by Steven C. Day

12.26.01 | It feels like ages have passed since last year’s presidential campaign, back before the war, back when the economy was booming and back when we all assumed that the guy who got the most votes would win the election (I’ve moved on, I just haven’t forgotten). But there is one aspect of last year’s campaign, aside from its historic aftermath, that deserves to be rehashed in light of all that has happened since: The question of what role, if any, religious faith should play in our political process. And what better time to discuss it than now, when Christmas bells are ringing and religious observances abound.

During the last campaign, the candidates on both sides spent a lot of time moonlighting as preachers. George W. Bush has always worn his evangelical Christian faith on his sleeve, so there was nothing unexpected in his frequent expressions of faith in God (be it a gun-toting and lethal-injection-loving God). It was the other side’s (my side’s) infatuation with religion, as a subject for political discourse, that was something of a surprise.

The Democrats seemed bound and determined that, for once, they were not going to be out-prayed by the GOP. And Sermonizer-in-Chief Joe Lieberman went to work on this almost immediately following his selection. Lieberman’s most widely reported comments were made during a speech at the University of Notre Dame, where he called for “a new American awakening” based on religious faith.

“At this moment of moral uncertainty, I believe our best hope for rekindling the American spirit and renewing our common values is to have faith again,” Lieberman said.

To borrow George Wallace’s phrase, there wasn’t a dime’s worth of difference between the two campaigns on this point: Religious faith, they agreed, whatever its creed or flavor, is an unqualified blessing to society that holds the potential of building a better world.

But a “funny” thing happened on the way to this faith-based paradise. On Sept. 11 a group of men, acting on the basis of their religious faith, murdered several thousand people. A short time later, two other men, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, also purporting to act in the name of faith, tried to blame these terrorist attacks on other Americans, including feminists, gays and lesbians, abortion providers and members of the ACLU.

Meanwhile, Clayton Lee Waagner, who calls himself “God’s warrior,” kept quite busy (until his recent capture) sending hundreds of anthrax hoax letters terrorizing employees at abortion clinics. Other anti-abortion zealots have, of course, gone beyond hoaxes and actually murdered abortion providers — again all in the name of faith.

Plainly, religious faith is not the unqualified blessing Messrs. Bush and Lieberman would have us believe.

Don’t get me wrong: Faith does wonderful things. It provides comfort to the sick and dying and a sense of community to the lonely. It has the power to inspire people to do selfless and even noble things. And faith-based organizations have provided valuable charitable services in every community across the country for as long as anyone can remember, without, I might mention, ever needing to receive a dime from the government.

But faith also has a dark side — one that can lead to hatred, bigotry and, sometimes, violence. And all issues of separation of church and state aside, it is irresponsible for political leaders to advocate faith as an unvarnished social good without also at least acknowledging these risks.

The key issue that none of the candidates in the last election ever discussed involves, of course, figuring out how to keep religious faith from turning into fanaticism. And while I am no man’s theologian, I think I know part of the answer: It’s a simple matter of doubt.

I’m not referring so much to doubting the existence of God as doubting the doctrines and rituals of one’s faith. Doubt, in this sense, means nothing more than a respectful acknowledgment of the diversity of religious practices. Given the scores of different religious denominations within the United States alone, each with their own unique customs and beliefs, it is the ultimate arrogance for any sect to claim that it knows the only possible truth. If pride is a sin, then surely this is a whopper of one.

Doubt is the single greatest defense we have against the rise of religious extremism. Doubters don’t kill people to further God’s work. They don’t crash planes into buildings in order to reach paradise. And they don’t declare themselves to be soldiers of God, exempt from all human laws. Think of how differently Sept. 11 might have turned out if those 19 fanatics had been taught that some questioning of religion is natural, instead of being drilled to blindly follow their faith. 

Calling into question a biblical account causes no crisis of faith for me. Since I was raised in the non-fundamentalist religious tradition, I have never been asked to accept the Bible as literal truth. Doubt, far from being a sin, is actually an essential part of my faith. Because I believe that the Bible was written by men, not God, I am free to discount any part of it that offends my sense of reason. I am also free to consider things like the historical context in which the various Scriptures were written, the fact that many of the authors and translators had axes to grind and, of course, the obvious truth that many of the accounts in the Bible were written as parables, rather than as historical accounts. 

Consider the passage in the Book of Exodus where Moses tells Pharaoh of the final plague that will befall Egypt:

And Moses said, “Thus said the Lord, ‘About midnight will I go out into the midst of Egypt. And all of the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of the Pharaoh that sits on his throne, even to the firstborn of the maidservant who is behind the mill; and all the firstborn of beasts. And there shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt, such as there was none like it, nor shall be like it any more.’” (Exodus 11:4-6)

This is one of those places where my doubts prevail: I absolutely refuse to believe that any of this happened. I will not worship a God who commits mass murder against innocent children, and if some nutcase were ever to try to use this passage to convince me that God approves of killing nonbelievers, even children, who offend “God’s people,” I would have no trouble telling him to go jump into a pool of holy water.

Doubt is the buffer between blind faith and cold logic. It allows a person to believe without abandoning reason or discounting the value of others who don’t share that faith. 

When literalists read the ancient religious texts, with their innumerable accounts of extreme violence and cruelty undertaken in God’s name, they have no choice, if they are to remain true to their faith, but to embrace the image of God as a cruel and vengeful tyrant. This is true, notwithstanding the very different picture painted in the New Testament. Now, of course, the vast, vast majority of fundamentalists, of all faiths, do just fine. But it isn’t hard to see how, with the wrong person and the wrong set of circumstances, this can sometimes lead to fanaticism.

So, yes, Mr. Bush and Mr. Lieberman, faith can work wonders. But so too can doubt.

Discuss. Debate.
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Steven C. Day is an attorney practicing in Wichita, Kansas. His previous columns can be found here.

Related Sites
In Salon, Carolyn S. Briggs recalls her life as a fundamentalist.
Debra Dickerson and Katha Pollitt discuss Christ, Jack Miles’ literary biography of Jesus, in Slate’s Book Club.
Read the transcript of a Brookings Institution forum on the importance of religion in the 2000 election.