Religion & Politics

On the other side of the Atlantic, particularly in Continental Europe, elections are generally little more than light fisticuffs over the pace of economic reform and what to spend taxes on. There're plenty of issues in Europe that religion could intervene on. For example, Holland's lenient approach toward doctors practicing euthanasia. The ever-so-civilized Dutch can't bring themselves to protest it in big numbers. Compare that with the brouhaha in America over Jack Kevorkian's conviction.

Even ideologically kindred political actors like Reagan and Thatcher differed in this respect. He was open about his faith. If she has one, I've never heard about it.

Europeans' determination to steer clear of religious utterances can get ridiculous. Tony Blair and William Hague, the leader of Britain's opposition Conservative Party, are now trying to reach out to Christians, as something of a revival is sweeping the nation. Both men recently gave speeches to a large black evangelical group in the UK. In their addresses, both talked enthusiastically about things like "faith," "churches" and "charity." But Blair didn't mention The Big Man Upstairs at all. Hague did once, but only when citing something William Wilberforce said. Okay, I'm being picky. But if one had had the nerve to slip in a couple of hallelujahs, he would have brought the house down.

While politicians in America still pay a lot of lip service to the Lord, religion has actually been playing a much lesser role here. True, Joe Lieberman powerfully articulated his faith in the 2000 campaign. Yes, Bush and Gore both said they looked to Christ for guidance. And Bush's apparent calm during the Florida face-off did suggest that he was resting on God. But for all that, religious voices aren't adding new subjects to the debate, or firing people up like they used to. At least in Washington.

Until about two years ago, believing politicians, particularly on the right, were introducing much innovation into policymaking circles. And firebrands like Jerry Falwell, though they often went off the deep end, brought a rather fun end-times air to politics. There was no clearer symbol of the new timidity than Bush's inability to state, when pressed during one of the televised debates, that he wanted to restrict distribution of the RU-486 pill?a policy that was on his platform. Needless to say, Europeans have been killing their babies with this pill for many years.

Now, many Democrats have long displayed a very European hatred for Christian fervor. In 1998, Sidney Blumenthal labeled Kenneth Starr deputy Hickman Ewing a religious fanatic. His grounds were that Ewing is a born-again Christian. (Blumenthal later apologized.) Early the next year, staffers from the European Commission in Brussels used the fanatic insult to discredit an accountant, Paul van Buitenen, who exposed widespread corruption in that body. The commission's reason? Buitenen attends a rather lively Anglican church in Brussels.

However, Christians in politics need to remember how unnerving Christian zealotry appeared when it was something foreign. Growing up in Britain, a deeply secular country, I recall people snickering insecurely when reading about movements like the Promise Keepers or the Christian Coalition. For once, this is a case of the media definitely being responsible for perpetuating ignorance. U.S.-based correspondents for British newspapers generally don't understand religious America. Some can hardly tell the difference between David Duke and Henry Hyde. Harold Evans, the doyen of condescending media Anglos, includes a truly bizarre section in his coffee-table tome, The American Century, that attempts to smear the religious right as either stupid or anti-Semitic.

Admittedly, European snootiness toward American religion is hard to shake off. Though I converted to Christianity a full 18 months before I arrived in the U.S., I was initially irritated with my brethren here. They were brash, and stupidly muddied their hands in politics, I thought. But New York, supposedly a godless city, soon changed my mind. The enormous evangelical and Pentecostal churches in the boroughs do much to invigorate communities. I volunteered for a while in a faith-based Ave. D hostel for getting homeless men back on their feet. This wonderful place was set up with money from Giuliani. Yes, your tax dollars.

There are two chief reasons proselytizing pols have been holding their tongues lately. The suburbs, a rich source of votes, are being de-Christianized, so sensitivity made sense from a campaigning point of view. Second, Bush didn't need to go around the country Bible-thumping to get conservative Christians to vote; their disgust at Clinton was adequate motivation.

However, the large number of believers in America suggests that Christianity's influence in politics will return. Faith percolates up. This passage from Tocqueville's Democracy in America still applies: "America is still the place where the Christian religion has kept the greatest real power over men's souls; and nothing better demonstrates how useful and natural it is to man, since the country where it now has widest sway is both the most enlightened and the freest."

Indeed, one could argue that American politics suffers when Christian influence wanes. More Tocqueville: "What can be done with a people master of itself if it is not subject to God?" Here, the keen-sighted Frenchman touches on the central problem in all Western societies today: what do you replace Christianity with once it recedes? The secular faiths that have long been moving into the vacuum have done little good. Christians need to be entering the political fray. Religion and politics not only mix, they get on famously. God wants it so.

Peter Eavis is a columnist for [TheStreet.com].