The Orbis

At a recent meeting of evangelical Christians in Chicago, a man proffered an abridged Bible, from which he had physically removed all of the verses that referred to poverty. There was hardly anything left. According to the New York Times, the man then challenged the members of his audience "to take their Bible and cut out every verse about abortion or gay marriage, and we'll compare Bibles."

This display was a tangible and clever demonstration of an emerging issue among a broad spectrum of religious groups: that issues like same-sex marriage, abortion and stem cell research have been thrust to the forefront of the moral values debate at the expense of biblically significant issues like poverty. These religious groups are questioning the Republican dictated moral value platform, which has subverted many of the most fundamental Christian teachings in favor of more politically expedient ones.

The National Council of Churches (NCC), an organization that represents 100,000 congregations with 45 million members, is at the forefront of a movement to propel poverty into the political scene as a moral value. In a meeting in Washington, a spokesman for the NCC, Rev. Leslie Tune, said, "We need to get our legislators and policy-makers to understand that there's more to morality than who you have sex with and whether or not you have an abortion."

In the context of the moral values campaigns led by Republican-allied Christians, this statement seems revolutionary in Darwinian proportions.

While many Christians remain blindfolded by the faux-Christianity propagated by Republicans, at least some have recalled their Sunday school lessons about a Christian's primary responsibility, a development that should enliven still-sore Dems.

In a document entitled "Christian Principles in an Election Year" the NCC suggests principles its members should consider when selecting a candidate for office, and not one of them mentions, even indirectly, abortion, gay-marriage, stem cell research or euthanasia. In fact, most of them could be taken directly from the Democratic platform: "We look for political leaders...for whom a foreign policy based on cooperation and global justice is an urgent concern...who yearn for economic justice and who will seek to reduce the growing disparity between rich and poor...who will pursue fair immigration policies and speak out against xenophobia...who will support adequate, affordable and accessible health care for all."

Democrats need to take advantage of the extreme disparity between these Christians and the actions and agendas of the Republicans who ostensibly represent them. These groups co-exist in a relationship more strange and unnatural than any the Republican-Christian right has sought to make illegal.

As the push to inject moral values into politics continues, Democrats need to stop avoiding the debate altogether and instead delineate exactly what should be debated. The Republican spin machine portrays Democrats as godless, homophilic baby killers eager to burn Bibles, effectively discrediting the Democrats on moral issues while limiting the values debate to a few token topics.

Unlike meaningful issues like poverty or health care, fighting abortion and gay marriage serves a dual purpose: they do not suck money from economic projects like the war in Iraq and they distract the religious masses from outrages like the war and continuing tax cuts for the wealthiest citizens.

The Democrats need to turn the religious tables on Republicans, explaining that with every program cut as a result of Bush's excesses, there is literally another poor American starving or freezing to death as a result, and that is not hyperbole. They need to expand the moral values debate to include issues that are substantive, like poverty, health care and education, and not be afraid to associate themselves with overtly religious organizations. Democrats must attack the Republicans on their own turf, and in doing so, demonstrate that the Republicans have appropriated Christianity for their own political agenda and made a mockery of its core values.

Democrats only need to challenge Christians to one test to determine their appropriate party affiliation: "Where is Jesus in Bush's 2006 budget?"

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