Progressive Christians are better than evangelicals: Just ask them! They care for the poor, they care for women’s rights, they care for downtrodden and oppressed LGBT people. They actually care about life more than evangelicals and conservative Catholics, whose only real concern is holding power over people. Funny thing, though: For all their moral superiority, they have serious problems with telling the truth.

This isn’t just one accommodationist who does that. I see it again and again. Take the Rev. Benjamin Cremer, an ex-evangelical whose Xwitter feed (as I think we should all call it now) is one long rendition of moral superiority. Example One:

Imagine if the pro life movement put all the effort it is putting into abortion bans into dismantling poverty, providing healthcare, living wages, access to reproductive education, and advocating equal rights for women rather than criminalizing them.

They’d reduce abortion.

Imagine if the pro life movement put all the effort it is putting into abortion bans into dismantling poverty, providing healthcare, living wages, access to reproductive education, and advocating equal rights for women rather than criminalizing them.

They’d reduce abortion.

— Rev. Benjamin Cremer (@Brcremer) November 8, 2023

On the surface you could almost call it a strategy recommendation: “Want to reduce abortion? Here’s the best way to do it.” The real message isn’t what you’d call well hidden, though: “Pro-lifers don’t really care about abortion. These hypocrites won’t do what really helps. They don’t care about anyone’s real needs. They just want to make life miserable for women.”

Sure. Like “criminalizing” them? That’s a lie. Absolutely no pro-lifer is calling for that. And the implication that we’re doing nothing for the rest is simply wrong. Sex education? Absolutely! “Save it for when God intended it, you’ll be a lot happier and healthier, and so will your family!” Equal rights for women? Sure, if you strip out extremist versions of it, like the Equal Rights Amendment. And by the way: We do a lot to fight poverty, help with health care, and so on, and we’re not pawning the job off on the government to do it for us.

Hypocrisy Abounds

It’s a bit hard believing he means what he says himself. I asked him on that Xwitter feed if he’d ever called on George Soros and Michael Bloomberg, who poured multiple millions of dollars into passing Ohio’s Issue 1, to put that money into “dismantling poverty,” etc., instead. They’d have helped a lot more people that way than by ramrodding democracy, using their massive wealth to buy elections that way. I had a whole list of questions for him like that. Rev. Cremer answered other people’s comments, but somehow he doesn’t seem to have gotten around to mine yet. He never got around to the many questions I asked in weeks past, either.

If it was just Rev. Cremer it be pathetic, and nothing worse. But progressive, rather, accommodationist Christians’ hatred for evangelicals is well documented in social science. He just displays it more openly and more consistently. Like this:

Imagine living in the United States with over 200 different sects of Christianity, all with their own unique theology, and not only arrogantly insisting that only your sect “knows the full truth,” but that your sect should rule the entire nation and over all other people as well.

Imagine living in the United States with over 200 different sects of Christianity, all with their own unique theology, and not only arrogantly insisting that only your sect “knows the full truth,” but that your sect should rule the entire nation and over all other people as well.

— Rev. Benjamin Cremer (@Brcremer) November 1, 2023

Or this:

Christians in the United States need to be outspoken against theocracy.

We shouldn’t want our nation to be dictated by any religion, including our own.

When we demand a “Christian nation,” we are simply telling everyone else, “we want to be in control.”

That’s tyranny.

Christians in the United States need to be outspoken against theocracy.

We shouldn’t want our nation to be dictated by any religion, including our own.

When we demand a “Christian nation,” we are simply telling everyone else, “we want to be in control.”

That’s tyranny.

— Rev. Benjamin Cremer (@Brcremer) October 25, 2023

What Is This “Theocracy”?

That’s as dishonest as the first xweet. What is this “theocracy,” anyway? Answer: It’s a meaningless scare word whose only political significance is to supply “evidence” of some ruthless heartless Christian takeover plot. Use a big enough magnifying glass and you might find such a thing in small pockets of politically harmless fringe groups. We need not waste time being “outspoken” against meaningless “threats” like that. But we should absolutely speak out against people with actual power dishonestly using that fringe to smear all of conservative Christianity.

I wish people who cry “Theocracy!” would just use their heads instead. It’s not as if it were mentally taxing.

Yes, there are also Christians in politics who hope to influence public policy in line with their beliefs, through normal democratic processes. That’s because … wait for it … what they believe is true, they believe is true. They even think it’s good: Imagine that!

Funny thing, though: There are non-Christians in politics who also think their beliefs are right, and true, and good. They too want to influence policy with their beliefs. There’s a name for this, and if the progressives (secularists, too) will only think hard enough on it, I’m sure they can come up with it. We call it “democracy.”

Maybe We Should Be Just as Silly, and Cry “Progressivocracy”?

Some people try squirming out of that obvious answer, saying, “The difference is, you think you’re right! You think your morality is right! You even think you’re right about everyone!” Puh-lease. Go read the Rev. Cremer’s Xwitter feed and see if you notice him expressing any doubt over what’s true and what’s right. Try it with any progressive or secularist. If you don’t like people thinking they’re right, go tell them the same thing. Or raise the cry, because if it fits conservatives, it fits them too: “Aaagh! Progressivocracy!! Run for the hills!”

But no, I’m not asking you to be that silly. The point isn’t that no one should think they’re right, but that everyone thinks they’re right about something. If they’re in politics, you can even expect them to think they have a good idea about what’s right for public policy. Where’s the threat in that?

I’m not happy about progressives’ being so convinced they’re right, and that we’re wrong. As long as we follow constitutional processes, though, I’m not about to cry “Progressivocracy!!!” If we follow the Constitution, we have democracy (or democratic republic, but close enough). There’s no way to get to theocracy except by dismantling or ignoring the Constitution.

Speaking of which, undoing the Constitution could bring us a host of other evils besides theocracy, like plutocracy. Or oligarchy, in the form of the deep state, the FBI, the media, and the White House colluding to get the power they want regardless of democratic processes. Put that up next to “theocracy,” and ask, which one is the real threat now? How much evidence do we have for conservatives working to undo America as a democratic republic?

Please don’t make the mindless mistake of saying “January 6,” okay? Even if it had been an “insurrection” — it wasn’t — it still wouldn’t mean a thing as far as dismantling democracy. Contrast that to this: How much evidence do we have for the rule of law being usurped by the current regime, er, excuse me, the current administration? Are you worried about tyranny? You should be. But look for it where it may be found.

Smokescreens and Other Lies

“Tyranny”? That’s a smokescreen — where “smokescreen” means “lying,” in the form of hiding what you really mean. And what they really mean is they’re afraid we’ll “impose our beliefs” on them, because then they won’t be able to impose theirs on us.

It works both ways, you see. If “imposing” is the word you want to use for persuasion, campaigns, and elections, then go ahead and point your finger at yourself. Point it at everyone! That’s how things get done politically, here in America. Except when the regime actually does jump constitutional process to impose its power on us.

If you think Christian views are out of court because they’re “religious,” take a short break, please, and go read the First Amendment. Then come back and read the paragraph above this one. Then tell us how you think democracy will survive when people want to discard the Constitution the way you obviously do.

Most of these breathless alarms over it are nothing but fearful echoes voiced by the ignorant and the gullible. It’s a con foisted on them and the country by people who know the truth, who know exactly what they’re doing.

Conscience? or Not?

They know what they’re doing with all these dishonest tactics. It’s calculated, it’s manipulative, and it comes from people who don’t care if it’s true as long as it works to get them more power.

These people actually are using their heads. Just not their consciences. Some of them are atheists, some are agnostics, some are spiritually apathetic agnostics. Whether we can appeal to their consciences, I do not know. Some of them, though, claim to be Christians. They at least ought to know there are problems with “bearing false witness against your neighbor.” They ought to know it’s wrong to use lies to get their way.

And they really ought to know it’s a lousy way to set yourself up as being morally superior.

 

Tom Gilson (@TomGilsonAuthor) is a senior editor with The Stream and the author or editor of six books, including the highly acclaimed Too Good To Be False: How Jesus’ Incomparable Character Reveals His Reality.