Letters
11/5/2008Give Uniform Thanks
“From Combat to Campus”—nice article [September–October]. During my time at the University in the late 1960s, I, and other military veterans, were treated horribly by fellow students and others. Some veterans generally did not disclose their service. However, it was somewhat easy for one veteran to recognize another veteran and speak without fear of being maligned. Whatever the situation, when a military serviceman returns home, he should be greeted with “Welcome home, brother. How can I help you?” For many years, I have shown my appreciation for our military by buying lunch for servicemen in uniform when I am in an airport. The next time you are in an airport, buy lunch for a serviceman in uniform.
L.A. Nelson (B.S. ’71)
Jacksonville, Florida
A Left Turn?
Good grief! Why not just emblazon the cover of the next magazine with “Vote Democrat.” Reading [editor Shelly] Fling’s piece on democracy and Swanson’s “The Good Son” (“. . . the rest, alas, is history”), it is painfully obvious about the leftish bent of this official(?) rag. Fling needs a clue, and it’s that not every U of M grad is a liberal geek and also explains why my contributions to the U, except for UMAA membership, are nonexistent. Even my UMAA membership now hangs in the balance.
D. Allan Larson (B.A. ’55)
San Diego
Coincidence or Political Drill?
Is it something in the fluoride? I couldn’t help noticing that the three alumni who decried the “liberalism” of Minnesota [Letters, September–October] all had D.D.S degrees, from different decades. I suspect that, like me, the editor-propagandists of Minnesota come from the liberal arts, where we were indoctrinated in atheism, Communism, and hatred of the USA. Little did I know that a unit across campus was frustrating our agenda of liberal hegemony. Does the School of Dentistry still inoculate its students against such abominations as environmentalism and separation of church and state?
Stephen Adams (B.A. ’70, M.A. ’74, Ph.D. ’79)
Barnum, Minnesota
To Sleep, Perchance to Live
I enjoyed your news blurb in the September–October issue on the study of lowering the risk of death in older men [“Routine Findings,” Discoveries]. I always thought the risk of death was 100 percent regardless of sleep patterns. It is too bad Walt Disney didn’t know this. It would have saved his estate millions of dollars in cryogenic fees. Right on, University of Minnesota School of Public Health.
Peter Schreiner (D.V.M. ’78)
Stratford, Wisconsin
Make No Errors about God
Your interview with David Domke [“Playing the God Card,” July-August] contains the assumption that God is just a word used by political actors and not an Actor in the historical process. Grievous errors have been made by politicians claiming God was acting on their side—and these errors are usually quite visible and easy to detect, as the alleged divine acts don’t match the divine character. That does not mean, however, that there is not an opposite error in assuming no Actor God—and that error will, by its very nature as an omission, be harder to detect. No acts, no inconsistencies. Yet it still may be an error.
Steven J. Keillor (Ph.D. ’93)
Askov, Minnesota
Be True and Vocal
Shelly Fling made several incorrect assumptions about people of faith [“Playing the God Card”]. As a Christian I must remain true to my faith and not try and hide it, therefore any politician that claims to be a Christian must live that faith plainly, not just on Sunday morning. Try asking an environmentalist to only be vocal of their beliefs while only at a rally, and not on the job. That is ludicrous.
Daniel Payne (B.S. ’78)
Tualatin, Oregon
Let All Faiths Make Their Case
I was surprised that Professor Domke considers religion and politics “a lethal concoction.” Why wasn’t that charge delivered against leaders of the Civil Rights movement, which was deeply grounded in Christian faith? What about the Christian pastors who opposed the Vietnam War? I remember precious few accusing them of having “exclude(d) the millions of Americans who don’t understand this language.” Does it concern him that the highly secular language advocated by most political scientists, most of whom are in debt to John Rawls, is just as off-putting and strange to orthodox believers of many faiths?
The professor declares that faith-oriented political language shuts down conversations. Ironically, in the very next article that follows the interview, the author approvingly (and rightly) celebrates Hubert Humphrey’s use of St. Francis of Assisi’s prayer during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Was Senator Humphrey guilty of stopping the conversation? I doubt it.
A thoughtful, philosophically grounded perspective reveals instead that religions, or, as I prefer, comprehensive worldviews, often carry within them inherently political connotations. Ask most Muslims, and they will tell you, for example, that their faith is meant to be applied not just culturally, but politically as well. And for those willing to explore history, as John Witte has done in a recent volume from Cambridge University Press, the intellectual leaders of the Protestant Reformation explicitly advanced original, religiously grounded arguments for political and human rights.
We don’t need a return to the naked public square of the 20th century (as Professor Domke wishes) or the sacred public square of the 19th century and earlier. Instead, a much more robust case is made by thinkers like Os Guinness and Charles Haynes that we need to embrace a civil public square where theistic and secular faiths can make their respective cases politically.
Robert Osburn (Ph.D. ’05)
Roseville, Minnesota
Faith and Politics Entwined
In 1791, the First Amendment to our Constitution was enacted which provided for a division of religion and government through the mandated institutional separation of church and state. However, unlike religion and government, faith and politics have always been closely entwined in America, beginning with the foundation document of our nation, the Declaration of Independence.
In this document, our founding leaders declared the God-endowed right of all people the opportunity for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This absolute claim to truth has subsequently guided the actions of our nation through a political process that, while imperfect, has nonetheless made great strides in providing equality for everyone. From a Christian perspective, the dominant religion of the time, this truth is captured in the moral teaching of Jesus that all people are equal before God and is accompanied by the mandate to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
As the United States has become increasingly diverse, the entwining of faith and politics has no doubt become more complex. Does the potential for entanglement signal the need for separation as the article [“Playing the God Card”] alludes to? I think not.
Rather, what is needed are new ways to productively share beliefs and proposed solutions in a manner that seeks middle ground yet also recognizes the freedom to differ. To agree it is acceptable to disagree, while continuing to dialogue and strive for change is at the heart of our nation. As people in a nation where faith and politics have always been entwined we should hope for and expect nothing less.
Gary Forsberg (B.S. ’72)
Apple Valley, Minnesota
To submit a letter, go to www.alumni.umn.edu/opinion or write to Letter to the Editor, Minnesota Magazine, McNamara Alumni Center, 200 Oak. St. SE, Suite 200, Minneapolis, MN 55455. Guidelines are at the Web address above.
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