If you asked ten random people on the street to define what an evangelical Christian is, it’s likely that you would get at least one person who would say “someone who opposes abortion and gay marriage.”  It is a lamentable (and frustrating) truth that the church in the late 20th and early 21st century has in many ways become known for what it opposes, with the hot button issues of abortion and gay marriage being the most prominent ones.  One of the major contributors to this perception of the church has been the Christian Coalition of America, a political advocacy (and pro-Republican) group founded by Pat Robertson and led for many years by Ralph Reed.  The Christian Coalition lobbies for “pro-family” issues in Washington and has historically focused much of its efforts on the twin issues of abortion and gay marriage. 

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If you were watching the news last night, you were likely assaulted by the horrific lead story of a young woman stabbing her three children, leaving them all in critical condition.  As a parent, I was shaken by the story of a young woman who for some undetermined reason decided to stab her two year-old twins and seven month old baby.  As I struggled to understand how a mother could do such a tragic thing, suddenly the always dapper Logan Byrnes reappeared on my television screen to let me know that, oh by the way, a 17 year-old East Hartford High student had been stabbed at his school and had passed away.  Again, I was shocked and saddened, but after a couple seconds was able to return to playing with my 17 month-old, Ryan.  When Logan wrapped up his brief segment on the East Hartford stabbing, Janet Peckinpaugh showed up to alert me to the fact that it had been another deadly day in Iraq, with five more American soldiers dying.  Interesting, I thought.  And again, I went on playing with my son…

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If you grew up in the church, or have been around the church at all, you probably know that Christians can be very wary of the entertainment coming out of Hollywood.  Many Christians set strict standards for themselves and other believers, such as avoiding R-rated movies, because of their sincere desire to reduce their exposure to sex, violence, and language.  However, those who draw such lines were faced with a quandary when Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ was released a few years ago and received an R rating for the scenes of intense violence.  If a parent has preached against watching R-rated movies, for example, should they bar their children from seeing this movie as well?  Or is this an exception?  And if this is an exception, who is to say that there aren’t other R-rated exceptions?

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I was reading through an e-newsletter from the Christian organization Sojourners last Thursday when a headline caught my eye:  “The fallout from Ted Haggard.”  Oh no, I said – what happened now?  As I read the article, I heard about the breaking story that was only in its infancy but was clearly going to get uglier over the next few days – Pastor Ted Haggard, pastor of the megachurch New Life Church of Colorado Springs and President of the National Association of Evangelicals, had been accused of participating in drug-fueled trysts over the past three years with a gay male escort.  What made the story even more shocking, of course, is that Pastor Haggard has been crusading against gay marriage across the country, getting amendments prohibiting gay marriage on the ballots of many states for today’s election.  And all the while, he had apparently been struggling with the very thing against which he had been crusading.

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