<a href="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/t-shirt1.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-112" title="t-shirt1" src="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/t-shirt1-300x286.jpg" alt="" width="341" height="325" /></a>

OK. Time to put on my Christians Against Christians T-shirt again. (In case you're wondering, this shirt doesn't actually exist. Yet.)

I really don't want to blog about politics—it's not my thing. But one of my things <em>is</em> spreading the word that Not All Christians Are Like That, and these days it's hard to separate that theme from politics.

So...here I go. Did you all see this <a href="http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/22/palin-god-will-do-the-right-thing-on-election-day/">CNN headline</a> yesterday? "Palin: God will do the right thing on election day." I started spitting venomous bile when I saw it. I'm sure it's not the worst thing that's been said connecting religion and politics during this race, but I'm pretty sure it's the one that's affected me most violently. It's so wrong on so many levels, I hardly know where to begin. I'll just say a few things and be done with it.

1. I agree. God <em>is</em> going to do the right thing. But that "right thing" doesn't have anything to do with American politics. It certainly has nothing to do with Sarah Palin, who seems to think she has God all figured out. I know she <em>thinks</em> she's trying to present God as really really big, by saying that he can turn Obama's lead in the polls into a win for McCain. But what she's actually doing is presenting God as very very petty and small.

2. It's interesting that when Palin said this "right thing" bit about God, she was at Focus on the Family. That's the same organization that publicly prayed for rain in the evening of Obama's DNC acceptance speech (I wrote about this in <a href="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/?p=67">God, irony and rain</a>). As you probably remember, it was perfectly clear and 72 degrees in Denver the evening Obama spoke, and the Republican National Convention got partially rained out. Coincidence?

3. My first two points aside, and regardless of my personal beliefs, it's time to demand that religion be left out of politics. Believers of every stripe along with non-believers need to stand up together and insist in a clear separation of church and state. Applying a personal belief system to your personal political perspective is one thing; wielding God around like a weapon and invoking him to promote extremist views is flat out wrong.

4. I know Palin is ridiculous. So do the nearly 700 people who commented on the CNN story. (As I skimmed, I only saw one comment that supported Palin.) This is very comforting. It's also comforting to know that people are going to do what they want when they go to the polls, because God gave us brains and free wills. When it gets down to it, the most disturbing part of all this, to me, is the damage Palin is doing to the reputation of both women and of Christians. For smart, liberal, Christian women (yes, they exist), the cringe factor is doubled. No, tripled.

At least she creates lots of damage-control work for people like me. Keeps us busy.

I'm going to wrap things up with one of the CNN article comments, from someone in Tulsa. He/she sums up what I think God is really about quite nicely:

<em>My faith tells me these are the virtues to strive for;
Valour: Pursuit of Courage and Knowledge
Generosity: Pursuit of Giving
Liberality: Pursuit of Will
Diligence: Pursuit of Ethics
Patience: Pursuit of Peace
Kindness: Pursuit of Charity
Humility: Pursuit of Modesty
Only one of our candidates represents these. It's not McCain.</em>