Faith & Values

With the emergence of Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin onto the scene as the newest political superstar, the religious viewpoints of candidates are once again getting attention. Last spring, an awful lot of airtime and ink was devoted to the beliefs of Barack Obama and his association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright, his pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. Ultimately, Obama denounced Wright and withdrew his membership from Trinity as the political heat was melting Obama's message and disrupting the spiritual lives of the thousands of people who look to Trinity as the sanctuary for their souls. Now Palin has burst onto the political scene using the language of her faith, a Christianity with as much a conservative tilt as Obama's has a liberal tilt. And McCain's religious beliefs, less well articulated, are somewhat more confusing. There... READ MORE

Two years ago, Eric Elnes and a small group of progressive Christians set out from Phoenix, Ariz., walking to Washington, D.C. to see what place their style of Christianity might have in a nation that seemed to view their religion as sort of an adjunct of conservative politics. What they found along the way was what Elnes describes in his book, Asphalt Jesus, as "a new form of Christian faith at the grass roots that transcends labels and stereotypes," a faith "more concerned with honesty than morality, more with embracing difference than with judging others, and more with pushing boundaries than with creating them." The book and the companion video, ... READ MORE

I was disappointed in Barack Obama's answer Saturday night when Pastor Rick Warren asked him during their televised conversation at Saddleback Church, "At what point does a baby get human life, in your view?" Obama dodged the core question with a flip reply that "Whether you're looking at it from a theological perspective or a scientific perspective, answering that question with specificity is above my pay grade." But public policy is based on the answer to that question, so the answer is well within the pay grade of someone seeking to lead the nation -- even if it simply a matter of choosing among conflicting possibilities. Not that I liked John McCain's simplistic response any better, since it really didn't answer the... READ MORE