Monday, March 14, 2005

"Why are they afraid of us?"

Around the time of the last elections, or just afterwards, lots of opinion pieces ran in the NZ Herald about this new Christian party that had won an unexpected majority in parliament, United Future.

Some were very concerned about the 'fundamentalist' backgrounds of the MPs in the party, including many who I was acquainted with working for Rhema.

At the time I thought, why on earth are they so afraid of us?

That was until I read about the Holy Roman Empire. And Oliver Cromwell. And I'm yet to read about the Spanish Inquisition.

Since then, I've formed a definite opinion on Christian political parties. Generally, I don't think they should be around. As the Anglican archbishop of NZ pointed out, they tend to just focus on a few points of the gospel to the neglect of other points. In essence, misrepresenting the Gospel.

Individual Christians in politics? Hell yeah! But it's a different thing when you form a party.

Actually I think I'm reverting to type. Ian Grant (now of Parenting with Confidence) used to say when Christians have power, generally bad things happen. Something like that. I agree with him now - but the best thing is, I know why I agree with him.

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