What Would Jesus Vote?

As the nation goes to the polls, every politically-motivated group in America wants to go with them. Over the past weekend and spilling over into yesterday, both parties and the interest groups that support them were working overtime to remind you who is the right man to vote for today.

So it is with the folks at WorldviewWeekend.com, a partner ministry of American Family Online, an Internet service provider dedicated to serving Christian households with heretic-free web surfing. Worldview Weekend, which sponsors Christian seminars and boasts actor Kirk Cameron as one of its featured speakers, sent an e-mail missive to its members yesterday giving them a "no bones about it" view of today's democratic (small d) activities.

Brannon Howse, the group's President and Founder, penned the letter, in which he states rather unequivocally that his belief that "anyone that does not vote on Tuesday is sinning and anyone that votes for Kerry is committing an even greater sin!"

As if that didn't do enough to seemingly run counter to the Christian ideal of love and understanding - not to mention the Internal Revenue Service's code of conduct for religious entities - Mr. Howse goes further in his tirade:

This is no time to waste votes on third party candidates..A vote for a third party candidate is a vote for Kerry. If you disagree that is fine....don't waste your time sending me an e-mail about it because I will not waste my time reading it.

Is this how Christians should approach this election? Hardly. Support for Bush by the majority of Christians is expected and understood, but this kind of nasty electioneering smacks of something that is decidedly un-Christian - and perhaps more directly important today - un-American.