This is very inspiring personally as someone who is a liberal. Looking at the two agendas of each group it really shows me which one is truly trying to do God/Jesus's duty and which one is just trying to use God/Jesus for their own personal gains. I like that the "religious left" has lots of different issues and you can agree to disagree on various one's but still partake in other things you care about such as minimum wage, health care, war and peace matters etc. The article tells how the "religious left" started in the 60's with the anti-war movement and civil rights movement. There are lots of really great groups out there who are organized and getting active. Some good groups to check out are: SoJourners (the best one in my opinion), Christian Alliance, Interfaith Alliance (all sorts of faiths involved) and Americans United (Speration of Church and State). As a Christian liberal sometimes it feels like you're all a lone in the wilderness where politics is concerned but it's nice to know I'm really not. Even if you're not liberal it's still nice to know people are working on the issues you care about too. Oh and the "religious left" is full of all sorts of people and not just liberals.

Link- http://www.columbusdispatch.com/?story=dispatch/2006/08/13/20060813-A1-02.html

Left-leaning churches push own faith-inspired agenda
Sunday, August 13, 2006
Catherine Candisky and Alan Johnson
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Thirty years behind, less organized but equally motivated, liberal churches are coming together to counter their conservative brethren in the political arena.

"They have run an entire track meet and we just got to the stadium," said the Rev. Tim Ahrens, lead pastor of First Congregational Community Church of Columbus and head of We Believe Ohio, a loose aggregation of 300 clergy and lay people from across the state.

Another movement leader, the Rev. Eric Brown, of Woodland Christian Church, shakes his head when asked if this is a left-wing movement.

"I’m a moderate," he said. "God could care less what political party you belong to."

The revival of liberal and moderate religious movements — first energized in the 1960s by the civil-rights and anti-war movements — comes largely in response to the success of the religious right, which made abortion and same-sex marriage keystone issues of the 2004 election.

Activists say they have a broader, faithinspired agenda — ending poverty, increasing the minimum wage, providing affordable health care, protecting the environment and ending the war in Iraq.

They come from a variety of faith backgrounds: Roman Catholic, Jewish and Protestant.

Coalition members don’t agree on everything. Many Catholics, for example, oppose abortion and same-sex marriage, but are on board with the other issues.

Evidence of increased activity is seen by the formation of We Believe and other left-leaning faith-oriented groups, an ever-increasing number of books and Web sites, and national religious conferences that attract 25,000 people or more, many of them teenagers.

Congregations such as Brown’s on the Near East Side are moving beyond traditional charity work by conducting voter registration before and after Sunday services. Other churches helped collect petition signatures to place a minimum-wage initiative on Ohio’s Nov. 7 ballot.

We Believe recently agreed to support a get-out-the-vote effort targeting urban neighborhoods in Columbus, Dayton, East Cleveland and Lorain.

"There has certainly been a variety of evidence that the religious left has sought to countermobilize in response to the Christian Right," said Corwin Smidt, director of the Henry Institute and Political Science Department at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich.

"It’s a little too early to tell how much effect they are likely to have."

Many congregations involved in the movement experienced declining membership in recent years while attendance at the megachurches associated with the religious right soared.

Still, leaders say they believe their message will attract those in a wide variety of denominations as well as non-churchgoers who consider themselves religious or spiritual.

"This is our moment," Ahrens said. "The vision for a Christian Ohio that the religious right has is not a vision that most Christians in Ohio have.

"Given time this will catch fire."

Eric McFadden, Ohio field director for Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, said he has been dismayed to see his faith "co-opted by the religious right."

The late Pope John Paul II condemned the Iraq war repeatedly, McFadden pointed out, yet the political debate two years ago focused largely on outlawing abortion and same-sex marriage.

"During the election cycle in 2004, our Catholic values were whittled down to four or five issues that were nonnegotiable," McFadden said. "We want to bring other issues into the discussion."

The Washington-based alliance, launched last month to promote the church’s teachings on justice, human dignity, freedom and the common good, recently endorsed the minimum-wage proposal and is preparing a voter guide for the fall election.

The alliance represents a relatively small piece of the Catholic faithful, but the ideas it espouses may have a large impact, officials said.

Meanwhile, Cantor Jack Chomsky, of Congregation Tifereth Israel in Columbus and a founding member of We Believe, said these issues are not new in the Jewish tradition.

"In every aspect of Jewish life, justice and fairness are almost incomparably important issues. We remind ourselves every day that we were slaves."

Chomsky is frustrated that the "only religious voice that has been heard in the public square for the past 20 years is a negative voice.

"I can only do what’s right," he added. "Maybe now I have to do what’s right louder and stronger and more clearly."

The Rev. Mark Diemer, of Grace of God Lutheran Church on the West Side, is offended by suggestions that those not with the religious right are not moral or religious.

"Abortion and same-sex marriage are not unimportant issues, but they have caused a blur of other issues that are important, too, like health care and jobs, education and poverty, inner-city preservation," Diemer said.

"To me it is essential that we maintain a healthy balance and not let one faith or one view dominate."

Conservative Christians no longer control the agenda, said Jim Wallis, a preacher, theologian, founder of Sojourners and author of the popular book God’s Politics.

"The monologue is over ... and a new dialogue has begun."

Wallis has been rallying people who he said "didn’t feel spoken for by anyone" in either party.

Sojourners recently hired an Ohio field director to work with faith-based and community groups through the 2008 presidential election. The group is also co-hosting a candidate forum in Cincinnati this fall. Wallis said he tells people of faith who want to know how to influence leaders in Washington to take a visit to Capitol Hill. "Go to the Hill and look for the people who are licking their fingers to see which way the wind is blowing. "We need to change the wind."

ccandisky@dispatch.com ajohnson@dispatch.com