Unambiguous morality

What planet is this guy from? Speaking in Troy, Michigan Rick Santorum said that kids shouldn't go to college because the liberal professors will "indoctrinate" them. Perhaps college will make them too smart to allow the GOP to do their own indoctrination about how they are destined to rule America.



The latest book by John Shelby Spong that I'm reading is Eternal Life: A New Vision. In it Spong traces a brief history of religion. He comes to the conclusion that religions are not about truth (in spite of Fundie claims), but security.

Ira Chernus, writing in Religion Dispatches Magazine, applies that idea to conservative voters. These people want to live in a community with boundaries that can't be violated so they can be protected from threatening evils. They want unambiguous morality even in an age of moral uncertainty. They want their morals to be obvious, immutable, and with clear distinctions between good and evil.

Naturally, these voters will flock to a candidate who vows to support their morals. "Vote for me and I'll save you from moral chaos." There is a safe inside and a dangerous outside. If you are in, you are good. If you are out, you are evil.

They hate Obama and Liberals because no such assurances are coming, even more their goal appears to be making moral boundaries more vague or erasing them completely.

Every campaign becomes a search for the father who will protect the house from invaders. In this case the "house" is both the country and religion. Every campaign becomes a discussion of whether politics should be used to create and support fixed boundaries and unshakeable truths?

But when politics is used for that people suffer. Women die from unsafe abortions. Gay couples can't get married. In addition, a search for absolute truth is anti-democracy. In a democracy, we choose our values, everything is open for discussion, new views are debated, and the outcome cannot be predicted. That is not a search for unambiguous morality.