ and doing this means loving and serving others into the kingdom of God, not engaging in the political process of the kingdom of man.
Abortion is a political cause. Euthenasia (sp?) is a political cause. Poverty is a political cause. Should pastors not be permitted to endorse or criticize candidates who support or reject these causes?
As I said above, pastors can endorse a candidate if they choose but they must be aware that they will have violated the terms of their agreement with the IRS in order to maintain their tax exempt status. I think that a better position would be to speak clearly and openly about these evils and lead the church in addressing them. Is the kingdom of God best served by legislative means or by loving and serving those who are facing a crisis pregnancy or terminal illness or poverty? There are better ways to be the salt of the earth and light in the darkness than by allying oneself, or the body of Christ, with a political cause.
Heath’s next point is very good and deserves careful reading and consideration because it identifies the point where action from the pulpit does become necessary.
And what if a candidate was calling for the disillusion of the church? Currently a pastor could say nothing against that candidate. I think that not only should they be permitted too, but actually bear the responsibility of leadership as shepherds to make judgements as leaders of their flocks and guide their congregations accordingly.
If a candidate were running for office and was advocating the abolishment of the church, it would be the responsibility of a pastor to lead their church and guide their congregations accordingly. This is one of the points that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. made in his Letter From a Birmingham Jail: when a law of man breaks the law of God, it is a Christian’s responsibility to become an outlaw. Over and over we see Jesus “breaking the law” in the gospels. The religious leaders had turned the law into a rigid set of requirements that dictated nearly every action that a person could take. That is the kind of lawbreaking that we should engage in when the time comes: loving and serving everyone regardless of the consequences.
And so what if they pick a candidate? People are going to make up their own minds as they choose. Good people are permitted to disagree.
This is also a good point. People will make up their own minds as they choose. In most cases, a pastor will not be the deciding factor behind the way the members of his congregation vote. If that is the case, is engaging in a political campaign the best way to spend the limited amount of time that a pastor has each week to teach those who make up their community?
Heath’s third point of disagreement with my previous post is similar to his first point but different enough to deserve a careful response.
3) Sometimes our allegiance to Christ gives us a mandate as to whom we should support. Sometimes it is not as clear. But while you might disagree with your pastor on his or her judgement, that doesn’t mean that he or she should remain silent. In fact, he or she should be compelled to address the political situation in accordance with the principles of God’s kingdom.
I agree that a pastor should be addressing the social and moral issues that make up the day to day world that we find ourselves in. In rare cases, this means engaging in “prohibited” political speech from the pulpit. However, I still believe that the pastors who took part in this protest yesterday are losing sight of the more important issue: the kingdom of God is here. These pastors seem to be concerned with injecting the church into the kingdom of man and that is not an acceptable path to lead a faith community down. Instead of trying to take part in a political campaign that will further the kingdom of man, wouldn’t it be better to address these issues with a kingdom of God perspective? Instead of asking “how should a Christian vote?” maybe we should ask “how can a Christian love?”
