{"id":11741,"date":"2012-08-13T12:45:02","date_gmt":"2012-08-13T16:45:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/?p=11741"},"modified":"2012-08-13T16:43:22","modified_gmt":"2012-08-13T20:43:22","slug":"was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican","title":{"rendered":"Was Jesus a Democrat? Or a Republican?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n
\n
There\u2019s a bit of debate about Jesus\u2019 politics these days.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

\u201cJesus would send all these right-wing pseudo-Christians straight to hell,\u201d writes Jack Clark<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can prove Jesus was a Republican,\u201d writes Darrin Yaeger<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Jesus changed everything, notes author John Ortberg in his new book <\/a>Who Is This Man<\/a>? <\/em>“He is history’s most familiar figure. His impact on the world is immense and not a coincidence. And yet, Jesus did not brashly defend His movement in the spirit of a rising political leader.”<\/p>\n

So, why have His followers become so politicized?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\"\"“Some of my church brothers and sisters were appalled when I showed up at home group sporting my Obama tee-shirt and parked my ‘Obama-mobile’ front-and-center in the parking lot (pretty much assuring that I’ll never be an elder . . .),\u201d writes\u00a0columnist\u00a0Jeff Myers<\/a> on behalf of a friend identified only as Bruce. \u201cIt’s almost as though they question the legitimacy of my faith because I don’t support the Republican viewpoint.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be sure, Jesus might commend Democrats for their concern for the poor, the downtrodden, the disenfranchised, the outcasts — the very people He reached out to again and again during His life on this earth,\u201d writes an unsigned editorialist for the Modesto Bee<\/a> <\/em>newspaper in California. \u201cTo be sure, Jesus might commend Republicans for their focus on personal accountability and responsibility \u2013 the very things He espoused over and over again during His ministry. To listen to many of the politicians and partisans on both the left and the right these days, He’s one of their own. They show up at His churches, they talk of His principles and they ask His blessing on their policies and programs.\u201d<\/p>\n

So who’s right?<\/p>\n

\"\"\u201cThe secular left has mastered use of the Internet to further its extremist goals. In fact, President Obama’s web-based \u2018Organizing for America\u2019 propaganda machine may have given him the 2008 election,\u201d writes Matt Barber.<\/a> \u201cI agree with Barack Obama that November 2012 represents the most important election of our lifetimes \u2013 perhaps our history. Of course, that’s where my agreement with Obama both begins and abruptly ends.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere’s the operable question,\u201d continues Berber. \u201cDo we want America \u2018fundamentally transformed\u2019 to mirror the secular-socialist ideals of the radical leftist currently \u2018occupying\u2019 the White House? In Barack Obama’s America, individual freedom is trampled beneath jackboots as a matter of course. It’s already happening at an unprecedented rate. One need only look to the HHS mandate forcing Christian groups – both Catholic and Protestant – to violate, under penalty of law, biblical prohibitions against abortion homicide. Or consider recent attempts by multiple elected officials, all Democrats, to shutdown Chick-fil-A \u2013 a private, Christian-owned business \u2013 simply because its leadership holds the biblical view of marriage. Is this Continued on Page Two<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a bit of debate about Jesus\u2019 politics these days. \u201cJesus would send all these right-wing pseudo-Christians straight to hell,\u201d writes Jack Clark. \u201cI can prove Jesus was a Republican,\u201d writes Darrin Yaeger. Jesus changed everything, notes author John Ortberg in his new book Who Is This Man? “He is history’s most familiar figure. His…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":270,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32,2114,102,5,854],"tags":[2204,1134,2307,394,1135,2236],"class_list":["post-11741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian","category-democrat","category-feature","category-politics","category-republican","tag-christian","tag-conservative","tag-democrat","tag-jesus","tag-liberal","tag-republican"],"yoast_head":"\nWas Jesus a Democrat? Or a Republican?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Was Jesus a Democrat? Or a Republican?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There\u2019s a bit of debate about Jesus\u2019 politics these days. \u201cJesus would send all these right-wing pseudo-Christians straight to hell,\u201d writes Jack Clark. \u201cI can prove Jesus was a Republican,\u201d writes Darrin Yaeger. Jesus changed everything, notes author John Ortberg in his new book Who Is This Man? “He is history’s most familiar figure. His…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-08-13T16:45:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-08-13T20:43:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/files\/2012\/08\/election2012-art.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Was Jesus a Democrat? Or a Republican?","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Was Jesus a Democrat? Or a Republican?","og_description":"There\u2019s a bit of debate about Jesus\u2019 politics these days. \u201cJesus would send all these right-wing pseudo-Christians straight to hell,\u201d writes Jack Clark. \u201cI can prove Jesus was a Republican,\u201d writes Darrin Yaeger. Jesus changed everything, notes author John Ortberg in his new book Who Is This Man? “He is history’s most familiar figure. His…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican","og_site_name":"Beliefnet News","article_published_time":"2012-08-13T16:45:02+00:00","article_modified_time":"2012-08-13T20:43:22+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/files\/2012\/08\/election2012-art.jpg"}],"twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican","name":"Was Jesus a Democrat? Or a Republican?","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/files\/2012\/08\/election2012-art.jpg","datePublished":"2012-08-13T16:45:02+00:00","dateModified":"2012-08-13T20:43:22+00:00","author":{"@id":""},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/files\/2012\/08\/election2012-art.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/files\/2012\/08\/election2012-art.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/08\/was-jesus-a-democrat-or-a-republican#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Was Jesus a Democrat? Or a Republican?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/","name":"Beliefnet News","description":"Top Religious News From Around the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/author"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/270"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11741"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11743,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11741\/revisions\/11743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}