Not everyone who cries, Lord, Lord and all the rest...

Ok, why is it that Presidential candidates who are allied with strict Biblical interpretation can get a pass when it comes to lying and being aggressively mean-spirited - to say nothing about forgetting all that blessed are the peace-makers stuff - while progressive believers get nailed for things taken out of context from their former pastors? It simply isn't true that Jesus lied about his opponents - and I can't find anything in the scriptures that tell us he mocked and smirked about them either - rather it seems that he argued with those he opposed with truth and grace in the daylight and let the chips fall where they may. I don't know about you, but I am sickened by the ugly hypocrisy of Sarah Palin.

I get it: she is a snarky, scrappy middle aged hockey mom (her line about pit bulls seems both funny and prophetic) who gives the Religious Right and the cultural warriors red meat. She brings beauty and zip to her team and isn't afraid to play hardball. I get it that politics is for the big boys and girls - you play rough for keeps - and all is fair in love and war and this is a real war of ideas, values and possibilities for America and the world. But you can't throw around the name of Jesus as your Lord and Savior and then go after those you don't like with sarcastic half-truths, innuendo and outright lies.

People were all over Obama for the things his former pastor said (things, which in the context of Black liberation theology makes sense) but Palin gets a pass from the cultural warriors, the press and everyone else. (No wonder she's being kept in hiding this weekend!) Lord have mercy on us all if we let Karl Rove get away with this crap a third time.

As I think of our young women and men in combat, this mean-spirited manipulation of Jesus is NOT why they agreed to lay down their lives; the civil rights martyrs didn't face dogs, prison and death to beat people up with the Bible and degrade them, either. They knew that freedom and faith are costly. God help us if we let those who take the Lord's name in vain bully us into silence: not everyone who cries Lord, Lord... (What follows is a truly lovely remake of CSNY's "Find the Cost of Freedom." I find it helpful to hear when I pray for peace and integrity for all the political candidates this year. Maybe you will, too.)