faith and politics

News

Kerry quotes Bible; Bush aide cries foul

Faith and works
Apr 20, 2004
On the presidential campaign trail, Senator John Kerry (D., Mass.) is using the New Testament’s Letter of James to imply that the Bush administration may be long on expressing faith but lacks compassionate deeds in dealing with hunger and joblessness. Following Kerry’s appearance in a St. Louis church, a White House spokesman decried the ploy as “exploitation of scripture.”
Books

The Christian Right in American Politics: Marching to the Millennium

John C. Green, Mark J. Rozell and Clyde Wilcox

Movement on the right

Apr 20, 2004 reviewed by Kimberly H. Conger
In 1976 Jerry Falwell got a phone call from Jody Powell, special assistant to Jimmy Carter—a call that launched the Religious Right. Powell asked Falwell to tone down his criticism of Carter’s interview with Playboy magazine.
From the Editors

Minus a miracle

The Middle East impasse
May 17, 2003
The release of President Bush’s “roadmap” to peace in the Middle East, designed to lead to a Palestinian state by 2005, brings to mind the famous New Yorker cartoon in which a scientist, after filling a blackboard with a complicated mathematical formula, ends with the words “and then a miracle happens.” A colleague observes: “I think there’s a problem with your last step.” In the case of th
M.E.M.O.

Fake IDs

Trent Lott's apology
Jan 25, 2003 by Martin E. Marty
Trent Lott is last year’s news, history, on the ash heap. The senator has been contrite, has repented, asked for forgiveness, done penance and publicly resolved henceforth to lead a godly life.
Books

The Quiet Hand of God: Faith-Based Activism and the Public Role of Mainline Protestantism

Robert Wuthnow and John H. Evans, eds.

Let’s argue

Jan 11, 2003 reviewed by Alan Wolfe
Despite the size and historic importance of mainline churches, say sociologists Robert Wuthnow and John Evans, “their activities and the ways in which they seek to influence public policy are poorly understood.” Compared to the noisy political activity of conservatives and evangelicals, tha
Editor's Desk

White House Christians

Faulty assumptions about faith and party affiliation
Nov 06, 2002 by John M. Buchanan
I am not immune to the seduction of being invited to a White House briefing, nor of being called a “religious leader,” so I flew to Washington in mid-October (at my own expense) and showed up as instructed at the Executive Office Building. There were more than a hundred of us. I recognized three Presbyterian peers, pastors of large churches.