USA Today published an article today claiming that how often you attend church almost always determines who you’ll support for President. Frequent church goers vote republican and those Easter Christians (folks who only show up on holidays) tend to vote for democrats. Does this suggest that more faithful Christians support George W, Bush or is there anther issue that should be considered? Maybe your church attendance has nothing to do with this. Many theological liberals and moderates have been driven out of their churches over the year (the best example of this is the Southern Baptist Conference). That process has lead many people to leave church life all-together. That doesn’t mean those who have left church are any less faithful than those who go every week. Progressives, often with legitimate concern, see churches as extensions of the Republican Party. Many in the general public may hold the same impression. It isn’t that the faithful vote republican, it is that so many of the faithful have left churches they see as ridged, conservative, and irrelevant. And those intelligent people – along with the millions of Christians still in progressive mainline churches – will vote for John Kerry in higher numbers. The divide is not between the faithful and the non-faithful. The divide is between the conservative Christians and the progressive Christians. A better story for USA Today to write would have been one on the tragic divisions between Christians in a faith divided that should be whole.
Evidence of my claim that conservative churches often integrate themselves with republican party politics can be found here.
