This has been an interesting year for the faith-and-politics conversation, as Democrats are getting more comfortable talking about faith and Republicans no longer seem to be beholden to a particular faith agenda. But what’s interesting about that, notes the Washington Post, is that while faith is still important to the candidates, clergy have become liabilities:
A curious thing has happened in this year’s contest for the White House. Candidates are having to distance themselves from preachers, almost as quickly as they had sought their embrace. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) denounced his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., who was videotaped asserting that the federal government had brought the AIDS virus into black communities and that God should “damn” America.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has found it necessary to disassociate himself from the Rev. John Hagee and the Rev. Rod Parsley, two conservative preachers who have expressed, respectively, anti-Catholic and anti-Muslim views. Just last week, Obama and his wife resigned from their church after a guest minister, the Rev. Michael L. Pfleger, mocked Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.).
Clergy have become ticking time bombs in this year’s presidential campaign, so much so that the Obamas say they won’t join another place of worship until after the election — if then.
Worth reading the whole thing, here.