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Why a Christian in America Should Not Be or Vote for a Socialist

Why a Christian in America Should Not Be or Vote for a Socialist

Last updated on: February 10, 2016 at 5:53 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

Why a Christian in America Should Not Be or Vote for a Socialist 2016-02-10T17:53:49-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

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Senator Bernie Sanders is being promoted as a way for Christians to vote their values, but voting for Sanders would promote some values at the cost of being foolish.

Sanders shares my values in some important areas (race, poverty), but has poor solutions. You can do bad, after all, by doing good! Generally, it is good to feed the hungry, but if the hungry are an army from Daesh (so called ISIS), then feeding them would do more harm than good. Senator Sanders would do good, but do more harm than good. I applaud his goals: ending poverty while shuddering at his methods.

Socialism has a long Christian history. If you think about it, this makes sense. As a Christian, I am commanded to feed the poor and treat my neighbor as I would wish to be treated. Why wouldn’t I be a socialist?

Let’s take a standard slogan for Senator Sanders: nobody should work forty hours a week and live in poverty.

Let’s agree.

The devils, sadly, are in the details.

What is “work?”

What is “poverty?”

I am not trying to be tricky . . . I am asking what Senator Sanders means. If I love Plato and work hard at Plato, then that is a job. Should the state support that work? If I only studied Plato, however hard I worked I would live in poverty, because just now nobody wishes to pay me to work hard on Plato forty hours a week. The government will start deciding what jobs deserve subsidy. That strikes me as very dangerous.

What is poverty? If we all get enough to eat, nobody is starving, is that enough? What about shelter? How good must the shelter be? How much medical care is a right? What if I do not want what the government provides?

The response will be: “He is not talking about you, but the working poor.” First, we have to ask how many of the working poor are poor, because of factors other than money. What if some of the working poor refused to study in free public school? What if they intentionally goofed off? Aren’t they learning an important lesson? Wouldn’t Sanders undermine the hard working people by removing the reward of hard work? Second, we must worry what “helping” does to people. Doesn’t my “help” put me in a superior relationship to the person I help?

Of course, my socialist friends would say that even my example is more complicated: maybe other social problems created the social system and schools that discouraged some students from working. What about “intersectionality: where one evil may intersect with another? I agree. That is perfectly possible. Do we want a government big enough to “solve” those problems?

As a Christian in a pluralistic society, I do not.

First, government isn’t good at this sort of project. Government tends to find solutions for all, but I am not “all.” To quote The Prisoner, I am a man and not a number. Social Security has done great good, but it is blunt. It sends money to folk who do not need it and not enough money to those who do.

Second, government needs a basis for morality to make decisions and in a pluralistic society that is dangerous. Where will get this morality? Science cannot give us morality. Science is good at saying what is, but it can never tell us what ought to be. Science can tell us what it means to “hear,” but science cannot tell us that the government should make all “deaf” children hear. What if a deaf parent wants a deaf child to continue in the deaf subculture? Government must make moral judgments and the more areas where government exists, the more moral judgments it will make.

Pacifists are already tolerated, but find their tax money going to war. A socialist state will expand areas where reasonable people will find their government doing what they hate. Anything that the government does comes with the power of a gun. The same people with the right to arrest you may not be the best people to educate you. Dissent from government is dangerous!

Finally, a bigger government will discourage other social structures that might do the job better. Government stuff is “free.” Private schools must compete with “free schools” and this is hard . . .forcing uniformity on education. Imagine that uniformity spreading.

Socialism in places like Europe, where it has worked “best,” has produced some goods, but at the loss of prosperity. The United Kingdom, for example, has a standard of living lower than almost every American state. In other areas of the world, socialism has produced tyranny. Do we wish to raise up a few at the cost of lowering the standard of living for many?

Finally, when the government took over airport security, we ended up with many of the same weak systems now paid for by tax payers. Imagine what would happen if we had the state pay for education. After all, if you give the government the power to give you free education, then government will run education. That is more power to government and less to churches, private schools, clubs, families, and individuals. “Free” education will reward the present schools, with their giant administrations and waste, with “free money.”

The problems with socialism are why I favor a government that is by modern standards small. This government will have a social safety net that prevents absolute poverty or no medical care. With Theodore Roosevelt, I want a government big enough to check “big business,” but not so large that it simply gets together with big business in a corporate state.

In short, I favor a government somewhat smaller than the one we have and believe this to be the best solution to a problem that cannot be solved until King Jesus runs everything. Senator Sanders is loveable, but dangerously wrong.

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