The Kamala Harris campaign has been busy in recent weeks building its coalitions operation. There are teachers for Harris, nurses for Harris, LGBTQs for Harris, even cat ladies and white dudes for Harris. It looks like a robust operation.
Wishing to leave no stone unturned, there’s also a Christians for Harris coalition, which actually makes the most sense, politically. Democrats have a lock on most of the aforementioned groups but not so much among people of faith. Within this demographic, Democrats have long under-performed Republicans so targeting Christians is smart politics.
But executing this strategy is easier said than done by a party that doesn’t fully understand it. Consider this MSNBC interview with Christians for Harris member James Talarico, a Texas state house representative from the Austin area. “Too many Christians have forgotten all about Jesus and now worship at the feet of Donald Trump,” says Talarico as the anchorwoman nods in agreement.
Talarico is also an aspiring seminarian who hopes to receive his Master of Divinity degree by 2025, so he still has time to learn that scripture frowns on bearing false witness. Perhaps he actually does know someone who worships the Republican presidential nominee. If so, I should like very much to meet him and tell him to knock it off.
The budding pastor then trots out the old trope, ‘What Would Jesus Do?’ and aligns his argument with his party’s agenda. “What would Jesus do about a tax system that benefits the rich over the poor?” he asks. “What would Jesus do about a health care system that forces the sick to start GoFundMe pages to afford life saving surgeries? What would Jesus do about an education system that ties a child’s school funding to their community’s property wealth?”
The problem with trying to shoehorn the teachings of Jesus Christ into a political ideology is that it usually doesn’t work. I have no idea what Jesus would do about our tax code but He might consider ending tax breaks benefitting rich people taking deductions on their waterfront vacation homes.
If Jesus wanted to drill down into the nuts and bolts of a healthcare system that disadvantages the poor it’s possible He’d suggest getting rid of such an expensive system. It’s called the Affordable Care Act, signed into law by Barack Obama 14 years ago.
In the event Jesus wanted to analyze America’s system of government education, He might question the wisdom of forcing children to attend substandard schools instead of letting parents choose the best school for their kids. I know Jesus said, “Let the children come to me,” but I can find no reference to Him saying to let the children come to the state.
Even as Talarico repeatedly invokes the name of Jesus in a softball cable news interview, and repudiates three major Democrat policies in the process, the Christians for Harris coalition gets stranger still. It posted a video a couple weeks ago featuring a well known TV personality. “I just want to say, and add my voice, to the many other Christian voices," spake the personality. "This joy that we’re feeling, this joy that’s sweeping the country, ya know, it has a resonance with the kind of joy that is found in the best of the Christian church.”
Powerful stuff, especially coming from CNN political analyst Van Jones. Jones said he became a Communist in 1992 and co-founded a group called Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement, which identifies itself by the entirely benign acronym STORM. It sponsored study groups on Leninism, Marxism and Maoism. If they added Stalinism, they’d have all four gospels of Communism.
A conversion to Christianity from Jones’s stated belief system might rightly be called a miracle but I suspect it’s something less. Van Jones is either a bad Communist or a bad Christian, based on the observations of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.
“Let us begin by stating that Communism and Christianity are at the bottom incompatible,” said King in his August 9, 1953 sermon at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. “One cannot be a true Christian and a true Communist simultaneously.” Merging the two, according to King, is simply not possible. “They represent diametrically opposed ways of looking at the world and transforming the world,” King preached. “We must try to understand Communism, but never can we accept it and be true Christians.”
We needn’t ask what Jesus would do to build a strong coalition; we already know. He started with a dozen disciples who understood, believed and taught truth. From there, it took hold among the people and the rest is history. Given what Christians for Harris has shown us thus far, it sounds a bit like a scam. If they want more credibility, they might consider putting forth people who do not condemn their own policies or foment murderous political ideologies.
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