From The New York Times, 10/16/04:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/16/politics/campaign/16christian.html
By NEELA BANERJEE
MADISON, Wis. -
The efforts of conservative Christians to mobilize voters against
same-sex marriage and abortion and in support of President Bush have
stirred a growing backlash among more liberal believers.
And they are taking their cues from the religious right.
Members of the First Unitarian Society here, Claire Box and Linda Knox
are part of a broad effort by moderate and liberal religious people to
register voters, especially in swing states like Wisconsin and in poor
areas with low voter participation.
One autumn morning, the women went to neighboring Madison Town and
stepped out into the parking lot of the Maple Glen apartments, home to
working-class and poor families, hoping to find new voters. In
minutes, those people found them.
"Can I vote?" Tracy Briggs, 26, asked Ms. Box, balancing her baby
nephew on her hip.
Soon, Ms. Briggs's younger sister, Tyree, 24, told Ms. Knox that she,
too, needed to register.
Then came Clarence Martin, 48, a meat plant worker.
None voted in 2000.
All were determined to vote on Nov. 2.
Ms. Knox has not been so politically active in 30 years.
But as is the case with so many fellow volunteers, the politics of
conservative Christians and President Bush have taken her to places
like Maple Glen, she said.
"The religious right is defining what it means to be a patriotic
American, and they're patriotic because they believe in their God,
they have Bush, and they are convinced they have the answer," Ms. Knox
said later.
"But as Unitarians, we don't believe there is a single right answer."
Long scattered and out of the limelight, some liberal believers, led
by Christian groups, said they saw this election as the first step to
regroup and take back an agenda and a faith that they believe the
religious right has hijacked.
Liberal preachers are barnstorming the country, telling Christians
that they are not alone in their moderate views or their questioning
of the government.
Parishioners are registering people in their congregations, going door
to door in their communities and enlisting volunteers to get out the
vote.
No one says these Christians are as well organized, well financed or
politically formidable as conservative Christians.
But they are rousing people, mainly in areas that lean Democratic,
around issues of social justice like the environment, the war and,
most often, poverty.
"In this election, some religious voices say all our beliefs can be
boiled down to - I'd say strangled by - two hot-button issues,
abortion and gay rights," the Rev. Jim Wallis, convener and president
of Call to Renewal, said in a sermon here.
Mr. Wallis, whose group is committed to reducing poverty, added:
"We have Southern Baptists who wear buttons that say, 'Vote your
values.' I say, 'Vote all your values.' The cries of the poor ring
from cover to cover in my Bible. God hears the cries of the poor. Do
we?"
The effects of the efforts will not be known until after Nov. 2,
because registration continues in some states like Wisconsin through
Election Day.
Yet, a partial picture is emerging.
In Dane County, home to Madison, the nonpartisan but mostly liberal Go
Vote coalition has registered 20,000 voters, many of them low-income.
The Gamaliel Foundation, a grassroots interfaith organization,
estimated that it had registered 44,000 people through its Rolling
Thunder voter campaign in 18 states.
That includes more than 17,000 in the Detroit metropolitan region, or
more than 1 of every 10 among the 100,000 new voters registered in
southern Michigan this year, the campaign director, Laura Barrett,
said.
In Minnesota, the state's Baptist Convention, an affiliation of black
churches, led a coalition that has registered more than 10,500 voters,
said the Rev. David L. Everett, program coordinator.
Through its Let Justice Roll antipoverty network, the National Council
of Churches said it had registered more than 100,000 voters, with
40,000 in Oregon.
Though the groups say they are exceeding their targets, their numbers
are modest compared to bigger, better financed efforts like Rock the
Vote by MTV.
That effort says it has signed up almost 1.4 million voters.
Conservative Christians say their more liberal counterparts pose no
threat.
Their activism is too weak to slow the momentum of the evangelical
movement, said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council,
a conservative group.
"Historically, what they advocate is a nondescript position devoid of
any values, including principles in Scripture," he said.
"It's hard to get people excited about mush."
+--+
| Hezbollah endorses George W. Bush: http://www.hezbollah.ws/
| http://sf.irk.ru/www/ot3/otiii-gif.html -- Scientology crime syndicate
| "And his daughter drips semen relentlessly." - Molina
+--+
.
|
