DU Christians: What is the the directive that makes you progressive?

Whether it be theology or verse - - I would like to know what specific element of your faith makes you a progressive.

This is not to bash - rather the opposite. I'm an Atheist who is looking for bridges between the Christian Faith Progressives and Atheist Progressives.

Matthew 22:39

It is our christian duty to be loving toward all mankind.

Jesus explanation from Luke 10:

"But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"

In reply Jesus said: "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. 'Look after him,' he said, 'and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.'

"Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?"

The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him."
Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise."



Matthew 25:38-40

"When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'

"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'

That this is referring to spiritual guidance, not taking care (monetarily) of your neighbor. Many Evangelicals would argue that force feeding Christianity to your neighbor is your duty, not feeding them if they need it.

Again, I am playing Devil's Advocate here.

My compulsion as an Atheist Humanist is that a society is measured by how it treats the least fortunate among them.

but they cannot quote Jesus in support of those ideas. All they can do is try and pervert his message to square with their own.

He stated his mission as:

"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Luke 4:18-19

And I understand, the two are completely different.

Gnostic Christianity ignored Paul in most cases.

Gnostics revered Paul, calling him "the Great Apostle." Paul's letters are actually the earliest Christian writings. While fundamentalists like to quote some of his more unfortunate utterances, regarding women, homosexuality, etc., his theology is actually what you might call "proto-gnostic."

than the fundies. Nothing you quote from Jesus contradicts that "love your neighbor" is meant as a spiritual dictum. Even the "preach good news to the poor" doesn't mean that you have to be progressive. It could be the poor in spirit, hence the metaphoric use of "blind" and "oppresed" to indicate those that have not spiritually accepted Christ.

judging others, but anything that might actually cause them to care about poor people was just a metaphor.

that see the bible as a metaphor but use specific lines in a literal sense. I would admit that I like the progressives a lot more.

Not everyone in the world.

direction of Judaeo/Christian moral philosophy is toward ever-increasing levels of compassion. Yes, one can cherry-pick all kinds of passages from scripture that are anything but compassionate. But it is an evolving tradition, and not one that stopped evolving when the canon of scripture was finalized. The direction of that evolution is what matters.

The natural corrolary of compassion is social justice; hence, progressive politics.

The center of Christian moral instruction is found in Matthew 22:38:
"'You shall love the lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

Whether or not I am a Christian in a sense that most orthodox types would recognize is an open question. But there is no question about Christianity leading inevitably to a progressive political orientation, unless it is completely warped.

And don't get me wrong...I don't hold these beliefs

But the Conservative Christians would argue that showing the least of us "tough love" is still love, and motivates them to lift themselves "up by their bootstraps"

They would argue that that applies to Spiritual Love, not actually taking care of them

Don't get me wrong - I see these all as cop outs.

But how would you argue against these?

some history of mentioning Jesus talking about just that sort of thing, instead of being pretty darn earthy and practical.

While "feed" can certainly have several meanings, I think Jesus meant what we're told he said: give the hungry food, give the sick care, house the homeless.

Basically we love God by loving others here and now. It's the step of taking that practical action that matters, I think. In fact, I really don't understand how else someone *could* love God but by caring for their brothers and sisters here...

Matthew 25:35 is the one that gets me everytime.

22:38 lays it out, and 25:35 puts it into action.

You say: "Yes, one can cherry-pick all kinds of passages from scripture..."

The YOU cherry pick a verse that supports your POV, Matthew 22:38.

What makes your cherry picking more appropriate than the cherry picking done by those with whom you disagree?

Do you have anything better than cherry picked Bible verses to support your position?

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are the meek: for they shall posses the land.
Blessed are they who mourn: for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice: for they shall have their fill.
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the clean of heart: for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.
Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 5:3-10

Where does that say that you should be progressive? It just says that those that are shat upon in this life will have it better when they get to heaven. Seems like justification for Marx's point of view that religion is the opiate of the masses. The Beatitudes are a reference to rewards after death, not mandates for progressive action.

"Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven" says nothing about rewards.

And if you read Marx, his attacks are on the use of religion by ruling classes.

This thread is about none of the things you raise.

The OP says "be it theology or verse." It wasn't asking for a general "Hey, why are you a progressive." But for a religious basis. So, again, nothing in the beatitudes says anything about being progressive. A simple "I'm sorry" will do in this instance.

Yeah, I've read Marx, and how exactly does the ruling class use religion against the masses? Hmmmm, let's see...they say that things may be shitty now but it will be better when you get to Sugar Candy Mountain.

So, yeah, this thread IS about the first thing I said (the beatitudes say nothing about being progressive) and that first thing leads to a discussion of the second thing.

Can hardly wait for your response. Hope it is more than "Is not"

Since you don't admit you asked for something not in the OP, I'll repeat it. The question was not what in religion told you to be a progressive, but what about religion makes you progressive.

Now, since you think the sum of progressive politics is contained in health care and Iraq, I'll leave it to you to metamorphose out of that cocoon.

The simple fact is there is nothing in the Beatitudes that is not found in what is contemporaneously called progressive politics. It resonates. But it also suggests a lot more than liberal politics and the entire contents of your cranium.

I doubt Marx gave more than two shits about religion except for how the ruling classes coopted it to continue to suppress working and peasant classes for centuries. He was interested in the effects of religion on economics and class warfare, unlike you, who see it as juvenile fodder for internet message boards.

So yeah, your response is nonresponsive and predictably tedious.

that your next response was going to be an ad hom, but I thought that was too easy. Nice job of responding with a fallacy by the way.

I still stand by my interp of the OP. It asks "Why are you progressive" and then says "theology or verse." Seems pretty clear that it is asking for something specific in Christianity that makes a call for being progressive.

But in fairness, let's take a look at them. Three of them can be tossed out as not being really progressive in nature:

Poor in spirit
Mourners
Meek

Two more seem to look like it might be progressive:

Search for righteousness
Persecuted for seeking righteousness

But when we look to Luke's version, we see that "righteousness" most likely is a reference to Christ, it diminishes the progressive nature of those two.

Which leave us with three that are progressive in nature:

merciful (OK, that fits)
peacemakers (OK, another one)
pure of heart (Perhaps, but you wouldn't argue that a conservative is unable to be pure of heart)

So that's two of the eight. So, if as you say, there is SOOO much in there about being progressive, it would seem that the sum total of being progressive is to be merciful and a peacemaker. Maybe that is enough, but I know conservatives that are merciful and anti-war.

As a side-note as to editing, you may want to rethink your use of the double negative, it isn't as effective or clear as you may think it is.

you won't have perfect alignment.

Besides, they serve a entirely different purpose, as you fully know.

For now, I'll follow their counsel and leave you to yours.

Micah 6:8: He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?

James 2:14-20: <14> What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?
<15> If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food,
<16> And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?
<17> Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.
<18> Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.
<19> Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.
<20> But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?

Even Paul has his moments:Galations 5:22-23: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

My view of the Religious Right is that they just make stuff up. In fundamentalist churches, there is no hierarchy, no established way to do things, sometimes no standards for clergy. Anyone can declare themself a preacher and preach about their obsessions.

Years ago, I even saw a weekly paper called "Christian Economics," which claimed that Jesus was an economic Libertarian and that all taxes and restrictions on private property are Satanic. Where did the publisher get this idea?

Well, he uses the parable of the vineyard, Matthew 20:1-15, which is about a landowner who goes out at dawn and hires day laborers for a denarius a day. He keeps going out during the day to hire more workers, promising each a denarius a day, and at the end of the day, the workers who worked all day grumble (as well they should if this were actually about labor relations). In the story, the landowner says, "Am I not allowed to do as I please with what is mine?" And on that sentence, the publisher of "Christian Economics" decided that economic Libertarianism was the only "Christian" approach to money and property. However, the parable isn't about labor relations at all. It's actually about people who have been believers for a long time not lording it over people who have been believers only a short time.

In a mainstream church, the clergy person follows a standard lectionary that forces you to read the four Gospels through on a three-year cycle on Sundays, as well as the whole Bible if you follow the daily lectionary. The expectation is that the preacher will preach not on some arbitrary text, but from one of the Scriptural readings appointed for the day. A mainstream preacher CANNOT ignore the passages where Jesus and other figures talk about peace and justice.

(A mainstream clergy person also has to go through three years of seminary, which requires a very thorough study of the Bible, as well as a lot of theology.)

A fundamentalist preacher can just harp on his favorite topics, and who's to tell him differently? He's his own boss.

The teachings of jesus...All of them
There is noting in the teachings of Jesus that conforms to Conservative values and beliefes...nothing.

have never read them.

Yes, there's a lot of God smiting people in the earlier books, but the latter half, the writings from the post-Exilic period, is all about living a just life in society. Those who oppress the poor come in for a lot of condemnation.

People sometimes forget that the Hebrew Scriptures were compiled from materials written over a period of hundreds of years and reflect the Jewish people's growing sophistication during that time.

Joshua was a genocidal maniac.

part of the after-the-fact justifications for the conquest of Canaan.

And Psalm 137 : 9 is pretty harsh...

Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.

In one sense, they're as literalist as the fundamentalists. It's the same thing that fundies do when they zoom in on Leviticus and develop a theology of gay bashing, ignoring the context and historical background and original intent of the writers. Only atheists do it with "gotcha!" verses.

If there was a prophet Elijah, a good portion of his recorded exploits are probably fictional. A fiery chariot carrying him into heaven? Not unless he was really a space alien and the "fiery chariot" was a UFO--which I don't believe. I also don't believe that anyone can summon bears to devour children (or that two bears could finish off 42 children) or can command God to send fire down from heaven on cue.

Psalm 137 was composed by people whose city had been destroyed and who had been dragged off into exile. I wonder if there were African slave songs that have not survived that expressed similar sentiments.

By the way, I thought you were looking for common ground.

I just pick up on those when Christians cite the Old Testament as anything other than a written record kept by wandering Nomads, and then an early Bronze Age Civilization. It really has little to do with Christian Faith. Having been a Christian in my previous days - I had come to the conclusion that the OT's only real value to a Christian was to remind them "how bad things could be"

The Jewish tradition of social activism isn't just a coincidence.

But I could be wrong.

or so I've been told.

and Torah is the first five books of the Bible plus the Rabbinical literature which goes beyound the Talmud (i.e., Mishneh Torah, Shulchan Aruch, she'eloth u-teshuvoth, etc.).

Orthodox Jews look in the Shulchan Aruch for their answers, the Conservative movement look in the Talmud, and the Reform movement use the social ethics of the prophets in the Hebrew Bible for guidance which focus on how people are to live in the world in relation to each other and to other people.

when involved in a discussion with someone who uses the bible to support their arguments, you don't think that it is "fair" to then use the same document to show the opposite? Either the bible is the word of god or it isn't. If you can pick and choose what you want, then it really isn't a document to rely on for ultimate source of morality. If it isn't the ultimate source of morality, then why don't we just talk about The Great Gatsby and what we can learn about living a good life from that?

Although I think the Bible is a better work of literature.

You might have me if you were comparing it to say, the collected works of Shakespeare, though. I think there's plenty in there to teach about life, too.

This is a common problem to those who wish to argue against the Bible, and I'm really not sure how to continue arguing it. Most Christians do not read the Bible literally. Most do not require any sort of all or nothing understanding. Even those that claim to be literalists aren't, and can't be.

Morality is rarely a black and white, cut and dried thing. I think that's one of the points - personal learning, personal interpretation is what helps guide each person to a more full understanding. Reading words like a rule book doesn't internalize anything - it's memorization. I don't know about you, but I sure can't recite the periodic table anymore. Probably put that right out of my brain a day after Jr. year Chemistry's final exam. But continued thought, combined with life experiences, is likely to offer people a far deeper understanding. I think that's the point of scripture. Not an instantaneous "here are the rules from on high", but a thoughtful and thought-provoking record of humanity's reach for relationship with the divine. To me, it's entirely possible - no, likely - that God would work in this way.

I try not to get involved in the politics of pre-warp civilizations. Sometimes its tough, though...especially when the women on the planet are hot, humanoid and have green skin.

I think I would have been disappointed had you not responded in exactly this way.

;)

==================
GROVELBOT.EXE v4.1
==================



This week is our second quarter 2008 fund drive. Democratic Underground is
a completely independent website. We depend on donations from our members
to cover our costs. Whatever you do, do not click the link below!

I'm sorry I didn't get back to it sooner!

My problem is, I've never been any good at quoting chapter and verse. I can never get the quotes right, nor remember where they are.

Believe me, Goblinwhatever, I spent a lot of my life saying the same things you are. "The Bible is full of contradictions, you can use it to justify or condemn anything," etc. Which is all true. Is it the "Word of God?" I don't even know what that means, really. For me, it is the record of the ongoing spiritual development of a particular people. And you really do have to look at it in historical terms to understand it. And once you do, it becomes fascinating.

And believe me, politically, it is nothing but progressive! The prophets of the Old Testament do nothing but rant about social injustice. Jesus, in his teachings, is very much in that tradition, condemning the preisthood of his time, as well as the Pharisees, who were the right-wing fundamentalists of his day. This is so obvious, it is laughable that todays fundies can't see it.

It has also always been funny to me that Marxists ended-up being so anti-Christian, when Jesus would have applauded Marx. "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven." "Give all you own to the poor, and follow me." Not to mention his contempt for the institutional preisthood. In fact, it states very clearly in Acts that the first Christians were communists "holding all things in common."

There is more to Christianity and Judeaism than progressive values, of course. But there is no question whatsoever that the moral, social content is absolutely supportive of liberal, progressive ideals.

Another thing I find amusing about the fundies is, with all their enthusiasm for Israel, they never mention it is a socialist state. Of course for them, it is just a means to an end, a precondition for the Apocalypse. And BTW, did you know that Revelation, their favorite book, almost didn't make it into the Bible? No one wanted all that judgement, death and destruction in the Christian scriptures. The only reason it was included was because it contains the only references to Mary being crowned Queen of Heaven; the very part fundies can't stand! LOL.

“Whatever you do to the least of my brethren, you do to me.” (Matthew 25:40)

Goes BEYOND the golden rule, as I see it.....

I personally think it's the most progressive thing I've ever read.

Well, E. V. Debs elaborated on it...

http://www.marxists.org/archive/debs/works/1918/court.htm

snip>
"Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free."

good thinkers who are not believers, have also arrived at.

How we treat one another matters.

And Deuteronomy has a bunch of reminders throughout, in the giving of the law, to remember that you were slaves in Egypt and God saved you, so don't be obnoxious to people, be fair, and don't treat them like the Egyptians treated you, whether it be your own people, the poor, foreigners, your slaves, or resident aliens.

For instance, this one, from Dt 24:

14 You shall not withhold the wages of poor and needy laborers, whether other Israelites or aliens who reside in your land in one of your towns.
15 You shall pay them their wages daily before sunset, because they are poor and their livelihood depends on them; otherwise they might cry to the LORD against you, and you would incur guilt.
16 Parents shall not be put to death for their children, nor shall children be put to death for their parents; only for their own crimes may persons be put to death.
17 You shall not deprive a resident alien or an orphan of justice; you shall not take a widow's garment in pledge.
18 Remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the LORD your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this.


And there's the constant prophetic challenge of the prophets to take care of the widows, the orphans, the poor, the foreigners, and the resident aliens; to deal justly in business; and to deal justly in all things.

"Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven."

Combine that with the Beatitudes, the Two Greatest Commandments (one, love the Lord your God, and two, love your neighbor as yourself), and Matthew 25's "Whatever you do unto the least of these, you do unto Me," and I see a faith that depends on loving everyone around us and working for peace and justice.

Much of what I've seen in the right-wing churches sounds a lot more like the Pharisees with their many, many laws that trip people up and keep them feeling guilty followed by all sorts of social judgement. When I read what Jesus said, though, I see far less judgement (especially against women--St. Photini and the woman caught in adultery were both treated as equals, not trash) and far more love than many right-wing Christians seem to show. Sure, they show it for their own, but they're not always so great on showing it to all, even those they disagree with.

Then again, I've also known evangelicals to do amazing things with no fanfare to help those in need. Those people tend to be a bit more liberal, though.