These shores have seen both extremes; from John Winthrop’s theocratic rule in seventeenth century Massachusetts to the federal courts of today ruling that any reference to God in the public square is an endorsement of a particular religion and therefore a breach of law.

Give us time; I have faith in the American experiment. I have faith that we’ll grow up and find a fulcrum point.

Remember also that Huckabee is a politician and will say what’s expedient for the particular audience at hand. Remember also that history shows that when politicians are not kissing babies, they’re stealing their candy.

(I know that paragraph probably horrifies some folks, but so be it. All I mean is, I see the point of the questions.)

On the other hand, I think that political candidates, no less than any other citizens, have the right to practice and advocate for their chosen religion (or no religion) as they see fit, so long as they do not violate the laws of this country in doing so. (In other words, a practicing bigamist who has multiple spouses out of religious belief on the matter is a law-breaker. Likewise, if a candidate has participated in an honor killing, or has sacrificed animals in religious rituals, or seeks to prevent women or ethnic minorities or non-landowners from voting because they subscribe to the Federal Vision promoters’ religious beliefs, I would absolutely oppose them as fit candidates for public office.)

While I don’t see having signed the Baptist Faith and Message as a particular indicator that Huckabee would seek to abridge of freedom for women outside of religious institutions, I can see why non-Christians would have trouble being similarly assured. Abridgment of freedom is exactly that, and any hint that a candidate believes an entire class of people shouldn’t be just as free as everybody else (in the Baptist Faith and Message case, it’s women’s freedom) when it comes to his religion, are is going to prompt some people to ask how he reconciles those religious restrictions with upholding and defend the Constitution vis a vis women’s freedom.

I talked to a good friend of mine, a political junkie finishing his PhD in early United States history. I asked him if my observation was totally off-base, and he tended to agree with me (actually said it was as bad as it’s been since the Civil War!).

Throughout history, Christianity’s strength has often shone most when it has contrasted with the dominant culture; not in the sense of being strange or anachronistic, but when providing a corrective, relevant, and truthful alternative to some of the darkness around. I might be an hopeless idealist, but maybe we have a real opportunity to shine by showing the character of Christ in our public discourse instead of taking the seemingly more expedient roads of character assasination, hyperbole, innacurate research, etc. That doesn’t mean giving up on principles or being silent in the public square; it means being appropriately bold – and humble.

Regarding Huckabee, I am disappointed by the pervasiveness of the complementarian theology that his denomination and so many others espouse, and wish that he would (could?) have come out as a strong egalitarian. I think the doctrine is harmful and unnecessarily alienating. However, I know God also works in even the most imperfect circumstance.

One point I haven’t seen much here: we are reacting to a theological hole in Huckabee’s response that is of real concern to us. But for me this point, while worthy of exploration, misses a bigger one: the purpose of the question itself. The question was chosen to challenge Huckabee to defend his ability to lead as a Christian. Now, this particular point of theology is problematic, but the questions could have as easily dealt with hot buttons like creation, sexual morality, or eternal destiny. Am I the only one who identified with his faith as a whole being made an issue, despite my disagreement on the point at hand?

For that matter, none of you have that kind of information about me, and I don’t have it about you, either. I don’t think we can afford to write off members of Christ’s body simply because we differ seriously with them politically.

I think Huckabee waffled pretty badly on the Baptist Faith and Message question, but that’s not enough for me to legitimately decide that he’s not my brother in Christ, nor is his questionable political behavior. And while I have serious issues with both Clinton and Obama (and with everyone else who’s running, actually), if they profess faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior (and I have seen documentation that Clinton, Huckabee, and Obama have indeed done that), then I actually know more about the three of them than I do about some of the people posting here. I don’t mean that you don’t trust in Christ, only that I haven’t read anywhere specifically that you do.

All this to say, I have a problem with informal heresy trials and excommunications by people against other people they’ve never even met and with whom they’ve never interacted in Christian community. Who am I, or who is any one of us, to declare that a professing Christian isn’t, in fact, my brother or sister in Christ? Am I God, to declare a brother or sister outside the body of Christ when they profess the same faith that I do?

I take that issue very seriously. Too many faithful people have paid the price of martyrdom down through the ages because some have decided that they’re heretics just because of faithfully-held beliefs that differed in some way from the status quo beliefs. I’m not going to recite the very lengthy list of the sects and notable individuals who have been declared damned and who died at the hands of fellow Christians.

One thing to note (with great fear and trembling): the fact that someone identifies with a church or proclaims oneself to be a Christian does not mean that one is a Christian. Having said that, I want to make it clear that I am in no way casting aspersions on the personal faith of either Obama or the Clintons. That is between them and God. However, in the public position they and Huckabee have put themselves in, it is entirely appropriate to scrutinize their policy stands, records, views, and characters.

I don’t know enough about Hillary to proclaim her a sister in Christ, but I do know that God calls me to be fair, humble and loving in my approach, especially where I disagree. The same standard should apply to those who pronounce their faith and disagree with me, but the fact that they don’t always follow it doesn’t release me from my obligation to God in how I deal with them (as part of that vast right-wing conspiracy(apparently), that can be hard to swallow sometimes.

As a side note: a book of interest from the other side of the fence is The Right Women: A Journey Through the Heart of Conservative America by Elinor Burket. A self-proclaimed liberal journalist doing some actual investigation into ‘the other side.’ Some of her conclusions and definitions may be a bit iffy (in my humble opinion), but a noteworthy effort, with real insight into personal and ideological bias. Anyone else familiar?

But that’s an aside.

The ‘mainstream’ view of the husband as providing ‘servant leadership’ is so much ‘twaddle.’ The Bible has nothing like the modern popular concept of ‘leadership’ but confines itself to ‘servant.’ I am disheartened when I see the church ape business and political fashion and talk, teach, and discuss ‘leadership’ when the New Testament consistently calls us to self-denying avoidance of titular primacy and to substitute service-ambition.

If we all lived to serve and taught that ministry, not leadership, was a Christian value, the silly and oxymoronic idea of ‘servant-leader’ would go away.