'Amen and a-women:' Inane political correctness proves how little Democrats get faith

We’re just days into 2021, and already the race for the most inane politically correct statement of the year has a strong frontrunner.

Ending the prayer opening the new session of Congress, Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) intoned, “Amen and a-woman.”

So first, let’s do a fact check: “Amen” has as little to do with men as “menstruation” does. It originates from Hebrew and means to give assent — and shares nothing with the word “men” except three letters.

After an uproar, Cleaver, a former Methodist pastor, explained to the Kansas City Star that he intended the word to be “a lighthearted pun in recognition of the record number of women who will be representing the American people in Congress during this term as well as … the first female chaplain of the House of Representatives.”

Yet with Cleaver’s wordplay coming amid a House Democrat push to eliminate gendered terms like mother and father from chamber rules in the interest of equality, it’s hard not to see the vocabulary choice as somewhat pointed. Furthermore, the Missouri Democrat could have offered gratitude for the new women in his words without jarringly twisting a prayer ending into a pun.

Man is not the measure of all things

But even taking Cleaver at his word, his actions still come at a time of a troubling attitude among our political elites toward religion. Too often our modern world sees religion as needing to conform to us, rather than for us to conform to religion.

Cleaver is hardly the only example of this kind of thinking. Just last month, Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam told residents they shouldn’t want to celebrate the birth of Christ in a church. “For me, God is wherever you are,” the Democrat said. “You don’t have to sit in the church pew for God to hear your prayers.”

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Ah, thank you for that insight, Pope Northam. It’s really helpful to know my lawmakers know better than I or my religious leaders how God wants to be worshipped. I’m all for practical measures to limit the spread of COVID-19 — I wore a mask for Christmas mass and sat in a church where every other pew was roped off to ensure social distancing — but it’s not the government’s role to tell people of faith how, or where, they should pray.

Similarly jarring was The Obama Foundation’s message in July about the passing of civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis, which referred to Lewis’ faith as being an “act of self-care.” Naturally! Clearly, self-actualizing, exercising, following the latest trendy practice advocated by Gwyneth Paltrow and one’s faith are all equivalent. Who hasn’t heard of the martyrs who died for their nourishing skin care cream?

Can we imagine lawmakers doing this for a non-Western faith or cultural tradition? Would a lawmaker say he believes Mecca is wherever you want it to be, right there in your heart? Would a politician decree she thinks the Chinese New Year could just as well be celebrated in July?

Christianity is already inclusive

But what about the implication of the “a-woman” term, namely that the Christian tradition needs to get more inclusive?

Well, let’s take a step back and look at history. In a time where telling hard truths was more likely to get you crucified than retweeted, St. Paul made an audacious case for equality, writing to the Galatians, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Meanwhile, without the benefit of modern feminists explaining the harms of the patriarchy to Him, God was able to decide that the best way for His Son to come to earth was to have a human mother.

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And throughout history, Christians — from Harriet Tubman freeing slaves via the Underground Railroad to Corrie ten Boom hiding and saving Jews during World War II — have bravely taken steps to live out their faith in the equality and dignity of all human beings, even when lawmakers failed to.

That’s not to say that every Christian at every moment has lived up to those beliefs. But then even in the church of the woke, there are sinners: Just consider the recent uproar over the revelation that Hilaria Baldwin, wife of actor and “Saturday Night Live” Trump impersonator Alec Baldwin, has allowed people to believe she is Spanish despite being Boston-bred.

Cleaver told The Kansas City Star that his congressional prayer included “faithful requests for community healing and reversion from our increasingly tribal tendencies.” I’m with you there, Rep. Cleaver. But that healing and reversion from tribalism depends on mutual respect, not flippant approaches to faith.

Katrina Trinko is a member of USA TODAY’s Board of Contributors and editor-in-chief of The Daily Signal, a publication of The Heritage Foundation. Follow her on Twitter: @KatrinaTrinko

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Praying 'amen and a-women:' Political correctness strikes again