{"id":11611,"date":"2012-06-25T13:00:36","date_gmt":"2012-06-25T17:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/?p=11611"},"modified":"2012-06-20T19:03:31","modified_gmt":"2012-06-20T23:03:31","slug":"11-reasons-never-discuss-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/11-reasons-never-discuss-politics\/","title":{"rendered":"11 Reasons Why I Never Discuss Politics"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

This is a guest post by Sam Riviera. He\u00a0spends most of his time and energy caring for others in his community so that through his life and actions they might see Jesus. On Grace Ground, he has written a series of post providing practical advice for being the church in your community<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you would like to write a guest post for this blog, check out the guidelines here.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cSomeone\u2019s knocking on the front door.\u00a0 You\u2019d better answer it,\u201d my mother told my father.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one we know comes to our front door,\u201d my father replied.\u00a0 \u201cBesides, it\u2019s almost dark and it’s Sunday.\u201d<\/p>\n

The knocking continued and grew louder.\u00a0 Finally my father answered the door.\u00a0 I saw the expression on his face before I saw who was at the door.\u00a0 I immediately knew trouble was standing at our front door.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell aren\u2019t ya\u2019 gonna\u2019 invite us in?\u201d several voices asked almost in unison.<\/p>\n

A few moments later a carload of my mother\u2019s relatives poured into our living room.\u00a0 They were just returning from a big family get-together at my great grandmother\u2019s – the big get-together they had every four years on the Sunday before the presidential election.<\/p>\n

\"Nixon<\/p>\n

The Pope Is Gonna\u2019 Be Runnin\u2019 The Country<\/h2>\n

The year was 1960.\u00a0 The date was November 6, two days before the country would decide if John Kennedy or Richard Nixon would be our next president.<\/p>\n

We attended most family functions, but never the political ones.<\/p>\n

My father came from a political family.\u00a0 His father had been a career politician.\u00a0 Spell that D-e-m-o-c-r-a-t.\u00a0 My father married into a very conservative, religious, rabidly Republican family that equated their politics with their religion.\u00a0 They knew about my grandfather, the D-e-m-o-c-r-a-t.\u00a0 (Good Christian folks shouldn\u2019t say dirty words like Democrat, so they spelled it out.)<\/p>\n

Since John Kennedy, both a Democrat and a Catholic (gasp!) would be on the ballot in two days, the family had decided to send a delegation to convince my father to vote for Nixon, since they assumed he was planning to vote for Kennedy.<\/p>\n

My father loved my mother and didn\u2019t want to offend her family, so he suffered through almost three hours of a tirade that equated Kennedy with Satan, Democrats with Satan worshipers, and voting for any Democrat with voting for Satan himself.<\/p>\n

A Straight Ticket<\/h2>\n

Apparently unknown to my mother\u2019s relatives, my father was a moderate, as well as a devout Christian.<\/p>\n

When he came home from work two days later, my mother asked him if he had voted.<\/p>\n

\u201cYep.\u00a0 A straight ticket.\u201d<\/p>\n

We all knew what that meant.\u00a0 He hadn\u2019t been planning to vote a straight ticket, but my mother\u2019s relatives had convinced him to vote against every one of their candidates.<\/p>\n

Never Discuss Politics<\/h2>\n

Undoubtedly my views on discussing politics, especially in a religious context, hark back to that gray Sunday afternoon in November of 1960.\u00a0 I refuse to discuss politics, not only because of that memory, but also for at least eleven additional reasons:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. I think that your political opinions are none of my business and that my political opinions are none of your business.<\/li>\n
  2. In my opinion, following Jesus does not translate into voting for or against certain candidates or issues.\u00a0 For me, following Jesus means researching the candidates and issues and voting as I think best, not as someone else thinks I should vote.<\/li>\n
  3. As a follower of Jesus, I believe God is in control and does not need you to convince me how to vote or me to convince you how to vote.<\/li>\n
  4. Since I believe God is in control I don\u2019t place nearly as much importance in election results as do many other people.<\/li>\n
  5. People who know my political opinions want me to give money and time to their political cause.\u00a0 I choose to give my money and time to people in need.<\/li>\n
  6. Political discussions often turn people away from Christians and the church.<\/li>\n
  7. Many people find political discussions offensive.<\/li>\n
  8. Political discussions usually focus on candidates, political parties and issues.\u00a0 I have never heard any political discussion focus on loving people.<\/li>\n
  9. Political discussions focus on solving our problems at the ballot box, instead of depending on the Christ we follow.<\/li>\n
  10. Political discussions rarely focus on Jesus, but instead tend to turn people away from Jesus.<\/li>\n
  11. Political discussions often make me dislike my neighbor, rather than love my neighbor, as Jesus commanded.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The only thing I ever heard my mother\u2019s conservative, religious relatives get worked up about was politics.\u00a0 It was never \u00a0Jesus.\u00a0 It was never loving their neighbor.\u00a0 It was never helping the poor. \u00a0It was Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon and others.<\/p>\n

    I\u00a0 was always under the impression that politics was their real religion.<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Who do you follow? \u2013 The god of politics or Jesus?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

    \n

     <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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