Religion & Politics Do Mix, Part 1

It’s said that politics and religion do not mix well.  After interviewing Nichola Torbett, the National Organizer for the Network of Spiritual Progressives, I found the exact opposite to be the case – In the world of networking, religion (or rather spirituality) and politics compliment each other very well.

The Network of Spiritual Progressives (NSP) came out of the article "After the Fall: Why America Needs a Spiritual Left" , which was written by Rabbi Michael Lerner on November 3, 2004--the day after the last presidential election when it became clear how deeply divided the country was.  There was a strong positive response to the article, so Lerner and his organization, Tikkun, started planning the first Spiritual Activism Conference for July 2005.  That conference was the official launch of the NSP, a nationwide interfaith network of people committed to healing and transforming American politics and culture, and through that effort, contributing to the healing of the world.

According to Nichola, NSP works with the media to point out those ways in which they reinforce the notion that what really matters is material success, as well as to provide an alternative voice to the religious right.  They work with activist organizations to help them articulate a positive vision of what America could move toward, rather than just protesting what we are experiencing now.  Members are beginning work within all of the political parties to reframe political issues in terms of meaning and social connection.

In this month’s article, I’ll share the beginning part of my interview with Nichola.

Question: How important is networking in accomplishing the goals of the NSP?

Answer - A deeper kind of networking is at the very core of what we are about, which is to challenge the notion that we are each a self-contained nomad whose highest goal in life is to maximize our own personal success and well-being and, instead, to demonstrate the ways in which we are all fundamentally connected and interdependent and that our highest good is served by acknowledging and honoring those connections to each other.

We seek to bring together, on the one hand, people of faith who are distraught at the alliance between religion and corporate interest, and on the other hand, social justice activists who may be, at best, closeted about their spirituality, and at worst, openly hostile to believers in religion or spirituality.  Working together, these two groups can do much more to bring about social and economic justice than either can working alone.

Question:  Any examples of how you've seen networking help accomplish those goals?

We have found that most people respond in an intensely positive way to our ideas for a new bottom line in America, but that they are also cynical about the possibility of achieving that new bottom line.  At the root of that cynicism is the belief that, while they personally want a more loving, compassionate world, other people are just out for themselves.

The first time Michael Lerner presented the new bottom line, it was to a group of 400 Methodists in Kansas, and they were so thrilled that they gave him a standing ovation.  Afterward, though, a group of them came up to him and said, "Rabbi Lerner, we love your ideas, but they'll never work."

"Oh. Why won't they work?" He asked.

"Well, because the only people who would want the new bottom line are Methodists in Kansas.   We read the papers.  We watch TV.  We know what the people on the coasts are like, and they're all a bunch of selfish materialists!"

But when he or I present the same ideas in Seattle or New York or Washington, DC, or Los Angeles, the response is "We think this is great, but Middle America? They'll never buy it."

So we know that there are hundreds of thousands of people out there who resonate with this vision, but most of them are hesitant to talk about it, much less work for it, because they believe that no one else will, and so why should they put their hearts and souls into it only to be disappointed?   Instead, they water down what the really want to what they think is "realistic."   This dynamic plays itself out over and over again in electoral politics when we get into debates over who is "electable"  There may be a progressive candidate who moves me with her unusually powerful vision for a loving and just community, but because I don't trust others to be moved by the same vision, the very power of her vision leads me to label her "unelectable" and feel that I can't vote for her.  Other people, also moved by her vision, do the same thing, so that this incredibly moving vision that WE ALL WANT is never given a chance because we don't trust each other to respond to it.

Only by getting people to talk to each other, and in so doing to d e c l a r e to each other that they want the same thing, can we hope to overcome the cynicism that prevents us from committing to bringing about the kind of world we each want.

We’ll finish the interview in next month’s article.  Stay tuned.

 

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Contact Matthew Best at MatthewB@TheNationalNetWorker.com or Post a Comment on TNNW Blog.