In light of late polls apparently showing Rick Santorum "surging" in Iowa, it seems like a good moment to reprise a post from March, when Santorum visited Massachusetts.

Former Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) who is considering running for president, recently visited Boston, a major hub of Catholic politics and the biggest media market in New England.  While minor appearances by non-candidates don't always make the news, Santorum's remarks to a small group of Church partisans made The Boston Globe because he not only denounced our first Catholic president, John F. Kennedy in his home town, but he attacked Kennedy's historic 1960 campaign speech in which he explained his unwavering clarity regarding the constitutional doctrine of separation of church and state. Kennedy's position had  served as the standard for a half century of political leaders. (See Rob Boston's excellent defense of Kennedy's views on separation.)  

Santorum has been trying to rebuild his political career since being unseated by Bob Casey (D-PA) in 2006. And while he may not catch fire on the campaign trail, Santorum's bombast in Boston is certainly part of an escalating war of attrition against the principle of separation -- and it may be a bellwether for what we might anticipate in the run-up to the 2012 presidential campaign.

 

The Religious Right is deeply divided going into the Iowa GOP caucuses:   So much so, that it is difficult to imagine a candidate emerging from the current pack of Republicans strong enough to effectively contend with Mitt Romney for the nomination.  But just because it is hard to imagine, doesn't mean it won't happen.  And just because some of us try not to confuse political punditry with reality, doesn't mean that a candidate more acceptable to the Religious Right will inevitably emerge.  Political reality has never worked that way.  

This year's Republican presidential field this year offers us lesson: Just because the Religious Right does not unify around one candidate does not mean that as a movement it is dead or dying. The take-away needs to be that as politically powerful as the Religious Right is, has been, and is most likely to continue to be -- it has never been monolithic.

It's that time of year once again, to announce the recipient of the Coughlin Award --  presented annually to the person who best exemplifies an exclusionary, strident interpretation of the Catholic faith. The award is named for Father Charles Coughlin, the notorious radio priest of the 1930s who is the role model for today's Religious Right radio and television evangelists and other conservative media personalities.

This year the bride's maid finally takes his walk down the aisle. This Coughie is for you Bill Donohue!

Author Kim Barker wrote the best seller, The Taliban Shuffle.  She noted her impression of the Afghanistan country after a few days of travel.  She wrote it was full of bearded men riding around in pickups with plenty of weapons and hatred for the country.  She proclaimed it was just like Montana!

His public confession on Dr. James Dobson's radio program nearly five years ago, the speech at the graduation ceremony of Jerry Falwell's Liberty University, his much publicized conversion to Catholicism, his insistence on writing, making films and speechifying about the threat of a secularized America, may all have contributed to re-branding Newt Gingrich, from womanizing miscreant to redeemed sinner, in the eyes of the Religious Right.

Now, the personal endorsement of his run for the Republican Party's presidential nomination by the Rev. Donald Wildmon, the founder and chairman emeritus of the Tupelo, Mississippi-based American Family Association -- one of the most powerful Religious Right organizations in the country -- and the founder of American Family Radio, may indicate that the disgraced former Speaker of the House's long hard slog through the minefields of the Religious Right may be over.

Rep. Ron Paul has broken out of his seemingly  permanent less-than-ten-percent in the polls -- to emerge as a contender in next week's Iowa Republican caucuses. This is in no small part thanks to his faith outreach consultants who have sought to help him craft a more decidedly evangelical approach while seeking a bigger share of the Religious Right vote.  Along the way,  Paul has sought to emphasize the Biblical roots of his public policy ideas.

Paul also owes considerable thanks to national media that have not devoted much serious reporting to his campaign, perhaps because of his standing in the polls, was not taken seriously as a candidate.  Meanwhile, in a remarkable election year twist, his libertarian anti-drug war, and old time isolationist foreign policy views have been taken by marijuana reform and anti-war progressives as a reason to crossover and support Paul in Iowa and elsewhere, while down playing or ignoring his unsavory views that are consistent with the depth and breadth of his support from the far right in the U.S.  

Over the past few months, I've been faced with the utter irony of splitting my time between dealing with the steady stream of lies about my boss and the organization I work for being part of the so-called war on Christmas, and having numerous conversations with that same boss about helping to send toys to kids for Christmas. One minute I'd be writing about the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) spreading lies about our organization, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), trying to stop Air Force Academy cadets from participating in Franklin Graham's Operation Christmas Child, which, as I wrote in a previous post, isn't exactly what happened, and the next minute I'd be on the phone coordinating MRFF's participation in a Christmas toy drive run by a student group I work with here in New Jersey.

The saga of Bishop Robert Finn, (the outspoken Opus Dei prelate who is in hot water over his alleged failure to report to police, evidence of a pedophile priest under his diocesan authority) continues -- as does consideration of the fallout of his criminal indictment.   A faction of the Catholic Right that intersects Opus Dei, the Catholic League and the neoconservative movement has risen to the bishop's defense, suggesting that the Catholic Right believes they have more at stake than the legal or institutional fate of one negligent bishop.

Christmas has at least as many meanings as there are people, whether they celebrate the holiday or believe in any of the story, or not. It affects us all.  There is hardly a more defining day in all of our culture, and it embraces the best and the worst of what we have become as a people.

In that regard, I'm glad that this year the Religious Right and the dour propagandists at Fox News did not much engage in their repulsive annual revival of an anti-Semitic tradition begun by Henry Ford: Falsely claiming that there is a war on Christmas.

Where do our candidates stand on basic matters of separation of church and state and the constellation of values and issues that intersect this foundational doctrine of our culture and our constitution?  

Unfortunately, this is not usually the kind of thing we see on traditional candidate questionnaires.  To begin to redress this problem Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the Interfaith Alliance Foundation joined forces to publish ten well-framed questions to help us find out where our candidates are at, and to initiate meaningful discussions of our core values and how they interact with public policy.  

It is my sad duty today to give yet another basic civics lesson to the far right.

Here it goes: There are three branches of government. They are co-equal. Each performs a check on the other. Each balances out the other.

Just when Iowa evangelical Republicans are not only divided among several GOP candidates but many are actively skeptical of Newt Gingrich's character; just when Gingrich's once pack leading poll numbers appear to have peaked and are now declining in Iowa; just when a CNN poll has him tied with Romney nationally; and just when Ron Paul's numbers are rising even leading in Iowa -- along comes San Diego pastor and leading anti-gay activist Rev. Jim Garlow with a mass email to Iowa evangelicals supporting Gingrich, that is making news.  

Since Garlow has been deeply involved with Gingrich for years as the chairman of his Renew American Leadership organization (although he attended Gov. Rick Perry's famous pre-presidential announcement prayer rally) it is a little odd that the 9,000 word email endorsing Gingrich's sincerity about marriage is news at all, except perhaps as an indicator of political desperation.

Well, it doesn't get any clearer than this. In an article from the Baptist Press, the news arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, the Southern Baptists have finally come right out and admitted what we at the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) have known all along -- they oppose religious equality in the U.S. military.

Beyond just getting many of the "facts" wrong, the article, titled "Air Force Academy dogged by anti-Christian pressure," shows the true colors of the Southern Baptist Convention when it comes to religious freedom, stating, as if it's a bad thing, "Not only does the academy now provide worship space for all, it requires all cadets to complete religious respect training." Really? The Air Force Academy accommodating cadets of all religions and teaching religious respect is a problem? Well, maybe if you fancy yourself to be among America's "persecuted" Christians and consider religious pluralism a threat to your religion.

Yesterday, Politico reported that Sheldon Adelson is considering bankrolling the campaign of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich to the tune of 20 million dollars. Some portion of the money would be earmarked for a Gingrich counter-attack against "a weeklong anti-Gingrich on-air assault that is already taking a toll on his front-runner status in the Hawkeye State, according to private and public polling," Politico pointed out.

Adelson is one of the richest men in the world. He has made a boatload of money from an assortment of gambling enterprises.

If the Politico report turns out to be correct, will Religious Right leaders - many of whom vehemently oppose gambling -- sit quietly by while Gingrich, who has been courting conservative evangelical voters in Iowa and elsewhere, replenishes his campaign war chest with funds from Adelson's gambling empire?

Samuel Rodriguez has given a speech that he has proudly put up at You Tube. No one is playing “gotcha” with him, no one is putting this forward as representative of him without his knowledge, no one is lifting portions of a video out of context. This is what Samuel Rodriguez is proud to represent. In this six minute video Rodriguez clearly embraces the notion of an apostolic reordering of the church. He clearly embraces a prosperity gospel. And he clearly champions himself and his organization as an accepted blending of evangelicalism and Pentecostalism. Are the leading voices of mainstream evangelicalism really good to go with this? Is this what the evangelical center is now defined as? How can those at the National Association of Evangelicals and Christianity Today and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary—all places that proudly include Samuel Rodriguez within the elite of their institution’s leadership—claim that these views represent some extreme margin of Christianity that only the most avowed opponents of evangelicalism would view as significant, when they themselves are knowingly elevating one of the most well-known proponents of these views? And why aren't more people in the media and the general public asking them this question?