First published with Good Faith Media
Ostensibly, Duke Divinity theology professor emeritus Stanley Hauerwas once said, “A Christian could only ever run for public office one time. If their platform reflected the teachings of Jesus, they’d never get elected again.”
“Ostensibly” is a shaky way to begin an article. But as a Waco, Texas resident with 15 years of experience as a pastor near Baylor University, I’ve been privileged to know many Hauerwas disciples and have pressed them for the quote’s source. While none could provide me with something in print, they confirm that he has espoused the sentiment.
The notion of an unelectable Christian politician might seem odd in a country that routinely vets their candidate’s faith confessions. But Hauerwas is talking about a platform rooted firmly in the Sermon on the Mount, among other teachings of Jesus.
While “religious” political discourse often shrouds itself in conversations about the ethics of abortion and pontificates on the Obergefell ruling on same-sex marriage, both undoubtedly important conversations, Hauerwas’s vision is more comprehensive.
I am reminded of Diana Butler Bass’s provocative suggestion that the Amish should have been placed in charge of our foreign policy after their stunning response of forgiveness to the West Nickel Mines shooter. Or Shane Claiborne’s argument that we cut bombs, not bread, from the national budget. You get the idea.
While Jesus is an admirable sage that we love to quote as an antidote for our personal problems, his politics are too impractical for real American problems. It might be impossible for an American president to enact the politics of Jesus. The very idea of the nation-state carries implications that are at odds with the kingdom of God.
I was born in 1981. As much as I admire my favorite president of my lifetime, Barack Obama, I must be honest about the fact Jesus wouldn’t condone Obama’s use of drones to bomb, well, anyone, but especially targets that incidentally killed civilians. Nor would Jesus have supported his immigration policy.
What measures might be taken to honor former President Jimmy Carter, whose fame grew after his presidency due to his humanitarian efforts, humble lifestyle, and Sunday school classes?
President Carter took office after defeating Nixon’s former vice president, Gerald Ford, the last shadow of the Watergate era. The former Georgia governor really was a Washington outsider, and he quickly made a few moves to signal his differences.
Carter banned the playing of “Hail to the Chief” when he entered a room. He sold the presidential yacht and insisted on carrying his own bags on Air Force One. He also pitched his own version of fireside chats to tell the country what was going on.
Carter’s presidency can best be understood in three broad strokes. (I am indebted to Peter Baker of the New York Times for this summary.)
Economy
Despite his folksy honesty, problems for Carter quickly mounted after his inauguration. After an oil crisis in the Middle East, inflation rose and gas prices skyrocketed.
Carter’s initial response was to give speeches about energy management. He coached Americans to make small sacrifices and curb their consumption. His approval ratings tanked.
Carter then took a ten-day retreat at Camp David to listen to advisors and think more critically about the problem. He emerged from the retreat and gave a surprising speech that diagnosed much deeper problems than a political crisis.
Carter’s speech addressed existential matters, indicting Americans for their self-indulgence and consumption. But he did something else in that speech that caught the attention of the American public: he shared criticisms he heard from policy advisors.
That kind of self-reflective honesty was novel then. It is unheard of now.
Carter’s speech was initially well-received, partly because it was refreshing. However, after he fired his entire cabinet, and problems lingered, the speech would be remembered for its malaise.
Israel and Palestine
President Carter’s biggest political win was the Camp David Accords, the peace agreement he negotiated between Israel and Egypt. Before 1978, Egypt had been one of the strongest Arab countries that had refused to accept Israel’s right to exist. The two nations had been intermittently at war for 30 years.
In an unprecedented move, Carter invited Israel’s Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat to Camp David for peace negotiations. After fourteen days of rigorous negotiations, a peace agreement was reached.
It’s hard to underscore Carter’s commitment to this process. Sadat jokingly said Carter worked harder than his forefathers who built the pyramids. Begin remarked that Carter would be remembered for generations to come for his role in the peace talks.
Iran Hostage Crisis
In 1979, the Shah in Iran fled the country after Muslim clerics had overtaken it. Because the Shah was sick and needed help, many diplomats, including Henry Kissinger, advised President Carter to bring the Shah, who had been an American ally, into the country for treatment.
Despite his reservations out of fear that Americans in Iran would experience retaliation, Carter eventually agreed to take the Shah. Carter’s fears were realized.
On November 4, 1979, a group supporting the revolution took 53 American diplomats and citizens hostage. President Carter became relentless– some might say singularly focused– in his efforts to free the hostages. Before one failed rescue attempt, Operation Eagle Claw, in which eight U.S. servicemen were killed, Carter’s Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, resigned because he didn’t believe it would work.
As failed attempts to free the hostages mounted, Carter began losing the country. After 444 days, the hostages were released on January 20, 1981, about an hour after Ronald Regan had taken office, a choice made by Iranians in disdain for Carter.
—
Whatever judgments one might make about Carter’s presidency, it may be that his real legacy emerged after he left the White House. Carter broke another mold by the things he chose not to do.
He didn’t write books or schedule speaking engagements to accumulate wealth. Instead, he and his wife Rosalynn returned to their modest house in Plains, Georgia, where Carter began teaching his now famed Sunday school class.
After two years, Carter opened the Carter Center and began a career of service and civic- mindedness. He monitored elections in emerging democracies and began a program to eradicate guinea worm.
He promoted human rights globally and became a frontman for Habitat for Humanity. In 2002, he won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in peacemaking around the world.
Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority, founded in 1979, was the birth of a different approach to religion in politics, one that became much more palatable for the American appetite and imagination. This idiosyncratic approach privileges a hermeneutic that blesses America’s political economy and the military-industrial complex.
It focuses on metaphysics of the soul while ignoring Jesus’ teachings about caring for the marginalized in our midst. It provides a mode of interpretation that makes room for the rampant versions of Christian nationalism that we find ourselves confronting today.
It is probably an overstatement to say that Jimmy Carter lost his reelection bid because of his values. It is more likely he lost because of policy blunders and an inability to navigate the presidency through compromises and performative acts required to work the political machine in Washington. Carter even had trouble working with the Democratic majority he inherited in Congress.
But his inability to compromise, stubborn persistence in blaming the oil crisis on American gluttony, audacity in believing peace was possible in the Middle East, and singular focus on American hostages abroad give us a sense of what Jimmy Carter did have: character. And in that character, we get a sense of what Hauerwas might be suggesting.
In this way, the Carter presidency may have left us one last prophetic legacy: Being a faithful Christian may not make you a very good politician.
Leave a Reply