Dobson on Obama
I like James Dobson. I have since high school. We still listen to focus on the family as my kids are nearly in high school. I have to say I was disappointed at his response to Obama’s speech on religion. It is not that I disagree with him. I think he is basically right. I just don’t think the reasons he gave are particularly defensible. First he glosses over the problem Obama points out about different faith having different views. He pretends that is just a non-problem. It isn’t. In fact, separation of church and state was motivated by the reality that many of the different churches were fighting. Many were in the new world because they were running from Christian on Christian violence in Europe. So we need to address that issue. He does it by simply saying the other interpretations are wrong. But that is such an inadequate response. Why is his opinion right and others wrong? He makes some vague appeal to tradition. But there are multiple traditions. It is a huge problem and he just pretends it isn’t there. That somehow Obama is just confused.
Then he talks about the relationship between religion, morality, and politics. The idea that one needs to give some sort of moral reasoning that is not totally dependent on scripture. He fails to say that on the major issues of abortion and gay marriage there are such arguments. It is called natural law. It is the reason why we can outlaw murder and theft without having this problem. The reality is you can make a very strong argument in the same way that abortion and gay marriage should be illegal. That is a very important point he fails to make. There are cases where minorities must be protected from abuse by a majority group. Why doesn’t abortion and gay marriage fall into that category? We need to explain why because many don’t get it. Just calling it a fruitcake reading of the constitution is not going to get it done. Obama is an expert on constitutional law and Dobson is not so the charge is unlikely to work.
To tell you the truth, I would expect both Obama and Dobson to know what natural law is. Maybe they do and they are just not going there. But Obama specifically referred to finding reasons for laws that don’t come from one church. Is it to much to expect him to read St Thomas Aquinas? What do they teach guys in Harvard anyway?
Sure this kind of talk will work with most of Dobson’s loyal listeners. It won’t do much to convince people that Christians can engage in a rational dialog on these matters. He had a great chance to say some things that will make secular people think. He didn’t do that. Most will assume a very shallow reasoning on his part. They may be right. But there is much better thinking available from the Christian side. It would have been a good opportunity to make it known.
Problem is; natural law is also affirmed by the Scriptures — Romans 2:14-15; and western laws against murder, stealing; all come from the whole Judeo/Christian ethics from the 10 commandments.
natural law would also indicate in your heart that adultery is wrong and sin, etc. but our culure seems to have watered that one down over the years.
I agree that Christians should be able to intelligently articulate natural law without always putting a Bible verse on every point; but I also think that we should not be afraid of using the Bible. Part of the problem is that we have lost lots of our salt and light because we are so afraid to actually use Scripture in an intelligent way with unbelievers, even if they scoff at it.
June 25th, 2008 at 12:58 pmI have to say I was disappointed at his response to Obama’s speech on religion.
Where is the link to that?
June 25th, 2008 at 1:00 pmIn fact, separation of church and state was motivated by the reality that many of the different churches were fighting. Many were in the new world because they were running from Christian on Christian violence in Europe. So we need to address that issue. He does it by simply saying the other interpretations are wrong. But that is such an inadequate response. Why is his opinion right and others wrong?
So, you want to bring back the Inquisition, Crusades, etc. all the Roman Catholic Church’s doing? That is the implication of you wanting to solve the “that’s your interpretation” problem. Seems like the USA principle was a good one.
June 25th, 2008 at 1:04 pmI didn’t find the text online. There is a link to the audio on the focus on the family site. They have Obama’s speech video there too.
Part of the problem is that we have lost lots of our salt and light because we are so afraid to actually use Scripture in an intelligent way with unbelievers, even if they scoff at it.
I don’t think it is either/or. We need to use scripture effectively as well. I do think natural law has a major role to play. It gives us a framework for talking about morality in a multifaith environment. So we can say that Moslems may not teach their children that killing Jews is OK but that does not mean Christians can’t say gay marriage is wrong.
So, you want to bring back the Inquisition, Crusades, etc. all the Roman Catholic Church’s doing? That is the implication of you wanting to solve the “that’s your interpretation” problem. Seems like the USA principle was a good one.
We have the inquisition, minus some of the excesses. It is called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. It is a good thing. Soon we may need crusades as well. Again minus the excesses but moslem agression needs to be dealt with some how.
The USA principle does not solve the interpretation problem. It is simply a way of living with disagreement. When you want to know the truth or fight for the truth you are simply stuck. You have to somehow pick a tradition. But how can you know you are even close to God’s truth if you do that. Only if the tradition you pick is guarenteed to be in tune with God’s mind. You need a sacred tradition. Not a human tradition. Where could you find one of those?
June 25th, 2008 at 3:09 pmI do not know for sure, but I think that Senator Obama may not be familiar with natural law, and possibly Dr. Dobson is not that familiar with it, either.
How could this be? Well, what are they teaching them at Harvard (or any university’s political science/philosophy program)? Here at the local public university, rated one of the best in the U.S., public or private, the political science and philosophy departments have a sharp division between them: The bigger one, to paint in broad strokes, is a modernist (or post-modernist) school of thought, the other, smaller but still strong one is Thomistic (Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, and the contemporary Thomists).
Natural law is focused on heavily by the Thomistic division, but I do not think it forms a large part of the modernist division. It is likely that Senator Obama learned philosophy gravely deficient in natural law and classical Western thought.
What about faith and reason? Has either Senator Obama or Dr. Dobson read Fides et Ratio or Veritatis Splendor? I would tend to doubt it. Reclaiming more of the universities’ philosophy departments to teach natural law and Thomistic thought would go a long way and is a good place to start.
In short, I agree with you that this was a great opportunity to discuss the natural law and the relationship between faith and reason, which Dr. Dobson missed. At the same time, like you, I do think that Senator Obama’s interpretation of Scripture and his theology are distorted.
June 25th, 2008 at 3:24 pm