How Faith in Consumerism/Technology Replaced Faith in God

A friend of mine said once that whenever anyone walked through the doors of our Buddhist temple, it was because they were suffering and they were seeking a path to end their suffering.  That is probably a statement that can be made of all religions.  

In the past, when true faith in God was high, most people looked to religion to ease their insecurity and if not end their suffering, at least give them faith that there was some larger reason for their suffering.  Belief in God trumped everything else. “The Lord works in mysterious ways”; if we mere mortals can’t understand why, it’s not in our place to ask.  Even when people were in dire circumstances or tragedy struck, their faith in God was not questioned, indeed could not be questioned because to question it would have left them bereft of spiritual support, alone and unprotected; instead their faith provided them with comfort.

Enter the modern age of capitalism and consumerism.  Just as Darwin’s theory of evolution was taking root in the public mind, creating fissures in the bedrock of faith in the Bible and in God (the Scopes Monkey trial was in 1925), and the scope of the terrors of WWI raised questions anew about God’s mysterious way, there rose in our midst a new preacher, the ad agencies who promised happiness and security through the acquisition of goods and wealth.  Shaken in their beliefs, people were open to a new way to end their suffering, a new faith, and thus were an easy target for the siren call of consumerism.

And so for most of the 20th century, although surveys in the U.S. consistently reported that the vast majority of people stated they believed in God, religious service attendance declined as did membership.  People were giving lip-service to a belief in God, most likely as a result of peer pressure, the desire to belong to the group.  Their actions spoke otherwise.

But although the masses bought in to consumerism and its promise of happiness, people found themselves still feeling insecure and alone.  Small wonder!  And so during the last decade or so, the siren call of the new technology and social media found an avid audience.  If you observe people on the street, in restaurants, in any public setting, it would appear that most people have been fully taken in by the illusion of connectedness, of multitudes of friends, that the new technology provides.  Their faith in this illusion is so strong because it seems directly to answer their deepest longing.  Indeed the only word to describe their constant attachment to their electronics is “addiction.”   How sad.

At about the same time, though, a slight change in this shift of allegiance away from God could be observed.  Some people, mainly among the young, were feeling the effects of having no spiritual support.  They had grown up in an era in which they were not exposed to true faith.  So, unlike their parents, their faith wasn’t shaken, it never existed; there was just emptiness.  While they didn’t reject consumerism and technology, they were looking for something deeper to end their suffering and insecurity.

On the Protestant stage, numerous mega-churches … orthodox in the sense of preaching the inviolability of the Bible as the word of God … began preaching that God wants you to be rich.  That together with their emotional enticements … being born again and having a “personal relationship with Christ” … and “relevant” formatting resulted in soaring membership and attendance.  An odd marriage of convenience.

On the Jewish front, there has also been a large increase in the Orthodox community, both the more liberal Modern Orthodox and the ultra-Orthodox.  Without, however, the accommodation to modern culture seen in the Protestant mega-churches. 

But these changes in the Protestant and Jewish communities are small blips in the overall decline in religiosity as measured by attendance and membership.  The false idols of Consumerism/Technology still hold the greatest sway in our modern culture.  And so the vast majority of people, bereft of any sense of their spirituality, are left feeling alone and insecure behind a facade of connectedness at the same time as their ability to find some security through consuming, illusory though it may be, is impacted by falling real wages.

One can only hope that another false idol doesn’t appear on the scene to lead a weakened people astray and that instead a true source of spirituality, accessible to modern man, makes its presence felt and awakens people to their true self … to the God, Buddha, Higher Power, or whatever one calls it within them. 

It’s No Sin to Be Rich, BUT …

In recent years, observers in the United States have noted that the rich feel that they have no obligation for anyone else’s welfare.  In third world countries such as Angola (I just saw a shocking documentary about Angola, but the same could be said of many 3rd world countries, especially in Africa), the disregard of the rich for the poor is even more shocking because the divide is so clear and the poverty so visible and horrendous.

There is nothing wrong … morally, spiritually, ethically … with being rich.  Of course, there may be such problems with how one became rich, but that’s another matter and not the subject of this post.  This is about the moral, ethical, spiritual and civic obligations that come with being rich.

First, though, I need to define what I mean by “being rich.”  Rich is certainly a relative term.  By rich I don’t just mean fabulously wealthy … e.g. people who buy $50 million condos for their first or second residence.  (Incredibly there appears to be no shortage of such people in the global economy.)   

Webster’s defines “rich” as “having abundant possessions and especially material wealth.”  “Abundance” is in turn defined as “an ample quantity” or “a relative degree of plentifulness” or “extreme plentifulness.”

In the United States and other developed countries the dividing line between rich and not rich is a much finer line than the line between rich and poor in third world countries.  When President Obama was talking about tax rates at one point, he defined rich as anyone earning over $250,000 a year.  I would not be quite so conservative.  In 2010, the top 1% made $380,000 or more.  That clearly indicates a relative degree of plentifulness.  The top .09%, or 267,000 people, had an adjusted gross income of $1 million or more; extreme plentifulness.

For the purposes of this discussion, getting more exact than that isn’t necessary; you get the drift.  The point is that if one is rich in any country, one has a moral, ethical, spiritual, and civic obligation as a citizen of that country to help the government provide the poor, those less fortunate, with the basic needs of life … food, shelter, subsistence, and health care.  I should be clear … everyone has a duty to participate and help according to their means.  That’s what taxes are all about.  But the rich, because their wealth is abundant, should pay more, and the very wealthy should pay even more.

Why?  First, let’s dispose of one canard.  No one chooses to be poor.  It is not their fault.  It’s not because they’re lazy, as Republicans are fond of saying of late.  Yes, it is true that many do rise out of poverty, but not just through their sheer determination.  Whether a Rick Perry or a Clarence Thomas or a less extravagant example, they made it out because of the often happenstance assistance and guidance of people and often government programs, like affirmative action.  In third world countries, the intervening factor is often nepotism.  One should always remember the saying, “There but for good fortune go I.”

In most cases, someone is poor because of the way our society and economy are structured.  Whether someone is born into poverty and receives the poor education that the poor receive, live in a nightmarish environment, and have been told by society that they are worthless and bums.  Whether someone formerly middle class becomes poor because medical expenses force them into bankruptcy or the loss of a job makes them homeless almost from one day to the next.  Whether try though they may, over and over and over again, they can find no work.  These are all examples of how societal and economic structural issues cause and prolong poverty.

In none of these cases can the poor be blamed for their situation.  It is instead society that has failed them.  No child should be denied a good education.   No one should be denied safe and decent housing.  No one should be denied adequate food to keep them from being hungry.  No one who desires to work should be unemployed.  No one should be branded by society as worthless.  No one should be without a safety net when the circumstances of life turn against them through a major illness or the loss of a job.

If this is the result of a capitalist economy, then capitalism cannot be the sole economic force in a civilized society.  In such a society, there needs to be an adjunct social economy to provide for those that the capitalist economy would throw on the trash heap.  Even if we ever reach the point where there is true equal opportunity for all, some safety net would still be required for the elderly, the infirm, the intellectually-challenged, and those who face a catastrophe in their lives.

Which brings me to the other part of the response to the question, “Why?” … the moral, ethical, spiritual, and civil obligation.  Let me first speak to the civil obligation.

In the United States … and I will only speak to that as my knowledge is limited to the U.S. … this obligation is founded in our historical development.  In my book, We Still Hold These Truths, I devoted a chapter to the evolution of a social contract in the United States.  Let me quote from those pages:

“As the nature of the body politic and its political views changed during the course of the nineteenth century, there was a shift from the philosophy that each man was his own master and whether he succeeded or failed in the new egalitarian society it was to his credit or fault. The new philosophy instead recognized that many individuals were impacted by society-driven factors over which they had no control and which had a

significantly negative effect on their ability to make the most of their lives.

Especially after 1890, the reform movement gained strength, fueled by the extremes of poverty and wealth found in the country, as well as the general population’s dislike of

what it saw as the absolute power of big business, corruption scandals in government, and the violent suppression of strikes. The result over the next few decades was an American social contract with increasing emphasis on a balance of rights and individual obligations, and the role of government in leveling the playing field, with each person contributing to the government’s support according to his ability.”

Clearly, this was thought to be a civic obligation.  That’s a major reason why in this country virtually everyone pays their taxes.  Yes, they take advantage of every loophole that the law provides, but they do pay their taxes.  

But the idea of taxes being spent to help the less fortunate has grown out of favor among a large segment of the American populace, at the same time as the shift in political power has reversed itself and returned to the powerful, to the large corporations.  Social security is still supported because that is felt to be earned, but other programs … whether food stamps or health care or almost every program that supports the poor … are regularly attacked by the new Right.  Part of this new attitude is simple greed; the other part is the popularized myth that the poor are poor because it’s their own fault and thus are not deserving of government support.

The development of this civic obligation, while it was as noted above partly the result of a shift in political power during the 19th century, was based largely on moral, ethical, and spiritual teachings that go back to ancient times.  Every religion, every spiritual belief system, regardless of the cultural context and time has at its core a teaching of humanity, of concern for your fellow man.  “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” and helping others through charity and other ways are universal teachings.

Why is this so?  It’s a combination of the spiritual and the practical.  As I’ve written before in these pages, we are all one, we are all children of the same God or the same life force.  What divides us is man made, not nature.  And so we should treat our fellow man with humanity and compassion.  Not just for the benefit of others, but for ourselves, as in the teaching, “Give and you shall receive [spiritually].”  

The practical is that every society, from the smallest primitive to the largest industrial is dependent on people working together, each in their role, to make the society function smoothly.  And so community leaders and belief systems have always fostered a sense of community, that we were all in this together, that when one had the good fortune to have more he gave much away to those who had less, understanding that “there but for good fortune go I.”  

Even after the advent of the industrial revolution and capitalism, people understood that the poor were not just deserving of being cared for and helped, but needed to be for the good of all.  And so most developed countries, including the U.S., embraced some degree of socialism to counter the loss of community brought about by the move into cities, fragmentation, and capitalism.

The current state of affairs, where the rich care only for themselves and no one cares what happens to the poor, is a recipe for cultural disaster and collapse.  Just viewed coldly from an economic standpoint, the reason why our economy has been pretty stagnant is that the broad mass of people, as opposed to the rich or well-off, don’t have the ability to purchase like they used to, and so the engine of our consumer economy has partially dried up.  

Over time, if this continues we will get weaker and weaker economically.  And as inequality grows, the nation will become morally and spiritually weaker as well.  All of this is on top of the degradation of our environment, of the eco-system that is our life support, which degradation is related to this issue of responsibility and yet separate.  I certainly have no ability to predict the future, but I’m glad that I won’t be alive 50 years from now.

I have written over and over on these pages that the current state of affairs, in almost all particulars, cannot continue without disaster for our children and future generations.  What it will take to wake us up, I don’t know.  Whether we have the capacity to change our perspective and habits, to in many ways go back to the future, I don’t know.  But these are issues that need to be discussed in all parts of the body politic … in schools, churches, and government.

Modern Man Enslaved

We live in an era of unprecedented freedom ... of speech, of travel, of work, of intellectual and creative endeavor, of where we live, to name just a few.  And we live in a nation that has experienced great upward mobility over the past century.

And yet, whether rich or poor, professional or working class, we are enslaved.  To be more exact, the habit-energies of our minds are enslaved.  We have become little more than programmed unthinking robots that do what our masters ... the lords of capitalism ... want us to do.  And this affects virtually all areas of our lives.  (You may well find this proposition ludicrous, but please read on.)

The lords of capitalism (by this I mean all those who hold the reins of power in our capitalist system) have achieved their desired control over our lives by preying on the weaknesses of man ... on our intense desire or craving to be loved, to be desired, to be admired, to be part of a group.  Now, wanting to be loved or part of a group is not inherently either a weakness or something bad for us.  But because of the insecurity that affects most of us in this culture, those wants have been manipulated by the lords of capitalism into cravings which rule our lives and cause us endless frustration and pain, leading us further from the feelings of peace and happiness that are our birthright.

Let me site this enslavement’s most prevailing form.  In our contemporary culture, status is confirmed almost exclusively by one thing ... money.   Because the more money one has the more, and more expensive, things one can acquire, and ones acquisitions ... what used to be called, derogatorily, conspicuous consumption ... is at the core of one's status.  

Whether rich or poor, what you are able to acquire ... whether it’s fancy Nike sneakers for a ghetto dweller or a 20,000 sq. ft. mansion for the top 1% ... gives you status among your peers.  It’s not talent, brains, or looks ... it’s how you’ve been able to parlay those attributes into money.  And so we find that individuals are making life decisions, to the extent they have  control, based primarily on the prospect of making more money rather than the factors that used to be of equal or greater importance.

The reader might say, “so what’s wrong with that?”  What’s wrong is that it traps one in a cycle of endless frustration, even if one is successful, because one always is left wanting MORE.  What’s wrong is that it distorts decisions that are important for the larger society ... like how many people choose to become teachers, or engineers, or primary care doctors rather than financial industry brokers or high paid medical specialists.  What’s wrong is that ethics and professionalism are routinely sacrificed on the altar of money.  Whether you look at almost any aspect of the recent financial debacle or in general at the actions of industry, including the health care industry, if making more money means disregarding ethics or cutting corners on professionalism the latter concerns are hardly given a second thought.

Mind you, I’m fully aware that the enslavement of man’s habit-energies is not something exclusive to the capitalist system.  In almost any system that has a power hierarchy, those in power will take measures to ensure that the masses do what they want them to do.  The most extreme examples were found in totalitarian societies, like Communist Russia or Nazi Germany.

But while the political propaganda in those cases was far more reprehensible and sinister, there is little practical difference between the marketing that we are subjected to on a constant basis and that political propaganda.  It all falls under the category of the big lie.  And the aim in both is the control of people.

“Oh, come on!” you may say.  But think about it.  The success of our capitalist consumer-based economy depends on making people believe they need something, regardless whether they really do.  The more successful marketing has become, the more addicted people have become to consuming, and the more money has become the essential means to obtain the desired end ... to the point that people will do almost anything to obtain money.  

There is no shortage of examples of this among rich or poor.  It is this craving that resulted in affluent people in the financial industry not caring what the impact of their reckless actions were on others in the recent mortgage securities debacle.  It is this craving that results in many of the poor turning to the world of crime (10% of black males in their 30s are in prison or jail on any given day.  According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, one third of all black men can expect to be in prison at some point during their lifetime) or people with meager means agreeing to the removal of mountaintops for coal mining and hydro-fracking if they see money in it for themselves, regardless if the risk is high or virtually assured that it will ultimately despoil the environment and contaminate their very drinking water, the source of life.

“Ah,” you may say, “but people here have free will.  It’s their choice whether to buy something or not.  Whether to work in one industry or not.  Whether to be ethical or not.”  

But that’s just the point.  People don’t really have free will.  They have been programmed by our culture and its pervasive marketing and consumerist values to crave the acquisition of things and to acquire the money needed to satisfy that craving.   And when one craves something, when one becomes addicted to something, one has no free will.  That is how we have become enslaved.  And this includes those at the top who are exploiting the rest of us.  One has no real choice not to do what your addiction tells you to do ... barring of course becoming aware that one is an addict and going through a 12-step program to recover your peace and contentment.

A big lie central to the success of this marketing is the concept of progress.  Certainly since the industrial revolution, and perhaps before, progress has been touted as being the end all and be all for civilization.  And so we have come to accept and to crave everything that bespeaks of progress.  Acquiring such items, such as the iPhone, becomes the latest and most ephemeral of status symbols.

Should progress, however, be so uncritically regarded?  Without question, when it comes to material matters, we have progressed to an amazing degree, and the speed of that progress just increases with the advancement of technology.  

But has that progress brought us increased happiness or security?  No.  Has it brought us the increased leisure time that was much touted at the dawn of the technology age?  Hardly!  People are working longer hours and are more stressed, often being on the job almost 24/7 because of smart phones and the computer.  Has it brought us improved health?  No.   We live longer because of advances in medicine and improved hygiene, but we are not healthier.  In fact we are less healthy.  We are living longer despite our physical condition, not because of it.  Has it made our homes and schools and the world at large less violent?  No

Clearly there are many things that are better now then they were 50 or 100 years ago, but that is due primarily to a change in laws and attitudes.  Such things ... the status of women, people of color, and gays and lesbians, for example ... are social matters.  The things that are marketed as progress and which we purchase have not changed our interior, our spiritual, lives for the better.  Yes, women as well as men toil less arduously than they used to, but are their lives better now?  No.

The importance of marketing to make people want and purchase things they don’t really need extends from the highest luxury items down to the most plebian.  Let me give you several examples of the latter.  

Many years ago, because I was living someplace with no hot water, I started shaving using regular bar soap and cold water.  To my surprise, I discovered that I got a wonderful shave, even though I have a rough beard and shaving had always been difficult for me.  Some time later I happened to meet a dermatologist and told her about my experience, to which she replied that that made perfect sense as the cold water closes your skin pores, resulting in an easier shave.  I have not used shaving cream or hot water in more than 40 years!

More recently, we discovered a far less expensive form of clothes washing detergent than purchasing the commercial brands.  Just combine baking soda wash powder and borax powder with water and you have a very effective, inexpensive detergent that does just as good a job on washables (I can’t speak to delicate washables as I have none) as any commercial detergent.

These are but two small examples.  But if everyone followed my example, the manufacturers of these products would be out of business.  And this list could be expanded to much that we purchase.  Most of it just isn’t “necessary.”

The last example is not small.  We have a recognized and bemoaned epidemic of obesity in our nation, especially among our children and younger adults.  Why?  Because their diet habits have changed and their exercise habits have changed.  And why is that?  Because they have succumbed to the marketing wiles of McDonalds and makers of soft drinks and all the other unhealthy, fattening junk food that they eat.  They could easily have a healthier diet (note I didn’t say “healthy”) like kids used to.  And because their days are now spent in front of a variety of electronic gadgets ... TV, video games, and computers ... which they have been sold as being “cool.”  The exercise that children used to get outdoors is mostly a thing of the past.

The reader will in all likelihood now understandably say that what I’m advocating would cause the downfall of our economy and bring about much human misery.  Ah, but not if we turn from a consumer-driven economy to an infrastructure-driven economy as I suggested in an earlier post (“Strengthening America by Changing from a Consumer Economy to a Nation-Building Economy,” November 4, 2011).  In such an economy there would be ample work but money would be redirected and spent not on unnecessary fluff but on things that were critical to the ongoing health and strength of our country and indirectly our standard of living.

If we want to be truly free to do what is best for us ... not for corporate America, if we want to be strong and healthy, we must first recognize that we have become enslaved to the powers of corporate America and we must then demand a change in the status quo.  Just as Gandhi led the people of India to not cooperate with their British overlords, just as Martin Luther King led African-Americans to not cooperate in their own oppression by white America, so too Americans of all walks of life must gather and protest against the oppressive power that corporations have gained over all aspects of American life, including politics.

The future is ours to determine ... this is a democracy ... but only if we take our rights and our role seriously and demand change.

How Can Evangelicals Embrace Capitalism and the Republican Party?

Over the past 30-40 years, the Religious Right has gone from total noninvolvement with politics to total involvement to partial domination.  As a general matter, and more specifically in recent years, they have endorsed capitalism and the concept that each person is responsible for himself, they have endorsed a limited role for government, and they have tenaciously fought for the right to life of the unborn and against same-sex marriage or any kind of gay rights that gives homosexuals the approval of society.

As Christians who believe in Jesus, Evangelicals are fond of saying that we need to bring morality back into our government and our private lives, and that we need to bring God back into our government.  But do they practice what they preach?

What is the most central ethic of Christianity, or indeed of all the world’s great religions?  It is, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”  It is, “Love they neighbor as thyself.” It is viewing the community of man as one of shared responsibility.  From the Old Testament’s, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” to the many affirmative answers to that question in the New Testament such as that we are to “love one another” and that we are to “serve one another,” “bear one another’s burdens,” and “consider one another,” there is no question that to be Christian is to support the idea of a social contract among the citizens of our country.  

In ancient times it must be said that these sentiments were confined to relationships between those who were believers.  But in more modern times, as the world and its religions (not all) have become more progressive in their thinking, these concepts have been broadened to include a responsibility towards all humanity.  For if man is created in the image of God, then are we not all his children, regardless of our religion or lack thereof?  It is in this light that I will examine the positions taken by Evangelicals on several key contemporary issues.  

First, let’s look at capitalism.  While the commonly used phrase “Godless communism” refers to the fact that Marxist communism denies the existence of God and is, or at least used to be, totally against all religion, is capitalism any less Godless in fact or in practice? While it is true that capitalism is not against religion, history shows that the very premise of the capitalist enterprise is Godless in the sense that it is all about making the most money one can for oneself and ones associates regardless at what cost to others.  This is surely not behavior that Jesus would endorse.

In the first half century of the industrial revolution, unfettered capitalism showed it for what it was ... a rapacious system that would stop at nothing to make money.  Whether it was having no care for their workers’ safety, beating them, producing products that could harm the user, or fowling the air and water, capitalism showed a total disregard for the welfare of both its workers and the broader community.  

It is only the presence of government regulation, which began in the early 20th century and has grown over the years, that has resulted in corporations [capitalists] being able to claim to be responsible members of society.  But they are not reformed.  Even today with all the regulation we have, if there is an area where there is no regulation, or it is hazy, or they dislike it, capitalists will do whatever they can get away with regardless of its impact on the broader society or their workers.  It is simply the nature of the beast.  

Bottom line, capitalism has no soul, and since it has no soul it is Godless.  As such, Evangelicals and other Christians should not embrace it uncritically but insist that if it be allowed to continue that it be strictly regulated in order to insure that workers, users, and the broader community are protected.  The role of government here is critical.

Then there is the issue of public morality.  When this issue is raised by Evangelicals, as in “the culture wars,” this means that they are against any rights for homosexuals and they are against abortion. Before commenting on their stands on these two issues, what is troubling is that Evangelicals do not seem to think that public morality includes the concept of doing to others as you would have them do to you, of loving your neighbor as yourself, of feeling a shared responsibility for the welfare of their fellow Americans, if not for all of humanity.  

This is clearly the position that Jesus would take, but not his most righteous followers today. Their emotional, if not rabid, fight on the issues of homosexuality and abortion seems to have blinded them to the true admonitions of their faith.  And so they have become the front line soldiers of the Right, backing the most radical Tea Party and conservative Republicans ... the new Republican Party ... because they have these two causes in common, even though their partners have no interest and disdain government involvement in the broader social welfare.

As regards their campaign against homosexuality, it is troubling on so many fronts that one hardly knows where to begin.  But perhaps most troubling is their, and others’, misuse of the Bible, much as the Bible was used for years to support slavery, segregation, and the submissive status of women.  

The Old Testament certainly has some bad things to say about “men lying with men as with women.”  But one must put this in context.  

The same sections of the Bible also have equally bad things to say about many other acts. In fact, the Bible terms more than 60 actions an abomination.  Included are:  lying (Proverbs 12:22), eating food that isn’t kosher (Leviticus 11), a proud look (Proverbs 6:16), lying with a menstruating woman (Ezekiel 18:6-13), and what is highly esteemed among men (Luke 16:15).  Likewise, it is not the only sin singled out for death.  The Bible says that anyone who curses his father or mother should be put to death (Leviticus 20:9) and that a man and woman who commit adultery should be put to death (Leviticus 20:10.)  In Exodus 35:2, it says that anyone who works on the Sabbath shall be put to death.  

Clearly, Evangelicals and the Catholic Church are against homosexuality ... plain and simple.  And so they conveniently pick sections of the Bible to use in support of their campaigns, ignoring the fact that no one today, except perhaps the Jewish ultra-orthodox, would call these other acts an abomination and seek to ostracize perpetrators.

The issue of abortion is a far more complex one.  If one truly believes that life, in the legal sense, begins at conception, then one can understand why that person feels that abortion is murder and should not be allowed.  The problem is that while it is a scientific fact that “life” biologically begins at conception, there is a major disagreement as to when a legal status attaches to the fetus ... when the fetus becomes a human life ... resulting in abortion being illegal.  There really is no resolution to this disagreement.

My take on the issue is more sociological.  There are few things worse then a child being born to parents that do not want the child, for whatever reason.  There are few things worse then children being raised in our chaotic foster parent system, since the majority of unwanted children carried to term are not adopted.  

Evangelicals, however, do not deal with this issue.  They speak merely of God’s gift of life.  And so if their will were law, hundreds of thousands of children each year would be sentenced to a living hell while their parents would be dragged down into a variety of wrenching problems.  It’s all fine and well to speak of the responsibility of the mother or parents.  But ultimately, the burden of the Right to Life position would fall most squarely on the children.  And I for one would say that it is better not to be born, than to be born unwanted.  Life is hard enough without that burden.

But the issues of abortion and homosexuality are digressions.  The point is that if one wants a more moral nation, a more moral government, a nation under God, then many aspects of our system need to be changed.  First and foremost would be changing from a capitalist system in which everyone is chiefly out for themselves with no sense of responsibility for their fellow citizen to a system of regulated capitalism and a commonly accepted social contract with government performing its function of leveling the playing field, guaranteeing that all have the opportunity to pursue their “inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”  

The Democratic Party, in its own sometimes fumbling way, is trying to reach for that more moral nation.  As such, it deserves the support of all God-believing people and secular humanists alike.