Election Night
date posted: Nov 10, 2008
Last night I stayed up until midnight to watch the returns. Early in the evening, the Presidential race was shaping up to be a lopsided victory for the Democrats. Locally, I watched with interest the local races for the State House and for Congress. I was proud of our own Leland Prebble, who fought a good fight and received a good vote despite losing to a more experienced opponent for the Michigan State House. Leland ran a positive campaign and was cited in the Jackson Cit Pat for contributing to a clean race that focused on the issues. Thank you Leland!
As I watched the Obama celebration taking place at Grant Park in Chicago, I was thankful that our nation had reached the point where an African American could be elected President. It was a moving scene to see so many people of so many ethnic backgrounds dancing and hugging and celebrating together. Such a scene is inconceivable among other countries in the world where ethnic and tribal differences lead to predictable violence after every election. We are still a great nation.
I did not vote for Barack Obama. I was, and continue to be troubled by his stated philosophy and voting record on issues concerning the sanctity of life. He has pledged to reduce the rate of abortion in America. Let’s keep him accountable on that promise. I am concerned about his lack of experience in so many things, especially foreign policy. Our nation is now navigating where we never would have imagined just a few years ago. We have moved several steps towards socialism with unprecedented and untested government intervention in the financial markets. Our Michigan auto industry has now reached the point where it will not survive without government bailout. We are bogged down in a war that is being carried out on more fronts than we have personnel and resources for. These are just some of the many gargantuan challenges facing our new President.
We are under a scriptural mandate to pray for and respect our leaders. President Bush and President-elect Obama need our prayers as well as our critical engagement in the democratic process.
Unlike either Democrats or Republicans, we who carry the name of Jesus are under a scriptural mandate to stand for the full compliment of Kingdom values. As we read and reflect on scripture together, these values include, but are not limited to – the sanctity of human life in every context, the care for the poor and marginalized in the world, the dignity of persons by holding everyone accountable as moral beings and contributors to society, justice, the protection and preservation of marriage and family, racial equality and reconciliation, wise stewardship of the earth and its resources, generosity over greed, humility and gratitude over arrogance, peacemaking over aggression.
As followers of Christ, let us leave off unfair, inaccurate and derogatory attacks against those candidates or parties we may not agree with. Let’s not be moved by those who would make a living or gain a hearing based on their slanderous attacks and paranoiac claims, including those who spread their caustic message on the airwaves. These have no place among God’s people.
Our allegiance is to God, and to his call to holiness and truth telling. It is our duty to vote. Now that the election is over, it is also our duty to stay engaged with our leaders by praying for them, hearing them out, challenging them, and letting our thoughtful opinions be known.
Pastor Mark
Proposal 1: Medical Use of Marijuana
date posted: Oct 29, 2008
Voters in Michigan are faced with two proposals in the upcoming ballot. Proposal 1 advocates for the legalization of the medical use of marijuana. It seeks to allow doctors to prescribe marijuana use for patients with certain medical conditions without the fear of the patient or the doctor running afoul of state law.
As a pastor, I am not free to use my office to advocate for any candidate, but I can speak to any issue. Proposal 1 is receiving criticism from the medical profession as well as many major newspapers across the state. The following is an excerpt from the Ann Arbor News:
“Marijuana has a long track record of relieving pain or side effects for those being treated for cancer, glaucoma, HIV, AIDS and other conditions. Undeniably, some of those patients believe that they can find only find effective relief by using marijuana, and their doctors may agree. . . .Yet this proposal includes language that is troublingly vague. For example, “severe and persistent muscle spasms’’ is among the permissible reasons to use the drug.
The proposal lacks adequate provisions for oversight on dosing. With a prescription, for example, a doctor is able to make some conclusions about the frequency of use before providing a refill. Granting someone the ability to grow their own medicine, however, completely removes that from oversight.
And we’re also concerned about the message of using a cigarette to deliver relief when so much public-health effort focuses on ending smoking.
We’re comfortable with the attempts to provide other safeguards, such as the requirement to register with the state and carry an ID card that clearly identifies them.
And we’re empathetic with the goal of easing pain or reducing nausea, but this proposal seems like it was drafted more by the emotional response to pain than by good science.”
Some doctors subscribe to the idea that patient comfort and relief of pain should trump any overriding policy decision. It is a private matter, they say. Such thinking presents a troubling diiemna, I would think. Advocates for the proposal argue that it is only in the smoked form that marijuana is therapeutic. Many more doctors and studies say that marijuana is only uniquely therapeutic for advanced symptoms of AIDS, not the wider range of conditions espoused by the Proposal. They say other drugs are equally effective in other cases.
As Christians, we would do well to respond to proposals thoughtfully, scrutinizing the language and the research that is used to provide the rationale. We should be willing to affirm those components of an issue that are right, and firmly critique those components that are questionable or that violate scripture or even common sense. We do not need to respond merely out of an emotional bias against all drugs and forms of smoking. The Ann Arbor News is one of many public voices that exposes the proposal’s lack of common sense for the common good. The negative results of marijuana use are rarely mentioned. The one positive of temporary pain relief does not counteract the many medical and social negatives of smoking marijuana. Proposal 1 seeks to open a previously untried door to an attempt at the medical endorsement of a drug, a habit, and a lifestyle that has wrought so much damage to the minds and lives of men, women, and young people over many years.
Common sense people!