It’s interesting to me how people who screamed bloody murder whenever George W. Bush used a phrase that was even vaguely religious have no problem with religious ceremonies, led by clergy, wearing clerical robes, using the traditional forms of the Christian liturgy, to pray to Barack Obama. When I talk about personality cults and political idolatry and the messianic temptation of the Obama campaign, this is the kind of thing I’m thinking of—except a lot worse than anything I’ve thought of to this point.
The great political temptation from which Judaism and Christianity delivered us was the worship of human beings; during the medieval period, whoever came up with the idea of the “divine right of kings” brought that partway back, but never all the way. Now, in their reaction against Christian faith and their denial of their need for a divine Messiah, folks on the Left are trying to turn a Chicago machine politician into a secular messiah. It will never work. Put not your trust in princes.
HT: Kevin Carroll, via Toby Brown
That's pretty disturbing.
To the idea that we were delivered from worshiping human beings I have a lot more to say, but you're right at least that the clear Judeo-Christian intent is that we not do that.
"Deliver us Obama!"
::shudder::
At least I'm semi-consistent I guess. I'm also finding that I feel almost entirely divorced from the two-party system. Sort of like Utah Phillips, who described himself as "fundamentally alienated from the entire institutional structure of society." I'm about there.
If there were anything that looked like a better alternative to the two-party system, I'd be right there, too. I guess I'm stubborn enough, I'm still trying to find ways to purify and fix and work with what we have. It didn't work for the Puritans, in the end, and I don't know that I can think of any cases where it did . . . but like I said, I'm stubborn.
And I'll grant, the deliverance was imperfect, human sin being what it is; but even so, the difference between kings under the biblical law and kings under paganism is nothing less than profound. Moving back that way . . . yeah, "disturbing" is a good word. For starters . . .