via jesus Politics, On this day before the third anniversary of the Iraq invasion, this bit of polling turns my stomach

Go to church, back the war – Nation/Politics – The Washington Times, America’s Newspaper

Overall, 45 percent of Protestants and 47 percent of “other Christians” thought the war was a mistake. The figure was 52 percent among Catholics, 58 percent among other religions and 62 percent among those who had no religion.

Frequency of church attendance also held sway. Overall, among those who never went to church, 62 percent said the war was a mistake. Among those who attended services once a week, the figure was 44 percent.

Republican churchgoers were the most supportive. Among those who attended services once a week, 16 percent thought the war was a mistake. The figure was 26 percent among Republicans who never attended church.
Among Democrats, 79 percent who attended church weekly said the conflict was a mistake; the figure was 81 percent among those who never attended services.

The third paragraph shows how indcotrination actually changes the “unchurched”, “Neutral” opinion (kin dof like a control group). It illustrates how civil religion has replaced the teachings of Jesus ( the practicioners of this civil religion would say “clarifies” and “read Jesus correctly”, which seems to be an abandoning of the “the Bible says what it says and means what it means” kind of clarity that they say is used in backing their theology, EXCEPT of course where it comes into conflict with “the real world” (which is not the world as God has proclaimed as the end and goal of history, in the Kingdom of God, but the world as defined by the powers; the empire)

Not that “polling opinions” and “stances” is what makes for faithfulness in churches. For many Christians of Democratic persuasion, opposition to Bush may easily fail to move beyond joining the political debate. In fact , it often starts and stops there.

I feel like the blame is to be found not only in the abandonment of the Jesus story as authoritative, but also in the failure to form an alternative polis; a people set apart, so that the church no longer represents an intentional community resisting the allures and the lies of culture and its ideologies (its theologies; irregardless of their claim to be “universal, non-denominational, or religion-free”) Without the formative structures and habits, the “opinions” coming from churchgoers, left and right, fail to move beyond partisan politics.