The gentleman who commented on my previous post about Donald Miller’s benediction at the Democratic National Convention directed me to this short interview with Donald Miller that took place shortly before his appearance on stage. The video was originally done by Sarah Pulliam for Christianity Today. It’s only about four minutes long, but it’s really terrific. He speaks candidly about conversations he’s had with Democrats, and he speaks candidly about his own political views. Interestingly enough, he uses language to talk about abortion that is very similar to the language I used in my post yesterday. Anyways, Donald really has some great comments in this video so I highly recommend giving it a watch, especially if you’ve read any of his books.
Thanks, Donny.
3 Comments
August 28, 2008 at 8:23 am
[...] I found this video of Donald Miller’s pre-benediction video over at Brian Kiley’s blog. [...]
August 28, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Hey Kiley, an interesting couple of posts on your blog as always, and as always they make me think. I want to take a look at a point you made in your last blog entry where you stated
“They are rightly pointing out the flawed thinking that has led many Christians to believe that social evils can simply be legislated away”
This and the following statements clearly indicate that abortion (and theoretically other moral issues such as homosexuality, another hot button issue with the religious right) cannot be legislated away(which is debatable, but a point I would concede for the sake of argument). I’m pretty sure I agree with you. I’m also pretty sure that the social evils of “poverty, health care, peace, protection of the environment, fair labor laws, economic justice, the sanctity of life,, etc.” are equally incapable of being legislated away. (A point which can be argued, but I would assert any argument to refute this would also refute the earlier assertion regarding more traditionally “religious right” issues.
This doesn’t mean we as Christians should ignore the above issues. I think they’re every bit as important as they are made out to be. I simply don’t agree that its the responsibility of the government to ensure they are addressed(with the likely exception of fair labor laws)by the government. Instead they are the responsibility of the Church. We, as Christians, NOT as Americans, need to shoulder these responsibilities.
As always my disclaimer that this was a rather hastily written response and I’m perfectly willing to reconsider virtually any statement I’ve made herein if sufficiently warranted.
August 28, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Shinton,
Thanks for stopping by. I agree with you. I very much believe that the church, not the government, should take the lead in responding to all of the aforementioned social issues. The fact that we rely so much upon the government to, for example, care for the poor, is evidence of a lack of proper priorities within the church. That being said, the point I was trying to make with the abortion comment was basically that abortions happen largely (though not entirely) for economic reasons, and if the economic reasons aren’t dealt with, they will probably continue to happen regardless of the legality of the action. I could be wrong about this, but I don’t think I am. I certainly agree with you that all of the issues listed should be of great importance to Christians, my point is simply that we can’t make problematic behavior go away simply by making it illegal. As I look over the list of social issues that were in my post (and that you quoted in your comment), I am reminded of the reality that there is an economic component to just about all of them. I want to reaffirm my agreement with your main point, that it is ultimately the church, not the government that should take the lead in responding to these social crises. The gospel is after all, “good news to the poor” (I’m getting ready to teach on that passage out of Luke 4 next weekend). Thanks for taking the time to comment, I always enjoy hearing from you. Hope you and Ashley are well.
Peace,
Kiley