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Health & Fitness

Tea Party and Christianity and not compatible philosophies

I am puzzled by the idea that the Tea Party strongly identifies with both Christian values and Christian identity when their positions on the issues and their culture are the exact opposite of what the Bible says. And if we assume that Bible is the authority that defines Christianity then even an Atheist like me can see the contradiction.

I'm someone who has actually read the Bible from cover to cover. It's been a while but I read the story and I get it. I don't personally believe the stories in the Bible are literally true. I think they are just stories. However, even though I think Jesus is just a story doesn't mean that I don't understand the story or appreciate the message that the story is trying to convey. In fact, I think we can all agree that if Christians were to follow the values set out by Jesus in the Bible they would be better people.

So who is Jesus and what did he stand for? Jesus was generous. Jesus was altruistic. His message was to be a giving person. He condemned the selfish. He believed we should be our brother's keeper;  that we should love our neighbors as ourselves;  that we should take care if the sick; that we should pay our taxes; that we should be truthful; that we should be merciful and forgiving. And it doesn’t matter whether you believe in Jesus or don’t, the message is pretty clear about his values and his example as to what kind of a life one should live.

In contrast, Tea Party values are the exact opposite of Christian values as depicted but Jesus in the Bible. In the Tea Party it’s all about me. It’s a very selfish and angry message; my rights, my property, my guns, my money, my gold. They want the government shut down. They want to cut off the poor. Rapist gets you pregnant? Deal with it! Altruism is bad. Greed is good. It’s us against them. These aren’t the values that Jesus taught. These values are more like the values of the famous atheist Ayn Rand.

Ayn Rand for some odd reason is very popular among Tea Party Christians. She is famous as one of the first Atheists to come out of the closet and she expounded a philosophy based on early ideas of Darwinian Evolution; survival of the fittest. She was Russian born and escaped the tyranny of Communism under Stalin which strongly influenced her attitude towards capitalism and against any form of collectivism that reminded her of Communism.

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While I agree with Ayn Rand that God doesn’t exist and that the Bible is a collection of stories, she got most everything else wrong. The scientific understanding of evolution has evolved and we now know that the most successful species are those who form a cooperative structure rather than a highly individualized “every man for himself” paradigm. Atheism has moved away from Ayn Rand and considers her somewhat of an embarrassment to be explained away than something we embrace.

That is why I find it puzzling that Tea Party Christians are now living the life of an Atheist outlier.

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So – when I see the Tea Party Christian identity Republicans who gleefully shut down the government and take America hostage I can’t help to be confused at the apparent conflict of values between Jesus and what these people are doing and saying. It just doesn’t make sense to me.

So I ask myself, how can this make sense to anyone and my conclusion is that it can’t. The reason that Tea Party people can believe they are Christian and hold values that are the opposite of Christ’s teachings is that they have given up on making sense. In that Tea Party world you believe whatever you want to believe. There is no such thing as truth in Tea Party culture. In their world if you believe it then it’s true, and if everyone believes it then it’s reality. But as a Realist I put reality first. Reality is what continues to exist whether I believe in it or not.

As Jesus said, “By their fruits you shall know them.” All we have to do is look at the fruits of what the Tea Party influence has been to know what Jesus was referring to. I think that the Tea Party creates confusion about what Christianity is in the minds of non-Christians who look at the way they are behaving and say to themselves, “You got to be kidding me! Why would any rational person want to believe that?”


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