One of the last things I did before making the move to Chicago was voting in the Democratic primary in Texas. Our choices were Jasmine Crockett and James Talarico. I voted for James, because though I'm sure we'll have policy disagreements, and it may turn out that he's an imperfect vessel like all politicians, I want more of his brand of political rhetoric.
I grew up in the church. Specifically, a Southern Baptist church. Thankfully, not a fire and brimstone type of place, since my parents weren't those sorts of Christians, but make no mistake, it was quite conservative when we joined back in the mid-eighties. As time went on, and pastors came and went, the church we attended grew more moderate, but only in comparison to what it had been before. Nevertheless, our church maintained its focus on trying to ensure that, in the words of Russell Allan, their current pastor, "if our church disappears tomorrow, will anyone besides its members miss it?".
The relentless focus on ensuring that we were doing everything we could to show the world what God's love looked like, didn't seem to mesh with what I saw every night on the news from people who claimed to be Christians like we were. The dissonance was jarring. For quite some time now, America has viewed the church and the evangelical branches through the lens of folks like Pat Robertson, Franklin Graham, and Joel Osteen. So many "faith leaders" used the Bible and the gospel to support and explain their own natural inclinations towards a lust for power and control, as a cudgel with which to beat their opponents over the head. They cherry-picked verses to support their own prejudices, and welcomed outraged opposition as proof that they were truly doing the Lord's will on earth, since in their minds, that outrage was fueled by the devil and expected because they were speaking "truth to heathens". It felt like the public only saw Christians as hate-filled, bombastic little men who were hell-bent on imposing their version of morality upon the entire population.
So when I first heard James, speaking about how faith compelled him to support things like human rights, dignity for all people, love for the immigrant, the homeless, the disenfranchised - it was like finally hearing your own language while traveling through a foreign country. He even often quotes one of my personal favorite sections of the Bible, when the Pharisees, trying to make Him look foolish, asked Jesus of Nazareth which commandment was most important. Jesus replied, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind'. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
That's the entire gospel in two sentences. Love God, and love your neighbor. Of course the next natural question is, who exactly counts as my neighbor. He answered that question too, with the famous parable of the good Samaritan, which boils down to "Everyone is your neighbor, no exceptions".
We need more politicians and leaders who are able to humbly acknowledge that they do not know everything, and that they do not have a monopoly on deciding what God wants for the USA. We need more leaders who deflect vicious attacks with grace and humility. We need more self-professed Christians to stand up and advocate for the weak and powerless, for true justice, for a version of Christianity that focuses more on the Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount instead of the context-bound purity codes of Leviticus. That's why I granted my vote to James - he's a politician who might actually be missed by more than his own die-hard supporters if we can just give him a chance to lead in the Senate.