The most basic principles of Christianity taught by Jesus The Christ apparently is much too difficult for avowed members of the Christian Right. The hate and vitriol from the Christian Right against certain members of the human race defy and rebuke many of the beliefs held by Christ.
But even when the positions conservative Christians take are not steeped in vitriol and hate, their inability to embrace Christ's basic principles seem difficult ponderous, and mysterious to them.
When this Stephen Colbert quote was posted on various Facebook pages, the outrage from the conservative right was quick and unapologetic. The venom and hate from some corners in the defense of reasons to avoid helping the poor and needy apparently stem the conservative belief that helping the poor means rewarding lazy liberals, lazy blacks, and illegal brown immigrants for their worthlessness and laziness. Poor lazy white conservatives often are excluded from this diatribe or are not deemed to be a problem.
One conservative Christian's response to the Stephen Colbert posting on Facebook, however, was absent any directed vitriol. It was a statement that had the connotative air of a question. She simply said, "That depends on what we mean by helping". Taken out of context, it is a curious comment from a professed Christian. But, in the context of the conservative brain, it was a genuine attempt to ask an honest question.
What she really wanted to know is how can conservatives help the poor without letting lazy neer-do-well liberals, blacks, and illegal immigrants steal my hard earned money. Likely, most liberal have no problems with the same question as long as it is applied to both sides of the political divide and all parts of the racial and ethnic spectrum.
America would be a better America if the Christian Right would direct as much vitriol and venom toward wealthy CEOs of greedy, job killing, union busting, low wage paying, middle class destroying, off shore banking, affordable health care denying, job outsourcing corporations that pay little or no taxes and receive more money from the public treasury than do the poor.
Our system of government assistance can be improved to curtail waste and cheating. but it will happen if and only if elected members in the Senate and the House of Representatives work on the same issues with the same intent and without the weight of political grandstanding. Welfare cheaters should be eliminated. Some are too lazy to work. Some children who grow up depending on welfare do become adults who see government assistance as an entitlement that they pass on to their children.
However, not everyone who receives public assistance in the form of federal and state dollars are lazy blacks and illegal brown immigrants. Most are white Americans. Some are lazy white conservatives on the Christian right living in states that vote for conservative Republicans--states that year in and year out receive more in federal dollars that they pay in federal taxes. Neverthess, the amount of waste received by the poor, including the needy and working class cheaters pales in comparison to the billions received by corporations who give nothing back or at best give very little back.
Jesus said that that the poor will always be with us. But did Jesus Christ place any angry conditions on helping the poor and needy? Would The Christ have problems with any of these examples of aid to the poor?
1. Giving aid to a person or to a family that finds itself in dire straits. Like the parable of the good Samaritan, isn't that the Christian thing to do?
2. Providing public assistance whose goal is to lift the spirit and physical well being of the poor and needy.
3. Offering government assistance to provide additional educational opportunity and cultural experiences that give hope and help lift poor children--red, white, yellow, black, and brown--out of poverty.
4. Providing public assistance to any segment of society that, without that assistance, would remain in dire straits.
Helping does not mean giving poor lazy people the right to feed from the public treasury to get rich or even to get along without engaging in available work. It does not mean giving money to undeserving undesirables on either side of the political divide. On the other hand we understand that no effort to contribute to the common good is totally free from pitfalls and potential abuse by the poor, the not so poor, and the very rich--abuse we all should be willilng to guard against and help eliminate.
But, as Stephen Colbert so eloquently said: "If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn't help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we've got to acknowledge that He commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don't want to do it".