Sunday, November 7 – Not a word at Church about the Election

You would think it never happened. The Evangelical-in-chief was restored to the throne on November 2 with the proud support of the Evangelical movement and no one at our church said a word about it (at least to me). Odd. Then again, I go to an Evangelical church in Southern California. I asked about the politics thing and the impression was that Churches in the Midwest and South (not south California) were probably whooping it up. Even so, I know that people in our church were overwhelmingly supportive of the President’s re-election. There were a few of us Kerry people as well. I suspect there were a few of us in every church spreading a little salt and light.

So, if we don’t talk about politics in church, and we rarely do, where does the support come from? Who rallies the troops? Well, if you watched the Sunday morning news shows you saw where it was coming from, Dr. James Dobson. Dobson was upset because Senator Specter, who is set to take over the Senate Judiciary committee made statements that sounded moderate and reasonable. This is unacceptable, at least to Dobson.

I had never heard of Dobson before being exposed to the Evangelical church. Dobson is the heartbeat of modern American Evangelicalism (they tell me Jesus is important but Dobson has a better web site). Dobson’s “Ministry” is called Focus on the Family and it is the movement’s rallying point and department of dis-information. If you want to understand who the religious right is you need to go to the source and check these folks out. You should make it a point to check up on them regularly.

Focus on the Family is not the only place that joins Evangelicalism with politics, there are others, but these guys are big. I don't think all Evangelicals like Dobson, but he has an enormous influence.