Between a Rock and a Hard Place

You are a United States Senator. You hold strong faith in Jesus Christ and his gospel.

What do you do when you see your country’s actions running counter to the teaching of that faith?

How can you justify your country’s idolatry of power and condone the use of violence in light of Jesus Christ’s example of loving servanthood?

How do you feel when fellow Christians say your political stand—on war, foreign policy, social concerns both domestic and world-wide—makes them doubt the sincerity of your faith?

Is it really possible to follow a career in politics and be faithfully committed to Christ as the same time?

In Between a Rock and a Hard Place Senator Mark Hatfield shares his deepest feelings on these questions and others equally crucial. He describes vividly some of the agonies and frustrations of his career. The decision (as Governor of Oregon in 1958) whether to commute or carry out a death sentence of a condemned criminal. The truth—and often, absurdity—of who has influence and power over our nation’s policies. The dangers and evils of a civil religion which sees America as “God’s chosen nation.” The reaction to his 1973 National Prayer Breakfast remarks calling the Vietnam War “a sin.” The disillusionment with “all the pompous pretension, the dehumanizing relationships, the prestige-seeking social life, and the seeming impotence, frustration and emptiness of political endeavor.”

Impelled to find direction for his life, Senator Hatfield combed Old and New Testaments as well as early church history for what they had to say of the Christian’s relation to the state: the priorities of allegiance, “just” wars, civil disobedience, hunger and poverty, environmental stewardship.

What he found in that study took him from dilemma to decision. “My entire concept of leadership and power underwent a drastic revision,” says Senator Hatfield. “Radical allegiance to Jesus Christ transforms one’s entire perspective on political reality. Priorities become totally changed; a whole new understanding of what is truly important bursts forth. There is an uncompromised identification with the needs of the poor and the oppressed. One is placed in fundamental opposition to structures of injustice and forms of national idolatry. Further, there is a commitment to the power of love as the only means to the end.

“Our call is to faithfulness, not to efficacy; it is servanthood rather than power. We know that the most decisive action that we can take to shape history is to follow the way of Christ, to give ourselves to the building of the Body, and to pour out ourselves as he did in love.”