A case study that is probably not largely applicable to a broader population: My family had lunch with a young Black college student of mine the other day. His family situation isn’t great. His local Southern Baptist Church took an interest in him years ago and has been highly supportive of him.
Many of the people he loves and respects the most are Southern Baptists — and they have been great to him. Their care and investment in him will change his life and the lives of his descendants. Their actions have been admirable and represent the best of humanity.
Because of that environment, his mindset is to answer life questions by seeking out the biblical answer. This is his first election and he has been asking trusted older people for their opinions. Most of what he has heard is that the “biblical” answer centers around opposition to abortion.
He’s not homophobic nor drawn in by the Trump fake machismo. He’s a thoughtful, intelligent kid trying his best to make good choices. He told us at lunch that he’s unsure but is leaning towards Trump because that is the “biblical” answer. His teenage and early adult life has treated the Trump madness as something normal. Like all of us, we’re products of our environment.
I try to keep politics out of my teaching to the extent possible, but this was a good chance outside of the teaching environment to challenge his conception of biblical voting while speaking in his biblical terms. I pointed to the book of James and the discussion of Godly wisdom being pure, impartial, sincere, open to reason, and full of mercy and good fruit. I also pointed to clear and explicit commands about treatment of foreigners, widows, and orphans. Rather than detour down the complexities and unintended (?) consequences of anti-abortion laws, I pointed out that while it’s possible to make a reasonable implicit case for the pro-life position using biblical principles, there are very explicit biblical commands concerning how we treat one another and how we deal with marginalized groups.
I think his inclination would be to vote Kamala if not for the influence of those people he looks up to. My hope is that I was able to give him space to see that even using his standards, the answer is still pretty clearly Kamala.
I understand that for many on this board, even granting the premise of “biblical” voting sounds horrifying, but our personal value largely define how we vote and it’s often possible to show someone a better way using their own values.
We left that conversation with him expressing the strangeness that a convicted felon could be elected. My wife brought up the rape issue.
I’m not sure how he’ll vote; there’s a lot of baggage pulling him to Trump but I think he also knows it isn’t the right thing to do.