Emerging evangelical center could decide 2008 election

By Jeffrey Haggray

The cherished Baptist legacy of religious liberty and separation of church and state is well-established. So too is the need to preserve and defend these values for all people for the future. Some of the practical challenges we face in defending religious freedom, however, stem directly from other prominent strands within our tradition.

First, we have a tradition of “prophetic preaching.” Baptists defend a “free pulpit” and claim the right and responsibility to “speak truth to power,” which often leads to political activism. Yet some political activism, particularly involvement in the electoral process, can potentially compromise our stance on separation and give rise to liability. Second, the possibility of government funding of social services provided by churches is a strong area of temptation for Baptist congregations owing largely to our “missional” tradition. Third, respecting religious diversity and upholding the freedom to not practice religion within our pluralistic society is a potential area of liability for Baptists because of our “evangelical” nature.

Although each of these strands — prophetic, missional, and evangelical — exists throughout Christendom, they are particularly evident, and at times strident, among Baptists. These noble features of our faith can potentially give rise to conflict or compromise with our historic regard for religious liberty and the separation of church and state. If we are to continue to be protectors of religious freedom, we must be mindful of the risks and vigilant about respecting appropriate boundaries. As we acknowledge the risks, we should look for best practices for defending our liberties and avoiding liabilities.

First, the prophetic preaching strand is deeply rooted within the Baptist Experience. Baptists cannot resist a fleeting mention of Roger Williams on Religious Liberty, Walter Rauschenbusch’s Christianity and the Social Crisisor Martin Luther King Jr.’s Stride Toward Freedom and Why We Can't Wait. Their writings constitute a framework within the Free Church for the Free Pulpit that challenges injustice and the status quo and speaks on behalf of the least of these. Baptists expect to be moved from pulpits and pews to engagement with the powers that be for the enactment of real change.

We only need to say the words “Civil Rights Movement” and we are reminded of prominent Baptist prophets, such as Ralph Abernathy, Martin King, C.T. Vivian, Otis Moss, John Lewis, Jesse Jackson, Fred Shuttlesworth, and an endless list of personalities who created so much fire in the pulpit that they were forced to carry their message of justice from the church house into the streets. You remember the commands of the Southern sheriffs to the freedom fighters: “Now you all return to your homes or to your churches.”

Thank God, they did not willingly heed those commands, but fought for voting rights and against segregated lunch counters and separate, unequal schools. A prophetic pulpit challenged corrupted elected officials to do the right thing and challenged good people to answer the call to public service. It became clear that some clergy themselves would make suitable candidates for public and elected office. After all, they possessed qualities important to political success, such as integrity, strong character, critical thinking skills, gifts for compelling oratory, and the ability to influence people. With these skills, they could raise money, register voters, and hold their own in the face of adamant political opposition. In the early days of African-American engagement in the political process, the question for the church was not simply “whether or not to endorse candidates” but whether “preachers themselves” should run for elected office. This question was largely disposed of within African-American sectors by concluding, “Let the best qualified person run and win” even if that happens to be the preacher. Thus, the prophetic strand within the Baptist tradition easily gives rise to activism, and pushes toward involvement in the electoral process, also known as electioneering.

Risk: What is at stake when churches engage in electioneering?

What is most frequently cited is the risk of losing our tax-exempt status under the Internal Revenue Code section 501(c) (3). Under this code, religious organizations are free to preach and speak on moral issues, including policy issues, and to advocate for justice, with few limitations. They are not free to engage in purely political activity, such as endorsing candidates, without risking their tax-exempt status. The IRS has stepped up enforcement regarding churches and other tax-exempt organizations, creating a huge need for education of churches in this regard.

A greater concern for churches, however, ought to be protecting unity within the church community and upholding our integrity as the faith community. There will always be differences within congregations over candidates. When the pulpit takes it upon itself to choose a candidate for the entire congregation, it threatens to undermine the freedom it cherishes. Sacred space where people are free to decide according to conscience gets turned into secular space that becomes suspect as to its judgment, integrity, and motives. Over time, the prophetic influence of the Church diminishes because its political preferences obscure its concerns for justice, equality, and fairness for all people.

Political endorsements also threaten the viability of our causes and our influence. We can insist upon accountability, integrity, honesty, and conviction from politicians, but we cannot insure them. When we align our credibility and influence with a particular candidate or party unequivocally, we potentially subject ourselves to the consequences of their political futures, good and bad. Ultimately, our credibility and influence are more important than any one endorsement.

Best practices that fit within the prophetic tradition but also can keep a church above reproach:

1. Provide teaching and training that help the faithful to translate values and beliefs into concrete policy formulations. Many concerns that resonate with Christians in a prophetic tradition are appropriate for policy discussion and activism:

* Equal access to quality education

* Equal access to quality health care for all people

* Overloaded prison systems and the absence of

rehabilitation

* Unfairness in the employment industry

* Unfairness in the housing industry

* Police brutality and unequal justice in the courts

2. Partner with other churches to provide weekday forums where all candidates are invited to address the concerns that are important to your faith community. Tell them what you care about, not only from a values perspective, but from a policy-making perspective. Leave it to individuals to ask their own questions and formulate their own opinion about the best candidate to address their concerns.

3. Provide forums on citizenship combined with voter registration drives. It is important that we help people understand that the right to vote was obtained through blood, sweat, tears, and toil, and that the protection of our religious liberty is intertwined with exercising our civic duty. We cannot expect others to defend our religious liberties if we don’t exercise our civic duties. Churches can — in non-partisan ways — provide mechanisms that raise awareness about the importance of exercising our civic duties. If the town clerk or voting clerk won’t bring voter registration forms to the church, then take church members to the voting clerk’s office.

4. Youth groups can teach teenagers who are approaching voter eligibility the importance of registering. Youth groups can also hold mock debates and mock elections where Christian youths debate public policies and talk about how to improve the quality of life for all people utilizing the political process. This can be done without promoting a particular party or candidate.

5. Refrain from endorsing candidates. Yours is to cast a vision, and let the people cast the vote.

6. Encourage your members to remain active and involved in the civic process outside the election season, utilizing town hall meetings, city council hearings, neighborhood action meetings and school board meetings. It is naïve to think that we are fully exercising our moral influence by simply getting involved in the electoral process, without participating in the ongoing civic process.

Baptists also have a strong missional strand, which leads us to the field of service to help those in need. Our emphasis this week on Luke 4 reflects our commitment to furthering the mission of Jesus with good news for the poor. We are concerned to translate the good religion of our heads and hearts to our hands and feet. We believe that true religion demonstrates concern for the widowed and the orphaned; we recognize that human needs have reached monumental proportions.

Thus, our missional nature renders us susceptible to compromising our convictions regarding the separation of church and state in the area of funding services that are important to us. In recent years, there has been a growing policy emphasis on government funding of social services and programs provided by religious organizations. We recognize that times have changes from when various ministries of Baptists, Methodists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Catholics and others worked side by side to supplement the services provided by local government to provided an adequate safety net.

Today we see many needs going unmet. Ironically, government resources have been on the decline at the same time that the public need has been on the rise. Many people feel that the reduction of social services in this period is reproachful when you consider America’s wealth. One of the tactics of our government has been to appeal to people of faith to take on more responsibility to meet needs.

Though the heart and will of the faith communities is in addressing social needs, churches do not have resources to meet all the needs. Federal, state, and local governments have appealed to the faith community, corporate community, foundation community, and people of good will to accept a larger share of the responsibility for providing social services with the caveat that the government will shift financial resources from government agencies to not-for-profit agencies that will provide these services, and that will include organizations that are religious in nature, or faith-based organizations.

One doesn’t have to impugn the motivations and integrity of charitable organizations to recognize the lure of applying for resources that assist them in accomplishing their mission. I happen to be very sympathetic to those agencies that are doing good works, and who could do more good works if they had adequate resources to pursue their mission. However, there are compelling reasons for churches to be very cautious about soliciting government dollars to fund their social services.

What are the risks of government funding for the social service ministries of churches?

Churches might inadvertently promote a political and social agenda of the funders that is not their own agenda. Some suspect there is a political agenda underway to under-fund or de-fund government-funded social services that are greatly needed in the public sector. The decisions to de-fund social services represent a political agenda, which many churches do not support. What may follow from funding for faith-based services is the privatization of social services including family services, social services for various types of health related and social needs, welfare assistance, and public education.

Government funding of faith-based social services potentially leads to discriminatory practices either in providing services or hiring. Citizens should be able to access needed services from their government without being required to interact with a house of worship or a set of religious beliefs that they are not interested in. Faith-based entities tend to exercise certain preferences in their hiring practices that may not be warranted with government money.

Government funding for faith-based services threatens to undermine the prophetic influence and the freedom of religious organizations by limiting their capacity to freely declare their beliefs and convictions, or to practice those interventions that are rooted in faith which they claim are the source of their success, such as prayer, Bible study, worship attendance, listening to sermons, etc. Likewise, many church-based programs also advocate for the needs of the poor and the underserved, which entails challenging government. However, that freedom can be severely limited when the government is the funder: “Whoever funds you will seek to run you!”

Best practices for a missional church cooperating with government:

1) Work with existing or create a separate community

development corporation with its own 501(c)(3) tax-exempt

status if you are considering applying for government

funds. Establish a mission for the organization that does not

have a religious objective or motive.

2) Form a separate board to manage such an entity with its

own executive director, not the pastor of the church. Ideally

select some directors for the board that are drawn from the

community, and who have no affiliation with the church to

help insure impartiality.

3) Separate the funds of the nonprofit from the Church’s

funds. Absolutely no co-mingling of the funds.

4) Establish firm anti-discrimination policies with respect to

hiring and service provision.

5) Create high quality accountability structures for treasurers

and bookkeepers that are responsible to the Corporation, not

to the Church, and hire quality assurance officers.

6) Make a firm commitment to serving all people in your

community who are in need of service regardless of religion,

race, ethnicity, lifestyle choices, sexual preferences or

physical handicaps.

7) Hire adequate personnel that are trained and certified to

provide the services you are offering.

8) Space used for religious services and social programs

should be separated if at all possible.

Third, Baptists have a strong evangelical strand that challenges our commitment to liberty for all. Our evangelical nature prompts us to believe that we have an obligation to declare to the world that Jesus is the Lord and Savior of the World. We believe that we own the whole truth about God in the story of Jesus, and that we’ve got to tell it, no matter what others think or believe. Some are even willing to be jailed to defend the right to proclaim the Good News.

The strong convictions of Christians with regard to evangelism can potentially lead to a serious conflict with another value we hold as Baptists and as Americans, namely religious liberty. The freedom to practice our religion without coercion, interference from the state, or without having that religion sponsored by the state is not a “right” belonging only to Christian Americans, but it is a “right” belonging to all people in America, whatever their religious identity happens to be. Also, in America, persons who don’t identify with or observe any religion have a right to do so, no matter how enthusiastic Christians are about the Good News of Jesus.

What are the risks related to our evangelical zeal?

Our evangelical zeal at times may lead us to disregard the religious liberty of non-Christians. We may overlook or fail to recognize that many Americans do not share our enthusiasm about prayer in the public square, prayer in public schools, support for Christian candidates for elective office and support for religious entities involved in providing government services. We may even find we act out of bias and discrimination in secular arenas where preferences should not be granted for religious purposes.

Best practices:

1) Publicly affirm respect and support for religious freedom

of diverse groups from our pulpits and during public cere-

monies.

2) Teach our parishioners that all persons in our society have

a God-given right to freely choose and exercise their faith,

even though it differs from our own.

3) Firmly reject hatred and fear of other religions.

4) Intentionally practice hospitality to persons of other faiths

without having “winning them to Jesus” as our objective.

5) Participate in interfaith activities in your community to

help foster increased understanding of different faith tradi-

tions and cultures.

6) Oppose public policies and legislation in your localities

that are designed to suppress minority religious practices or

traditions that are represented in your community.

Jeffrey Haggray is executive director/minister of the District of Columbia Baptist Convention and a BJC board member. This article was adapted from his presentation, which covered the best practices for ministries, at the New Baptist Covenant Celebration in January.