Monday, August 08, 2005

Harvard Gazette: Reclaiming religion from the right
Divinity School lecturer and evangelical Christian leader Jim Wallis said the time has come to end the religious right's monologue on national moral values and begin a new, broader-based dialogue that goes beyond a fixation on gay marriage and abortion.

Wallis, a self-described progressive, said the nation's liberals long ago ceded national religious discussion to a small, conservative minority that has successfully defined the debate around a narrow agenda.

Liberals forget, he said, that the major reform movements in our nation's history, from abolition to civil rights, were begun by spiritual leaders.

"Lyndon Johnson didn't become a civil rights leader until Martin Luther King made him one," Wallis said. "Where would we be if they [religious leaders like King] kept their faith to themselves?"
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