Questions over the relationship between the secular political left and the progressive Christian left have been making the rounds of blogs this week. A few people, me included, have questioned why some on the political left react with such anger toward the religious community – regardless of our theological beliefs or social stands. The debate started this week because of a perceived anti-religious bias on the part of some at Air America Radio. Liberal blogger Atrios answered those questions with broad attack on the religious community. He wrote, in part:
… I'm a bit fed up with people hand-wringing about anti-religious sentiment from "the Left." First of all, "the Left" which has any clout or power in this country is explicitly "pro-religion" to a degree which disturbs me. My retinas still burn with the image of the members of Congress on the steps of the Capitol screeching out "UNDER GOD" while performing the pledge of allegiance. Left-leaning people with strongly held religious views need to stop worrying about what some comedian says on some radio show and need to start worrying that the public faces of their religion are people who, if they had their way, would establish their own flavor of theocracy and revoke our right to worship as we please (or not at all).I'm tired of liberalish Christians telling me it's my job to reach out to Christian moderates who feel that "the Left" is hostile to them. Screw that. It's time for liberalish Christians to tell their slightly more right-leaning brethren that those of us who fight to maintain the separation between Church and State do it to protect freedom of religion - not destroy it.
Atrios is one of the nation’s best known bloggers and has done more than his fair share in fighting off the conservative tide. Unfortunately, his remarks on religion are spiteful and bigoted and must be answered. My friends over at The Village gate (formerly The Right Christians) have made the attempt:
Atrios is mightily offended at the complaints raised about gratuitous slamming of Christianity by Melanie and me and picked up by Kevin Drum here. It's also clear how he really feels about religious progressives or at least Christians. We're "liberalish," not liberal or progressive. And the fundamentalists are only "slightly more right-leaning" than we.Atrios makes the standard claim that, "I'm not hostile to religion," but there is obviously a great deal of anger that always appears against columnists like Kristof and Easterbrook who write about religion, and now against progressive Christian bloggers like Melanie and me who dare to consider themselves both Christians and progressives. That same anger is expressed again and again in the 400+ comment thread that follows the post.
Clearly, Atrios is hostile towards religion and obviously uneducated over the hard work done by religious progressives over the nation’s history to fight for social justice. On many issues (slavery, nuclear weapons, globalization, etc) Christians have been at the table long before the secular community. Somehow he even missed that the head of Americans United for the Separate of Church and State is a United Church of Christ minister. Atrios’ voice has served in this case to inflame and divide. No one needs that a time when the stakes are so high on so many important issues.
Update: Read comments on this post left at The American Street.
