John McCain - He'll Put Country First

A highlight from tonight's republican national convention that for many was a feel-good throw-away line: John McCain's mother said 'If I know anything, it is that he'll always put country first, that's what I know about John McCain."

That, my friends, is simply heresy.  Country can never be first.  As pompous as it was, Yale even got that right.  The old motto is "For God, for Country, and for Yale".   St. Peter put it succintly.  "We must obey God rather than humans."  Sure, we can put that in context and talk about proper loyalties to penultimate things.  But the prophetic caveat remains and it is not a line that patriotic celebrations like to encourage unless the are joined as one--God and country--rather than ordered loyalties that give one priority over the others.

More on the politics of our season soon.  I'm attentive because I'm teaching a course on Worship and Ethics: Political Worship later this semester.

Peace,

Chris

Comments

[Scott Bader-Saye]

Hey Chris - I was thinking about the "putting country first" line myself this morning, and it struck me just how liberal this is! At its best our democractic polity creates space for traditioned communities of substantive good to pursue those goods, share wisdom with one another, and pursue ad hoc projects together. Rightly then, one would put first the community of substantive good that shapes one in a life of virtue and helps one pursue fullness of life. The liberal democratic state, lacking any substantive goods beyond the good of free choice, cannot be (or should not be) the first object of loyalty and probably not even the second (pace Yale!) - since it (like the phone company, as MacIntyre says) prescinds from naming goods that could rightly become objects of loyalty. It's hard, then, to hear McCain's claim as anything other than jingoism.

[Josh]

Professor Scharen,

It's always good to read your thoughts. I pray you and the family are well.

I thought you might find this running conversation I've been involved in recently quite interesting.

Give it a look (at the comments, that is): http://joshlaurawyrtzen.blogspot.com/2008/09/nothing-changes.html

Cheers!
josh

[Howard]

OBAMA = BETRAYAL
Obama supporters are foolish to think that he will never betray them.
Obama was a close friend of Pastor Wright for TWENTY YEARS.
Obama threw Wright under the bus for personal ambition.
McCain would not betray his country even after 5 years of torture.
You can put lipstick on a traitor, but he's still a traitor.