Back in the early days of GetReligion (we launched on Feb. 2, 2004) I urged reporters not to forget the old Religious Left and, when covering believers in those flocks, not to forget that there is more to their stories than politics. The left is the left because of doctrinal and worship traditions, as well as convictions that align with the New York Times editorial page.
Then something happened that modified my thinking on this subject. Hang in there with me, because I am working my way to an interesting think piece, care of Religion Dispatches. The headline: “The Inauguration’s Beautiful Call for Unity Was Undermined by the Invocation of Religion.”
Faithful readers of GetReligion will remember that, in the summer of 2007, political scientist and polling maven John C. Green spoke at a Washington Journalism Center seminar to a international circle of journalists who came to Capitol Hill to discuss press freedoms in their homelands. But the hot topic of the day was the rise of Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois and whether he could reach the White House. As I wrote in a previous post about that:
The bottom line: Obama was speaking directly to Democrats in the black church, but he was also reaching out to an emerging power bloc in his party — a group Green called the “religiously unaffiliated.” These so-called “nones” were poised to form a powerful coalition with atheists, agnostics and liberal believers.
Green made a prediction that was years ahead of schedule, in terms of the conventional thinking of Beltway politicos. At some point in the future, that growing coalition of secularists and religious liberals was going to cause tensions inside the Democratic Party.
Five years later, when the Pew Forum released its groundbreaking report on religiously unaffiliated Americans, Green raised that issue once again in a public event. Here’s a bite of the “On Religion” column that I wrote at that time.
[The] unaffiliated overwhelmingly reject ancient doctrines on sexuality with 73 percent backing same-sex marriage and 72 percent saying abortion should be legal in all, or most, cases. Thus, the “Nones” skew heavily Democratic as voters — with 75 percent supporting Barack Obama in 2008. The unaffiliated are now a stronger presence in the Democratic Party than African-American Protestants, white mainline Protestants or white Catholics.
“It may very well be that in the future the unaffiliated vote will be as important to the Democrats as the traditionally religious are to the Republican Party,” said Green, addressing the religion reporters. “If these trends continue, we are likely to see even sharper divisions between the political parties.”
This brings us to Biden, today’s Democratic Party and some of the challenges he faces, when dealing with moral, cultural and religious issues in American life.
The Religious Dispatches essay was written by a “usual suspect” on a topic of this kind — Andrew Seidel of the Freedom From Religion Foundation. What he has to say would not ring true, I imagine, for the liberal Catholics, oldline Protestants and, especially, Black church Christians who are part of Biden’s base.
America’s new leader will, at some point, remember that African-American churchgoers saved his political neck in South Carolina.
But here is my main question: What did Nones and unbelievers think of all of that Inauguration Day Godtalk? Obviously, they were celebrating the defeat of President Donald Trump. But were there tensions under the surface?
There could be news stories here. Thus, let’s read Seidel’s overture:
There’s a reason religion and politics are forbidden topics in polite conversation: they’re divisive. Mixing the two is doubly so. President Joe Biden is a deeply religious man who turns to his faith in dark times. But 85 million Americans do not. Those nonreligious Americans were left out of yesterday’s moment of national healing.
The inauguration was beautiful. I cried when Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the first Latina on the high court, swore in Vice President Kamala Harris, the first female, first Black and first Asian American to hold such a high office. But religion is divisive and every time the people on that stage turned to the Christian god, or to prayer, or to religion, millions of Americans were left alone, a catch in their throat, a flush in their face, a feeling of exclusion growing with each appeal to the divine. And yes, some of the religious language was intended to be ecumenical or more inclusive than that which might be heard in a church on a Sunday morning, but the religion was impossible to ignore and it wasn’t just nonbelievers left feeling like outsiders in their own country.
There were prayers and hymns. Garth Brooks sang “Amazing Grace,” but those aren’t lyrics non-Christians can sing without feeling, at best, disingenuous. We should not have to set aside our principles and beliefs to participate in the moment of national unity. To ask this is to ask non-Christians to ignore who they are, rather than recognizing that they are just as American as anyone else.
Here’s another interesting observation, or two:
President Biden’s speech was powerful overall, and magnanimous. But also divisive. When it came time to address the pandemic scything across the country leaving 400,000 dead Americans in its wake, what could have been a moment of silence including everyone, Biden instead called for a moment of silent prayer for the believers. It was disappointing. And alienating.
Biden quoted St. Augustine, “a saint in my church,” who thought nonbelievers and non-Christians would be tortured in hell for all eternity, even scorning “tender-hearted Christians” who believed in a less painful or more metaphorical hell. To quote such a person on the beauty or virtue of love cheapens love.
As you would expect, Seidel has much to say about the clout of “Christian nationalists” during the previous administration and the presence of “Jesus Saves” banners in the hands of many participants in Donald Trump’s March to Save America rally and even a view rioters who crashed into the U.S. Capitol.
But that isn’t the big idea, here. This essay was a message to the Democratic Party leadership. Here’s the finale:
This is not to say that everyone needs to keep their religion to themselves at all times. But ours is a secular government. It was designed that way to ensure religious freedom. There is no freedom of religion without a government that is free from religion. America has no shared faith. To say otherwise, is to say that Americans without a faith are not true Americans.
If America is ever to be unified, our leaders must learn that dividing people along religious lines at moments of national significance is counterproductive. If Joe Biden wants to unite this nation, to knit the sundered American tapestry, he must learn that religion only unites its adherents and excludes everyone else. Today was a missed opportunity. Let’s work together to make tomorrow more inclusive.
Read it all. Like I said, there are valid news stories here.
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