Listening to a recent commentary
I was struck by the Christian Right's confusion concerning the role of
government with regard to health care.
On the one hand they're
vehemently opposed to government regulation in terms of pricing and/or the
government legislating access.
But on the other hand most of
them want the government to regulate pharmaceuticals and who has access to
them.
The particular commentary I
listened to was dealing with surrogacy.
Personally I'm opposed to
surrogate pregnancies but I'm also opposed to IVF and many other commonplace medical
procedures.
However I would say most
Christians are not necessarily opposed to IVF or other alternate forms of
fertilization, conception and implantation.
I'm not sure their views are
always consistent.
While I would agree with the
BreakPoint commentator that I don't want to see surrogate mothers becoming a
more common practice, I'm a little confused.
In this case they clearly want
the government to regulate and intervene. If a childless couple or even an
inconvenienced couple wanted to hire a surrogate... isn't that their private
business?
I'm not speaking morally. I'm
speaking socially. I realize that kind of bifurcation is tantamount to heresy
for Monistic/Sacral thinkers but I would argue it emulates New Testament
categories. See 1 Corinthians 5.
I don't agree with surrogacy,
but do I want the government to let me make my healthcare decisions and
arrangements? If so, then on a democratic basis, don't I have to allow others
the same liberty?
BreakPoint says no, they want
the government to intervene and separate or at the very least regulate that
relationship and transaction.
I'll grant the Libertarians
this...they are consistent. If health care is simply a commodity, an economic
transaction like buying furniture then it certainly makes no sense for the
government to intervene.
I would hope most of us would
know better and realize health care and access to food, water and heat are not
the same sorts of issues. But that's for another discussion.
But with BreakPoint and so many
other Christian Right think-tanks and lobbyists we are presented with a
schizophrenic model... the free market with heavy moral regulation.
These same folks often miss the
tremendous moral implications of the free market as well as the ethical fallout
in terms of communities and culture.
I don't want sinners to sin, but
I also realize what they need is the gospel. If we want to maximize freedom,
then indeed get the government out of private lives.
If it's the government's task to
regulate morality, in terms of thoughts and private behaviour...then fine. We
can argue the theology of that.
But you cannot say that you
support freedom and democracy.
You cannot have it both ways.
Interestingly as I considered
these issues I heard another commentary. This time the host was talking about
all the medications our society uses to control behaviour and deal with all the
supposed disorders everyone has. And he finds himself in another tangle, as
generally speaking he has no problem with psychology but seems alarmed at the
scope and spectrum of analysis and treatment.
I would go even further than
this commentator and condemn the various branches of psychology as not only
false but perhaps the single most destructive element within our modern
society. The worldview framed by psychology has decimated our culture and has
worked its way into the Church.
Because of it many Christians
have completely reframed how they think about everything from marriage and
divorce to child rearing and money. Many esteemed and "Biblical"
teachers and counselors dealing with these topics are doing little more than
promoting a baptized worldliness and in many cases they are literally calling
evil good. Some have even tried to distance themselves from psychology but are
still ultimately promoting the same concepts.
BreakPoint was rightly
challenging the notion that a pill would be developed that would help people to
be happy and to forget past anguish and travail. He referred to it was
reminiscent of Huxley's Soma... which created a dulled and deadened populace.
Lives would not be transformed, problems would simply be suppressed. People
would be reduced to conformist automatons.
We already have many Soma's at
work within our culture. The proposed psychosomatic pill would just be icing on
the cake.
But ironically I would argue
Christendom itself is a form of Soma.
At best the Christendom project
can only create a veneer, it can bring about a type of conformity. The moral
senses are not heightened but dulled as the hordes of unregenerate people
engage in an endless quest to circumvent the law and the supposed morality that
undergirds it. It cannot transform lives. At best people are trying to maintain
a social acceptance. Their moral conformity has nothing to do with glorifying
God or displaying gratitude for His reconciliation.
And as I've often said it is far
more dangerous than some secular attempt at uniformity. For those who engage in
this project and vision must ultimately redefine Biblical categories. The term
Christian must be re-cast in order to function on a social or national level.
This confuses the Gospel and instead of a Christian society you end up with
masses of people who have been Soma-ized into believing they are good moral
people who will inherit the Kingdom. Instead in their stupour they walk off the
cliff and into the abyss.
In the end I believe the
schizophrenia on all of these issues is the result of politicization. The
political activist wants to win and will employ whatever argument is necessary
in order to do so. Integrity is shattered and the result is never what they
originally hoped for. Politicization means the embrace of a new epistemology
and with it a set of wholly new criteria for deriving ethical norms.
