Faith, Morality, and Loving Your Neighbor Through Politics

Politics doesn't move people anymore. I mean, you read Common Sense by Thomas Paine, um, you read Lincoln speeches, you listen to Fannie Lou Hamer, you read- Martin Luther King Jr. ... King, yeah.

They infused their politics with a moral foundation, oftentimes explicitly rooted in faith.

And I feel like what we're suffering from now, people start with their politics and then try to figure out the morality on top of that, right?

When it should be reversed. Who are we as human beings?

Where do we come from? Why are we here? How should we live?

The politics should grow out of that. I, I really do feel like this is a way that I can love my neighbor at scale- Mm-hmm ... through good public policy, reducing the cost of prescription drugs, reducing the cost of childcare,

the cost of housing, all the things I've worked on in the legislature.

It was to love my neighbor, make their lives easier and better, help them become who they're supposed to be, to give the gift that they're supposed to give.

If we can infuse our politics with more of this, this spirituality, I think we could treat politics like a sacrament.

We could have an incarnational politics.

What does that mean? If you take seriously, and again, you don't have to be a Christian, you don't even have to be part of an organized religion.

I, I do think that everyone is religious.

Um, even- Ooh, that's a bold, that's a bold claim. That's my hot take here.

What do you mean by that? I think we all put our trust in something.

You were talking earlier about whether Donald Trump was religious, and I, I think I disagreed with you because Donald Trump does put his trust in money and in power and in status.

I choose to put my faith in love, which sometimes the evidence suggests is not gonna work.

Sometimes love is defeated, sometimes love experiences setbacks, but the trust is that it will one day win, and that's what my tradition's all about.

But my point is, if you do believe that each person is sacred, that each person is holy, that each person bears the divine image, that should fundamentally change how we engage in politics, how we treat our neighbors, and how we treat our enemies.

To me, an incarnational politics would take seriously that idea that every person is, uh, is God.