Video of Bishop Miller at the rally today:
. Thanks to Shannon Kelly.
I didn’t see Bishop Miller today. I was in Grace as the clergy assembled and my guess is he was either outside the church or couldn’t make it through the crowd.
One amusing note: clergy and protesters behave like everyone else when they enter a church. They crowd the back and leave the front half of the church completely empty.
I went up to the church this morning after learning that the steps of Grace Church would be a gathering point for another Interfaith rally. When Corrie and I got there, and realized how cold it was, we decided we had to open the church. I was there from 10 to 5. I made it out onto the steps of Grace for a few minutes to soak in the atmosphere. People came in to warm up all morning and early afternoon, but by 2:15, we had a crowd inside.
This is what religion looked like at 2:15:
Here a few Grace members:
Here’s what religion looked like at 4:00:
I didn’t follow the group as it went around the square. I stayed back at Grace, keeping our doors open for those who were looking for a warm space and somewhere to rest their feet.
We were a sanctuary. In the course of the day, I had interesting conversations with lots of people. It was a long, exciting, and rewarding day. Thanks to all of those Grace people who helped today.
From my colleague, David Simmons, Rector of St. Matthias Episcopal Church, in Waukesha, WI on why he participated in the interfaith rally on Tuesday.
Two evangelicals, Brian McLaren and Jim Wallis on the larger issue of Christianity, morality, and budgets.
Wallis writes:
As Sojourners said in the last big budget debate in 2005, “A budget is a moral document.” For a family, church, city, state, or nation, a budget reveals what your fundamental priorities are: who is important and who is not; what is important and what is not. It’s time to bring that slogan back, and build a coalition and campaign around it.
The significance of Christianity in the actions of Governor Walker and among the protesters continues to be a matter of debate. Diana Butler Bass’s interprets Governor Walker’s actions in light of a talk he gave to Christian businessmen in which he said his motto was “Trust and Obey.” Walker is the son of a Baptist pastor and member of a non-denominationl church. Bass argues that absent the rich moral reasoning traditions of mainstream Christianity, Walker has developed a highly individualistic theology. To use her words:
His spiritual universe is that of 20th century fundamentalism, in its softer evangelical form, a vision that emphasizes “me and Jesus” and personal salvation.
From there, she jumps to a comparison of Walker’s position with that of President Bush whose certainty led the United States into wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Her complete remarks are here. My guess is, she did what I did. She googled Scott Walker and religion and found this.
I find this analysis unhelpful and misleading. Granted, I’m a relative newcomer to Wisconsin; I live in Madison, which is very different from other parts of the state, and I’ve relocated from South Carolina, where religion (Christianity) does play a prominent role in politics. Plus, I watch relatively little local TV, and get my news and politics (even local) from alternative sources. So, my perspective is quite limited. Still, I haven’t noticed the foregrounding of religious language or religious arguments, either from Walker or from his supporters.
I went back to earlier coverage of Walker’s campaign in Isthmus. In an early piece on him, there was barely a mention of religion. In fact, it seems to me that religion, Christianity, has been a bit player in the drama that is unfolding and that it entered only in the second or third act. For example, last week Dan Schultz wondered where the religious voices were.
I rather doubt that Walker’s refusal to negotiate has anything to do with his religious beliefs or religious certainty. If anything, I would suspect that his religious certainty is a product of his personal and political certainty, not the other way around as Bass would have it.
Updated. Here’s The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank on Walker’s rigidity.
Preaching Grace on the Square 