Ascension: Amy Sullivan says that the era of the religious left has begun

Washington Monthly, Jan-March, 2008 by Paul Baumann

Sullivan opens her concluding chapter, "A Level Playing Field," with an upbeat description of last June's presidential "faith forum," sponsored by Sojourners, at George Washington University, where the Democratic candidates were quizzed about the role of faith in their politics and lives. There were plenty of what, at least to this reader, seemed like cringe-making moments: John Edwards was asked about "the biggest sin you've ever committed," while Senator Hillary Clinton was queried as to how her faith helped her deal with "infidelity in your marriage." But Sullivan gives the candidates high marks for how they responded, and judges the event a watershed moment in the Democratic Party's effort to connect with religious voters. As an evangelical, she is perhaps more comfortable with this sort of public "testimony" than am I, a somewhat repressed Catholic still trying to get used to the idea of shaking the hand of the stranger standing next to me in the pew.

Nor, I must confess, am I as convinced as Sullivan appears to be that such public avowals of religiosity represent real progress for our politics. Sullivan is right about the heedlessness with which the Democratic Party has alienated Catholics and evangelicals, and her hands-on prescriptions for how to rectify this history make good sense. Yet notwithstanding the handful of Democratic victories where religious outreach appears to have helped, the truth is that issues such as the economy, national security, and even class and race remain decisive. E. d. Dionne makes this point in his new book, Souled Out: Reclaiming Faith and Politics Alter the Religious Right (see Steven Waldman, "Downfall," p. 58). "[R]eligion's role in our politics should not be demeaned or ignored," he writes, "[but] it does religion no favors to exaggerate its influence or to see its hand at work when it is not." Contrary to the conventional wisdom, Dionne claims, religion and morality were not the determining factors in Bush's 2004 triumph. Similarly, it was Democratic gains among moderates, independents, and voters who were less religious that account for the swing away from the Republicans in 2006. "The gap between the more and less religious voters actually widened between 2004 and 2006," Dionne argues. In his view, Democrats "modestly cut their losses among more religious voters ... while at the same time vastly expanding their advantages in the rest of the electorate."

Although an inattentive reader might miss it, Sullivan is careful not to assert too much with respect to the impact of what Dionne calls "new organizing among voters of faith." She concedes that "all it proved was that in an extraordinary election year, some white evangelicals could switch their votes to Democratic candidates, just like members of every other group." Yet the tone and overarching argument of The Party Faithful imply something more dramatic about the role religion can play in future Democratic victories. Writing of this year's presidential candidates, Sullivan approvingly notes that their "sophisticated religious outreach was unprecedented in Democratic politics." The result, she argues, was that "the received wisdom that such a strategy would drive away the supposed secular base of the party had been shattered."