It is a time of fear in the face of freedom, a time for the widening of previous roads and the opening of new paths, a time of an emptying country and swelling cities, yet a time when these paths are mined by knowing algorithms of the all-seeing eye. It is the time of the warrior's peace and the miser's charity, when the planting of a seed is an act of conscientious objection.
 | ABC Gives Religious Test to Democratic Presidential Candidates |
There were a great many important questions that George Stephanopoulos chose not to ask on Sunday morning’s presidential debate on ABC television. There were no questions about global warming, or about the use military commissions. There was no question about the new, and extremely controversial, Protect America Act, or the revelation that the American government is now allowing federal, state and local law enforcement to use military spy satellites and airplanes like the U2 to spy on American citizens. There was not one question at all about the dramatic attack against Americans’ constitutional rights.
Oh, but George Stephanopoulos found plenty of time to slip the following question in there:
“My question is to understand each candidates’ view of a personal God. Do they believe that, through the power of prayer, disasters like Hurricane Katrina or the Minnesota bridge collapse could have been prevented or lessened?”
I do not understand why George Stephanopoulos asked this question. It’s completely off-topic. It doesn’t have anything at all to do with the job of President of the United States. It’s an invitation to engage in baseless theological speculation. Stephanopoulos might as well have asked the Democratic presidential candidates how many angels they believe could fit on the head of pin.
In 2008, we’re electing a secular executive leader of the government of the United States of America. We are not electing a Priest-In-Chief.
Sadly, this wasn’t just an isolated question. Over the last few presidential elections, there has been an escalating attempt by religious groups to wield their power in the political sphere, and make presidential candidates subject to religious tests of worthiness. That’s an explicitly anticonstitutional approach. Article VI of the Constitution of the United States of America states that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”
George Stephanopoulos should have known better than to subject the Democratic presidential candidates to religious test. In 2008, we need to elect a President who has the wisdom to confront such blatant attempts to make the Presidency a theocratic position.
(Source: ABC News, August 19, 2007)
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