New School Politics

Rudy, The Secular Candidate

Ryan | 14 08 2007

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From the AP:

Addressing a town-hall meeting in Iowa, the former New York mayor was asked whether he considered himself a “traditional, practicing Roman Catholic.” An audience member also called on Giuliani to discuss the role his faith played in making decisions on issues such as abortion.

“My religious affiliation, my religious practices and the degree to which I am a good or not so good Catholic, I prefer to leave to the priests,” Giuliani said. “That would be a much better way to discuss it. That’s a personal discussion and they have a much better sense of how good a Catholic I am or how bad a Catholic I am.”

In a political realm where religion is becoming increasingly important to voters, the fact that a major candidate is declining to inject his religious leanings into the debate is encouraging. The rise of religion in politics has greatly affected government, and its influence has become so immense that even the Democrats find themselves pandering to religious voters. Additionally, the rise of evangelical conservatism has corresponded with the rise of big government conservatism which has been a large contributor to the increase in the size of government since the ’80s (and especially under President Bush). It was exactly the religion factor that led Senator Barry Goldwater, Mr. Conservative himself, to become so disenchanted with the Republican Party in his later years.

The problems with religion in politics are manifold and those problems will persist whether or not we go to the particular extreme of establishing a state religion. However the root of those problems can be summed up in the fact that reason is always a better tool for solving such existential problems like issues of government policy that affect hundreds of millions–if not, billions–of people.

Quite frankly, I cannot understand anyone’s rationale for worrying about a candidate’s religious affiliation. Do voters such as the one in Iowa really think that God will favor America more if we elect a President of a certain denomination? The bottom line is that faith and politics make for a dangerous combo while secular politics have proven to result in far greater freedom over the course of history. It is a pleasure to see that at least one candidate for leader of the free world is not trying to prove that he (or she) is the “Jesus candidate”.