Jesus was a Liberal

In a comment in a post below, Gerald says:

Jesus was a liberal? Is God a liberal too? Which party do they belong to? I know there's an election going on but I think you need to take a step back Ono.

Jesus was a liberal. Note the key word, "was," as in, "in his time." Jesus upset the leaders of his time because he so blatantly violated the existing religous rules and laws. For Jesus, people and relationship, trumped laws and regulations anytime and this is what being liberal is about. For instance:

--IN Jn 8:1-11 the conservatives thought they had Jesus cornered. They knew his "liberal" impulse would be forgiveness rather than condemnation, the woman's wellbeing over the Mosaic law which required that she be stoned to death. True to form, Jesus' liberal impulses kicked in, but the he who is the wisdom of God, turned the situation on its head . . . you all know the rest of the story. Jesus was more concerned about the woman, her dignity and her soul, than the precepts of the law.

--Also in Mt 12:1-14 (Lk 6:1-11), we note that the conservatives criticized Jesus and his disciples for plucking corn, rubbing it in their hands and eating on the Sabbath day. Again, the conservatives were more concerned with principle and regulations. However, Jesus justified it by saying that "man is not made for the Sabbath, rather, the Sabbath is made for man." Again, it is people and relationships over rules, laws (even religious laws conerning something as sacred as the sabbath), and regulations.

--The we have the case were Jesus heals the man born blind in Jn 9. The conservatives were upset because Jesus healed on the Sabbath day and because this man who was healed was carrying his bed on the Sabbath. The interesting thing here is the man's response in Jn 9:25-35. He is befuddled and asks, when, since the beginning of time have we seen the blind healed like this, yet the conservatives are quibbling over what day of the week it is.

--Then there is the healing in Lk 18:11-14, where the Lord heals the crippled woman and again, the conservatives are upset because this has been done on the Sabbath. Yet, Jesus points out that she is a "daughter of Abraham" who deserve healing, regardless of day of the week.

--Of course, we have the numerous cases of Jesus eating with the "sinners" "tax collectors" and such. The conservatives criticized him for the company he kept. These were sinners after all, rather he should eat with people who were more "sacramentally" acceptable. Jesus defied the conservatives of his time and their self-righteousness. He ate and supped with whoever opened his heart to him.

Jesus was disliked by conservatives in his time whose desire was to "conserve" and "preserve" the law of Moses, a worthy goal by all accounts. But here again, this is the danger of conservatism, their religious adherence to principles, rules, laws, regulations, can blind them to the fact that the point of all these rules and laws is people, not the rules themselves. Of course, liberals have the opposite problem in which one can committ to people and relationships at the expense of principles. However, it is clear that Jesus was firmly rooted in the left of the ideological spectrum, the golden question is "how far left?"

As to question if God is liberal? If Jesus was liberal, then I it would follow that God, of whom Christ is his purest expression, if cast in human terms, would be liberal. Besides, when we bring God into the equation, the liberalness expands, because we are all God's children, his creation that he loved and sent his only son to die for. So God is far more interested in saving people and not at all interested in the exclusivity proclaimed by conservatives.

Jesus is liberal, God is liberal, shouldn't you be liberal too?