{"id":1189,"date":"2005-05-18T14:01:53","date_gmt":"2005-05-18T18:01:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/nateptest\/2005\/05\/18\/widespread-evangelical-dissent-from"},"modified":"2005-05-18T14:01:53","modified_gmt":"2005-05-18T18:01:53","slug":"widespread-evangelical-dissent-from-the-bush-agenda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/2005\/05\/18\/widespread-evangelical-dissent-from-the-bush-agenda\/","title":{"rendered":"Widespread evangelical dissent from the Bush agenda"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

President Bush will speak at the commencement of Calvin College<\/a> this weekend.  Apparently, about one third of the faculty are unhappy<\/a> (requires a subscription unfortunately, but this “temporary URL” will get you there until Monday<\/a>):<\/p>\n

\n

\nMore than 100 professors at Calvin College, in Michigan, have signed a
\nletter criticizing the policies of President Bush, who is scheduled to
\nspeak at the evangelical Christian institution’s spring commencement on
\nSaturday.<\/p>\n

The letter, which will be published as an advertisement in The Grand Rapids Press<\/i>
\non Saturday, says that the professors “see conflicts between our
\nunderstanding of what Christians are called to do and many of the
\npolicies of your administration.” It calls the war in Iraq “unjust and
\nunjustified” and argues that President Bush’s policies “favor the
\nwealthy of our society and burden the poor.”<\/p>\n

Among those who conceived and circulated the letter was David Crump, a
\nprofessor of religion at Calvin. “We wanted to object to some specific
\npolicies but also to object to the way that the language of orthodox
\nevangelical Christianity has been hijacked by the religious right and
\nits close association with this administration,” he said.<\/p>\n

An Open Letter to the President of the United States of America, George W. Bush<\/b>\n <\/p>\n

\nOn May 21, 2005, you will give the commencement address at Calvin
\nCollege. We, the undersigned, respect your office, and we join the
\ncollege in welcoming you to our campus. Like you, we recognize the
\nimportance of religious commitment in American political life. We seek
\nopen and honest dialogue about the Christian faith and how it is best
\nexpressed in the political sphere. While recognizing God as sovereign
\nover individuals and institutions alike, we understand that no single
\npolitical position should be identified with God’s will, and we are
\nconscious that this applies to our own views as well as those of
\nothers. At the same time we see conflicts between our understanding of
\nwhat Christians are called to do and many of the policies of your
\nadministration.\n <\/p>\n

As Christians we are called to be peacemakers and to initiate
\nwar only as a last resort. We believe your administration has launched
\nan unjust and unjustified war in Iraq.\n <\/p>\n

As Christians we are called to lift up the hungry and
\nimpoverished. We believe your administration has taken actions that
\nfavor the wealthy of our society and burden the poor.\n <\/p>\n

As Christians we are called to actions characterized by love,
\ngentleness, and concern for the most vulnerable among us. We believe
\nyour administration has fostered intolerance and divisiveness and has
\noften failed to listen to those with whom it disagrees.\n <\/p>\n

As Christians we are called to be caretakers of God’s good
\ncreation. We believe your environmental policies have harmed creation
\nand have not promoted long-term stewardship of our natural environment.\n <\/p>\n

Our passion for these matters arises out of the Christian faith
\nthat we share with you. We ask you, Mr. President, to re-examine your
\npolicies in light of our God-given duty to pursue justice with mercy,
\nand we pray for wisdom for you and all world leaders.\n <\/p>\n

Concerned faculty, staff, and emeriti of Calvin College\n <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Calvin is no hot-bed of liberalism.  (I’d guess that 90 percent
\nof these people voted for the president.)  I went to secondary
\nschool
\nwith a number of kids who went on to Calvin in some form or another,
\nand about half of my teachers were graduates; it’s a college associated
\nwith the conservative Christian Reformed Church in America<\/a>
\nand from what I know, you must sign a profession of faith to teach
\nthere.  The CRC members are Dutch Calvinists and their
\ndescendants, and in my experience, it can be a fairly strict
\ndenomination that prefers its change slow or not at all.  So the
\nfact that a bunch of CRC intellectuals (Calvin doesn’t slide too much
\non that factor either) dissent so openly is perhaps a canary in the
\nmine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Bush will speak at the commencement of Calvin College this weekend.  Apparently, about one third of the faculty are unhappy (requires a subscription unfortunately, but this “temporary URL” will get you there until Monday): More than 100 professors at Calvin College, in Michigan, have signed a letter criticizing the policies of President Bush, who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":709,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[46],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politicks"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5G3PH-jb","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/709"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}