NICHOLAS KRISTOF: She's evangelical, 'Pro-life' and voting for Biden
Thursday, Oct. 22, 2020 -- A granddaughter of the Rev. Billy Graham, Jerushah Duford is a committed evangelical Christian who describes herself as "pro-life." For most of her life, she voted Republican. Yet this year, she is voting for Joe Biden and is encouraging fellow Christians to distance themselves from a president who she says is trying "to hijack our faith for votes."
Posted — UpdatedEDITOR'S NOTE: Nicholas Kristof is a columnist for The New York Times. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes, for his coverage of China and of the genocide in Darfur. His latest book is "Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope."
“The Jesus we serve promotes kindness, dignity, humility, and this president doesn’t represent our faith,” Duford said.
She made clear to me that she is not speaking for her grandfather, the famous evangelist who died in 2018. But she added: “I think he would be sad. I think his greatest desire had nothing to do with policies but to introduce people to a loving Jesus, and the division this administration has caused I believe has hurt this effort.”
A huge obstacle for many evangelicals considering a vote for Democrats is abortion policy. So a particularly important part of the upheaval now underway within evangelical ranks is a move to redefine “pro-life” to apply to more than fetuses.
“I genuinely wish the Democratic Party would have a greater value for life inside the womb,” Duford said. “ Yet I equally wish the Republican Party would place a greater value on life outside the womb. You cannot choose just one and define yourself as pro-life.”
“A growing number of Christians have realized that their religious beliefs concerning the sanctity of life can be advanced in practical ways other than simply voting for conservative judges to make abortion illegal,” said Deborah Fikes, a former evangelical leader in Texas who became so disillusioned by policies of the American Evangelical Church that she left and joined the Methodist Church. Evangelical churches, she said, have mistakenly pursued a harmful “strategy of political gain in Jesus’ name.”
A similar ferment is apparent among Catholics. “I am voting for Joe Biden because I am pro-life,” a Catholic nun, Sister Mary Traupman, wrote to The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Describing family separation at the border, environmental degradation, denial of health care to the poor, she added, “ These are not pro-life policies.”
The Rev. Greg Boyle, who runs programs for gang members in Los Angeles, told me something similar. “I have never endorsed a candidate in any race until now,” Boyle said, but now he endorses Biden. “This is a vote for the soul of the nation,” he added. “I’ve never seen an existential threat like this in my 66 years of living.”
“This is not about partisan politics,” he said. “It’s about truly choosing life.”
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