Mixed Bag

The following is addressed to my conservative evangelical friends:

First of all, I want to be perfectly clear: I, too, lament the fact that one of Obama's first acts as president was to sign a bill which would rescind the Mexico City Policy thereby providing funding for abortions overseas. I believe abortion to be one of the greatest evils on the face of the earth and that history will one day prove pro-life advocates to be in line with civil rights leaders, abolitionists, and the best of humanitarians. On this particular issue I strongly disagree with the Obama administration although I applaud his efforts to work with both conservatives and liberals on promoting realistic measures to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies and abortions -- primarily by fighting poverty.

That being said, I am disturbed by all of the conservatives who have already begun to gripe about the new administration. Obama's first act was to set a deadline for the closing of Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. Gitmo, most Americans do not realize, is an icon of American oppression to the rest of the world. Our ideal of presumed innocence is flaunted as the world hears stories of innocent victims incarcerated without an opportunity to defend themselves. Gitmo is a blight on our ideals as a nation; the world sees this and rightly calls us hypocritical. Human rights activists the world over are rejoicing that this emblem of oppression is coming to an end. Christians would do well to join the chorus.

Obama's second act as president was to outlaw the practice of water-boarding, overturn the Bush administration's lax approach to torture, and align America once again with the Geneva Convention. Once again, human rights advocates rejoice. Americans are a people who abhor torture in all of its forms and condemn countries like China who, behind closed doors, practice such methods of interrogation. Obama rightly believes that we must "reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals" and that America's founders understood that "our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint." (By the way, I heard Bill O'Reilly -- that great Bible-believing Christian -- claim that we DO have to sacrifice our ideals for safety).

As Christians, no leader will always reflect the kingdom. We must prophetically condemn that which does not align itself with the sanctity of human life and conservatives are right to grieve over the fact that American money will be used to fund abortions overseas. But let us also rejoice. Let us rejoice that the sanctity of human life is also being uplifted by this administration through its opposition to dark rooms, imprisonment without trial, and torture. Politics will always be a mixed bag for us who know who the true King of Kings is, but let's at least put aside our party lines when we see progress made in the battle for human dignity.