Several clarifications on this church and 501(c)3 stuff and what I think about it, sorry this has been too long in coming, I'm just swamped with work and school.
Suffice to say:
1. I probably spoke too soon about the Mormons. As much as I hate the idea of spending church money on those ads, it was legal for them to do so. Probably it should remain so. I have a basic mistrust of the idea of 501(c)3s using their money to lobby for things and tend to think lobbying groups should be separate from religious and charitable organizations so that you can give to the second without giving to the first. But that's not the way the law is written and I think most people would probably disagree with me.
I know a little bit about lobbying, what works and what doesn't, and I think a vast majority of lobbying money and efforts are for all practical purposes wasted. I think the UUA and the UU organizations that do it could be actually helping people with the money and time they spend on it. If nothing else, it doesn't encourage me to give them any money.
The Mormons spent a lot of money that could have done a lot of good, but their ads were effective in getting the legislation they wanted. Yet at the same time, I wonder if ten years from now even they will consider it a good investment.
2. As much as I hate it when UUs say "People are suffering, clearly we should lobby the government to do something about that" rather than trying to solve the problem themselves, that also is legal. Things do happen in UU churches sometimes that run afoul of the law as written, but we don't make a habit of it. Yes, most of us could string together a few anecdotes and make it SOUND like a habit, but a few anecdotes in a lifetime of churchgoing does not a habit make.
3. The stories written by life-long Mormons who are leaving the church over the proposition 8 issue break my heart and I hate to think we do that to people on the other side politically, though I know we do.
4. I agree with Joel that UUs, particularly President Sinkford, have gone over the line in the past in delineating "good people who agree with me vs. everybody else who is racist/classist/all around stupid/evil." Joel's example of Sinkford writing that those who agree with him on illegal immigration are "people of conscience", and are "called to acknowledge that racism has blinded most Americans" seems a good example to me.
I would never want such statements to be in themselves a violation of our tax status, but I really think they suck and do more damage to the church than most people who agree with them realize.
5. I think lobbying gives us something to point to that "We" are doing to help those in need without actually doing any work.
So I hope that helps. I should have been clearer on some of that stuff from the beginning.
CC
17 comments:
I think I pretty much agree with CC here, and my main comment would probably be that "things that suck" should always be a far larger category than "things that break the law."
In what context did Sinkford say that? I think Joel indicated that the capacity in which the person speaks makes a huge difference. If he is just speaking as Reverend Sinkford and speaking his mind, surely he is as entitled to do that as anyone.
Notice that it IS possible for two "persons of conscience" to disagree.
Oops, sorry, I get it now...yeah, slave traders aren't typically people of conscience...
3. The stories written by life-long Mormons who are leaving the church over the proposition 8 issue break my heart and I hate to think we do that to people on the other side politically, though I know we do.
This is at the heart of why I will not join any UUA-affiliated church.
Do you think there are any political stances that may be fundamentally incompatible with the core values and precepts of a faith, or can all of these be subsumed under Biden's pro-choice Catholicism (i.e., "I personally think X is wrong and wouldn't do it because my faith forbids it, but I don't think the law should prohibit X")?
Joe, the quotes about immigration reform- and he left no room for people of conscience to disagree- were from a statement published on the official UUA website in April of 2006. It is an interesting fine line... it is his personal statement, but it was also published in his capacity as the president of the UUA, and faxed around by the Washington Advocacy office. Legally, it is not "the official position of the UUA"- he is not the Pope- but it was presented to the other six billion on the planet in such a way as to make it look as if it were.
Speaking only for myself, I would be much happier if the entire UUA organization existed only as a resource for the UU congregations, and were not permitted to speak independently to the public, but I know I'm in the minority.
(((Do you think there are any political stances that may be fundamentally incompatible with the core values and precepts of a faith)))
That would be hard to do for my faith. If there were a Unitarian that believed that, say, Protestantism should be the national religion of the United States of America and non-protestants should be punished, that would be violation of UUism's core values, I would say.
Whether there is such a thing for other faiths is theirs to decide.
CC
Joe,
You are as entitled as anyone to, say, start a blog about how the small liberal arts college you work for is the worst academic institution in America.
That doesn't mean it would be a good thing to do.
Further, I would say that if you, a math professor, can quite easily see that people of conscience can disagree on political issues then we should expect more from the president of our denomination than a statement that implies that they cannot.
CC
Careful, CC- calling us a "denomination" tends to start big debates.
Joel and CC--now that I have more of the context, I can see better why people would be upset. CC, my main issue was not whether it was a good thing to do (even if he were only speaking for himself), but whether Sinkford was claiming to speak for some organization tied to your religion or your religion itself. It sounds like he was at least implying that.
Was the video advocating Obama's election also posted on the UUA website? Advocating with regard to a policy is OK, but candidate advocacy is verboten. Even if posted under an individual's name, if it used church resources (as a video on UUA's server would do, unless that server is an open forum for all members to post whatever they want), that's problematic.
pg, the video was not the UUA website, but it was a minister's blog, under the minister's name, not a pseudonym. Sorry I don't have the link; it was some time ago.
I have no problem with a minister favoring a candidate, or a position. Such opinions carry only the weight of one person's opinion. But when they state it as a choice between good and evil, they are speaking with the moral authority of their office, whether they realize it or not.
I have no problem with a minister favoring a candidate, or a position. Such opinions carry only the weight of one person's opinion. But when they state it as a choice between good and evil, they are speaking with the moral authority of their office, whether they realize it or not.
But on what basis is a minister competent to judge policy except by its morality? If someone wants to know an economic cost-benefit analysis of immigration policy, she asks an economist; if she wants a moral analysis, she asks someone who spends a lot of time thinking about morality, such as a minister. Unless the minister is hiding a PhD in economics behind his theology degree, I'm going to put more stock in his moral evaluation than his economic one. As to whether he has moral authority, that necessarily depends on whether I deem him a good thinker in his field, just as it does for whether I consider a given economist to have authority. Greg Mankiw isn't seen as abusing his "economic authority" by saying silly things about the tradeoff between work and leisure; why should a minister be seen as abusing his "moral authority" if he says silly things about immigration?
"But on what basis is a minister competent to judge policy except by its morality?"
The same basis as every other voter. But often, it's stated as a moral argument when it's really purely political- this was revealed when Sinkford spoke out against changing the Senates rules on cloture of filibuster. He laid it out in terms of our PPs... but at the end reserved the right to change his mind if it were a Democrat majority and a Republican filibuster.
The same basis as every other voter.
I should clarify: on what basis is a minister competent to judge policy such that I should give a damn about his opinion other than on the basis of its morality? Sure, every voter is "competent" to judge policy, in the sense that we all have a right to vote and hopefully make that vote in some part on the basis of a candidate's proclaimed policies (though I wonder how many Bush voters cheered for his 2000 mockery of "nation building" and then cheered for his 2003 invasion of Iraq).
But someone who is stating his opinion in the hopes of convincing others has his best shot by demonstrating some capacity that those others don't necessarily have. If Elaine Lafferty tried to convince McCain's policies were good for women, and her sole premise for why she can tell this is that she is a woman, I'm going to laugh her ovaries out of the discussion. On the other hand, if Lafferty tries to convince me on the basis of her having seen in her experience as an attorney that extending filing deadlines on discrimination statutes actually works to female employees' detriment in some way, I'd listen.
It's one thing to gripe about the substance of a minister's political positions, but it's another to say that he shouldn't be able to use moral language regarding politics because that's an abuse of his position.
"It's one thing to gripe about the substance of a minister's political positions, but it's another to say that he shouldn't be able to use moral language regarding politics because that's an abuse of his position."
You're still not getting it. I'm talking about quite a few ministers who state that a given position is THE moral stance. Why even pretend to accept diverse opinions in our religion, if the differences are legitimately choices between moral and immoral, good and evil? Why would Rev. Sinkford, for example, wish to fellowship with slave traders who have no conscience?
Lol... the word verification is "goducon"
I'm talking about quite a few ministers who state that a given position is THE moral stance. Why even pretend to accept diverse opinions in our religion, if the differences are legitimately choices between moral and immoral, good and evil? Why would Rev. Sinkford, for example, wish to fellowship with slave traders who have no conscience?
But presumably people once did fellowship with slave traders. At one point in our nation's history, there were considered to be diverse opinions about whether blacks were really human, had souls and were capable of responsibility for themselves and their families. Not having the full context, I'm unclear on why you think it's beyond the pale for someone to compare a political position to that of acceptance of the slave trade. Heck, the Constitution originally accepted the slave trade and forbade banning it. Nor does the Bible, the foundational text for most Americans' faith, forbid slavery; MLK had to get around the whole "son of Ham" thing by focusing on the idea that we are all children of God.
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