In 1974 I prepared to attend a seminar taught by the noted British historian, Herbert Butterfield. He inaugurated the seminar at Northwestern University with a public lecture on the subject "The Christian and Politics."

In 1974 Jerry Falwell had just started to sensitize the nation to the relationship between religion and politics. My classmates and I wondered whether they mixed like oil and water or cream cheese and bagels. So my heart beat a little faster as the evening of the lecture approached.

I sat in the front row of Leverone Hall at eight o'clock. Dr. Butterfield, who I later came to admire greatly as he shepherded ten of us graduate students through a quarter-long examination of the role of the Christian historian, shuffled his eighty-year-old frame to the lectern. He cleared his throat, paused a moment, and then said, "I don't think I can really speak to this subject to your satisfaction. You see, I don't believe the Christian really participates in the political process as a Christian ...