A Born-Again Christian's Reasons for Supporting Kerry

A resident of the Tidewater area by the name of Natalie Grayson attended a Kerry Meet-up last night in Norfolk, VA, and spoke to the group about a recent conversation she had with a neighbor who was supporting Bush. The neighbor believes that her Christian faith requires her to vote for Bush. Natalie composed a letter in response to this conversation. Tell me what you think after reading the letter below. (Click on Comment. You can post anonymously.)

Dear ____,

I am an unashamedly, unapologetically, born-again Christian woman. Given this fact, I would like to tell you why a born-again Christian is voting for John Kerry in the 2004 Presidential Election, with scriptural references to support my decision.

Before I begin, please let me clarify that I believe government and religion should be kept separate. I am a person of faith who encourages others to believe in God and trust in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, but I also don’t think any person should force his or her specific religious beliefs on others. Jesus did not demand that the people follow him, but he said “whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely” (Revelation 22:17). That is why God gives us free will. I am not trying to change who you vote for, but I want you to understand the many reasons (not just one or two) why I support John Kerry. My support for John Kerry is based on Matthew 25:44-46 which states, “When Lord did we see you hungry or thirsty, naked, or sick or in prison, and not help? And he will answer, I assure you, when you refused to help the least of these my brothers and sisters; you were refusing to help me. And they will go away into eternal punishment but the righteous will go into eternal life.”

How does this apply to John Kerry?

It applies on the issue of Education. The “No Child Left Behind” program is a wonderful initiative for Public School Education. I support its concept, particularly as a long-time public school educator, to require teachers, principals and administrators to be accountable to the government about how our children are taught. Did you know George Bush and the Republican-majority Congress underfunded the bill by 27 million dollars? Consequently, how can schools provide the services they are mandated to provide without the funds to resource the program? Did you know that many states are opposing out of the law? Why is that? Conversely, I believe John Kerry will fully fund the No Child Left Behind Program.

Jobs are another reason why I support John Kerry. Under the current Administration and the Republican-majority Congress, we have lost over a million jobs. Those job losses I believe are the direct result of the Administration and Republican-controlled Congress’s tax cut philosophy that is clearly targeted to the more wealthy members of our society, which in turn requires cutting funds for federal programs designed to provide jobs for the less privileged. Furthermore, the Administration and Congress appear to support companies who outsource jobs overseas to get cheaper labor and off-shore tax breaks. I realize that no Administration can totally eliminate unemployment, but I strongly believe that the current policies have exacerbated what is already a challenging and very important issue for our country, i.e. improving the quality of life for all Americans, not just the privileged few.

Another reason I support John Kerry is that I believe we need new leadership to address the issue of Health Care. Under the current Administration, an astounding number of Americans, many of whom do work but are in the lower tier economically, either have limited or no health care coverage for themselves and/or their families. I do not expect our President to totally eradicate the Health Care problem just like I don’t expect the President to totally solve the unemployment problem, but he or she should at least have a clear, specific, logical plan that he or she can articulate to the American people as to how he or she plans to address the problem. Can you tell me what President Bush’s plan is, in clear, specific logical terms, to increase health care coverage for those Americans who have very little or no coverage?

An even more specific health care issue that I believe the current Administration has not handled well is Medicare. It is great to have a prescription drug card for senior citizens, but did you know that the administrators of the Medicare system cannot negotiate with drug companies to try to get a cheaper price on medication? If given the option as a consumer, wouldn’t you like the ability to able to shop around to find the best price on something as important as medicine, especially when you are economically underprivileged and have to choose between buying badly needed medicine and food? Therefore, why can’t the administrators of the Medicare system have the ability to shop around to help senior citizens?

I also have a serious issue with the current Administration’s approach to combating terrorism at the cost of basic Civil Rights. The Patriot Act is a fanatic bill to fight terrorism. Did you know that you could be wiretapped if the government believes you might be involved in terrorism? Did you know that your medical records can be released to the government without probable cause? I understand that we live in an era where we have to be more vigilant because terrorism is a global threat, but I also believe we can be vigilant without imposing martial law or the federal government exercising control over individual citizen’s lives that mirrors the Communist philosophy, which former President Reagan, who Mr. Bush has tried to compare himself to, dedicated his life to ending. Do you see a contradiction here?

I also take issue with the current Administration’s policy on Gun Control. I hate guns, but I believe people have the right to bear arms. I believe the Brady Bill requires gun buyers to get a background check and to wait 2 days before getting a gun. However, George Bush is about to let the Brady Bill expire. The majority of the public wants this bill to pass and the Republican Speaker of the House will not even bring it to the floor for vote.

Probably one of the most contentious issues I have with this Administration is the way they handled and are still handling the situation with Iraq, in the name of fighting the war on terrorism. They have tried to scare us into thinking that the war in Iraq and the current post-war situation in Iraq were unavoidable. Iraq did not attack us. We were told that Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). We now know definitively that no WMD has ever been found and that there was no definitive proof at the time our President made the decision to go to war in Iraq. Since he made that critical decision, we have now lost over 1,000 American lives in Iraq, not to mention the lives of citizens from our closest allied countries. No wonder the rest of the world hates us! It was not worth the death toll. I do not have family members that have been killed, although Roger was scheduled to go to Iraq. He has taken a government civil service job instead, but what if one of your family members were assigned to go to Iraq right now? I understand, being married to a military man, that there will always be situations where we have to send our loved ones who choose to serve in the military into harm’s way, but it is also the President’s job to determine whether the goals that will be achieved by military action will be worth the possible economic as well as personal costs (i.e., American lives) that most likely will be incurred. If I am not mistaken, the genesis of the war on terrorism was the tragic event of 9/11, which we are now commemorating three years after that tragic event. If I am not mistaken, I also believe we do have definitive proof that the perpetrator of that horrible act was Osama Bin Laden, which led our President, for which I give him due credit, to launch the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT). However, since then, it seems like he has lost sight of why we started the GWOT. When was the last time you heard or read anything about what the President or the Administration is actively doing to find Osama Bin Laden, who perhaps should more appropriately be referred to these days as “Osama Been Forgotten,” and bring him to justice. As long as he is alive and well, even though we may be finding, capturing and killing little Al-Qaeda cells here and there, it’s like we are trying to kill individual hornets to keep people from being stung when we should be focusing our time and effort on trying to find the hornet’s nest. Does the Administration have any clue where Bin Laden is or could be?

Allow me to share with you another point of departure I have with the current Administration, and this goes right to the heart of the Christian argument, abortion and gay marriage. Regarding abortion, the Sixth Commandment, found in Exodus 20:13, states “Thou shall not kill”, which is what Christians use as a basis for opposing abortion and I agree with. This is squarely, in my opinion, a religious or moral issue, and the Body of Christ, i.e. all churches who preach and teach Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, should be preaching and teaching the gospel. However, I also believe that if our churches and so-called religious people really wanted to stop abortion, they need to do what I believe Jesus Himself would do, that is, minister love to the person that will convict or convince them to change, not condemn them. Are you familiar with the event in the Gospel of John Chapter 8, verses 3-11, where the Pharisees wanted to stone the woman caught in adultery, and how Jesus handled the situation? My point here is that if Christians, who by definition are followers of Jesus Christ, would do what I believe Jesus would do, which is to minister through actionable (key word) love to the women who find themselves in situations that lead to them to have abortions, I believe we as Christians could make a significant impact on reducing the number of abortion cases. The way to reduce if not eliminate abortion, in my opinion, is through showing these women the love of Christ and putting the word of God into action, not by making laws that restrict a woman’s right to choose, which treats the symptom but not the root cause, which like treatment of any disease, will not cure it.

As for gay marriage, I am totally against that also. However, just as with my view on how to reduce if not eliminate abortion, I believe the church’s responsibility is to minister agape love to those who are caught up in the homosexual lifestyle and show them a better way, not discriminate against them or enact laws that divide “us and them”, which I believe is a Pharisee-like approach versus what Jesus would do. Don’t we have enough division in our country today, e.g. race, religion, socioeconomic status, that is not supported by law, that we need to enact legislation that formally institutionalizes more division?

Now that I’ve articulated to you my views on the issues that influence my voting decision, let me talk to you about my views regarding John Kerry, the individual. I strongly believe that our President should be a person with strong leadership qualifications who has good grasp of both domestic and foreign policy issues. This does not mean, by the way, that the President, nor the person the President chooses as his Vice President, must have years of experience in both foreign and domestic policy making to run our country well (Bill Clinton and Al Gore proved that decisively for 8 years), but certainly having a President with both credentials is a great advantage and I believe is very much needed in these perilous times we live in, both in our own country and throughout the world. John Kerry undisputedly has those credentials. He is a proven leader as a Vietnam combat veteran who fought for our country when he could have easily avoided it because of his privileged upbringing. Then, after returning from Vietnam he had the moral courage, as well as the knowledge, to take on the highest levels of government leadership at the time to bring to light the inherent flaws in government foreign policy that influenced the Vietnam conflict, even at the risk of demonizing and consequently alienating some of his fellow veterans, which I truly believe, as he himself said, was never his intention to do. That to me is true leadership and shows understanding of how an Administration’s foreign policy decision affects our country. His 20+ years of service as a Senator working on the Foreign Relations Committee further adds to his foreign policy qualifications. Moreover, he has been a Lieutenant Governor with experience in domestic policy at the state level, so he understands issues like education, jobs and health care. Given these qualifications, I believe he will fully fund No Child Left Behind Program, give tax cuts to the working middle class versus just the privileged upper class, provide healthcare to more people, help to increase jobs, restore our reputation around the world, and has a plan to get us out of the Vietnam-like mess we currently are seeing in Iraq.

Now let me give you my thoughts on Mr. Bush, using the same criteria I use to evaluate John Kerry as a presidential candidate. Back in 2000 when he ran for President, he had the opportunity to show his integrity and his political “calling card,” i.e., his strong Christian convictions, by allowing all of the votes in the entire state of Florida to be recounted. Instead, he went to the Supreme Court to stop what was up until then the foundation of the democratic process, i.e., the way we elect our President, that has made the United States throughout our history the standard-bearer for democracy throughout the world. All he had to do was wait for the results of the recount, and if the results revealed that he had won, then to me it would have shown real character. Even if I did not vote for him, which I did not, I could then respect the fact that he was elected by the people. Since the Supreme Court appointed him, in my opinion, as well as thousands of voters in the state of Florida whose votes were not counted, he is not a legitimate President.

I also find it interesting that Mr. Bush and the Republican Party’s contention on why Mr. Bush is the better choice for President is that John Kerry is indecisive, that he “flip-flops” on his views when it is convenient and advantageous to him. I certainly could understand why that might be a concern if indeed that were based on fact versus political sound byte. With that being said, let’s look at some “facts” regarding Mr. Bush’s leadership and decision making record:

Mr. Bush originally stated, and it is public record, that he said he did not want a commission appointed to look at the events that led up 9/11. It took the persistent voice of 9/11 victim families to go public and force the issue that led to him eventually “give in” and endorse the 9/11 Commission Study. If he was so strong in his convictions that there was no need for a 9/11 Commission, why could he not stand his ground and articulate to the 9/11 victims’ families why he opposed the 9/11 Commission Study?

The 9/11 Commission is just one example of what I perceive to be “flip-flopping” on Mr. Bush’s part. Here are some others:

· Mr. Bush originally said he did not want an Intelligence Director, but then after he was pressured to do so, agreed to appoint a Republican to the post.

· Senator Joe Lieberman, a Democrat who supported much of the Bush Administration’s policies regarding the war on terrorism, recommended the development of a Department of Homeland Security, and Mr. Bush was initially totally against it. However, he later, with some pressure from the media and the public, changed his mind and appointed Tom Ridge.

· In his first presidential campaign he said we would not use our military for nation-building. What are we doing in Iraq today then? I understand that our world has changed since the 2000 election and circumstances often require flexibility in adapting to those changes, but if the circumstances don’t justify the need for that change, then to me the person with the decision-making power that makes such changes appears to be “flip-flopping”.

The punch line I would like to leave you with, as I conclude this letter, goes to the heart of where this conversation started, that is, with the notion that Christians should not be voting for John Kerry and should instead vote for George Bush. The Bible says in the Gospel of Luke, Chapter 12, Verse 48, “To whom much is given, much is required”. In this case, we the American people (or actually the Supreme Court) gave George Bush the chance to make good on his promises that got him elected (excuse me, selected) as our President, with all the privileges that go along with being the President. Mr. Bush said his tax cuts would provide more jobs, yet we have lost more jobs under this Mr. Bush’s leadership than we have since the Herbert Hoover Administration, and while supposedly jobs have been created in the last six months, economists have overwhelmingly agreed that we still have a net job loss since Mr. Bush took office. Therefore I ask you, where are the jobs? He promised in his first campaign that he would enact policies that would make healthcare more affordable and consequently more readily available to more Americans, yet facts and statistics show that fewer Americans, particularly senior citizens and the working poor, can barely afford healthcare or have no healthcare at all. I could go on but hopefully I have articulated well enough to you why I, a born-again Christian, am not voting for George Bush.

I hope our differences of opinion on this matter do not affect our friendship. However, just as you appear to be very strong in your convictions regarding who is best qualified to lead our country, I also have very strong convictions, and even if you feel that my convictions are so wrong that we cannot remain friends, I truly hope and pray that you can at least respect my convictions, as I respect yours.

Yours In Christ,

Natalie