The Bible As The Barometer For The Moral Values Of Conservatives

When I was a little girl, I can remember having to escape the burning homes in neighborhoods on the West side of Chicago because of anger that ensued over the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther king, Jr. Our family became exiles because we had to leave our home in the middle of the night to find safety and security. My dad drove us back to his home town of Anniston, Alabama so we could be safe. I can remember leaving with only my baby dolls and my brother’s medicine. My brother had seizures a lot, especially when he was excited or nervous, so I did not want him to have a seizure without his medication so I packed it in my baby doll’s pocketbook.

It has been 39 years since that exilic experience, yet this year, at many point during this campaign season I felt like an exile in my own country. Much of that exilic experience came from the language and rhetoric that was used by Conservatives to share their platform with their political base in particular and the American people in general. Such implicit statements like "Christian values are protected in small town America" and "Obama is a terrorist because he pals around with Muslims" have done much to disenfranchise those of us who do not live in small town America, or are not Christian or religious but who truly love these United States of America.

Conservatives are quick to decide who’s in and who’s out of the game of politics based on a candidate’s platform. If the candidate’s platform is pro-life, pro-family, pro-defense, and anti-government, then it is a platform that honors God and protects Christian values. Yet, I reject the notion that any platform that does not align with the Conservative ideology is an anti-God platform that dishonors Christian values. I reject an ideology that honors the lives of Americans but doesn’t hesitate to murder millions of innocent men, women and children in other countries. I reject a platform that is honors life in the womb of Americans but kills living beings in other countries. I reject a platform that purports that Christian values are honored, protected and preserved in small towns across America!

In our current presidential election, the Conservatives and the Regan democrats have decided that president-elect Barack Obama is anti-America and Muslim because his middle is Hussain; his father is from Africa; and he attended a school that comprised Muslim students in Indonesia. This kind of thinking is very narrow-minded and myopic. Conservatives who spread this type of propaganda do not have the right to call themselves Christians because Christ would not behave in such a despicable manner. Christ came so that the oppressed might receive liberty. He came so that the disenfranchised and the disavowed might find hope in him. He came so that the left out and the down and out might know that through him all things are possible. It is because of the example of Christ that the sick and the afflicted were drawn to him. Women who had been marginalized and discounted in ancient and early Christian communities were counted in by Jesus. Gentiles became part of God’s family through relationship with Jesus.

Despite these facts, Conservatives continue to use the Bible as a way to disenfranchise people by isogeting texts instead of exegeting texts. The difference between isogesis (or eisegesis) and exegesis is that isogesis is similar to proof-texting; that is, interpreters of biblical text force the text to say what they want it to say rather than the author’s original intent of the text in an effort to prove a point. Exegesis is when you interpret a text in the historical context under which it was written and communicate that intent to your audience.

When Conservatives use the Bible as a way of excluding people such as gays, lesbians, blacks, Hispanics, Asians, women, they are not only isogeting texts but they have strayed from the basic tenets of the Christian faith, and that is to be an example of Christ and to serve as a witness for Christ. If this past election could serve as a witness for the Conservatives, it has communicated to them that the Bible that they are reading is not God-inspired nor is it Christ-centered because of its exclusivity. Their Bible of hate rhetoric, fear-mongering, and safety within small rural communities of America has landed them as exiles in their own land. If they are to be the witnesses that God has called them to be then they need to deconstruct and begin anew with a reading of the Bible that not only includes small rural communities in America, but that includes small rural villages in Africa, India, China, Cuba, and Russia. Their exegesis of texts should seek to transfer to their audiences a more inclusive reading of texts so that everyone’s rights are protected not just the pro-family, pro-life, and pro-war constituents. When this happens, Conservatives will abandon their exilic locale and become part of God’s big, inclusive family! Conservatives must always remember that "all" communities are important to God because we are "all" part of God’s big family! After all, God made humankind, not just Conservatives, in his image!