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Dear Christians,
Even in the midst of sex scandals, terrorism hysteria, and the disaster of illegal, pre-meditated, potentially endless war, there's good news:
Millions of American Christians have had enough.
Enough of watching as our faith has been hijacked, warped and twisted for partisan political gain.
Enough of seeing Christ, the foundation of our Church, virtually bulldozed out from under us by power-hungry "Christian" leaders and politicians.
Enough of watching "Christian" leaders annihilate Christ's message of love, compassion, self-sacrifice and humility to replace it with a message of fear, arrogance, greed and self-righteousness.
Enough of knowing that Christ, the Prince of Peace, would never condone "Christian" politicians launching illegal, unconstitutional wars of conquest against third-world nations--nations whose resources are coveted by the transnational corporations who fund the politicians!
Enough of being told that "voting our Christian values" boils down to voting against homosexual rights and against a woman's right to medical privacy--when, according to the Bible, Jesus of Nazareth never said a word about homosexuals or about abortion.
Enough of knowing--but too rarely hearing from our "Christian" leaders--that Jesus' most central and profound message was simply this: "Love your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself."
If you've had enough, you're not alone!
On Tuesday, November 7th, millions of American Christians will vote Christ's values of love, compassion, gentleness, caring, humility and peacemaking.
We'll reject, once and for all, the tactics of fear, hatred and deceit some would use to control us. Instead, we'll remember what we've read in the New Testament, in 1 John 4; that "perfect love casts out fear" and "The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love."
We'll vote for wise candidates--locally and nationally--who promote humility, caring and peacemaking, not arrogance, fear and warmongering.
We'll vote for ballot measures that will advance the well-being of people, especially the most needy, rather than enhance the profits of the already wealthy.
We'll learn from history, remembering that although Jesus never said a word about homosexuality or abortion (even though both existed in his time), Adolf Hitler so hated both homosexuality and abortion that, in 1936, Nazi leader Heinrich Himmler created a Gestapo "Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion." [For more on this, see "Homosexuals: Victims of the Nazi Era, 1933-1945" at
http://fcit.coedu.usf.edu/holocaust/people/USHMMHOM.HTM]
With history in mind and an eye to a compassionate future, we'll vote to honor the dignity of homosexual persons and to establish legal rights and protections for partners in homosexual relationships.
We'll vote to uphold a woman's right to choose (even while many of us work to minimize unwanted pregnancies), realizing that medical privacy is a right all of us deserve and want to protect.
We'll vote to promote wise stewardship of the environment, believing it's both our duty as Christians and essential for our survival as creatures of the Earth.
We'll remind ourselves that a "War on Terrorism" is, by definition, unwinnable; precisely as unwinnable as a "War on Gravity" or a "War on Lint." We'll remember that Hitler claimed to be waging a war against terrorism when, in fact, he was out to conquer the world and its resources. We'll recognize that any politician who speaks of "winning" a "War on Terrorism" is either deceived or out to deceive us, or both. And we'll vote for candidates committed to ending this empty, unwinnable war and using crime-fighting techniques to minimize the threat of terrorism and to bring terrorists to justice.
We'll vote for candidates who oppose wars of conquest (and exploitative foreign trade agreements) and support diplomacy, negotiation, peacemaking, fair trade and honest, fair dealing.
When we're done voting, we'll work hard to make sure our votes are counted, to make sure all future elections provide a recountable paper record of every vote, to demand dramatic reform of our national and local media (so that real news and in-depth investigative journalism might once again thrive), and to end the corrupting influence of money and soulless transnational corporations on the soul of our democracy.
We'll work side-by-side with people of other faiths (and people of no faith at all!) to achieve our goals.
And we'll work in love, humility and boldness to call to accountability our own ministers, priests and other Christian leaders, refusing any longer to accept a Church that has lost its foundation; a "Christianity" that has forgotten its Christ.
Keep the faith--and know you're not alone,
An American Christian