Bernie Sanders took the stage at a Liberty University convocation , the same stage where Conservative GOP candidate Ted Cruz announced his candidacy months ago. Sanders, an openly irreligious Jewish Socialist Democrat gave a progressive sermon on economic inequality. Other Democrats have talked about religion and preached from the pulpit. Yet Sanders may have gone where no Liberal -- certainly no agnostic -- has quite gone before. He quoted the bible. He quoted the Pope. Here are 15 amazing quotes from his speech in the belly of Evangelicalism.
1) “Liberty University is a religious school, obviously. [...] And you try to understand, in this very complicated modern world that we live in, what the words of the Bible mean in today's society.”
2) “In the Pope's view, and I agree with him, we are living [...] in a world which worships not love of brothers and sisters, not love of the poor and the sick, but worships the acquisition of money and great wealth.”
3) “You know there is a lot of talk in this country from politicians about family values. [...] In my view there is no justice when low income and working class mothers are forced to separate from their babies one or two weeks after birth and go back to work because they need the money that their jobs provide.”
4) “I understand that the issues of abortion and gay marriage are issues that you feel very strongly about. We disagree on those issues. [But let me respectfully suggest that there are other issues [that] we can try to work together to resolve them.”
5) “I am not a theologian, I am not an expert on the Bible, nor am I a Catholic. I am just a United States senator from the small state of Vermont.”
6) “There is too much shouting at each other. There is too much making fun of each other.”
7) “I am motivated by a vision, [...] so beautifully and clearly stated in Matthew 7:12, and it states, ‘So in everything, do to others what you would have them to do to you, for this sums up the war and the prophets.’ That is the golden rule.”
8) “Injustice is rampant. We live, [...] in the wealthiest country in the history of the world. But most Americans don't know that. Because almost all of that wealth and income is going to the top one percent.”
9) “In my view, there is no justice, when here, in Virginia and Vermont and all over this country, millions of people are working long hours for abysmally low wages of $7.25 an hour.”
10) “Put this in the context of the Bible, not me, [...] we are living in a time where a handful of people have wealth beyond comprehension.”
11) “I think that when we talk about morality, what we are talking about is all of God's children. The poor, the wretched, they have a right to go to a doctor when they are sick.”
12) “You have to think about it and you have to feel it in your guts. Are you content? Do you think it's moral when 20 percent of the children in this country [are] living in poverty?”
13) “‘The worship of the ancient golden calf has returned in a new and ruthless guise in the idolatry of money and the dictatorship of an impersonal economy lacking a truly human purpose,’” he said, quoting Pope Francis.
14) “In your hearts, you will have to determine the morality of that, and the justice of that.”
15) “I conclude with this thought, I would hope very much that as part of that discussion and part of that learning process, some of you will conclude that if we are honest in striving to be a moral and just society, it is imperative that we have the courage to stand with the poor, to stand with working people and when necessary, take on very powerful and wealthy people whose greed, in my view, is doing this country enormous harm.”
The full speech, replete with annotations, is available on the Washington Post .
The full exchange, including a Christian hymn intro and a question-and-answer session that touched on abortion and racism is available in a video on C-SPAN .
"I pray father that [Bernie Sanders] man know that he has made friends today," Liberty University senior VP of spiritual development David Nasser said in a closing prayer that followed the candidate's remarks.
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