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Politics and Religion – 9 November 2007

Looking through the latest issue of “The Vision,” a newspaper of the United Methodist Church, the title of an article caught my attention and I stopped to read “Faith before politics, author says.”

This book review by Linda Bloom starts out with the following: “After studying the effects of religion on politics in diverse places, author Charlene Floyd says, ‘Faith should lead and politics should follow.’ ”

Although I have not read the book, the provocative review title made me think about the way so many pastors use their influence over their flocks to sway voters at election time – even though their church’s tax-exempt status is supposed to preclude such political activity.

I found it interesting that, according to the review, the author’s father (now a retired pastor) had taken “an active role in politics through his position with the area’s council of churches and even ran for mayor….”

One of the problems with politics today is that the politicians all too often use fear and smear tactics, and cater to special interests, to try to get elected.

Political corruption results from influential, fear-mongering pastors delivering their flocks’ votes to politicians at election time – almost like “sheep being led to slaughter,” as the old saying goes.
 

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