Confessions from a Former Right-Wing Republican - Part 1

I started thinking about how good it used to be some years ago when I was a clear-cut, die-hard Rush Limbaugh republican. I belonged. I knew I was right and I knew the other side was dead wrong. There was a clear bold line to not cross, and both God and... Ronald Regan himself were on my side. Even at a young age, that was comforting to me. It was also intellectually stimulating, as I was learning a logic and language and I could argue a lot of points, and where my arguments broke down, I could rely on the obvious attacks of “liberal”, “socialist”, “left-wing”, and “godless”. To make it feel even more "right", I was was taught these things by the people who taught me about God and church. But, even as a little boy – it did not sit right in my soul... and I think that was when my loyalty to the republican party felt its first crack.

I grew up being told that Catholics don’t go to heaven. My father had his reasons, but seemed to hate gospel choirs, Martin Luther King and all black people. I have been told countless times that the King James Version is the only “real” Bible. I’ve heard immigrants labeled as worthless, the poor disregarded as lazy people who deserve what they get and anyone of Middle Eastern dissent as terrorists. Do you see what was offered to me? I was young and needed to belong - and both belonging and being right were mine and all I had to do was just agree with everyone around me. But, it still did not seem to square with most of what I heard about in church. I was just a kid, but it did not seem like Jesus hated so much. Still, I observed that belonging seemed to requrie that we carve out a homogeneous high ground where we feel superior and right – and then systematically use a blade to cut out, and cut off literally millions of people, or worse yet, our next door neighbors, with disdain. And somehow, we do this with a warped gratification like we did God a favor by ridding the world of parts of his created image he mistakenly loved. I know what it's like to grow up in an unsafe storm, but are we so loved deprived that we are willing to have so much hate? Is this part of why America is so divided, where now, as adults, In the midst of living life, we have some 300 million people who are constantly being courted by two polarizing sides – who offer belonging and identity and the satisfaction of being on the right side. This is true in politics, but it’s also with religion… and, according to Jesus, it’s a false choice and a counterproductive allegiance. So, I am no longer a right-wing republican – but I am also not a democrat. It’s not a third party thing, and it’s bigger than populism.

David Dark reminded me in his book The Gospel According To America that “…our desire for a quick fix, a to-do list, or an easy explanation of whom we’re supposed to love and who’s most deserving of our wrath is born of a natural need for meaning and order. We want answers and resolution, and we’ll pledge allegiance to whatever personality or principality can give it to us the quickest.”