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Christianity Today, November, 2007

Faith-Talk Surprise

Presidential candidates deviate from the usual religious scripts.

Sarah Eekhoff Zylstra | posted 10/09/2007 08:41AM

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Political observers have noticed a surprising twist this election campaign: Democrats and Republicans seem to have switched places in their use of religious rhetoric.

Republican candidate Fred Thompson said he attends church only when visiting his mother, while Rudy Giuliani told reporters he prays like a lawyer: "I try to make a deal: 'Get me out of this jam, and I'll start going back to church.'"

Meanwhile, Democrats have been wearing their religious commitments on their sleeves. Senators Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Edwards all speak frequently and publicly about their faith.

"That is a change from the past," said John Green, senior fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. Democrats have traditionally kept their faith private, he said, because their base was seen as primarily secular.

But after the strong showing of evangelical voters for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, some Democratic Congressional candidates began reaching out to the religious community. It worked in 2006, said Mara Vanderslice, senior partner and founder of Common Good Strategies, which seeks to build alliances between Democrats and the religious community.

"[Religious Democrats] did significantly better than the rest of the Democrats did around the country," Vanderslice said. "The presidential candidates have learned that lesson."

Vanderslice believes Demo-crats are gaining a hearing within an evangelical community that is "broadening their agenda … [beyond] abortion and gay marriage."

So why are leading Republican candidates downplaying their faith? "I would expect both sides to be talking about it," said Jim Tonkowich, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy. "There is certainly an awareness after the last two elections that believing Christians are a substantial voting bloc."

Some Republican candidates—most notably Senator Sam Brownback, a Roman Catholic, and Governor Mike Huckabee, a former Baptist minister—speak easily about their faith and fit the evangelical profile of President Bush. Green said the fact that candidates topping the polls do not is mere coincidence.

Even so, the Republican frontrunners need to be careful, Tonkowich warned. "The evangelicals that got out there and worked for George Bush may hold their noses and vote for Giuliani," he said, "but they aren't going to wear out shoe leather for him."

Talking about faith might work for Democratic candidates, Green said, noting that they will be able to compete for states that were off-limits to John Kerry in 2004. Conversely, he said, evangelicals may appreciate Democrats' new openness, but vote for candidates seen as upholding traditional family values anyway.

Related Elsewhere:

Weblog collects links about 2008 presidential candidates' faith, including:

Faith's role on the rise in Campaign 08 | A new Pew poll on religion and politics finds that 70 percent of Americans want a president with strong religious beliefs (The Christian Science Monitor)

How religious do we want our presidential candidates to be? (Andrea Cornell Sarvady and Shaunti Feldhahn, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

Christianity Today's coverage of the 2008 presidential candidates includes:

Latter-Day Politics | Mitt Romney believes American values, not Mormon doctrine, should rule a President. (September 26, 2007)

The Giuliani Choice | Conservative leaders doubt his support among evangelicals will last. (June 5, 2007)

Mitt's Mormonism and the 'Evangelical Vote' | Can conservative Protestants vote for a member of what they consider a cult? (May 31, 2007)

Q&A: Hugh Hewitt | Conservative blogger, political analyst, and radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt on Romney's bid for the White House. (February 27, 2007)

God's Will in the Public Square | Democratic Senator Barack Obama gets it mostly right. (September 1, 2006)

More Christianity Today coverage of politics and law is available in our full coverage area.

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November 2007, Vol. 51, No. 11

Comments (10)

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G Braden

October 11, 2007 8:11am

This article doesn't really say anything. Sometimes, I think the Christian voting block is as superficial as those whom they vote for.

Viktor

October 10, 2007 5:31pm

Today the President urged Congress not to vote about recognizing the Turkish genocide of Armenian people last century. How are we going to continue talking about American values to the rest of the living world after this awful and miserable statement? Is for Christians in politics everything now for sale to gain some questionable political benefits? There is something extremely disapponting about my new country's direction. What a painful discovery,God help us !

Raymond Takashi Swenson

October 10, 2007 10:20am

The assertion of religious faith is not anything new to Democrats. Jimmy Carter was elected in the wake of Watergate to restore rectitude to the White House. He was also an Annapolic graduate and former nuclear submarine officer. He demonstrated that these things do not predict good judgment in either domestic or foreign policies. Bill Clinton gave campaign speeches in churches (something Republicans would be excoriated for) and attended church before having Sunday assignations with his White House staff prostitute. Evangelicals and other Christians need to examine what each candidate actually believes about the duties and opportunities of the next president, rather than rely on a religious resume, positive or negative, which is a notoriously poor predictor of performance in office.

John

October 10, 2007 9:28am

I think this article begins with the premise that politicians really have well-established beliefs. I think Mitt Romney's flip-flopping on abortion and gay rights and Bush's profession of ANY kind of Christian beliefs while launching preemptive wars, "rendering" and torturing prisoners, and saving the veto pen for kid's health insurance, clearly put the lie to such a suggestions. Politicians, at least the top tier candidates that have a chance of winning, worship at the altar of power and money...any one of them would burn an abortion clinic down or cut the ribbon at the openning of one if they thought it would get them re-elected. Don't kid yourselves...in the end they are all "Ceasar."

Ted Voth Jr

October 09, 2007 5:00pm

As a political Liberal and a conservative Christian, who believes firmly in the separation of church and state for the church's sake, and the state's, it scares the spit out of me that the Democrats might learn to talk the faith talk, while inwardly being ravening wolves, like the greedy Republicans who profess Christianity. God is not a Republican or a Democrat. Be wise as serpents, sisters and brothers, and harmless as doves! Don't you know we will judge the angels? How much more, then, the politicians?

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