What Kind of World Would YOU Rather Live In?

Well, I'm about to go on another political tangent, maybe even a rant. But come along for the ride with me. It's an interesting subject which anyone who is religious and conservative (most of you who read my blog fit into this category) will probably relate to.

We're already full throttle into a political race focused on the presidential election in 2012. If you don't really pay attention this early, count yourself lucky. (Elections like this seems to fray tempers and raise blood pressure.) I can't seem to help myself-- I've been following some of the Republican entrants into the primary race, and anyone who has been paying any attention to Pres. Obama at all can see that he is already working at the reelection game. On some of the conservative blogs that I follow, and in the opinion of some of my most conservative friends, the Tea Party is our last hope. Some people see us as racing right toward a financial cliff, one that the country won't be able to recover from.

Maybe you can relate. Are you worried about the spiraling budget deficit? Do you wonder if the government will ever quit spending beyond its means?

You're certainly not alone if you are concerned. Anyway, some of my Tea Party friends are so concerned about this that they are starting to champion the ideas of Ayn Rand. If you haven't heard of Ayn Rand, she was a writer who strongly urged what I would consider the most Libertarian of policies when it comes to government. She was also an atheist who taught a morality that in the words of Onkar Gate (a senior fellow at the Ayn Rand institute) "instructs us to uphold reason as an absolute in our lives, as our only source of knowledge and only judge of values, and to achieve self-esteem in our souls." In other words, religion doesn't matter. Only a determined pursuit of our own interests according to our reason matters.

In other words, selfishness is king. It is the only value that will bring us true happiness and self-esteem.

Oh, you'll never hear it described that way. But Mr. Gate makes it quite clear, in an editorial that he wrote recently that appeared on Fox News, that a belief in Ayn Rand's morality is NOT compatible with a belief in the teachings of Jesus Christ. And what did Jesus teach us, but to put the needs of others before our own?

I've read Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand's most famous novel. The story was compelling and believable (though be warned-- I found the sex scenes unnecessary and offensive). But the world she shows as being the only kind of successful one-- one where people never, ever do anything to help people out of the goodness of their heart but only in exchange for services or goods, I found appalling.

I'm sorry, but I don't want to live in a world where my neighbor is sick and in need, and I only help them if they can pay me back somehow. Can you imagine a world where you have gotten in a car accident, and nobody bothers to help you because you have no service or good of value to trade? A world where we just abandon a mentally retarded adult to his fate, determining that it is his responsibility to find a way to care for himself? What if when I was on bedrest with premature labor with my last baby, my friends and family had left me to fend for my family on my own because it was my responsibility to take care of myself, and if I didn't have the money to provide the care my family needed while I was laid up, then it was my own fault for choosing to bring a child into the world when I "couldn't take care of it?"

I must vehemently disagree with Mr. Gate, and any of the Tea Party who subscribe fully to Ayn Rand's belief system. I think somehow they are mistaking the issue-- believing in the teachings of Jesus does not mean that we must endorse the welfare state. Quite the contrary. Nor does it mean that we can never defend ourselves from our enemies just because Jesus taught that "whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also" (Matt. 5:39).

For those of us who are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, passages in the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine and Covenants clarify this quite well, not to mention teachings from recent prophets and apostles.

I believe that it is our responsiblity-- no, our highest duty-- to learn to love everybody as God does and that the principles of self-sacrifice and service will bring us greater happiness than single-mindedly focusing on our own desires. However, this does not mean that the government should be the one providing everything and making all the decisions about who needs help. God also wants us to be self-reliant and to help others achieve self-reliance, and mandating things from the government level backfires where this is concerned, more often than not.

That's my two cents. What do you think?