{"id":1204,"date":"2019-04-05T09:35:20","date_gmt":"2019-04-05T16:35:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/?p=1204"},"modified":"2019-04-15T10:34:00","modified_gmt":"2019-04-15T17:34:00","slug":"you-have-no-power-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/","title":{"rendered":"You Have No Power Here"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

There is a scene in the Wizard of Oz<\/em>, at the beginning, when Dorothy has been transported to Oz and after her house has landed on the Wicked Witch of the East.\u00a0 As we know, her sister shows up.\u00a0 She puts on a big show and tries to intimidate Dorothy.\u00a0 But Glinda, the good witch of the North, with laughter summarily dismisses and rebukes her:<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have no power here.\u00a0 Now, begone, before someone drops a house on you!\u201d<\/p>\n

Apparently, the Wicked Witch of the West forgot where she was.\u00a0 Her power was conditioned upon geography, longitude and latitude.<\/p>\n

There are different types of power\/authority.\u00a0 For instance, there is moral power and authority.\u00a0 It\u2019s not based upon geography, or longitude and latitude.\u00a0 It\u2019s based upon, first, one\u2019s actual lived life\u2013but secondarily, upon being consistent in one\u2019s applications.<\/p>\n

For churches, pastors, priests, denominations, and religion in general they normally try and be consistent in how they apply morality and ethics, generally and specifically.\u00a0 For instance, if they\u2019ve consistently said it was morally and ethically wrong for businesses to take advantage of poor people, but then begin taking advantage of them themselves, they lose their moral power and authority.<\/p>\n

Or, if they consistently told us they would only support political leaders who were people of good character, who were decent and honest, people of integrity, but then decided to support someone who lacked all those markers, they lose their moral power and authority.<\/p>\n

Or, if they consistently told us they would only support political leaders who maintain a strong ethical and moral character when it comes to traditional marriage and sexuality, but then decided to support someone who has no such ethical character, they lose their moral power and authority.<\/p>\n

What will certainly hasten this loss of moral power and authority is if it is learned their decision<\/a> to no longer be consistent was because by changing their view, they would benefit<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If something is morally and ethically true, then it should be applied fairly and consistently if we are going to point out any supposed failures on the part of others.\u00a0 Otherwise, we are shown to be hypocrites.\u00a0 We lose our moral power and authority.\u00a0 No one cares what we think now.\u00a0 \u201cOh, you don\u2019t like such-and-such?\u00a0 Who gives a damn\u2014you gave your boy a pass on that, a \u201cmulligan<\/a>,\u201d remember?\u201d<\/p>\n

As we gear up for the 2020 presidential race, we are going to hear and read a lot of things regarding the ethical and moral choices of the candidates in the areas of marriage and sexuality.\u00a0 Skeletons will no doubt emerge, unbidden, from closets everywhere.<\/p>\n

We may learn of affairs, or non-traditional family and partner arrangements.\u00a0 Who knows what we may learn<\/a>.\u00a0 And some of it may be admitted to, denied, or found to be merely gossip or innuendo.<\/p>\n

Here is the point: The first time a white evangelical is critical of any candidate because of their marriage, divorces, relationship choices, sexual ethics, lies, or basic character\/decency, who either supported Trump, defended him, or were silent in the face of his deficits in all those areas, needs to be told:<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have no power here.\u00a0 Now, begone, before someone drops a house on you!\u201d<\/p>\n

Or, better: \u201cBe quiet\u2014who cares what you think about those things. You lost any moral power or authority to criticize anyone running for office the moment you supported, defended, or remained silent in the face of Trump\u2019s absolute failures in those same areas.\u00a0 Hypocrite.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Every evangelical who supported Trump, defended him, or remained silent during his first three years in office, has made one thing abundantly clear.\u00a0 The only thing that now matters to them is a candidate\u2019s political views and not their character, decency, honesty, or ethics.\u00a0 Fine.\u00a0 Good to know.<\/p>\n

We can now completely dismiss everything they told us about the ethical\/character qualifications candidates running for office needed to have prior to 2016.\u00a0 That was before<\/em> Trump.\u00a0 White evangelicals will now have, forever, on their political time-line: Before Trump<\/em> (BT) and After Trump<\/em> (AT).\u00a0 Everything changed on November 8, 2016.<\/p>\n

Thus, in this new and dark era, 2019 AT, they have no right (moral power or authority) to criticize or call into question any candidate whose character, decency, honesty, or ethics they find wanting.\u00a0 Will some do it anyway?\u00a0 Of course.\u00a0 But that is why we have the word, hypocrite<\/em>.\u00a0 Put it on a ring and wrap it around their necks.<\/p>\n

I have a Patreon<\/a> Page\u2014please consider supporting my writing.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There is a scene in the Wizard of Oz, at the beginning, when Dorothy has been transported to Oz and after her house has landed on the Wicked Witch of the East.\u00a0 As we know, her sister shows up.\u00a0 She puts on a big show and tries to intimidate Dorothy.\u00a0 But Glinda, the good witch […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3524,"featured_media":1237,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[197,712,344,715,485],"class_list":["post-1204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-hypocrisy","tag-moral-authority","tag-political","tag-political-candidates","tag-trump"],"yoast_head":"\nYou Have No Power Here<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"There is a scene in the Wizard of Oz, at the beginning, when Dorothy has been transported to Oz and after her house has landed on the Wicked Witch of the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"You Have No Power Here\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There is a scene in the Wizard of Oz, at the beginning, when Dorothy has been transported to Oz and after her house has landed on the Wicked Witch of the\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Divergence\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-04-05T16:35:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-04-15T17:34:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/1004\/2019\/04\/Wizard_of_Oz-good-witch-wicked-witch.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Darrell Lackey\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@darrelllackey1\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Darrell Lackey\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/\",\"name\":\"You Have No Power Here\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2019-04-05T16:35:20+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-04-15T17:34:00+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/#\/schema\/person\/d88a32b8d4b5f40fbd6ccbfce4e0f813\"},\"description\":\"There is a scene in the Wizard of Oz, at the beginning, when Dorothy has been transported to Oz and after her house has landed on the Wicked Witch of the\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/2019\/04\/05\/you-have-no-power-here\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"You Have No Power Here\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/divergence\/\",\"name\":\"Divergence\",\"description\":\"Commentary Regarding Fundamentalism - 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