Dear Sir,
I was fascinated to learn from your profile of Tea Party president Karen Cage that “The Bible says give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach him to fish and he can sustain himself.” I’m curious to know if Ms. Cage can direct me to chapter and verse for that one.
It’s not in any Bible I’m aware of, and is in fact a Chinese proverb. (How ironic: the Tea Party’s being guided by Chinese wisdom?) This is one of those sayings that seems to be taken from the long-lost mythical Book of Hezekiah, along with such other oft-quoted “Biblical” verses as: “God helps those who help themselves” (Benjamin Franklin), “God moves in mysterious ways his wonders to perform” (William Cowper), “Charity begins at home” (Terence, a Roman actor), “Cleanliness is next to godliness” (Francis Bacon), and “Hate the sin, love the sinner” (Mahatma Gandhi).
What is in the Bible are passages such as: “Just as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me” (Matthew 25:40); and “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress” (James 1:27). In that vein, the list truly does go on and on, with both the Hebrew prophets and Jesus blessing the poor and the hungry while excoriating the rich, the heartless, and the self-satisfied.
But frankly, as one for whom the Bible is my spiritual life blood, I’m leery of those at either end of the political spectrum who seek to use it as a political weapon, or who imply that their understanding of it is the only possible “Christian” stance. And I’m equally wary of those who rattle off a whole newspaper article full of debunked clichés and then vaguely say they want “a nation based on Christian principles,” without bothering to specify what they’re talking about. I for one am quite content to rely on the principles embodied in the U.S. Constitution. The last thing I want is for any politicians, presidential or congressional, to try and impose their own personal, so-called “Christian” principles on the entire country. Jimmy Carter had probably the deepest, most complete and sincere Christian value system of any U.S. president; does Ms. Cage consider him a good president? Devout, Bible-believing, “Jesus-changed-my-heart” George H. W. Bush still managed to increase the size of government exponentially while racking up unparalleled debts and deficits.
Chinese proverbs aren’t going to pull us out of a world-wide economic mess, any more than government-by-cliché, or the wishful thinking of imaginary Bible verses. When millionaires and billionaires begin to carry their fair share of the economic load, we may have started on the road back to financial sanity.
One last observation: Ms. Cage proclaims, “If you do not vote, you do not have the right to protest.” Really?? I’ve never missed an election in my life, but even if I had never bothered to vote I would still have the right to protest. Why? It’s called freedom of speech and it’s the cornerstone of the Bill of Rights, which no political party or spokesperson can set aside. You may not like it, and there are times when I may not like it, but to declare that someone doesn’t have the right to express themselves because they missed a vote is sheer nonsense.
Winston Welty