"Crazy Doctors and Crazy Christians"

As he often does, Nicholas Kristof makes a point for American decency in his New York Times column today:

"Liberals believe deeply in tolerance and over the last century have led the battles against prejudices of all kinds, but we have a blind spot about Christian evangelicals...

"Scorning people for their faith is intrinsically repugnant, and in this case it also betrays a profound misunderstanding of how far evangelicals have moved over the last decade. Today, conservative Christian churches do superb work on poverty, AIDS, sex trafficking, climate change, prison abuses, malaria and genocide in Darfur.

"Bleeding-heart liberals could accomplish far more if they reached out to build common cause with bleeding-heart conservatives."

Of all the damage George W. Bush has done to our national character, least visible is how his faith-based meanness has obscured traditional admiration by Americans of all religions, or none, of figures like Albert Schweitzer and Mother Teresa, whose beliefs lead to humility, self-sacrifice and good works rather than contempt for those who fail to share their self-serving political certainties.

“Cheap grace,” wrote Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a minister hanged by Hitler for denouncing the comfort his Church was conferring on believers while turning a blind eye to the inhumanity of the Nazis, "is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance...absolution without personal confession.”

That the cheap grace of Bush, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson is being superceded by the working faith of a new generation of evangelicals is heartening.

"In parts of Africa where bandits and warlords shoot or rape anything that moves," Kristof writes, "you often find that the only groups still operating are Doctors Without Borders and religious aid workers: crazy doctors and crazy Christians."

Their devotion is good news in every sense.

Republican Squeaky Wheels

The overhyped story of the 2008 elections so far is the role of the Religious Right in picking a GOP candidate, fueled by headlines about Huckabee's commercial cross, Romney's speech on "Faith in America," Pat Robertson's underwhelming endorsement of Giuliani and the Rev. James Dobson's serial excommunication of each aspirant as he edges toward supporting his fellow preacher.

But this media melodrama may be obscuring the decline of the so-called God Vote in Republican politics, starting last November when opposition to the war in Iraq overwhelmed candidates of the Bush theocracy and gave control of Congress to the Democrats.

Even as Huckabee rises in the polls, prominent Republicans are questioning what Peggy Noonan calls his "creepy" appeal and, in New Hampshire, the resurgence of the resolutely secular John McCain is threatening Romney.

A new Gallup poll offers some perspective, showing only 32 percent of Americans now feel religion is increasing its influence in national life, compared to the Eisenhower era half a century ago when 69 percent felt that way.

A recent study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life found that "younger white evangelicals have become increasingly dissatisfied with Bush and are moving away from the GOP."

In October, Mike Huckabee told the Values Voters summit, “I come today as one not who comes to you, but as one who comes from you. You are my roots.” Nonetheless, Romney won the straw poll after the meeting.

Now that Huckabee is surging and real voting is about to begin, Republicans will give us some answers about what kind of President they want after George Bush's pious pronouncements and disastrous performance. "Cultural conservatives" may be in for some surprises.