Huckabee, a Baptist minister, delivered a sermon on how to be part of "God's Army" to a small evangelical congregation in New Hampshire. Huckabee's campaign did not allow cameras into the church and there was no appeal for votes in the sermon. But a church official invited members to attend a Huckabee rally where free clam chowder was served and they couldsee actor Chuck Norris. Some quotes from the article:
"When you give yourself to Christ, some relationships have to go," he said. "It's no longer your life; you've signed it over."
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"When we become believers, it's as if we have signed up to be part of God's Army, to be soldiers for Christ," Huckabee told the enthusiastic audience.
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Likening service to God to service in the military, Huckabee said "there is suffering in the conditioning for battle" and "you obey the orders."
There, in just these few words, is the authoritarian mentality that tells believers they've joined an army, "soldiers for Christ," and having given yourself to Christ, it's no longer your life, "you've signed it over," and you should "obey orders."
And don't forget the company Huckabee keeps.
UPDATE:
PZ has another Huckabee quote:
"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution," Huckabee told a Michigan audience on Monday. "But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view."
Is a comment necessary?
I'll have to try that quote on some Christians.
2 comments:
OK, I didn't do a particularly good job answering your question. This was my main point, but first I have to clarify that Huckabee is at the bottom of my list of candidates.
So long as a candidate is committed to using the normal Constitutional process, whatever they say does not alarm me all that greatly. I am not afraid of opposing viewpoints, and would not be disturbed by a candidate advocating the opposite, ie., an amendment to force all states to allow homosexual marriage.
What troubles me is politicians who attempt to subvert this process by appointing judges amenable to their specific issues or creating bureaucracies outside voter control to direct policy.
Huckabee may talk God, more so than other candidates, but he doesn't strike me as a raving fundamentalist. In fact, he is having problems with support from his own SBC because he fell on the "wrong" side when fundamentalists were trying to take over back in the '90s.
He's clearly Christian, and I do not doubt that. I have very a very different philosophy of government than he does and I don't know how many more issues he can flip flop on before even is staunchest supporters will begin to leave him behind.
For those who might find this first part of Dana's comment cryptic: "I didn't do a particularly good job answering your question," because you won't find Dana answering any question elsewhere on my blog. You have to go to Dana's blog where I've been testing Dana's reaction to Huckabee's statements by asking Dana what she thinks about them.
I may pick up on the rest of this later.
Dana's blog is Principled Discovery, a home schooling blog.
I left some comments on Dana's post, Adventures in fundamentalism, and here.
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