It’s more complex than that, though. Evangelical Christians and many other religious persons have beliefs which are completely incompatible with political realities: Abortion is safe and legal, gay marriage is gaining legitimacy….
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What would be more appropriate, of course, is for an event of this nature to be conducted by journalists. Good ones. Real ones.
As a religious person, I don’t think my beliefs are incompatible with political realities. But rather than pretending to take things too personally or arguing over what constitutes a political reality, I actually want to offer an observation.
I think the world of political discourse—even serious political discourse—is a bigger world than we often imagine it to be. Journalists have there role—but they have no monopoly on the dissemination of information. Why not let scientists conduct a forum between the candidates? Why not get some trial lawyers to really hold their feet to the fire? What about other politicians? Maybe a teacher?
And of course, why not a pastor if that’s what people want? To say that religious belief, religious conviction, or even religious people have no place in political discourse, in itself, unconscionably exclusive. The opposite proposal, that religious dialog—or a specific type of religious dialog—should dominate political discussion is similarly exclusive. Ultimately, we have a few hundred million people who are going to vote—and they can vote for whatever reason they want to. The guy who votes for the candidate with the nicest tie or the hottest wife, gets the same size vote as you do. The trick is to convince this guy to vote for something you consider more important.
A huge portion of the country considers their faith the most important part of their life. They don’t want to be told to segregate this portion of their identity from their public lives. Why should the campaigns ask them to do this?
