Many have called Pat Robertson's endorsement of Rudy Giuliani hypocritical. Robertson has compromised his position on abortion and gay marriage in order to hitch his wagon to the presidential contender.

Not so, says Naomi Schaefer Riley, in a opinion piece in today's Wall Street Journal. (It deserves to be read in full.) In fact, Robertson's decision fits in a long tradition of evangelical support for an agressive foreign policy toward ideologies deemed to threaten Judeo-Christian civilization.

Riley quotes Richard land, who says evangelicals have long been interested in foreign policy. "The only part of the country that had majority support for Roosevelt's interventionist policies was the South." Then, after World War II, came godless communism. "Communism was seen as a direct threat to the Christian faith and Judeo-Christian civilization. Among Catholics and evangelical Christians, this message resonated first and with the most intensity."

For decades, evangelical missionaries returned ...

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