From “A House Divided: Engaging the Issues through the Politics of Compassion” by Mark Feldmeir
Many Christians try at all costs to avoid mixing politics and church. The popular sociologist and pastor, Tony Campolo, once said that mixing church and politics is like mixing ice cream and manure. It doesn’t do much for the manure, but it sure does ruin the ice cream.
But what if, when Christians are in church, they should actually be at their most political. By political I do not mean partisan. The word “politics” comes from the Greek, “polis,” meaning “affairs of the cities.” Many assume that “politics” comes from the two words, “poly,” meaning “many,” and “tick,” as in “bloodsucking parasites.” To “do politics” is to be concerned about the affairs of the communities in which we live, and to do politics in church is to ask, What does the gospel of Jesus Christ say about how I should live in my community, and what should my responsibility be to the members of that community?
This is a politics of compassion, and it is vastly different from what typically passes for politics in America today. It transcends “issue politics” and calls us to consider what kind of community we want to live in, and what kind of neighbors we want to be. We cannot answer those questions by simply pulling the lever in the polling booth because, when all is said and done, Jesus will not ask us how we voted, Jesus will ask us, “When I was hungry, thirsty, sick and in prison, did you care for me? When I was your neighbor in disguise, did you love me?” A politics of compassion is the only kind of politics that matters to Jesus.