Methodist Activist Reacts to Seminary Hosting Dems' Conference
by Jim Brown
August 14, 2006
(AgapePress) - - A conservative United Methodist activist finds it ironic that a United Methodist seminary in Colorado recently hosted a Democratic party conference on how to attract religious voters. The political summit at Iliff Theological Seminary in Denver drew Democratic Party leaders, academics, pollsters, and members of the clergy. According to Associated Press, some of the participants said Democrats do not need to change their position on abortion or same-sex "marriage," but need only to emphasize the morality of helping the poor or protecting the environment. A table at the conference was stacked with new books from the religious left, and bumper stickers that read "Jesus rode a donkey."
Mark Tooley is director of the United Methodist Action Committee at the Institute on Religion and Democracy. He finds it ironic that the same liberals have been lamenting the supposed "marriage" between Evangelicals and the Republican Party.
"If nothing else, this illustrates what the religious left is all about and has been about for many decades previous to the founding of the 'Religious Right,'" observes Tooley. "And I guess there is resentment over the fact that conservative religious activists, although their movement is newer, have been far more influential and more successful than the old religious left."
According to Tooley, the sponsors of the conference may have outdone themselves this time. "Here, in this case, we have the Democratic Party of Colorado actually holding an event on the campus of Methodist Iliffe Seminary there in Denver, brainstorming on how to attract religious people into the Democratic Party," he points out.
"I really would be hard pressed to think of any examples where the Republican Party has convened a similar event at a conservative seminary."
Tooley says Iliff is probably the second-most liberal of the 13 United Methodist seminaries in the United States.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
