This past Friday marked the first time since John McCain's selection of a vice-presidential running mate that the Democrats actually "won" a daily news cycle.
Your weekend was eventful, so to refresh your memory: Sarah Palin did not exactly kill in her interview with Charles Gibson. Alaska lawmakers voted not to delay further inquiries into Troopergate until after the election. And most importantly, John McCain was taken to task on The View for recent attack ads on Barack Obama.
Watch the video and you will see the hosts pressing an uncomfortable McCain about two negative spots his campaign ran. One alleged that his opponent made porcine allusions in reference to Sarah Palin. The other suggested that Obama voted in favor of providing five-year olds with sex education.
The McCain team was clearly playing dirty pool and the hosts of The View performed a public service by calling him on it. Maybe they could ask Obama one day about some of his own negative advertising (though to this point the GOP has retained its traditional lead in the categories of misinformation and nastiness). Which got me thinking. Could those who feel that faith must play a role in politics learn something from Barbara Walters and her colleagues (and gain some much needed public trust in the process)?
In the past few decades a variety of religious groups in the United States have come charging into the public sphere. Their objective has been to set governmental policies in accordance with their own doctrinal beliefs. Conservative Evangelicals and Fundamentalists have charged harder and faster than any other group in the land. If it weren't for them we wouldn't have a veritable industry of consultants, think tanks, demographers and pundits who describe their professions as "exploring the intersection between faith and politics."
Needless to say, the attempt to infuse religious beliefs into government upsets many Americans. These people are known as "secularists" and they are positively livid about the increased prominence that faith is playing in this selection. They deeply mistrust Conservative Evangelicals and have even been know to say unflattering things about them.
It might surprise secularists to learn that many Conservative Evangelicals are, in turn, puzzled as to why their compatriots consistently think the absolute worst of them (e.g., that they comprise an American Taliban, that they disrespect the Constitution, that they wish to subjugate all others to their theological worldview).
Knowing many good and decent Evangelicals, but also recognizing that secularists have legitimate cause for concern might I suggest that Friday's episode of The View offers the former a bridge-building possibility. What if Evangelical leaders were to adopt an ecumenical, as opposed to sectarian, approach to their actions in the public square?
Instead, of trying to influence public policy on issues like abortion, they would concentrate on helping to monitor the truthfulness of claims made by candidates in both parties. After all, honesty is every bit as much a Christian value as opposition to abortion. And honesty in public officials is a value that Evangelicals with their media sophistication, organizational infrastructure and sound finances are uniquely equipped to help the American public monitor.
This too is a way of letting religious values enter the public square. My proposal does not deny Evangelicals the right to express their views on abortion and gays. But it might help counter the widespread suspicion that when they speak of "bringing faith into politics," they really mean to bring their particular faith into politics and no other.
Jacques Berlinerblau is the Rabbi Harold White Chair in Jewish Civilization in Georgetown's Walsh School of Foreign Service and senior advisor to the Center for Jewish Civilization, where he was director from 2006 to June 2020. Berlinerblau has published on a wide variety of issues ranging from the sociology of heresy and modern Jewish intellectuals to African-American and Jewish-American relations.
