Russell Vought is a Wheaton College alumnus who weighed in on the controversy over the faculty member who insisted that Muslims and Christians worship the same God. He disagreed. He wrote on a website, “They do not know God because they have rejected Jesus Christ his Son, and they stand condemned.”
Now, at his confirmation hearing for his nomination as deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget, that statement came back to haunt him.
Senator Bernie Saunders called that statement of Christian orthodoxy “indefensible,” “Islamophobic,” and “hateful.”
Vought tried to explain, but the Senator kept trying to shame him for his belief and voted against his confirmation.
The Atlantic, no less, has a great story on the exchange. Its author, Emma Green, defends Vought and argues that what Sanders was doing was imposing a “religious test” as forbidden by Article VI of the U. S. Constitution. She goes on to explain why this is an important principle.
The episode also reminds us Christians that our convictions are out of synch in this time of intolerant tolerance and that we can expect to be vilified and possibly, at some point, punished for what we believe.
From Emma Green, Bernie Sanders’s Religious Test for Russell Vought – The Atlantic:
Article VI of the U.S. Constitution states that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” On Wednesday, Senator Bernie Sanders flirted with the boundaries of this rule during a confirmation hearing for Russell Vought, President Trump’s nominee for deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget.
Sanders took issue with a piece Vought wrote in January 2016 about a fight at the nominee’s alma mater, Wheaton College. The Christian school had fired a political-science professor, Larycia Hawkins, for a Facebook post intended to express solidarity with Muslims. Vought disagreed with Hawkins’s post and defended the school in an article for the conservative website The Resurgent.During the hearing, Sanders repeatedly quoted one passage that he found particularly objectionable:
Muslims do not simply have a deficient theology. They do not know God because they have rejected Jesus Christ his Son, and they stand condemned.
“In my view, the statement made by Mr. Vought is indefensible, it is hateful, it is Islamophobic, and it is an insult to over a billion Muslims throughout the world,” Sanders told the committee during his introductory remarks. “This country, since its inception, has struggled, sometimes with great pain, to overcome discrimination of all forms … we must not go backwards.”
After an initial round of questions, the exchange between Sanders and Vought became tense—Sanders began raising his voice and interrupting Vought as he tried to answer questions.
Sanders: I don’t know how many Muslims there are in America, I really don’t know, probably a couple million. Are you suggesting that all of those people stand condemned? What about Jews? Do they stand condemned too?
Vought: Senator, I am a Christian—
Sanders: I understand that you are a Christian. But this country is made up of people who are not just—I understand that Christianity is the majority religion. But there are other people who have different religions in this country and around the world. In your judgment, do you think that people who are not Christians are going to be condemned?
Vought tried to clarify how he thinks people of other traditions should be treated, referring to a doctrine known as imago dei. “As a Christian, I believe that all individuals are made in the image of God and are worthy of dignity and respect, regardless of their religious beliefs,” Vought said. “I believe that as a Christian, that’s how I should treat all individuals—”
Sanders interrupted again. “And do you think your statement that you put in that publication, ‘They do not know God because they rejected Jesus Christ the son, and they stand condemned,’ do you think that’s respectful of other religions?” Vought replied that he wrote the post as a Christian alumnus of Wheaton, which “has a statement of faith that speaks clearly with regard to the centrality of Jesus Christ in salvation.”
After a long exchange on tax cuts for the wealthy and other issues directly relevant to Vought’s proposed role in government, this issue—Vought’s beliefs about the exclusivity of his religion—seemed to be the reason why Sanders saw him as an unacceptable candidate for office. “I would simply say, Mr. Chairman, that this nominee is really not someone who is what this country is supposed to be about,” Sanders said. “I will vote no.”
Illustration from Patheos
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