How Can a Christian Be in Politics?: A Guide Toward Faithful Politics

by Dan Taylor and Roy Herron

Book Overview

A state senator for Tennessee shares his own experiences and those of others to help Christian assess their own responsibility in politics. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0842381082
• ISBN13: 9780842381086
• Release Date: March 2005
• Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 4.2" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

It works

At one point I figured that as a Christian--maybe even a "progressive" Christian, I could never run for office. Mr. Herron's book told me what I think I already knew: As a Christian whose motivation comes from the Sermon on the Mount, how can one NOT run for office if that is the guidance you feel? I'm on the ballot.

Attention to state politics

Herron gives a heartfelt "yes" to those who question whether liberals' values are Christian values. Although books with this theme are now raining down on us, his should be the first choice for those dealing with politics at the state level. Moreover, it is small and inexpensive--an ideal choice for book "liberations." In answer to McGeehee's question about how to find more of Herron's ideal politicians, I offer this suggestion. Commit to a party; brainstorm with others who share your concern; convince people you admire to run. Those people who say, "I vote for the man not the party," don't understand their duty in helping to find the best candidates possible.

Daniel in the Lion's Den

Herron does not concede reliance on scriptures to biblical literalists, but wades right in, applying both Old and New Testaments to finding guidance for living in the politicized arena. From the Old Testament, he meditates upon the Israelite concept of "shalom", a synonym for wholeness, orderliness, relationship, and peace, the counter-part of which in the New Testament is "eirene", the triangular right relationship of God-to-man and man-to-man. He finds particular inspiration in Jeremiah's commandment to "seek the welfare of the city" and Micah's entreaty to "do justice, and love kindness, and to walk humbly with God", and in Jesus's Sermon on the Mount and his injunction to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, visit the imprisoned, and care for the sick. Such concepts embrace both biblical justice and love. Interspersed with Herron's guidelines are personalized stories that illuminate his points: how medical research saved the lives of his twin sons, clean water legislation as a form of quenching thirst, how visiting prisoners leads to job training, drug treatments, and literacy programs, how legislature on lending rates and usury help the poor. Especially interesting is Herron's expansion of right-to-life concepts beyond the controversies of abortion, in legislation against drunk driving, in favor of seat belts, in police protection against killers or domestic violence, in teen-age gun control, in organ transplants, and in health care delivery. He speaks powerfully in defense of human and constitutional freedoms of worship, assembly, speech, and trial by jury. What a contrast Herron's ideal politician--compassionate, a good listener, patient and forbearing, humble, sacrificial, reverent, able to love enemies, able to cross partisan lines, truthful, courageous, joyful--presents to the manipulative Machiavellian commonplace lawgiver! The only question Herron does not address adequately is how to find such people and how to get them to run for office. Our highlighting of Herron's handy book for Christian politics does him some injustice. He is far less religiously polarized than this synopsis makes him out to be. He is not out to attack the Religious Right. He eschews dogmatism and demands. His mission is to show how Christian faith is relevant to our times. But from our perspective, it is refreshing and reviving to find a rejoicing politician who has not conceded the defining of faithfulness to those seeking to impose their religious convictions upon us and to turn democracy into theocracy. It is delightful to have an alternative deeply-help religious view that does not levitate Levitican legalism above the love of God and the teachings of Jesus. Moses stood upon a mountaintop and delivered good "thou shalt nots", but Jesus stood on a mountaintop and completed the unfinished Mosaic message with great Christian "thou shalts". Senator Herron beckons us to renew our faith and t