American Blind Faith in Political Leaders?

Canadians are leery about mixing politics and religion – Evangelical Christians have greater influence in the U.S. than they do here

By Douglas Todd, from Vancouver Sun, October 04, 2008

“What do Democrats Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and Republicans John McCain and Sarah Palin, have in common?

All four candidates for U.S. president and vice-president have made it clear, exceedingly clear, they’re proud Christians.

None is willing to follow the wishes of many annoyed Canadians and refrain from ending speeches with “God bless America.”

Canada has become more secular in its makeup since church attendance started dropping in the 1950s.

Religion, specifically Christianity, plays a much bigger role in American politics than it does north of the border. God talk just can’t be avoided down there – thanks to the overwhelming Protestant presence.

And even though it’s not unethical by definition to invoke a Supreme Being from a political stage, the practice can be manipulated. It can even be abused for demogoguery, through suggesting, for instance, questionable wars and policies reflect “God’s will.”

That doesn’t mean the word God doesn’t ever sneak into Canadian politics. Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who is quiet about his loyalty to the evangelical Alliance Church, will sometimes talk of his faith, carefully. Harper has also been known to declare “God bless Canada.”

Former Liberal PM Jean Chretien, a Catholic, occasionally mentioned God, including in this novel way: “God gave me a physical defect [a facial tic] . . . but I accepted that because God gave me other qualities and I’m grateful.”

Still, there are many fascinating reasons Canadian politicians are much less inclined than their American counterparts to, as typically skeptical Canadians might put it, “play the God card.”

I’ll cite a few of them.

The most obvious is the rising strength of white evangelical Protestants. They make up one out of four Americans.

They feel divinely motivated to convert others to their Jesus, and some are ready to use politics as part of that. Seventy-eight per cent of conservative white evangelicals voted for George W. Bush in the past two presidential campaigns. It made all the difference.

Conservative politicians north of the border don’t have this huge religious voting advantage because fewer than one out of 10 Canadians belong to evangelical churches.

And while many evangelicals quietly support Canada’s Conservatives – half of Harper’s caucus of MPs are evangelical – most don’t have any illusions they can openly bring most Canadians onside with their beliefs.

Canadians are like secularized Europeans that way. Of the world’s industrialized countries, the U.S. is the most religious and most Christian.

It wasn’t always this way.

In the early 20th century, Canada had a much higher percentage of the population attending churches than in the U.S., as North America’s leading historian of religion, Mark Noll (an evangelical), writes in A History of Christianity in Canada and the U.S.

Beginning in the 1950s, however, Canadian church attendance dropped off dramatically, as it did in Europe. At the same time, however, U.S. evangelical churches began to become more appealing, particularly to the middle classes.

The trend has caused many U.S. evangelical leaders to become carried away and aggressively declare theirs is a “Christian nation” – and always has been.

The First Amendment Center last year released a poll that showed 55 per cent of Americans believe the Founding Fathers were Christians who enshrined Christianity in the U.S. Constitution.

But it’s a fiction. In his scholarly book, The Faith of the Founding Fathers, David Holmes shows those who formed the U.S. republic fell into several religious categories. Some were Christians, but many others were Enlightenment rationalists or Deists, which meant they believed in a God but not that Jesus was divine.

Despite the wishes of born-again U.S. pastors, evangelicalism is strong but not dominant in the U.S. Religious pluralism still holds. It explains why Republicans nearly always get a run for their money when they pursue the presidency, Congress, the Senate or governorships.

Even though 26 per cent of Americans are white evangelical Protestants, another seven per cent are black Protestants and 18 per cent are mainline Protestant – the latter two often leaning Democrat. Another 24 per cent of Americans are Catholic, and they spread their votes around.

As do Canadian Catholics.

The role of Catholicism in Canada is the most important factor explaining the striking gap between Canada and the U.S. when it comes to religion in politics.

Catholics make up 43 per cent of this officially bilingual country, compared to Protestants at 30 per cent. Catholics have tended to veer to the Liberal party.

Catholics don’t talk about “Chosen Nations” and neither do Canada’s mainline Protestants.

Canadian Catholics are also not as loyal to their religious leaders as U.S. evangelicals. Polls consistently show most Canadian Catholics, only one-third of whom regularly attend church, do not adhere to Vatican teachings on personal moral issues such as abortion and homosexuality. Beyond religious demographics, I’d maintain the strong injection of religion into U.S. politics also has a great deal to with the declining role played by its governments.

With the downsizing of the social welfare state in the U.S., any lingering trust that the government will be there to help when times are tough is virtually gone.

In such an insecure milieu, scholars have shown many Americans are increasingly turning to their church (or synagogue or mosque) for security – for an identity, community and even livelihood.

Evangelical mega-churches, hundreds of which have more than 10,000 members, operate like virtual cities, offering adherents everything from financial support and sports clubs to job networks and food supplies.

Many evangelical Christians pastors believe this is the best way to run a country. So they urge their followers to support politicians who champion charity and claim to believe in small government.

The final reason I’ll cite for why Christianity plays such a big role in U.S. politics is that Americans have become more deferential to authority than Canadians.

Environics Research has discovered through polling that a strong contingent of Americans feel more afraid than Canadians and are ready to obey certain leaders to deal with it. They especially look up to religious figures.

Canadians have their own weaknesses to be sure, but I’d suggest a lack of skepticism about leaders is not the worst of them.

Gullibility seems much stronger among many Americans than Canadians. The culture of marketing, sloganeering and celebrity in the U.S. is on overdrive 24/7.

Many Americans have been having Jesus hawked as the simplistic Answer – through the soaring oratory of leading pastors and some politicians. And it’s had an impact.

It’s no coincidence, for instance, that motorcycle-driving B.C. faith healer Todd Bentley – a former criminal who sports full-body tattoos and sometimes punches and kicks people to “cure” them – was this summer drawing more than 30,000 people a week to his Pentecostal revivals in the U.S. In Canada, in contrast, Bentley was lucky to draw a thousand evangelicals to his emotion-charged services. Now Bentley is in disgrace. And most Canadians, including many evangelicals, aren’t surprised about his fall.

Compared to Americans, fewer Canadians are willing to place blind faith in their leaders, either religious or political. So they certainly don’t see any advantage in mixing the two.”