Should Sarah Palin's religious beliefs and practices be the subject of public discussion and critical scrutiny? Should Sarah Palin answer questions about her beliefs and the practices at her churches? Many Christians and Republicans are horrified at the idea, but these same conservatives are quick to use religion for their own political benefit — and Sarah Palin is no exception in such hypocrisy. Anyone who uses religion politically should be expected to answer questions about their religion.
Whether a politician uses religion to promote their own values or as a cudgel to attack the values of opponents, it's illegitimate to expect to be able to use religion without facing hard questions about what one really believes. Unfortunately, few in the media are willing to go so far as to ask even remotely probing questions about religious beliefs and practices. At best we get softball questions about favorite books of the Bible. Any more than that, though, and politicians start whining.
In an interview with Hugh Hewitt, McCain campaign manager Rick Davis was unambiguous that the McCain campaign is unhappy with the attention being directed towards Sarah Palin's religious beliefs:
HH: There is also a double standard on Churches. Sarah Palin’s Church, both of them, have been under enormous scrutiny by CNN and others over the last 48-72 hours. But Trinity Church is off limits, their bulletins, their preaching, et cetera. Is this a double standard that bothers the McCain campaign?
RD: You know, I would say beyond that, there’s something going on in the media right now, and I’ve seen it on television in the last couple of nights, and that’s literally an attack on Christianity itself. I mean, every one of these candidates are good Christians. There’s no question about that. They all have something in common, and that may be one of the most important things they have in common. And yet, the news media has all of a sudden decided that they’re going to start differentiating between their faiths.
They’re going to start differentiating between their beliefs and what Churches they go to, or what kind of education they got in religion, and what they believe about religion. And I’m just wondering where’s that coming from? I mean, is now the role of the media to divide us on religious lines, too? I mean, I always thought that was sort of sacred ground in politics. I think it ought to continue to be, and I’ll a little disturbed by the patterns.
Source: Hugh Hewitt
Rick Davis is being very disingenuous in suggesting that the media is "dividing" people based on religion. Conservative Christians in the Republican Party have been doing that for years. All the media has done — and not very well or nearly enough — is to ask a few tentative questions about Sarah Palin's religion. They should ask a lot more questions about what she really believes, as they should with Barack Obama, but Sarah Palin and the Republicans have done far more to use religion politically than the Democrats.
Chip Berlet, a journalist who is also a Christian, wants Sarah Palin to be asked these questions before the election:
- Do you believe in the anti-Christ?
- Do you believe we’re living in the end times?
- Do you believe that Jesus will return in your lifetime?
- Do you believe that true Christians have to battle Satanic agents in the End Times?
- Do you see yourself as a warrior for Christ as part of a new Apostolic movement?
Of course Hugh Hewitt isn't going to ask such questions because the answers are potentially too embarrassing. Why would he put one of his favored candidates in the position of admitting to outrageous, irrational, and even offensive religious beliefs? He did have Sarah Palin as a guest on his show, though, and this is the sort of probing questioning he tried:
HH: Do you think the mainstream media and the left understands your religious faith, Governor Palin?
SP: I think that there's a lot of mocking of my personal faith, and my personal faith is very, very simple. I don't belong to any church. I do have a strong belief in God, and I believe that I'm a heck of a lot better off putting my life in God's hands, and saying hey, you know, guide me. What else do we have but guidance that we would seek from a Creator?
That's about as simple as it gets with my faith, and I think that there is a lot of mocking of that. And you know, so bet it, though I do have respect for those who have differing views than I do on faith, on religion. I'm not going to mock them, and I would hope that they would kind of I guess give me the same courtesy through this of not mocking a person's faith, but maybe perhaps even trying to understand a little bit of it.
Source: Hugh Hewitt
As superficial as Hugh Hewitt's questions were, Sarah Palin couldn't help but reveal a few noxious elements to her religious beliefs; unfortunately, they won't appear to be noxious to most religious theists. First, Sarah Palin implicitly denies that it's possible to find "guidance" outside of a "Creator," buy which is meant the traditional, orthodox Christian god. So non-Christians, and certainly atheists, can't find "guidance" anywhere they look. I wonder if she ever bothered to ask others before making such assumptions about them? Why shouldn't people mock the idea that there is no guidance for anyone outside of her god?
Second, Sarah Palin assumes that people who mock her religious beliefs — and there's a lot more to her religion than she admits to here — don't "understand" it. What is there about understanding an ideology that should preclude deeming it worthy of mocking? Finally, Sarah Palin implies that mocking a religious ideology is tantamount to mocking a person, as if mocking religion should be off-limits out of respect for believers. She's not the only one to presume that religion should be exempted from the sort of treatment given to other ideologies, but on a personal and a professional level she would benefit form that attitude more than most so here it is far more self-serving than usual.
