This analysis will be largely a summary and interpretation of the very detailed information provided by Family First at valueyourvote.org.nz. Analysis of party choices for the 2014 election will be posted shortly after Value Your Vote is updated for this election, to ensure all relevant information is taken into consideration.
For this analysis at the 2011 election, which is largely still relevant, check out christianvote.blogspot.co.nz
Since then we have had marriage redefined, and euthanasia is looking to be the next serious issue ahead of us, so this years analysis will consider these issues also.
While you're waiting, have a read of this old article by the new Act leader Jamie Whyte. Here's a real challenge for Christians this election:
The real test for genuine belief is not what people say, but what they do. To believe something is to be disposed to act upon it. The vast majority of Western Christians fail this test. ...What is really important this election? Whether some politician seems like a decent bloke, whether another watches porn, whether a party has the 'right' ratio of females? Or are there far deeper, real issues to consider before you vote?
[the idea that abortion is murder] is a horrifying idea. Anyone who believed it to be happening would surely rise up against the regime, with violence if necessary, or at the very least passively resist by not paying taxes or refusing to recognise the legitimacy of the State. To do nothing while millions of children are murdered would display despicable moral complacency. ...
If they believe what they claim to, they are no better than those who turned a blind eye to Nazi atrocities. But I do not think they are that wicked. It is just that they don't really believe the things they say about foetuses and immortal souls. ...
All Christians fail to act on their avowed beliefs. Suppose you believed that Heaven exists and that only some of us will qualify to live in it for ever, as the vast majority of Christians claim to. How would this affect your behaviour?
It would depend on what you thought were the admission criteria for Heaven. But whatever you took these virtues to be, they would utterly dominate your life. When everlasting bliss is on offer, nothing else matters at all. People who believed in Heaven would surely act quite unlike those who do not.
Yet the expected behavioural difference is not to be observed. The vast majority of Christians display a remarkably blasé attitude toward their approaching day of judgment, leading lives almost indistinguishable from those of us open non-believers. Put simply, they fail the behavioural test for belief.
Do you really believe in Christianity enough to act on it in an election, or are you indistinguishable from the world around you?
