New Poll Shows Public Thinks Churches Should Stay Out of Politics
A slight majority of people believe religious institutions should stop speaking out on political issues
In the week after Barack Obama and John McCain explored the connections between their beliefs and political convictions in one of America's biggest megachurches, a new poll shows that a slight majority of the public now thinks that churches and other houses of worship should keep out of politics.
The Pew Research Center and the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life say that this is the first time since they began asking the question more than 10 years ago that a majority has not been in favor of religious institutions speaking out on political and social issues.
Surprisingly, the biggest change of heart has occurred among conservatives. Four years ago, only 30 percent thought religion should keep its nose out of politics. Now, a full half does. That brings self-identified Republicans more closely in line with Democrats (51 percent in 2004, 52 percent in 2008) on the question.
The public in general is also now more uncomfortable with politicians who talk about their religious convictions, with the biggest shift again taking place among Republicans.
While Republicans still are viewed as being friendlier toward religion, the survey shows that the public sees a change in Democratic attitudes. Almost 40 percent today think the Democratic Party is receptive toward faith matters, while only 26 percent did two years ago.
This poll follows other recent surveys that suggest Obama is making inroads with many religious voters.
Reader Comments
p
p
Absolutely
Christian institutions shloud have a say in the matters of governeent because our government is guaranteed by our constitution to be representational. There is a controversy in England about busses carrying advertising that questions whether God exists, paid for by atheists. In my view, atheism as well as secularism and humanism are religions because they are belief systems. This means the religion that is not called a religion is saying a religion that is called a religion must step aside, against the tenets of democracy of government "of, by and for the people".
An atheist, (or secularist or humanist) to be honest (and honesty, being a central call of God in Christian religion shouldn't be a necessity for non-Christians), recognizes that he or she does not know if God exists. Many churches, Christian included, hold the important consideration that it is one's own choice to believe God is Who people witness of Him as being or He is not. This is called a matter of personal faith and should be respected. These paople are a part of the population our government represents, so their involvement in free discourse should not be restricted. Since atheists have said that God does not exist, the statement belies itself in that there is no way for an atheist to know if God exists - especially, according to the Bible, when accepting His existence is based in the faith of the will to believe. Thus, the term Agnostic (the understanding that one is not sure if God exists) is more honestly appropriate for an Atheist, knowing that the words of terminology can be a belief system also because the facts of living are not generated in the existence of particular symbols of words. When anyone is incensed about what another says, as on the busses is England, the angry response is part of the purpose of the advert. But, for the parties who support and paid the message that "there probably is not a God" to be upset because others are upset, saying they have no right to express their disgust and disdain for the message on the bus, are hypocritically undermining the advert itself by calling for oppositional responses to be silent.
What are we teaching?
What are we teaching in our schools today? I'm sorry, what aren't we teaching in our schools today?
Just because a teacher says something religious does not mean that he/she is promoting that particular belief system. What do history teachers do when they get to the Crusades? The First Thanksgiving? The Reformation? These are important historical periods that can not be ignored because they are all religious. As for seperation of church and state, G. Washington and T. Jefferson were both quoting a Bapist leader who did not want the government running the church like England's king was doing, neither did this religious leader want the church to become corrupt by controlling the government like the Catholic Church was doing before the Reformation and the Puritans were doing in Massachusetts.
Please note that the phrase "seperation of church and state" is not found in the Constitution, and if our schools would only talk about the historical importance of religious leaders like Christians, debates like this wouldn't occur.
advertisement
