Hunger, Heaven, and Hell

It's possible to worship God when you are afraid. But in fretfulness, I find it hard to pray. My dread can suffocate my prayer. I’m not proud of that. This humbles me before those who have a steel-hard spiritual strength that I lack. It forces me to reckon my own sin in one of its shapes, fear. Judge me or don't. Your call.

It’s possible to worship God when you are hungry. I have worshiped in hunger and thirst. But in those times I had chosen to be hungry and thirsty. It may be that hunger creates in the poor such dread that, like me in fretfulness, they find it hard to pray. And hunger alone might come between creator and creature. To be hungry is to be in danger of losing sight of God. Judge the hungry or don’t. Your call.

I don't have children. So my ability to worship while my daughter groans in her sleep for lack of food is entirely hypothetical. So I cannot judge the man with a hungry daughter who cannot lift his eyes to God.

This is a beautiful prayer, the beauty of which I would not wish on anyone:

     My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
        Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?
     O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer;
        and by night, but find no rest. [Psalm 22:1-2 (NRSV).]


1. Helping the rich, hurting the poor.

That prayer might soon be the anthem of many hearts among America’s poor. An element of the House of Representatives has killed the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (food stamps).

But they gave billions of dollars to Big Agribusiness – $195 billion over 10 years.


2. Hurt has its reasons.

Many if not most of these members of Congress confess Christ. So I am enjoined from hating them. But if I could ask them a question, it would be this: Congressmen, how do you beautify helping the rich and hurting the poor? What is the biblical lipstick you put on your legislative pig? Is it Matthew 13:12?

For to those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. [NRSV]

I would say, Jesus did not mean that men and women of power in our time should add to corporations’ fleets of jets at the same time that they put discount bakery-remainders above the grasp of a poor family. Jesus was talking about understanding.

I would urge them, Get that; that is a prayer my for you: get understanding. Your authority is greater than mine, but I will seek it, too.

3. Hearing from heaven and hell.
I am unlikely ever to be among members of Congress, such that we could share what we know about God. But in my place and time, I might share my ideas with Christian men and women who might share such ideas back at me.

And when two or three are gathered in his name, Jesus is there. I hope he brings Lazarus, from his parable, who was poor, who had sores that dogs licked, who did not get even crumbs from the rich man’s table, who’s door he starved at. Lazarus suffered in his lifetime, but now he gets every good thing in heaven. And maybe Lazarus will pray his own gospel story into the hearts and minds of we who speak together about hunger. Lazarus stands for the poor and desperate in Jesus’s Palestinian days and in our present time.

But if Jesus does not bring Lazarus, maybe he will bring up from hell the other character in that parable – the rich man, who did not love Lazarus, who did not help him, who suffers now, who suffers unbearable thirst, who will suffer forever. Maybe, from the rich man’s mouth, in which lack of spittle makes his mucous congeal into tiny, sharp pebbles, he will rasp a warning not to enjoy our prosperity as if God had prospered us only for ourselves. Not that Jesus wants the rich to have less; he wants the poor to have more. He wants them not to be hungry.


4. Where Jesus will be.

After food stamps are cut off, if that is the final outcome, Jesus will be in America. Jesus will be among the poor, just as he was among the poor of Israel two-thousand years ago. In that time, he did not enter a palace until it was time to die.

And for every man, woman, and child who suffers, Jesus will know their suffering as if it were his own. It will be his own. When we afflict the poor, we afflict Christ. Isn't that revealed in the nature of a brother, a father, who loves perfectly?


5.  Prayer.

Jesus, pray Lazarus into our hearts. Amen.

Capsizing

1. Ships that can’t be righted.

A large capsized ship can’t be righted.

As a wave pushes a ship over, it’s crew might hold their breath in mute terror, waiting to see if the ship reaches the point of no return, the point when all is lost. Sometimes the ship returns to upright to take on the next wave. Sometimes it doesn’t.

I say this because the right wing in America risks to capsize the country. It risks this for political gain. The odd thing is that they seem to think that when they capsize the country, only the Democrats will get wet.

2. Capsizing the economy.

So with the debt ceiling.

The dollar is the world’s premier currency. It has rivals in the yen (Japan), the yuan (China), and the euro (Europe). China, particularly, agitates for countries to "balance" their foreign reserve holdings with other currencies aside from the dollar. China hopes to start a trend that ends the dollar’s supremacy.

China has allies in America. They aren’t moles in banks who cut secret, treasonous deals for their own enrichment. They are the Republicans in Congress.

Congressional Republicans are holding the debt ceiling hostage to their own uncompromising position on debt. They use the vote to raise the debt ceiling as leverage to get their way -- and get their way 100% -- on the budget.

The debt ceiling is the legal amount of indebtedness that America can have. If we reach our statutory debt limit, we cannot borrow more. Then, we cannot pay our debts. We’ll default on something: our sovereign debt (what creditor countries lend to us); soldiers’ salaries; social security checks. The damage from this will ripple through the economy.

Ripple might not be the right word. Tsunami might be more correct.

The Economist is a socially-liberal but fiscally-conservative magazine ("newspaper" in British English). They champion debt reduction. They have criticized Obama for not doing enough about debt. Even this week they said, "Mr. Obama had been deplorably insouciant about he medium-term picture, repeatedly failing in his budgets and his state-of-the-union speeches to offer any path to a sustainable deficit."

But here’s what The Economist says in an article in this week’s magazine called "Shame on them."

This newspaper has a strong dislike of big government; we have long argued that the main way to right America’s finances is through spending cuts. But you cannot get there without any tax rises. In Britain, for instance, the coalition government aims to tame its deficit with a 3:1 ratio of cuts to hikes. America’s tax rate is at its lowest level for decades: even Ronald Reagan raised taxes when he needed to do so.

Here’s more from The Economist:

And the closer you look, the more unprincipled the Republicans look. Earlier this year House Republicans produced a report noting that an 85%-15% split between spending cuts and tax rises was the average for successful fiscal consolidations, according to historical evidence. The White House is offering an 83%-17% split (hardly a huge distance) and a promise that none of the revenue increase will come from higher marginal rates, only from eliminating loopholes. If the Republicans were real tax reformers, they would seize this offer.

The Economist expects serious damage to the economy when America defaults on its debt.

The Obama administration proposed an 83%-17% ratio of cuts to increases. They basically said Yes to the Congressional Republicans’ own proposal. But The Republicans wouldn’t take Yes for an answer. They walked out of discussions.

The New York Times speculated that the Republicans might want to exploit, for political gain, the economic turmoil that will come after a debt-ceiling default. That might be. They might stick to that plan, unless they can get something better. If they follow that plan, then they are making all of us – all of us who aren’t rich – unfortunate pawns in their grand strategy to rise to the top.

3. Capsizing political debate.

The Russian-roulette game over our economy isn’t the only way that the right wing gladly risks disaster.

Political debate is in recent years sullied. But Republican leaders and Republican media reached a new low by whipping up fervor against "death panels" in the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare" to its detractors).

Nobody can point to death panels in that bill, because they aren’t there. The closest thing to that was a part of the law (taken out) that paid doctors to do what they have been doing for free: advising patients about end-of-life choices.

Most people don’t want to be irretrievably comatose and on a feeding tube or a heart-lung machine. Advanced directives that come from these doctor-patient discussions keep a patient’s children or spouse from being burdened with the guilt or expense of making that decision without a clear statement of the patient’s preference.

Accusing the Democrats of legislating "death panels" to "pull the plug on grandma" so poisoned political conversation in this country that I don’t know that it ever can recover. It went far toward capsizing political debate.

4. Capsizing the legitimacy of the Republic.

And Republican media and Republican politicians take aim at the Republic itself. Republican governor of Texas Rick Perry talks about seceding from the Republic. Here’s a guy who literally would fight to keep "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance; "indivisible"– not so much.

This attitude has trickled down. On Facebook, I have seen a post that compares democracy to two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.

It’s funny in its way, but it’s more frightening than funny. After all, democracy is fair, and fair is the opposite of wolflike-ness. It’s the ultimate way that a government can have legitimacy. Democracy reflects the will of the people – or at least most of the people. That’s right and just. It’s more right and just than any other form of government.

And there are safeguards against the so-called tyranny of the majority. Under the Constitution, majority rule is subject to checks and balances. The Supreme Court can declare laws unconstitutional – as might happen to the Health Care Reform Act, which will one day come before the Supreme Court. And before a bill can become law, it has to pass in the House of Representatives (where congressmen are elected by districts that have roughly equal population to each other – this give more power to large states); and the Senate (where each state gets two Senators – this gives more relative power to citizens of smaller states). Then, usually, the President has to sign a bill into law (but Congress can override his veto).

This is the most perfect (but not perfect) form of government. Other forms are less fair.

And we have a vigorous press in which all opinions can be expressed, And, compared to most of the world, we have little official corruption.

But the right wing is revving its chain saw at the base of the living American tree – disputing the fairness of our democracy – because they aren’t happy with political outcomes. When they do that, the right wing risks much to our Republic. Because when people dispute our Republic’s legitimacy, when they urinate on our Constitution, they weaken the Republic. But the right wing seems willing to risk this capsize.

5. Capsizing justice and political restraint.

As much as the right challenges the legitimacy of government under Obama, the real scandals of governance have taken place under Republicans.

In the Bush administration, U.S. Attorneys asserted that they were fired for partisan reasons. David Iglesias, for example, refused to politicize prosecutions. He said under oath that Republican politicians directed him to target Democratic officeholders because they were Democratic officeholders. When he refused, he was fired. The U.S. Department of Justice Inspector General backs his assertion.

An official from the Bush administration asserted her Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate herself in the investigation of the U.S. Attorney-firing scandal. After getting immunity, she admitted to feloniously using political criteria to fill non-political Justice Department jobs. She also testified that many Bush-administration officials had lied under oath about the U.S. Attorney-firing scandal.

The Wisconsin Republican governor and the Wisconsin Republican legislature passed a law to weaken public-employee unions. Now, there is in Wisconsin no counterweight to corporate money. Other Republican states are following.

Under Bush, America was Ukraine. And under Republican governors, Ukraine continues among us.

6. Capsizing freedom of speech.

A former ambassador investigated the charges that Iraq had sought uranium yellow-cake from Niger. He published an editorial in the New York Times that accused the Bush White House of knowingly lying to the American people. In fact, the Bush White House did not know of his report; the report didn’t travel up from the CIA, which had sent him on his fact-finding mission.

But that’s not the point. The point is that high Bush-administration officials swiftly retaliated against the former ambassador by disclosing to several reporters that his wife was a CIA employee –Valerie Plame. Right-wing columnist Robert Novak outed her. In fact, Valerie Plame was a covert operative who specialized in nuclear proliferation. America became less safe after she could no longer do her job.

7. Speak up!

Some of my right-wing friends are adamant that Muslims must renounce the terrorists who share some form of their own religion. Where are my right-wing friends when their political brethren threaten our welfare and disparage our Constitution?

Unless you hate Obama more than you love America, speak up.

________________________________

Selected sources.

A conservative columnist for the New York Times says that Republicans should shake hands with Obama and declare victory on the budget. He says they’re nuts not to:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/05/opinion/05brooks.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

A neutral referee discusses so-called "death panels" in the Health Care Reform Act. It’s hogwash:

http://www.factcheck.org/2009/08/palin-vs-obama-death-panels/

Governor Perry wants to lower Old Glory in Texas forever:

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/04/17/0417gop.html

U.S. Department of Justice Inspector General report on the firing of U.S. Attorneys. It says Rove and others wouldn’t cooperate with investigators about the firing of U.S. Attorney David Iglesias:

http://www.justice.gov/oig/special/s0809a/final.pdf

See, especially, p. 186-187; 190

U.S. Department of Justice official Monica Goodling invokes the Fifth Amendment in Congressional hearings.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/26/AR2007032600935.html

Monica Goodling admits using political criteria to fill non-political Justice Department jobs:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/23/AR2007052300728.html

The outing of Valerie Plame (Book):

James B. Stewart, Tangled Webs (The Penguin Press 2011)