Barack: I just want to put in a plug for my old friend Joe Biden...
Joe: Keep it clean...
At the risk of heresy, let it be said that setting up the two presidential candidates for religious interrogation by an evangelical minister -- no matter how beloved -- is supremely wrong.
It is also un-American.
She goes on to blather about the separation of church and state, yada yada yada, applying a religious test, yada yada yada. And she is far, far off the mark, in my opinion, in much the same way that George Bush and his $%*&^#@ "faith-based initiatives" were. Churches, all churches, would do well to steer clear of politics and government. In the Christian tradition, going back to Jesus (as opposed to the Roman tradition, where The Church ruled in this temporal realm), there is a delineation between the things that are Caesar's and the things that are God's. True, since the advent of representational government, we as individuals must examine our consciences about how our religious values are best expressed in the political realm. But this isn't about a "religious test." Frankly, the law says there can be no religious test to be eligible to run for office, but that doesn't mean we as individuals can't apply one for ourselves. Didn't a poll just come out saying that most Americans would have a problem voting for an atheist? So when Rick Warren puts up the two candidates head-to-head and asks questions that are important to "values voters," I think he's doing a public service, but not serving his flock well. I feel sorry for his church, in a sense and sorry for his brand of Christianity. That's why I'm not a fundamentalist (we can toss the "evangelical" moniker: many non-fundamentalist Christians consider themselves evangelical).
Ugh, Kathleen. If you were really a heretic, you'd be more interesting.
bbmoe
Oh, and while I'm clarifying the "evangelical" v. "fundamentalist" distinctions: one commentator I heard said that Barack's recusal on the issue of when life begins was "technically correct, because the Bible doesn't tell us when life begins."
Oh puh-leeeeez.