Sure – when religion and the state are “one” tyranny can happen.  No thinking non-Muslim religionist wants that kind of thing for America.  But the other extreme, one that so marginalizes religion as to dismiss it from social discourse, is just as bad.  Yes, there are some predominately secular nations in Europe functioning as democracies.  But they tend to have that socialist quirk that makes the state itself a religion. Let’s see how it looks over there in twenty-five years.

Religion has always been important in America and that should not change. To the extent that it’s a part of a would-be president’s lifestyle, it should be on the table as people make electoral choices.  When Mr. Romney made his first speech on the general subject several months ago, the issue at hand was his Mormon faith.  The subject, not to mention the speech itself, reminded many of when John F. Kennedy appeared before The Greater Houston Ministerial Association less than two months before he narrowly defeated Richard M. Nixon for the presidency in 1960. 

He effectively neutralized the idea that his religion (Catholicism) should somehow disqualify him for the nation’s highest office.  The subject had been an undercurrent in the campaign.

Even before he announced his candidacy in 1960, Kennedy was talking about the issue telling one national magazine in 1959: “Whatever one’s religion in private life may be, for the officeholder nothing takes precedence over his oath to uphold the Constitution and all its parts – including the First Amendment.”  That was the essence of his argument before the Texas ministers.

Eugene McCarthy was a Senator from Minnesota at the time, though he is best known to most of us for what happened in the 1968 campaign.  He was a devout Catholic who actually took issue with Kennedy’s handling of issues of faith.  Writing in America, a Catholic weekly, at the time he said:

“Although in a formal sense church and state can and should be kept separate, it is absurd to hold that religion and politics can be kept wholly apart when they meet in the consciousness of one man. If a man is religious – and if he is in politics - one fact will relate to the other if he is indeed a whole man.”

McCarthy, in my opinion, hit the nail right on the head.  Yes, the mixing of politics and religion will always be tense.  It might even threaten at times to become toxic. But a nation without religious influence will…well…let me let John Adams, our 2^nd President (quoted by Mitt Romney in his speech last week) say it for me: “Without religion, this world would be something not fit to be mentioned in polite company, I mean Hell.”

Indeed.