April 22, 2005

CHICAGO (ELCA) – The Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), joined four other U.S. religious leaders in criticizing U.S. Sen. Bill Frist's (R-Tenn.) decision to participate in an April 24 teleconference which portrays Democrats as "against people of faith" for blocking President Bush's judicial nominees. The criticism came in an April 22 conference call with news reporters.

Frist is the Republican majority leader in the Senate. The April 24 telecast is being organized by the Family Research Council, Washington, D.C., a conservative public policy organization. It will originate at Highview Baptist Church, Louisville, Ky., and is to be distributed to congregations throughout the country over the Internet and through Christian television and radio networks and stations.

Hanson and the other religious leaders are displeased with the materials promoting "Justice Sunday" and with Frist's decision to associate himself with the event by appearing in the telecast in a taped presentation. An advertising flier for the telecast said Justice Sunday aims to address the Democrats' use of the filibuster to challenge Republican judicial nominees.

"The filibuster was once abused to protect racial bias, and now it is being used against people of faith," the flier said.

Hanson was joined on the conference call by the Rev. Robert Edgar, general secretary of the National Council of Churches USA; the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, stated clerk of the general assembly, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.); Bishop Vashti Murphy McKenzie, African Methodist Episcopal Church; and Rabbi David Sapperstein, director, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism.

The religious leaders said they are concerned that a high-profile political leader would choose to associate himself with the event.

Edgar told reporters that Frist refused to meet with religious leaders about his scheduled participation in the telecast despite several attempts to meet this week. The telecast should be called "Just Us Sunday," Edgar said, who added that for some religious leaders to be cut off from key political leaders is an "outrage." Edgar said he is asking Frist to "change his very destructive tactics."

Hanson told reporters "that the rhetoric associated with Justice Sunday is divisive and damaging to religion and politics." He said religious and political leaders should invite people in this nation into "lively civil public discussion of what makes for a more just world."

"The needs of this world are too great. The challenges facing this nation [are] too complex for such divisive rhetoric that we are hearing," he said.

"The tragic irony of Justice Sunday is that it risks perpetrating further injustice," Hanson said. "To imply some people because of their political convictions are not persons of faith is an injustice." Using the power of an elected political leader to polarize people of faith is "unjust," Hanson said.

"We as religious and political leaders need to be calling the American people to the barriers we have erected to divide us from one another and together, turn those walls into tables of conversation and reconciliation," Hanson said.

The Family Research Council is entitled to hold such an event, but Frist should not participate, Sapperstein said. Frist's participation is "inappropriate and ill-advised," and Frist should withdraw or repudiate "the notion of Justice Sunday," he said.

"Senator Frist has the responsibility to lead America in a better direction," Sapperstein added.

All of the religious leaders believe in the First Amendment and the right of people of express opinions, Kirkpatrick said. "[But] we must have an environment where people of faith are not denigrated. I urge Senator Frist not to support such programs," he said.

"To be judged because of a political agenda – not because we're Americans, not because we're Christians, not because we're people of faith, but because we disagree – takes us to a dangerous place," McKenzie said. "We cannot be asleep. We must be wide awake" for such things, she added.

Hanson Writes Letter to Frist

In an April 19 letter to Frist, Hanson said that Frist's participation in the April 24 event and divisive rhetoric about people of faith is self-righteous and polarizing.

Hanson told Frist that Lutherans "share a common faith in Jesus Christ, a love of the gospel and, in the tradition of Martin Luther, a healthy respect for the separation of church and state. We are a church body deeply committed to unity in the body of Christ and to mission for the sake of the world."

ELCA members are conservatives, moderates and liberals, Hanson said. "As Republicans, Democrats and Independents, we are all ‘people of faith' who take our faith seriously and attempt to live out Christís love in love for and service to our neighbor. Discerning Godís will for all people and creation challenges each of us individually, and our church corporately, on a daily basis."

Hanson said this discernment is never "clear cut and it certainly is never subject to a political party litmus test on any issue."

"The rhetoric that some people of faith – Republicans, conservatives or fundamentalists – ‘have it right' and all other people of faith have it wrong not only is self-righteous, but inappropriately polarizes people of faith for political purposes," Hanson said in his letter.

Hanson "respectfully" asked Frist to cease judging whether or not people have faith by how they choose to express themselves on political issues.

"You honor neither yourself, this country nor people of faith by such political manipulation," Hanson said. "In the strongest terms, I urge you to use your position of significant responsibility to lead this country to a healthy respect not only for dissent but for all people of faith."

ELCA News Service
The text of the Rev. Mark Hanson's letter to U.S. Sen. Bill Frist is at http://www.elca.org/advocacy/ on the Web site of the Lutheran Office for Governmental Affairs, the ELCA's federal public policy office in Washington, D.C.