"Evangelical Left activists like Jim Wallis desperately want Obamacare despite possible abortion funding." -- Mark Tooley, IRD President
Contact: Jeff Walton, 202-682-4131, 202-413-5639 cell, Institute on Religion and Democracy, jwalton@TheIRD.org
WASHINGTON, March 18 /Christian Newswire/ -- Believing firm restrictions on government funded abortions are no longer possible, evangelical left officials are jettisoning traditional evangelical pro-life convictions to back the U.S. Senate version of Obamacare now before the U.S. House of Representatives.
The evangelical left initially sought to consolidate liberal evangelical support behind Obamacare by promising protections against government funded abortions. Now some evangelical left officials are claiming such protections are unnecessary.
A letter sent this week to Congress from some prominent liberal evangelicals claims information about abortion provisions in the Senate health care bill is misleading and urges Congress urgently to support the Senate version of Obamacare. In contrast, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops opposes the Senate's Obamacare, pointing out it lacks the House version's clear restriction against government funded abortions.
Evangelical signers of the congressional letter include Evangelicals for Social Action President Ron Sider, Sojourners chief Jim Wallis, Florida megachurch pastor and National Association of Evangelicals Board Member Joel Hunter, New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good Chair David P. Gushee, Emergent Church guru Brian McLaren and Glen Stassen of Fuller Theological Seminary.
IRD President Mark Tooley commented:
"For the mostly new Evangelical Left and the old Religious Left, government-imposed health care is a long-time totem for which their activists have toiled across years and decades.
"Politically liberal evangelicals remain anxious to pass the bill, even without the Stupak-Pitts language that some of them previously supported.
"Evangelical Left activists like Jim Wallis desperately want Obamacare despite possible abortion funding.
"For the Evangelical Left, when their espoused pro-life views conflict with messianic hopes for socialized health care, Obamacare wins."
The Institute on Religion and Democracy, founded in 1981, is an ecumenical alliance of U.S. Christians working to reform their churches’ social witness, in accord with biblical and historic Christian teachings, thereby contributing to the renewal of democratic society at home and abroad.
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