What We Want in Our Political Leaders
by Fr. Thomas Hopko
Some of us Christians don’t necessarily want our political leaders to
be “observant Christians.” We know ourselves and our histories too
well for that. We also don’t want our countries to consider themselves
“Christian nations.” We also know what that can mean.
So what do we want in our political and civil leaders?
Because politics is the “art of the possible,” we want leaders who can
practice the political art without selling their souls to the devil. We want
people who can achieve maximal results for the common good, as they
understand the common good, with the recognition that others can legiti-
mately see things differently than they do. And we want leaders who know
that there is no perfect and lasting good in this world, and never dare to
promise such a thing to anyone.
We want leaders who listen to others, tell the truth and learn from their
mistakes. We want leaders who resist reinventing themselves every few weeks
to please and appease one or another political constituency or voting bloc. We
want men and women who do not demonize their critics and opponents while
alleging to respect them deeply. We want leaders who can compromise their
convictions within acceptable limits, without betraying their consciences, in
order to achieve the best for the most, as they understand the best to be, in
cooperation with their political opponents. We want people capable of
changing their minds and admitting their errors. And we want leaders who
don’t seek “all or nothing” in ideological battles that no one wins and that
produce countless casualties. In a word, we want free human beings to lead
us, not ideologues or demagogues.
In the American setting, this would mean that when some argue that the
invasion of Iraq was an egregious analytical, tactical, political and military
error, those who disagree would not label them weak-willed cowards who are
betraying our brave men and women in the armed forces and surrendering our
nation to evil powers. Or, as another example, when some voice their
opposition to abortion, euthanasia, physician-assisted suicide, embryonic stem
cell research and gay marriage, their opponents would not accuse them of
being heartlessly cruel monsters who oppose modern science and technology,
abhor women and minorities, and want people to suffer uselessly as they
glorify human agony and pain at the sufferer’s expense. Or, when some
Americans think that illegal immigrants should be treated kindly and that
ways should be found to integrate them productively into society, their
opponents would not call them anarchists who oppose law and order and treat
working people with contempt; just as when others say that they want to keep
as many jobs as possible in America, with just wages for American workers,
their opponents would not accuse them of being selfish and retarded enemies
of economic freedom and the system that made America great.
Some of us want political leaders with the courage to conduct an all-out
campaign against global and domestic terror, crime, injustice and neglect of
the neediest by sacrificial spiritual, economic and philanthropic actions that
begin with their nation’s strongest and richest people. And we want them to
resort to carefully planned and responsibly executed police and military
operations to contain evil only when absolutely necessary, as the very last
possible option. We also want all people, not just the poor, to sacrifice equally
for justice, freedom, peace and well being for everyone. We want leaders –
who tend to be among their country’s wealthiest citizens – to be the leading
exemplars of such self-limiting sacrifice that would, for the most part, cause
them little personal suffering while costing them plenty of money that they
hardly need for their personal and familial well being.
In a word, we want leaders who are not prisoners of power, profit, posses-
sion, position, privilege and pleasure. We want men and women who demand
from others what they demand first from themselves, and who do for others
what they would want others to do for them and their loved ones.
Some of us Christians in the United States are convinced that the first step
in reconstructing American political leadership is a radical change in the way
we elect our leaders. We want an end to the agonizingly extended, disgrace-
fully expensive and endlessly analyzed campaigns that exhaust peoples’
patience and sanity, and lead them into all kinds of temptations. We want a
nation governed by people whose actions prove their genuine care and respect
(not to say love) for everyone, including America’s most violent enemies
whose children will be America’s even more violent enemies if things don’t
radically change in our country, both among ourselves at home, and in our
dealings with other peoples and nations.
If such political leaders would emerge in America, and indeed in all
nations of the world (whatever their present political systems), their religious
convictions, authentic or alleged, wouldn’t matter in the least to some of us
Christians. Such leaders would, in fact, be an answer to our prayers. We
would be their strongest, most faithful and most grateful supporters even when
we disagree with some of their policies.
We are also aware, when expressing our hopes, that – as an old proverb
puts it – we get the leaders, both religious and political, that we deserve.
Fr. Thomas Hopko is Dean Emeritus of St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary
in Crestwood, New York.
IN COMMUNION / FALL 2006
