Holy Boldness

Like many people in Washington, I work in politics. I also have a one track mind, so when I was asked to deliver the homily for this evening, the only thing I could think to speak about was politics and faith.

Now, don’t worry; I’m not going to make a plea for Christians to vote for candidates with progressive values. I’ve heard that plea from many others in recent months as I am sure all of you have too. You don’t need to hear it from me.

We have all heard that the nation has become polarized between a secular left on one side and a religious right on the other – in last fall’s election roughly three quarters of evangelical Protestants voted for one candidate while the same rate of Americans with no religious affiliation voted for the other. I don’t know about you, but I don’t belong in either of those groups. The truth is, small as they may be, there are also a religious left and a religious center.

I want to raise a concern that I haven’t heard anyone else address. My concern is not the impact that religion has on the outcome of elections, rather, my concern is about the impact that politics is having on religion in our society. Specifically, I have two concerns: One that the religious center is declining as the place where Americans of all political affiliations can find common ground and two that the non-religious – and those whose faith is not secure – will think that Christianity is an inherently political movement – concerned primarily with the accumulation of power – and that those people will be driven away from our churches rather than being drawn into them.

When I was growing-up in the Methodist church it never occurred to me that there was an inherent connection between religion and party identification. I believed at the time – and I still do believe it was true – that there were both Republicans and Democrats in my church. That is the way it should be. Society needs a place where we can find common ground on values - a place where we can talk about values outside of a political context.

The public discussion should be about how best to address society’s needs. Instead we seem to be moving into an ideological debate. Unfortunately, when we talk about the emergent split, a message is sent about religion that is inherently divisive. The message implicit in the way we talk about religion and politics in society today is that religion divides us. It doesn't have to be that way.

The emergent split of our society along religious and political lines isn’t good for our society and it isn’t good for our churches. This split was engineered for political purposes. It will take determination to reverse the trend.

The good news is that our Methodist tradition offers guidance as to how to respond to this situation. The answer is holy boldness – a favorite phrase of John Wesley’s – we know he used it in at least three of his sermons. Holy Boldness is being a Christian with integrity no matter what the challenges or circumstances. Holy boldness can be understood in terms of walking the walk and talking the talk.

Usually people are criticized for talking the talk without living the life they claim to live – the walking part of the analogy. In the Methodist churches where I have worshipped over the years I have often heard encouragements to do more to walk the walk – always good advice, but in my experience, we do O.K. at walking the walk. We don’t do so much talking the talk. We need to do more

My experience has been that there is a tendency not to speak openly about faith outside of church in our community of Methodists. I think other communities display this tendency, especially other mainline Christians. While I am sure this tendency is born in part out of genuine humility, it has also contributed to making the left and center of Christianity invisible. We need to raise our profile to show wider society that Christianity is more than just the religious right. We need to show that there is a vibrant religious center where people with different political identities and objectives can find common ground.

Learning holy boldness – in both words and deeds – has not come naturally to me. Indeed, I have far to go. I grew-up in a community that treated religion has a private matter. I am learning to be comfortable speaking-up, but I do believe it is important to do so. I do believe that holy boldness includes talking the talk, and that may be our most important contribution to the world right now.

In closing, from now on when I am confronted - either by those from the secular left, who believe that Christians do not truly love humanity, or by those from the religious right, who believe that progressives do not have faith, or even by those in the middle who feel they cannot reconcile their faith with their politics, I will speak up – with holy boldness – and say: “I am a believer. I feel the love of Jesus Christ and a love for humanity and it motivates and informs my actions in the world.”