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West Virginias legislature recently passed legislation allowing Bible classes in public schools. The outcome may surprise conservative supporters, according to a Masters thesis written by Aaron Franzen titled Reading the American Bible: Its Role in Liberal Morality, Criminal Justice Attitudes, in May of 2011. (https://ethics daily.com/why-regular-bible-readers-tend-to-become-more-progressive/)

Franzen scrutinized the effects of regular Bible reading on the readers views. Franzens thesis recognizes churches really dont teach the Bible. Generally, they offer an agenda-driven interpretation of select portions of scripture. Thats not a criticism. Its a fair critique. If youre longing for an in-depth study of the Bible, a Sunday morning sermon is not going to satisfy.

Franzens data show church attendance alone has very little impact on whether one believes that in order to be a good person, he or she must be engaged in the pursuit of justice. That comes with the discipline of regularly reading the Bible.

It was my working-class parents who made me a Democrat, but it was the Bible that made me a liberal. You might say I was radicalized by the Gospels and the Prophets of the Hebrew Bible, what Christians call the Old Testament. Franzens study explains how that works.

His observations about biblical literalism are consistent with mine. Many literalists dont actually read the Bible. Preachers and Sunday school teachers read select parts of it to them and interpret it for them. Thus, Franzen decided to conduct an academic inquiry, asking, What effect, if any, does this activity of routinely reading the Bible have on them?

Franzen says, It is surprising that little attention has been given to the significance of actually reading the Bible. Perhaps the Bibles ubiquity promotes the misperception that we all know what it says, and, consequently, reading it is simply a habitual and ultimately meaningless activity.

His conclusions wont surprise those who read the Bible.

Reading the Bible actually tends to have a liberalizing effect on the reader. With each increased level of reading the Bible, the odds that the respondent agreed with the statement about engaging in social and economic justice in order to be a good person went up by about 39%.

Most striking was Franzens finding that regular Bible reading impacts personal beliefs about social and economic justice as much their political ideology. That is, the more liberal one considers themselves politically, the more he thinks one needs to actively engage in social and economic justice in order to be a good person. His finding? The liberalizing trend of reading the Bible is even similar to the effect of political ideology.

Likewise, he found that the more an Evangelical reads the Bible, the more moderate their conservative position in regards to social and economic justice.

Franzen also considered attitudes about the relationship between science and religion. Case in point, those who believe climate change is a hoax tend to be more conservative politically and religiously. At the heart of those views is both a literal reading of scripture and a distrust of science.

Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe is a prominent example. He is conservative both politically and religiously. Inhofe reads Genesis 8:22 literally to make his point. It says, While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.

The senator explains, My point is Gods still up there. The arrogance of people to think that we human beings would be able to change what He is doing in the climate is, to me, outrageous.

Franzen found that Evangelicals are more likely to believe science and scripture are not compatible. He also found the more time one spends actually reading the Bible, the less likely they are to find religion incompatible with science. For each increase in how often the respondents read the Bible, the odds that they saw religion and science as being incompatible decreased by 22%.

Given Franzens findings, perhaps folks should read the Bible more often, and we liberals should join the Evangelicals in promoting Bible studies in public schools.

Rodger McDaniel lives in Laramie and is the pastor at Highlands Presbyterian Church in Cheyenne. Email: rmc81448@gmail.com.

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McDaniel: Want to avoid becoming liberal? Steer clear of the Bible - Wyoming Tribune