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Interview with Jim Wallis about Glenn Beck and 'social justice'
Here's a transcript of my April 7 video interview with Rev. Jim Wallis, founder of the Sojourners Christian community and well-known commentator on social and cultural issues:
Sally Quinn: Why did Glenn Beck get on your case?
Jim Wallis: Well, I don't understand why he is so upset about social justice and social justice Christians. That's who he attacked. He said "If your church even has social justice on their website, or if the priest or pastor is preaching social justice, run as fast as you can, leave that church, turn your priest into church authorities. I said if he says we should leave our churches, meaning the Catholic Church, the black churches, the mainline protestant churches, the evangelical, Pentecostal, his own Mormon Church -they all believe in social justice. And I say if he says leave our churches we should leave him and not watch his show.
JW: But to say that Jesus calls us, and I would say I was in a synagogue last Friday and the Jewish faith calls us, and I was with some Muslims last night in New York City and Islam calls us to the common good, to serve our brother and our sister and yes, to justice. To social and economic justice. And to say, as Glenn Beck has said, that's just a slippery slope to Marxism is just not true.
SQ: Do you think that he'll keep this up if he sees that it's really helping your movement?
JW: I don't know, I was surprised that he went after me in the way that he has. But I also have pointed out to our people [that] If Jesus calls us to social justice he also calls us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. So I've asked our people 'Do not attack Glenn Beck personally no matter what he says or does to me or anybody else. Do not attack him personally. And we have to pray for our brother even when he attacks us. That's part of what Jesus commands us to do: love our enemies. So we got to stay on the high ground here no matter . . .
SQ: Is it hard?
JW: Well, I mean, sometimes when they're just misrepresenting like they said "Does the gospel call us to redistribution?', and I said 'yes.'" 'So Jim Wallis wants the government to come in!' -I didn't say anything like that. That's dishonest.
SQ: Can you be a Christian and not be in favor of social justice?
JW: Well, I don't see how you can be a Christian unless you want to follow Jesus. That's the whole idea. So, did Jesus call us to a life of social justice? Yes. He lived it, He called us to it. The kingdom is about changing the world and us with it. So yes, to be a Christian is to follow Jesus. That's what it means.
SQ: And Jesus was in favor of social justice.
JW: Well he lived it. He defined it. But not in the narrow political ways it's used by the right and the left. I mean it is true that term's been used by the right and the left for all kinds of ideological purposes that aren't necessarily the purposes of Christ. But what Jesus meant by re-establishing right relationship together is what we're called to.
SQ: Would you say that social justice and Christianity are essentially the same and inseparable?
JW: Well, social justice is integral to the gospel. So when Jesus, his first sermon, I call it his 'Nazareth Manifesto,' the first words our of his mouth, he quotes Isaiah 'The spirit of the Lord is upon me cause he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. Now the word their for good news is 'evangel,' [from] which you get the 'evangelical.' So what it was originally meant to be evangelical was to preach good news to poor people. So whatever else the gospel does -it changes your life, it heals your addictions it cures your family brokenness, all that's wonderful -but if the gospel isn't good news to poor people, it's not the gospel of Jesus Christ.
By
Sally Quinn
|
April 12, 2010; 1:14 PM ET
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Posted by: bot1 | April 16, 2010 10:23 AM
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I'm sure that everyone is aware of the New Testament story of Jesus and the rich young man. In the story the rich man asks Jesus what he needs to do to go to heaven. After hearing that he has kept all the commandments, Jesus tells him that he lacks one thing: the rich young man must sell all he has and give it to the poor. The young man is grieved because he has many possessions and walks away (presumably he does not do what Jesus instructs).
Now imagine this: When the rich man walks away, Jesus uses his divine power to rid the man of all his possessions and Jesus then distributes them to the poor so that he can go to heaven.
Does that sound wrong and un-Christ-like? That's because it is. Even Jim Wallis should cringe at the thought of someone suggesting that Christ would do such a thing. I'm sure every Christian would vigorously protest any preacher that recited the story in that manner. It sounds too close to Satan's plan to destroy Free Agency. So why are Jim Wallis and all these Christian “progressives” in favor of stealing from the productive segment of society to provide largesse to their voting base?
Posted by: bot1 | April 16, 2010 10:21 AM
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And as I said on another thread:
Jesus didn't tell the young man, "Keep all of your wealth, but make sure to vote for the progressive/liberal Democrats."
Conservative Christians have been shown to give much more money than liberals - even to secular charities. Look at the charitable giving on Obama's, Biden's or John Kerry's tax returns. Simply disgraceful. Google it. Biden gave less than 0.2% to charity in the past decade. Great example of a "social justice" liberal. He votes to give everyone else's money to spend on yet another fiscally irresponsible money-pit program in Detroit, etc.
Posted by: GiveMeThat | April 16, 2010 1:58 AM
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Jim Wallis is simply a liar.
Glen Beck made it abundantly clear that what he is against is not social justice as practiced, say by the Franciscans, in serving the poor, but rather Jim Wallis' bastardization of the term which is nothing but liberal politics dressed up with some religious sounding words.
Posted by: GiveMeThat | April 16, 2010 1:47 AM
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Language is fraught with baggage. "Social Justice" defies definition. For instance, since Jesus said the poor will always be among us, I suppose, he meant that efforts to find a solution to poverty are misspent.
In fact, in Acts, in the name of Jesus, people are murdered for withholding their wealth, just in case this newfangled system of self-induced poverty and communal surrogacy doesn't quite fly. Heaven forbid they should countenance doubt.
Beck is an idiot, but anyone not brought up in faith knows the tenets of Christianity are socialist principles. Actual conservatives reject these principles and repudiate the religious right as incoherent nutjobs and vilify the religious left as the confiscators they are.
Posted by: mrbradwii | April 15, 2010 11:50 PM
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I won't recite the parable, but it is sufficient to say that the ant was industrious and prepared for the winter, and when the grasshopper came begging, the ant didn't have any extra to give him, for if he had he would have perished. Besides, the grasshopper's appetite was many times larger than the ant’s.
Sounds like our present government doesn't it? . . Except that the parable doesn't say that the grasshopper wanted to give the ant's storehouse to his friends so they would vote for him!