The people who identify themselves as conservative Christians are a mixed bunch. There are, on one end of the spectrum, the ultra-conservative fundamentalists and, on the other end, the more moderate conservative evangelicals. This wide range of conservative Christianity was illustrated for me last week in a couple of emails that I received.
The first email was from a local conservative Christian evangelical church leader praising Sarah Palin whom he had just seen delivering her acceptance speech for the Republican nomination for vice president. He noted how wonderful it was that the Republican party had nominated a woman for vice president and then drew a parallel with his church which he also thought was wonderful for having female leaders. Funny, I don’t remember him writing anything similar when Hillary Clinton was one of the final candidates for the democratic presidential nomination. And he must have “forgotten” that Geraldine Ferraro was nominated as the democratic candidate for Vice President in 1984. Apparently nominating women as leaders is progress only when Republicans and/or conservatives do it.
The second email came a day or two later. It was from another even more conservative Christian friend who had apparently forwarded a message he had received to everyone in his address book. Here are some of the freaky excerpts:
I have been waiting for a prophetic word re the current status of the election. This morning I received this word from Chuck Pierce (whom I have learned to trust and believe he truly hears the voice of the Lord in a prophetic way!) This will encourage your heart! ….
Dutch [Sheets] was traveling to Texas on Friday…. He watched McCain introduce Governor Palin and said he began to weep, even though he knew nothing about her. (I experienced the very same thing and we have had reports of many others including Newt Gingrich.) He asked what the significance of this 44-year-old woman was and he saw the clock said 4:44. He asked the Lord what that was and the Lord said, “Ezekiel 44:4. He brought me by way of the north gate to the front of the temple; so I looked, and behold, the glory of the LORD filled the house of the LORD; and I fell on my face.” NKJV North gate representing Alaska….
Alaska is the alpha and omega state. It is the place where things begin and end. You may realize that some of the Alaskan islands are on the other side of the Dateline meaning that the day begins and ends in Alaska. The Lord said that Alaska is a gateway for the Ancient of Days to come into the nation….
Dutch then decreed [Sarah Palin] will enter the White House… He said that he believes as of Friday the U.S. has come into a new level of alignment wilth [sic] the Lord and His purposes. By the way, the Governor will be the 44th Vice President. He continued to declare that she will be the Margaret Thatcher of America including that she would be President one day. Many other things came forth. I literally thought I would explode because the Lord had shown me many of these same things yesterday.
I believe we especially need to rally prayer for the family and children of the Governor. They will be targeted by the enemy and I believe we need special prayer for the oldest daughter. Please take this seriously in your prayers.
I don’t know which is scarier — the fact that there are people who actually think this way, or the fact that these people get to vote just like everybody else.
But vote they do.
Eight years ago there was some of this crazy thinking going on that had a lot to do with George W. Bush getting elected and, subsequently, re-elected. The good news is that it seems like most conservative Christians have distanced themselves from our war-mongering, and thankfully soon-to-be-former chief executive. The bad news is that there is still plenty of dementia among conservative Christians and they’ve been looking for a new messiah on whom to project their “prophecies.” Sarah Palin is now riding that wave of lunacy with John McCain tightly holding onto her for his dear political life.
Conservative Christians run a bewilderingly wide gamut from the blissful, myopic ignorance illustrated in the first email I received, to the mental instability illustrated in the second. But a good number of them across the board cling to the same deranged notion that the Republican party is the party of God and that if they can just get the right candidates elected they will be able to transform the United States of America into a Christian theocracy. Then we evil liberals will no longer be able to corrupt the youth of our nation with heretical ideas such as evolution, same-sex marriage and women’s reproductive rights.
If being a Christian means being conservative and Republican then I proudly wear the title of heretic. And if being a liberal means corrupting our youth with the ability to think for themselves and to question the absurd beliefs of their parents, then bring me my cup of hemlock. But first I am going to exercise my right to vote. Then at least I can die without being responsible for another four years of insanity.