Posts
Former Senator Mark Hatfield has passed on. See here. I do not know much about him, but I will remember him as a devout evangelical Christian (who actually wrote books about faith that evangelical publishing houses published) who did not feel that his Christianity chained him to right-wing political dogmatism. I was struggling yesterday with how (and if) to bring faith into the public sphere. Well, maybe Mark Hatfield was one model on how to do this!
I'll also remember him from the documentary, With God on Our Side, which was about the religious right in America. Hatfield talked about the time that he spoke before the 1964 Republican National Convention, and he denounced the ultra-conservative John Birch Society. Immediately, he was booed---which Hatfield narrated, and which we also got to see from actual footage of that event. Hatfield remarked as he told his story that about a third of the delegates were members of the John Birch Society!
