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It's likely that there will be more religion news out of the Republican National Convention this week than there was out of the Democrats' meeting last month. Weblog doubts, for example, that Amy Sullivan will be able to parse out each biblical allusion or reference to faith that comes from the pulpit podium. But at the Democratic convention, religion was an important subplot because the question was new: Is the party becoming dogmatically secularist? For the GOP, questions about the role and power of religious conservatives are pretty old. Will there be any truly newsworthy stories about faith and politics coming out of the convention? We'll keep watch, but Weblog's hopes aren't too high.

Speaking of Sullivan, she has closed down her Political Aims weblog with a triumphant crow about her party's "welcoming people of faith." Now she'll be blogging over at Washington Monthly, where she's newly employed. She has several posts already on faith and politics, but her most recent accuses religious conservative groups of hypocrisy. "Shouldn't it matter that conservatives don't get exercised at all over pro-choice Republican Catholics in high-profile positions?" she asks. The real problem, she says, is that the press follows the lead of activists like the Catholic League's William Donohue: "How many reporters do you think are going to ask Rudy Giuliani or George Pataki or Arnold Schwarzenegger if they should refrain from taking Communion?"

Sullivan says groups like the Catholic League should be treated like any other partisan organization. They don't really care about making sure that Catholic politicians treat Communion in ...