Jennifer is totally right.  The right has held the monopoly on religion for way too long.  I think that's because the loudest voices get heard and those who are more extreme tend to be louder. Therefore those christians who have so many judgements and say so many hateful things tend to be the ones we see most in the spotlight. There are many christians (not only younger) who do not share the belief of the evangelicals on the right.  There are many religious people period, who need to have their voices heard.  I'm glad the democrats are taking notice of that, and I don't think they'll let it get of control and run the party like the right has.

As somebody who is nothing more than an interested observer of the US political process, I have been fascinated by the power organised religion has in your democracy.  I'll admit that I've often struggled to understand how a supposedly sophisticated electorate appears unable to seperate out the state from religion. In most western democracies any candidate for high office who invoked god would instantly be dismissed as a nutjob and would certainly not be electable.  In the US it appears to be the opposite.  

This state of affairs is a reasonably new development though and this election is maybe the opportunity for those who believe that faith is a matter of walking the walk and not so much talking the talk, to take back the influence from the fundamentalists.

I do hope so.....  

...let me speak to this...

"I'll admit that I've often struggled to understand how a supposedly sophisticated electorate appears unable to seperate out the state from religion. In most western democracies any candidate for high office who invoked god would instantly be dismissed as a nutjob and would certainly not be electable.  In the US it appears to be the opposite."

In the last poll taken concerning American's and their beliefs (bear in mind only about 20% identify as Republicans) 92% answered that they believed in God.

What I usually find from the Secular Left - is that Christians voting for what they believe in ( as opposed to secularists and their beliefs and voting habits) - are derided by the "sophisticated" elites as equating to an inability to separate Church from State. With 92 % believing in God are we to let the remaining 8% run the whole damned show? Are the rest of us, those who invoke God ourselves, to be left voiceless in your ideal world? Some friggen democracy!

We believe, we have rights and we vote. Get over it.

 

 

I find this discussion very thought provoking and I find myself coming to a very tenuous line. Even though we sometimes forget it, the separation of church and state in the US was put in place by (generally) very religous men, and it was done so to protect religious freedom, and to protect the few from the masses. I am Catholic-  I find it worrying though when politicians running for election define the US as a Christian country with laws defined by the bible, maybe so or not, but intentionally exlusive of Jews, Muslims, Hindus, atheists, etc..

I prefer that goverment officials dedicate themselves to fixing roads, maintaining utilities, etc., and not so much telling my family and I what to believe. And I generally am skeptical when politicians raise religion in the context of a campaign... even though I genuinley want to know what is in a person's heart...I just would hope that they wouldn't "use" the topic.

And to Lucky045, my very dearest friend in the world is an atheist... and is the kindest, sweetest soul that I have ever met. As she gently pointed out over lunch one day, you don't need to believe in God to be a good person... you just have to be a good person, without excuses...

-Alice

 

cylonangel, I'm not sure what countries you have visited... but during the entire time I lived in Europe, religion was not a topic you discussed, nor was it a topic discussed by politicians. In fact, it is estimated that 10% of people in the UK attend church on a regular basis.

Religion is quite absent from Western culture. This is a direct result of centuries of religious wars, the direct hatred created by single-viewed religion and the vast destruction that it has created. The United States IS, for sure, the exception to that rule.

People tend to forget that in our nation, not only do YOU get your beliefs, but everyone else gets theirs. While you might strongly believe that religion plays an important role in politics, I agree with kiwifruit... whenever a candidate starts speaking to his religious beliefs, I find myself labeling him or her a nut job. This is the precise reason that I despise Obama even speaking about his religious beliefs in public. That is his private business. I don't need to know what he believes religiously to know that he is a great candidate with great ideas for my country.

Confucius once said "Do not do unto others as you would not have them do to you." I wouldn't want to apply my religious beliefs to your life, just like I wouldn't want yours applied to mine.

...is not neccessarily entirely defined by Europe, but we can leave that debate for another day.

See, i undertsand all that about how I get my beliefs and others get theirs. Got it.

But then let's say there were several hundred million of 'me' and much less than that of 'them'. Am I to live in a tyranny of the minority - where one offended leads to the loss of the many? Whose values should be respected? All of ours? Well that ain't happening here and atheists and secularists seem to make a point of it.

In this country you can put a cross into a jar of your own piss, call it art - and get a Government grant to pay you for your brilliance. Or you can display a picture of the Virgin Mary, glue little pictures of vaginas all over it, smear her image further with elephant dung, call it art - and get a Government grant and a big debut in a fancy New York art gallery, no less. It is acceptable, often admirable among the elitists, to offend a Christian - indeed any sacred symbol of Christianity is fair game, including Jesus Himself who died on that cross Mapplethorpe pissed on so gleefully. Try doing that with Islam or it's scared beliefs. Or minorities. Or gays. I am both gay and Christian and it is not acceptable for you to use my money to offend me. That's like rubbing salt into the wound.

No one's beliefs are being suppressed here just because I act upon my own. I don't want to pay for it. My money is being spent on things that are totally unacceptable to me. I don't just not want to have an abortion - I don't want to pay for anyone else's. Planned Parenthood (how Orwellian our liberals are with their naming of things) released it's annual financial report not long back (you can look it up there's been plenty enough written about it since) and discloses that it is now a Billion dollar player - and it still gets hundreds of millions of dollars every year from my Government - from me.

This is why people of faith must be involved with politics. This is our country too and if we wholeheartedly disagree with other Americans we will battle it out on the political stage. We will elect people to represent us, not you - you can elect those.

Why is religion still thriving in the U.S.?  Because the U.S. has the longest and most robust history of religious freedom of any country in the world.  Even today, many European countries have practices that would be illegal in the U.S., like funding religious schools, declared state churches, anti-religious laws, and religious services/education in publicly funded schools.  It is this freedom in the marketplace of religion that has allowed religion to thrive in  the U.S. and the lack of it, I think, that has destroyed religion in Europe.  (There are other factors but that's a big one.) 

Why do our politicians talk about religion? 

1.) A human being's stance on political issues is often influenced by morality/ethics.  I personally want to know what a politician's morality/ethics are, although that isn't always religion.  For an atheist politician, I'd like to know whether he's a secular humanist or a nihilist, for instance.  For a Christian, I'd like to know whether he's a religious fundamentalist or a Quaker.  This gives me a deeper understanding of where he'll stand on a whole host of issues and how he'll respond to potentially dangerous situations than soundbites and talking points ever will.  (It's not 100% effective and must be backed up with other more mundane information, but it helps.)

2.)  They're appealing to voters based on the voters morality/ethics/ideologies etc.  Politician's court environmentalists, free traders, human rights supporters, secularists, etc. and yes, the religious.  I fail to see why that is such a huge problem as long as they don't expect the law to be written based on religious principles without secular justification as is the current case with the gay marriage issue for both Republicans and Democrats.

For the record, I'm Jewish.  We kind of invented the concept of separating the sacred from the profane.  It's in the ten commandments, actually, although people are always misinterpreting the third to mean you can't say curse words.  One of my biggest pet peeves.  I bring that up because the third actually forbids the use of G-d's name for profane purposes.  Profane, in that context, means secular not dirty, by the way.

I'd prefer that politicians do the two above without constantly invoking G-d instead of just invoking the principles, but I can see why they do it.  It's much more offensive to me to see G-d's name on money.  Go figure.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

The funny thing about talk about religion and politics is that I do not see evidence in practice.  Politicians talk about religion, but rarely do they act from a place of Christian faith.  It's pure sanctimony.  They act out of expediency, from a place of power (seeking and keeping), not love.

Bush used religion to get votes.  Then betrayed any concept of peace, love, and faith by invading Iraq from a place of absolute falsehoods.  Look at McCain's shift.  Now that he's the candidate, he's shifting to a higher degree of religiosity.  It's political expediency!

As I said before, I want freedom FROM religion.  I'm pretty much disgusted with where America is at in the 21st century.  We're becoming such a backwater.

Can you really tolerate any more hypocrisy? I cannot!

That's a good point, but that's also why it's good to know what a person's professed values are.  You can then compare what they say they believe with their actions/policies.  I think it was pretty obvious during the 2000 election that W was more concerned with ambition and ego than the true teachings of Christianity.  Just as he was more interested in neocon ideology than the American constitution.  Hypocrisy is not solely a matter of religion, after all. 

Finally, with all due respect, America becoming a backwater in the 21st century has a lot more to do with neoconservative political and economic ideology and the Democrats' political weakness/cowardice than Christianity or any other religion.   The religious pandering was a tool to get and keep power.  What the neocons did with that power was all secular ideology and class interest.