For those of you interested in progressive political organizing, check out this interesting article written by a Kerry canvasser from Madison, WI. He draws interesting corollaries between Mormon door-to-door proselytizing and political canvassing.

Going door to door was hard enough. My pulse would quicken at each door, and after three hours tromping through numbing subdivisions I invariably got the urge to fill in numbers on my walk sheet, grab a soda and wait for the carpool to pick me up. And all we wanted was three minutes of someone's time to ask a few questions, give a short pitch and hand out some literature. A missionary who approaches a stranger's door is seeking nothing less than a complete reconstitution of that person's worldview. One imagines a lot of door slamming, unpleasant words and icy stares.

And yet the improbable fact about missionary activity is that it works, regardless of the faith's specific dogma. Mormons are the fastest-growing church in the country. Evangelical protestant congregations make up 58 percent of all new churches in the United States. Globally, Islam continues to reach into new and unfamiliar lands, experiencing explosive growth in China. Religions that actively proselytize--Pentecostals, Mormons, Muslims--grow, almost without exception.

He continues with what is the real problem with today's progressive organizing: it is not really organizing at all.

Once upon a time, organizing meant more than coordinating e-mail petitions or hosting house parties to raise money and awareness. It meant something much closer to what we now think of as missionary work. A union would send an organizer into, say, a small mining town in Pennsylvania. He would reach out to the miners, get to know them and their families, and tell them what a union was and how it could help them. He would try to convince them to risk their livelihoods by banding together and demanding a safer workplace and better wages. This was difficult, often bloody work. But when it worked--and often it didn't--it effected a transformation of the miners who joined the union. They now had a new identity. Even if they had joined solely for higher wages or a mine less likely to kill them, after suffering lockouts, harassment and possibly beatings, they would have an entirely new perspective on bosses and power. They would be more progressive.

This is what social movements at their best do. They pull back the curtain on power and expose its workings. They politicize those without political engagements by transforming personal grievances in the workplace, at home and in society into political issues.

Right on. We need more real organizing and more of it needs to be done to the non-converted. There is no silent progressive majority out there waiting for the right Messiah. We need to build it.

The religious left has finally started attacking Bush for his unjust and immoral 2006 budget. Mitch Cohen writes an excellent column in the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal covering the religious left's condemnation of Bush's 2006 budget.

This past week, leaders of five mainstream Protestant denominations came together to speak in one voice. Standing shoulder to shoulder, leaders of the Episcopal Church USA, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Presbyterian Church (USA), United Church of Christ, and United Methodist Church together condemned the 2006 Federal budget proposed by President Bush as unjust by biblical standards. They couldn't be more correct.

The President's budget cuts at least $45 million from Medicaid and shifts most of the payment to states that will not be able to afford the burden. As AFSCME's budget analysis notes, almost one-third of Bush's domestic program cuts are in education, with funding reductions totaling $1.3 billion. He has proposed total elimination of 48 programs, including Drug-Free Schools State Grants, the Perkins Loan program for students with exceptional financial need and the Even Start family literacy program. Adult education would be cut by 63 percent. The budget also reduces or eliminates 150 programs, block granting and slashing vital public services for a wide range of needs. The cuts are especially harmful for job training, community development programs, social services, veterans' health care, law enforcement, housing, election reform assistance to the states, and child care. And on top of all of this, we are told that the President's tax cuts, those that benefit the wealthiest Americans, should not only be made permanent but that more tax cuts should be enacted for the wealthy.

As Cohen rightly argues, the biblical prophets would be on the front lawn of the White House "condemning the outright aggression of this administration against the poor."

America is the wealthiest, mightiest nation on the planet, spending billions of dollars perpetuating a foreign policy based primarily on threats of war, but when it comes to clothing the needy, sheltering the homeless, or feeding the poor, there is a sore lack of both vision and moral will coming from Washington. There is much for the rich man, and precious little for Lazarus.

I often criticize the right wing for its monolithic, black-and-white perception of those on the left. I also think that those on the left commit the same mistake in not spending time trying to understand those on the political right, particularly evangelical Christians. For those of you interested in at least understanding (though it will not likely lead to agreeing with) evangelicals involved in politics, the newly proposed platform, "For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic Responsibility," of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) might provide some insight on a more complex view of evangelical political thought.

The Hotline has a decent story on the recent document:

The Nat'l Assn of Evangelicals (NAE) opened debate "on an ambitious plan" to influence policy by developing a new platform, which 87 Christian leaders signed on 3/10 (Duin, Washington Times, 3/11). The proposed platform...contains policy goals that go "beyond the fight against abortion and same-sex marriage" and urge "evangelicals to address issues like racial injustice, religious freedom," and poverty. At the NAE's 3/10 luncheon many speakers said the new platform was "necessary" because the NAE risked being seen as "merely" a GOP "voting bloc." Speaker Barbara Williams-Skinner drew "a standing ovation" when she "criticized evangelicals who decide their votes using abortion and same-sex marriage as a litmus test." Williams-Skinner: "The litmus test is the Gospel, the whole of it."

But other "evangelical leaders voiced concern that the new platform could dilute the focus of the evangelical movement." Focus on the Family VP Tom Minnery warned other evangelical leaders against taking a "smorgasbord approach." Minnery: "Do not make this about global warming...the issues of marriage, the issues of pro-life are the issues that define us to this day." Sen Joseph Lieberman (D-CT) and Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS) were among the "prominent figures" who attended the luncheon (Goodstein, New York Times, 3/11).

The 12-page document is thought-provoking. The authors are educated and eloquent. True, their biblical interpretation leads them to anti-gay discrimination that comes from a narrow reading of the Bible and a refusal to see and treat ALL people as equal. On the other hand, the authors also strongly support policies that benefit the poor, strengthen human rights, promote peace, and protect the environment.

While you may not agree with many of the sentiments in this document, I think it deserves a read because it provides a more complex and intelligent view of evangelicals than hate-filled mantras from Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell. I hope that evangelicals will take the advice of Williams-Skinner and stop confining their civic engagement to anti-gay, anti-abortion activities. If they take this document seriously, they will start marching for peace and protesting against poverty and environmental abuse. Evangelicals who agree with this document might also start realizing that they have a lot less in common with Bush, Inc. than they thought.

Today is a good day. I can now eat Taco Bell again! Bring on the vegetarian grilled stuffed burritto baby.

The Washington Post reports on the end of a long-term Taco Bell boycott that has resulted in higher wages for TB tomato pickers.

In what both sides called an unprecedented agreement, the fast-food company said it will increase the amount it pays for tomatoes by a penny per pound, with the increase to go directly to workers' wages. Taco Bell said it will help the farmworkers' efforts to improve working and living conditions.

While it is not an end to the fight for a living wage, it is a significant win for organizing and the potential for an alliance between workers' rights groups and the faith community on poverty issues.

The Taco Bell boycott had picked up considerable support in the last two years, especially among students and church leaders. Students at 21 colleges had removed or blocked the restaurant chain from their campuses, and "Boot the Bell" campaigns were active in at least 300 colleges and universities, and in more than 50 high schools. Religious organizations actively supporting the boycott included the National Council of Churches, representing 50 million Christians. Former president Jimmy Carter, among the workers' most prominent supporters, helped negotiate the resolution reached through his center.