Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, July 25, 1994 TAG: 9407250016
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By VICTOR KAMBER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
You see, my father was a Pentecostal minister who, along with my devout mother, gave me a strict, fundamentalist Christian upbringing. I was taught from day one to love thy brother. I was taught to treat all human beings with respect and dignity - that we are all creations of God. I was taught to forgive others' errors because we are all imperfect. I was taught the virtue of humility. And I was taught that hard work and living the right way would bring the ultimate reward - going to heaven - with secular concerns and materialism taking a back seat.
I look at Falwell, Robertson and their ilk and see nothing in common with my father. Rather than love, they preach hate. Rather than treat all people as God's creation, they equate their political opponents with the devil. Rather than forgiveness, they practice vindictiveness. Rather than show humility, they indulge in brazen ego gratification. And rather than eschew materialism, they have made themselves shamelessly wealthy. They're giving evangelical Christianity, the religion my father preached, a bad name. Shame on them.
They are disingenuous in charging that Democrats who attack their politics are attacking their religion. For Robertson, Falwell, et al. are not using politics to advance an agenda based on religious values, something done honorably by people of many faiths in this country's history. They are using the cloak of religion to advance an extremist political agenda and raise millions of dollars. This is the work of charlatans and swindlers.
Where in the Bible does it even remotely imply that a government should not provide health-care coverage for all of its citizens? Yet Robertson's Christian Coalition claims that President Clinton's health-care reform plan is somehow morally wrong. My interpretation of the Bible, gained from my evangelical father, suggests that Jesus would look kindly on the notion of a people acting to protect the health and well-being of their brothers and sisters. But I'm not arguing I'm a better judge of the Bible - just that health-care reform is a political battle. To mask it in the language and symbols of religion is a sleazy, malevolent ruse.
And how is it consistent with the values of evangelical Christianity for Falwell to peddle a videotape that makes vulgar, slanderous and false charges that President Clinton is guilty of murdering people? Did Falwell gain a divine exemption from the Ninth Commandment, "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor?" For this man to claim that he speaks for God or Jesus Christ is an obscenity.
Falwell and Robertson also use the old ploy that their critics "are really attacking our followers." Having grown up not just among my family but my father's congregation, I have the greatest respect for the decency and integrity of evangelical Christians, and the greatest empathy for their longing for a return to traditional values in these times of precipitous change and apparent moral decline. But their fears and yearnings are being cynically manipulated by the religious right's leaders to advance partisan political ends of which they may not be fully aware - and which they may not fully support.
I would be shocked if many Christian Coalition members endorsed Pat Robertson's statement characterizing feminism as "a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians."
I don't believe many evangelicals equate the Episcopal, Methodist and Presbyterian churches with "the spirit of the anti- Christ" as Robertson did on his show, "The 700 Club." And I cannot accept that many conservative Christians are so intolerant as to believe, as Robertson has said, that their political opponents are "satanic forces" - not just "human beings to beat in elections."
Just as appalling as the extremism and intolerance of Falwell and Robertson is the Republican Party's attempt to have its cake and eat it, too. Behind the scenes, the GOP works closely with the religious right, hoping to gain from the "stealth" and "guerrilla warfare" strategies advanced by Christian Coalition executive director Ralph Reed. The National Republican Senatorial Committee even provided the Christian Coalition's first seed money. But publicly, the Republican Party doesn't want to be too closely identified with these groups for fear of alienating moderate voters.
However, the camel's nose is now ensconced under the tent. An estimated 18 state Republican Parties are now controlled or largely influenced by the radical right. The takeover is so complete that Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Penn., was roundly booed at the recent Iowa Republican presidential cattle show for saying he supported the separation of church and state.
It's time for Americans of all faiths and all political persuasions to condemn and discredit our modern-day Elmer Gantrys, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson.
Victor Kamber is president of The Kamber Group, a communications consulting and public relations firm, and co-host of the "O'Leary/Kamber Report" weekly radio show on the NBC Radio Network.
by CNB