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12/28/2002 05:41:00 PM | Brad Plumer re: Religious Groups I live in Colorado now, which is "out West" enough (concealed-carry and cowboy boots). As far as I can tell many large churches here are quite tolerant. Last week my parents' church (Christian evangelical) held a couple of Christmas dinners for poor community members in conjunction with a local, predominantly black church. Even met an openly gay member of the congregation to boot. No doubt intolerant churches exist, but it does no good to judge 84% of the US population by their most intolerant members... As far as churches not willingly helping the needy, that doesn't necessarily follow. I was trying to find figures on what percentage of poor people vs. rich people belong to a church. Couldn't find anything, but my guess would be that plenty of poor people and minorities believe in God and would "qualify" for help from churches. (Remember, 90% of the US is theistic in some sense). The gay, etc. population is a different matter, as I imagine significantly fewer churches would be excited about supporting these groups/individuals (which is both idiocy and bad theology in my book, at least as far as Christianity is concerned). Anyways, I think it's wrong to see religion as the exclusive enterprise of bigots and rich white rightwingers (hey, that's sort of a tongue twister), without interest in the poor. I think it's entirely possible that church programs are as effective as other forms of social welfare. Perhaps moreso if religious support has useful psychological gains (Protestant work ethic, anyone?). I don't have a clue how to measure this though (just like I'm still trying to figure out how to measure school success... heh). Anyways, my point was that we should probably examine to what extent churches actually do discriminate in their social programs, rather than assume that because they won't hire a gay pastor, they'll automatically turn their backs on the needy. I think Bush could genuinely have better motives than simply "sucking right-wing sausage". Of course, we should also see if mosques fall under the Faith-Based Initiative too... EDIT: And apologies for the genetically modified foods assumption! :) perma link |
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