What is he? Baptist? Methodist? Jewish? Catholic? I’d say a beguiling mixture of them all. But the key tenet is separation of faith from politics:
We stopped going to Catholic Mass some years ago in the Army. We’d go to these Catholic churches, and when you’re Catholic, of course, going to church is a duty. But we’d walk out of the church and say ‘God,’ and we’d complain about the homily. One night I walked out of the church when the priest said that we should never have fought the Revolutionary war and every war was bad. It was 4th of July. It was an outrageously political statement. I just never felt right when people in the church would take these overtly political positions especially when I felt like I was a good Christian, I was serving my country, and I just didn’t feel like I deserved to be lambasted by the priest on the 4th of July.
It seems to me that there are two important things in a person of faith in political life. The first is that his faith be respected. The second is that he understands the civil-religious distinction. I fear George W. Bush doesn’t see that church and state truly are different things. I’m reassured that Wesley Clark gets it – for the sake of politics, but also, above all, for religion.
SOUTH PARK REPUBLICANS: An update from Brian Anderson. For the record, I think Brian is more right than wrong. The important thing is where the energy is in the culture. And there’s no question that an non-lefty perspective has gained enormous sway recently. But it’s also true that the left has also become energized during the war. I don’t know how you explain Dean’s surge or the popularity of Michael Moore or Paul Krugman without acknowledging that.
The Dish 