Home  >   Editorials   >   United States   >   Presidential Candidates' Religious Race

Presidential Candidates' Religious Race

By Josh Stein, New Hampshire

Race and gender have made this presidential election interesting, but it's really been the role of religion in Democratic politics that stands to make this race revolutionary. Not only have the fiery antics of Reverend Jeremiah Wright and rumors of Senator Barack Obama being a Muslim made continuous headlines but media has gotten into the act as well with correspondents interviewing democratic candidates trying to get them to pronounce their stand on God and religion.

"With all of the press surrounding Senator Obama’s religion and religious alliances, he nonetheless is bringing a new religious contingent into the process - black voters who come from grassroots organizations based in Black churches. " -Josh Stein

I really wonder where all of this is headed. Senator Obama has made a few attempts to dispel erroneous rumors about his faith, even though there has really been no point to it. Anyone uninformed enough to think he's a Muslim is probably not going to catch his interview on CSPAN. And after the whole Reverend Wright debacle, he's probably better off letting the 10% percent of democratic voters remain misinformed.

Infusing faith and fervor on spiritual matters into politics has largely been the comfortable domain of many Republican voters. With them, the line between religious belief and political opinion seems to have completely disappeared. Indeed, you’d think that “thou shalt oppose the estate tax” is the 11th Commandment and “thou shalt not support McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform” is the 12th (as if anyone who doesn't work for a PAC cares about campaign finance reform).

This year it looks like the Democrats are hoping to pull some of those religious voters into their camp. They're not going to change their stances on abortion or- God forbid- the estate tax, but there are a whole host of other issues that could move the Republican religious Right to the Democratic Left.

There's an inherent environmentalism, charity, and pacifism in most religious traditions- and it's definitely front and center in mainstream American religion. God teaches us that we are supposed to be “stewards of the Earth” while helping our fellow man instead of killing him, right? That ought to translate pretty well to supporting a cap on carbon dioxide emissions, supporting universal health care, and opposing the war in Iraq.

So, why hasn’t the religious right happily gotten into bed with the Democrats? So far, it's probably had a lot to do with shock value. Abortion and gay marriage simply stir up more emotion than health care or global warming, regardless of which is the more pressing moral question.

The charismatic, firebrand preachers- and not just the famously insane who spend all their time damning liberalism and calling any disaster that hits a disproportionately Democratic region “God's wrath”- probably have something to do with it, too. No one should be surprised when a raving madman who speaks in tongues about the decadent Left draws a big crowd.

But now we're starting to see some of those people falter and even change sides. On the one hand, they're disillusioned and alienated by Bush's failures and unpopularity. On the other, they're not too happy about McCain's so flagrantly breaking the 12th Commandment- even though he's way right of just about every other issue, except climate change - thank God. Regardless, there seems to be no negotiating with the religious Right. Their beliefs were handed to them by an infallible God and they expect a candidate who agrees with them issue by issue and buys each one hook, line, and sinker.
McCain has a history- or at least a reputation- of not doing that. In fact many people consider him to be a maverick in the Republican Party. While that may not cost him the religious vote – especially if he chooses a religious conservative as a running mate – there’s a concern that many Republicans may switch sides while many more may stay home on Election Day if the Republican ticket doesn’t conform to their beliefs.

Unfortunately for the Democrats, they haven’t been too successful in capitalizing on this possible shift, so far. The CNN debate centering on religion ranked somewhere between painful and absurd. In not wanting to alienate their constituency, the candidates seemed remarkably awkward talking about religious issues.

Because there is no Mike Huckabee in the Democratic Party voters have watched candidates dance around religious issues. Clinton's response to the question about why bad things happen to good people promoted her into a discussion about health care – and that just a seemed a little silly.

With all of the press surrounding Senator Obama’s religion and religious alliances, he nonetheless is bringing a new religious contingent into the process - black voters who come from grassroots organizations based in Black churches. As such, an historical precedent is already in place, especially in the south, where Virginia is shaping up to be this year's Ohio.

So the question remains – will the old Religious Right be weakened this election cycle even if McCain tags Huckabee on as a VP? As a new, Black Religious Left is forming perhaps it’s the Black churches that will determine who wins the election. If they do, it’s likely they will continue to be an extremely powerful political force to reckon with in the future.

There's one last thing to consider: all those people who chant “Yes we can!” at the Obama mega-rallies. I think, at this point, they qualify as being members of a personality cult. That's a religious voting block if ever there was one.