Bush the universalist
8 October 2007 - 27 תשרי 5768 by Huw
Over at GetReligion Mollie well points out a bias in the secular media’s reporting on The Lame Dubya. When he sounds like part of the religious right he is reported as such. But when he sounds like a religious modernist (”we all worship the same God and get to heaven by different ways”) the media pays almost no attention.
Mollie rightly wonders what it might be so.
I have a sneaking suspicion it’s because of politics: religion, qua religion, does not enter into American Politics. No one cares what defines “The Real ____ Religion”. Religion is the strawman in most political debates.
I was taught in Orthodoxy not to judge (as much as I fail in that, forgive me) and this loops out to an odd conundrum: if I see someone I “know” to be a sinner taking communion, I’m to not-judge them and assume the priest knows what he’s doing. Their salvation is between them and God (again, I fail at this often). But among the Orthodox - and even in these blog pages - you can find us judging Orthodox politicians for what we assume are non-Orthodox actions in the political sphere. Yet we know those politicians to be in fully communion with the Orthodox through the chalice at their local parish and we know we’re supposed to not-judge them.
But the *political* act becomes a way to ignore the *religious* one. I don’t think you’d see an Orthodox Bishop making the sort of pronouncements about Orthodox politicians that Archsbishop Burke has made about Rudy Guiliani - whom I assume he’s never met. If a given Orthodox Politician receives communion in his own diocese from his own priest… that’s good enough for everyone except for certain rumblings in Orthoblogoslavia.
The same seems to be *more* true among those who describe themselves as secular. It becomes possible to create straw men of every religion. I - the Reporter or Journalist - need know nothing about the reality or lack of your faith. I simply need to appeal to a stereotype and how you do or do not measure up (depending on my angle).
Until recently conservative Christians were desperate to assume Dubya as one of their own and they ignored Bush’s more non-conservative religious pronouncements. The media - likewise wanting to assume Dubya as one of the religious right - did the same thing. Now the Religious Right is trying to distance itself from Dubya in a lot of ways (I think, mostly to prepare for the Presidential cycle as they seek a candidate). But for the media, Bush must fit into a certain mould - no more or less now than two election cycles ago.
I hadn’t actually read Abp Burke’s remarks about Giuliani until I followed the link in your post. And now that I have read what he actually said, I find it a good deal less “controversial” than one might think. According to the article, the Archbishop said:
If any politician approached me and he’d been admonished not to present himself, I’d not give it
The key phrase there is “if he had been admonished not to present himself.” Abp Burke isn’t taking it upon himself to judge a politician (or anybody else) on reputation alone. On the contrary, he is indicating that he would respect the authority of the bishop (or the person’s father confessor) who had “admonished” him not to present himself for communion.
The scenario envisaged here is clearly one in which a person has been admonished because he has, either by persistent denial of the Church’s teachings or by unrepentant sin, placed himself outside of the communion of the Church. The authority to make that judgment doesn’t belong to Abp Burke, and he isn’t claiming it. It belongs to the person’s bishop and to the priest whom the bishop has licensed to hear confessions.
Abp Burke is only saying, if so-and-so is not a communicant in good standing in his own diocese, we won’t commune him in my diocese either. And I do think an Orthodox bishop would say the same.
Chris - you are right about the Orthodox Bishop saying “if so-and-so is not a communicant in good standing in his own diocese..”
But so far only Abp Burke has said this… I know he’s trying to get *all* the RC Bps to say this too. Which uniformity would be a good thing (and impossible in Orthodox land :-))
One only needs to look at the hit job done on Obama’s pastor to see how easy it is to report your bias and close your eyes to anything else. Then the typical game was played of trying to get Obama to disown his pastor. If he did not disown then he must agree with his pastor’s unbalanced statements. If he did disown, then you know that Obama has no loyalty and that you cannot trust him.
Both right and left have devolved into pure slanted reporting, looking to gain advantage. Religion is simply one more tool.
Sign me cynical!