I got another email this week from a pastoral colleague about health care.
It was 10 paragraphs long (including Biblical exegesis). He might have written it himself or cut and pasted parts from a Sojourners advocacy email--it doesn't matter. His point was this: if I didn't devote Sunday, September 6th to a sermon about why God supports government-sponsored universal health care, I should be defrocked for clergy malpractice. He actually said that.
The deluge of emails I'm getting on the subject of health care from progressive religious sources is getting a bit much. Most are the same: God cares for people/ Jesus healed people, therefore clergy should use that premise to preach a sermon supporting a government-sponsored health care plan. The emails don't tell me to endorse a plan--just to preach in support of universal health care at the same moment that the president has put a plan forward that moves us toward universal health care (while not actually accomplishing it). Is it wrong for me to feel inappropriately pressured by these emails?
One tension is that I feel like the unspoken subtext of these emails is that we should have single payer care. Truthfully, I'm not convinced that the Bible is a even a good source to justify a public health care plan. Elijah and Elisha, Luke recalls, picked and chose the few who got "health care" (Luke 4); Jesus actually let Lazarus die in order to prove a point about the resurrection (John 11)--sounds closer to what we've got now than what we might dream about for in the future!
I'm weary of ham-handed political advocacy by clergy. Not a single email from a fellow Christian that I've read explains why the Obama policy is good public policy. None address the primary criticisms of the Obama plan: 1) how will it be funded and 2) will the plan accomplish its objectives? And aren't there other options, outside of the Obama plan, that are worth considering? Maybe "real" Christians should object to Obama's public plan and insist on a single-payer option--wouldn't that establish health care as a universal right? Or maybe "real" Christians should insist on a market-based solution in which there are Christian-owned-and-operated insurance companies that Christians can buy into (a system that already exists)?
I would even go so far as to challenge the primary theological premise put forward by organizations like Sojourners: that good health is God's will for every person created in God's image. Good health is an eschatological ideal--crafting public policy based on eschatological visions comes close to saying we don't really need God to usher that future in--we can handle it ourselves, thanks. Eschatology is God's future transforming our present; God's future is not something we work toward incrementally by our own efforts. When evangelicals support a strong Israel on the notion that they're setting the stage for the coming apocalypse, progressives complain. When progressives say that we should create a government-sponsored universal health care system because, in Revelation 21, "pain will be no more..." that's OK? For the last decade and a half, evangelical Christians have crudely translated religious convictions into public policy, blurring healthy boundaries between faith and politics. Now, turnabout seems like fair play.
Sickness and health are interwoven human conditions that both serve as effective tutors of the virtues of gratitude and dependence upon God's grace. When we claim that "good health is the will of God," referencing eschatological truth in the service of policy-making, we risk invoking an even more damaging falsehood: that bad health is not the will of God. As a pastor whose life will always be wrapped up with helping people wrest meaning from the agony of illness and death, I simply can't go there. God's will is there, too.
I want every person to have access to health care when they need it for a price they can afford to pay. The stronger arguments for universal, single-payer care are secular arguments--a strong democratic republic should extend health care to all because it creates a strong and competent citizenry. I'm not convinced that the Christian faith points us in a clear direction when it comes to shaping public policy solutions to accomplish that objective. I don't want to be shamed into supporting a policy when a faithful person could well stand in opposition to the Obama plan.
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Always a fan of summary, here's a nice summary of the key points of Obama's plan from the Christian Science Monitor. Thanks to another CCblogger for the link.
Thanks for sharing David. I'm moving towards Christian Healthcare Ministries (it's been a process to tease out their views on queer folks and related health concerns) and I hear their concern about Obama's plan. My health insurance, at a good corporate job, was never ideal. I want everyone to access health care, I also want folks who have working arrangements which don't fit into a government model to be able to continue those.
ReplyDeleteI would agree with the Christian Health Care ministries, but there are always going to be people who have a problem accepting help from anything that has the word Christ in it. So a secular solution I think is in order. Canada and Britian seem to be doing just fine health care wise, and I think we need to model ourselves after them. The commerical featuring the canadian woman who said she would have died in canada is a lie by the way
ReplyDeletehttp://www.factcheck.org/2009/08/dying-on-a-wait-list/
1. I agree that there should be honest and open debate about alternative health care issues, with respect for different opinions.
ReplyDelete2. I agree that the New Testament does not paint a monolithic picture of God and health. That is true of many issues in the New Testament.
3. Where I strongly part company with you is the eschatological issue, and the importance of our own efforts is bringing about God's Kingdom. I would almost say that it is the Jewish part of me that insists we be partners with God in repairing the world. But really, it had everything to do with my choosing to be baptized as a Presbyterian. I said "yes" - with God's help - to the strong commitment to justice and reconcilliation right here on Earth which is spelled out so beautifully in the Book of Order.
4. This - in my view - is not a subject to be preached unilaterally. But then, in my view, few subjects are. Marble has little structure for serious and sustained discussion of urgent, yet difficult issues.
5. With love and respect, please remember that we bring who we are to this debate. You are young and healthy. The debate is a little different for those of us who face life-threatening illness right now or who live with chronic disability.
Ula, thanks for posting. I know it is bordering on arrogant for someone with good health care to stand in opposition to a plan intended to spread that right to others.
ReplyDeleteBut what I'm trying to tease out here (badly, I know) is how important it is to effectively translate theological convictions into the public sphere. Our religious longings do not necessarily translate into good public policies.
I think it is important for all Americans to have health care, that nobody be left out. However, to assign a mandate - yes or no from one side or the other of the Christian spectrum only works against the system - the best options should be worked out pragmatically in congress and across the nation for a humane solution to our current health care crisis.
ReplyDeleteHere's some helpful information from General Assembly that might ease your mind.
ReplyDeleteGeneral Assembly Guidance:
In 2002, the General Assembly approved "Advocacy on Behalf of the Uninsured," in which it:
• Reaffirm[ed] the church's commitment to advocacy for a national medical plan.
• Encourage[d] presbyteries, sessions, and the members of congregations to be advocates for universal health care and to support advocacy efforts in their local communities to bring public and private entities together in this effort.
• Urge[d] presbyteries and sessions to provide educational programs and advocacy efforts on behalf of persons, especially those with low incomes and fixed incomes, without medical insurance.