A Balancing Act

Balancing Political and Religious Beliefs

This Washington Post article tries to reconcile Paul’s religious beliefs with his libertarian political affiliation.  As we talked about the other week, it is difficult to discern whether his religious beliefs are more important than his political believes or vice versa.  He is a deeply religious man and holds great esteem for the power of the church and what it can provide for the community and, almost conversely, is troubled by the power of the government and its ability to overly assert itself into people’s lives. 

                Paul is anti-abortion and has stated mixed messages on same-sex marriage, stating that he is in defense of traditional marriage; that it’s a state issue; and that marriage should be administered by the church, not the government.  Though most libertarians are pro-choice, Paul believes life begins prior to the physical birth so a fetus is entitled to the full rights that any individual is.  He bases this off of his personal experience and feeling when seeing a fetus aborted.  Because he sees life starting before birth, he is actually in line with libertarian principles on individual rights.  Paul’s views on marriage entangle his religious and political views much more than his stance on the abortion issue.  While he supports states rights to administer marriage (but ultimately wants the government to be out of regulating marriage), he appears to be personally against gay marriage.  It is an interesting paradox however- while the government is in a place to regulate marriage licenses, Paul pushes for each state’s right to ban same-sex marriage but in his ultimate goal of having churches regulate marriage, same-sex marriage would be allowed under some religions. 

So where does this place his religious and political views? Is it a hierarchy or a balancing act?  It’s hard to tell.  His anti-abortion stance is based on a moral obligation to protect individuals, not religious doctrine, and his views on marriage are a mixture of individual rights, states’ rights, and religious teaching.  Based on this, and that he switched churches to one that fell into his moral and political beliefs better, I think Paul is trying to balance his religious and political beliefs.  It is because he is a religious man and that religion can take over for much of what the government does that he does tend to have more conservative religious views.