The religious left lifts its voice in campaign 2008A Democratic presidential forum on 'faith, values and poverty' is a counterpoint to traditional faith-based campaigningBY BETH REINHARD AND ALEXANDRA ALTER
As the Republican Party's hold on religious conservatives shows signs of loosening in Florida and around the country, some evangelicals are redefining what it means to be a values voter.
About 1,500 Christians are expected in Washington today for a nationally televised forum with the leading Democratic presidential candidates, in what organizers describe as a turning point in the debate over the role of faith in politics.
For decades, politicians touted their ''family values'' by disavowing abortion, gay marriage and stem-cell research. But some evangelical leaders are now pushing a broader moral agenda that includes AIDS, global warming, poverty and the crisis in Darfur.
After years in the shadow of the religious right, churchgoing liberals are joining the political fray: lobbying Congress, organizing grass-roots groups and promoting compassion in books and blogs.
''The religious right has tried to paint progressives as if they are a bunch of people on the fringe who are out of touch with mainstream America, and that's just not the case,'' said the Rev. Tim Simpson, a Presbyterian minister and spokesman for the Jacksonville-based Christian Alliance for Progress. ``We think theological reflection is the responsibility of every Christian voter . . . How should a Christian think about this war? How should a Christian think about torture?''
Efforts to resurrect the religious left -- a political force that many say has been largely dormant since the Civil Rights movement -- coincides with growing disarray among religious conservatives. The Center for Reclaiming America for Christ in Fort Lauderdale shut down in April after a decade of lobbying for conservative Christian causes. The Rev. Jerry Falwell's recent death prompted soul-searching among evangelicals about his legacy of uniting them with the GOP.
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http://www.miamiherald.com/569/story/127742.html Liberal Evangelicals Host Presidential ForumBy Dan Gilgoff
Posted 6/1/07
Though next week's political calendar is dominated by the New Hampshire presidential debates—the full Democratic field faces off on Sunday night and Republicans rumble on Tuesday—a less hyped presidential candidates forum could make for more interesting viewing.
The liberal Christian group Sojourners is hosting a forum in Washington, D.C., on Monday night for the Democrats' three front-runners, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards. It will be the first candidates' event of the '08 presidential season—and in recent memory—to focus entirely on the issue of poverty and how the candidates' personal faith influences their politics.
"There haven't been any candidate forums yet to focus on the compassion issues, to highlight the moral compass of the candidates," says Jack Panell, a spokesperson for Sojourners, which is led by the liberal evangelical Christian and antipoverty advocate Jim Wallis. "We intend to ask these people how they will rely on their faith and other moral values to govern if they're elected president."
The participation of the three leading candidates signifies just how far the Democrats have come in their willingness to reach out to religious voters since the '04 election, when Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry lost nearly 80 percent of white evangelical voters to President Bush and became the first Democrat in decades to lose the Catholic vote. In the 2006 congressional elections, Democrats redoubled their faith outreach programs and made gains among religious voters that contributed to important Senate victories in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.
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Next week's forum, part of the Sojourners' annual Pentecost conference, will be televised on CNN. Moderated by Soledad O'Brien, it will follow an unusual format, with questions coming from a panel of religious figures that includes Wallis; Hunter, who recently served a brief stint as president of Christian Coalition; Msgr. Kevin Sullivan, executive director of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New York; and the Rev. Suzan Johnson Cook, head of the Hampton University Ministers' Conference, the largest coalition of black clergy in the country.
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http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/070601/01evangelicals.htm ***** The Presidential Forum on Faith, Values, and Poverty will air on CNN today (June 4) @ 7 pm ET/4 pm PT. *****For more info...
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