George W. Bush, Liberation Theologian

From the intimidatingly prolific Daniel Larison:

"Freedom is God's gift to humanity." -GWB

If we believe Mr. Bush, God also has a sort of program of earthly liberation. It is an attempt to immanentise the spiritual liberty of Christians as political liberty, while at the same time stripping this liberty of any association with revelation. It is a modern gnostic error. Though the statement is brief, it is also strangely reminiscent of liberation theology in which the Gospel serves as a means of legitimising social and political revolution. As well as being Mr. Bush's ideology, this phrase is a rhetorical gimmick to baptise revolution with the appearance of holiness and to keep conservative religious Americans from raising objections to the fundamentally revolutionary and liberal nature of Mr. Bush's entire enterprise. If we judge by looking at who still supports his foreign policy, the gimmick seems to be working.