Developing this post brought to mind the evolution of Hillary Clinton’s e-mail ‘explanations’. It started off simple enough, but then it kept getting bigger than I expected, and soon became too lengthy for a single article. So in an effort not to present an undue challenge to the patience and endurance of my treasured readers, I decided to divide it. Part II will follow shortly. Together, they comprise my response to a couple of comments that I encountered recently that disturbed me, and since I do not like to be disturbed alone, I felt compelled to disturb all of you, as well.

Influence – A Power Not to be Wasted ~
The comments I found provocative were made in regard to the upcoming election, which is not surprising. We can hardly get through a day without a fresh load of sensational hyperbole from someone about one candidate or another. These comments provoked a response because they represented an example of the thinking employed by many Christians regarding their political choices, and the impact that that kind of thinking is likely to have on Election Day. This is a crucial time for Christian America. What we do and how we use our influence have never been more obviously vital in my lifetime. When I see the potential power of that influence squandered or rendered impotent and stripped of anything pragmatically beneficial, I feel compelled to react.

A salient problem was that neither of the comments were new, and I’m convinced that they did not originate with the people making them. They were not the product of careful thought about who we are and why we’re here, and how Christians ought to respond to the challenges of this election. Their conclusions failed to reflect a reasonable understanding of the facts supporting the vital issues at stake for us. Instead, they were a sobering exhibition of how easy it is for Christians to absorb, apply, and regurgitate the ‘progressive’ propaganda spewing out of every mainstream news outlet in the country.

Vote your Conscience?
But let me get on to the comments themselves. One came from a blogger. She was making

Vote my Conscience?

a concerted effort to avoid the slightest hint of approval regarding almost anything Donald Trump did, said, or represents. Then to appear balanced, she was careful not to sound positive or defensive about any of Hillary Clinton’s scandalous actions. Finally, after extolling the virtues of using our Christian integrity to rise above it all, she concluded by telling her readers to “vote their conscience”.

Wow … What a pathetic, empty, and indecisive wrap-up. After throwing out all the reasons she could conjure up for Christians not to support either candidate, and sounding like a clarion call to stay home on Election Day to avoid political contamination, she suggested that we go vote, and consult our Christian “conscience” for guidance, a classic move from the institutional church’s Christian’s playbook—‘cop-outs’ instead of courage.

Questions for a Christian Conscience ~
I’m aware that this is a tough election, and parts of this campaign have been hard to take, and that’s all the more reason we need to step up and make the tough decisions needed, not dance around them like timid little ballerinas, too delicate to soil ourselves by engaging in politics. So, regarding the conscience thing, I have some questions. For instance …

• Please tell me how one can claim deference to a ‘Christian’ conscience and vote to elevate a person to the highest office in the land who thinks that killing over 3,000 babies a day is not just OK, but a ‘right’ to be protected, and who promises to defend, not defund, the slaughterhouses run by Planned Parenthood.
• Then, how does an operative Christian conscience approve voting for someone who approves and promotes every godless form of moral depravity that human beings can develop, so long as it facilitates the national obsession for sex without the inconvenience of commitment, accountability, or consequence?
• Also, please tell me how a ‘Christian’ conscience handles voting for a person who used every office she ever held and employed every privilege she was ever granted as a mechanism by which to enrich herself through manipulation, deception, fraud, and coercion.
• And how does a ‘Christian’ conscience justify supporting someone for whom deceit and duplicity is her most prevalent personality trait, and for whom lying is a way of life?
• How does the presumptive ‘Christian conscience’ of a would-be Democrat voter honestly side-step even those few issues?
• And before you jump up and down in your pew suggesting that I’m defending Donald Trump’s language, how about being at least as righteously indignant when it comes to the degrading, obscene, and just plain filthy language Hillary Clinton spewed out regularly at those public servants who were cursed with having to work around her, many of whom were charged with putting their lives in jeopardy to protect her? Her filth doesn’t make his more palatable, but neither does it address any major problem facing this nation.

Relevant Reminders from God ~
Two admonitions Paul gave to Timothy are worth remembering …

“But evil men and impostors will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them,” (2 Timothy 3:13-14 NKJV).

“But avoid foolish and ignorant disputes, knowing that they generate strife. And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will” (2 Timothy 2:23-26 NKJV).

We are to instruct about things that really matter, not fight about things that don’t. It comes down to this. Like it or not, there are only two people on any ballot that have any chance of winning. Only one of them will stand against the godless systems plaguing our nation, and that’s Donald J. Trump. We have to do more than pin on our little ‘Christian’ badge and timidly squeak out, “Vote your conscience.” Retreating into the all-too-familiar façade of presumptuous institutional holiness without making any decision at all is a travesty, and we need to understand that that is one of the reasons the corruption has been free to rise to its current level. 

‘Conscience Conundrums, Loose Cannons, and Civic Confusion – Part II’ . . .   To be continued . . .

© 2016 Gallagher’s Pen, Ronald L. Gallagher, Ed.S.  All rights reserved.

Want to ‘follow’ this blog?  Sign up just below the ‘Search box’ in the upper right sidebar to receive email notifications of new posts!