Reply #9: Separating church and politics protects churches. [View All]

[Inland]

I don't know how many religious understand this. You go to a place like Europe, where religion and politics rode in the same cart, and you find legions of anti-clerics. Some European countries have settled this religion PROBLEM by creating studiously secular states, others by a populace voting with their feet in leaving churches, some both. I believe the reason why church-going has always been high in America is because we've worked hard to avoid that precise experience.

On the other hand, nobody really thought religion was a particularly DANGEROUS item in America until the eighties, when one started to get spefically religious political groups becoming a franchise to influence and control a political party. The association with politics has done a lot to damage christianity, and the specific association with Bush is going to be poison.