Note: I don't agree with a lot Harry writes (below, for example, I'd omit Thomas and put John in its place) but he gets me thinking, and I for one am not threatened by that! Rowland Croucher).

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By Harry T. Cook

The candidate who runs on his or her belief in Jesus - or upon some variation of that confession of faith - had better understand a few things about the Jesus depicted in the more reliable of the gospels, viz., Thomas, Mark, Matthew and Luke.

The Jesus portrayed in those documents is, by turns, a radical egalitarian, an economic socialist, a pacifist and a willing speaker of truth to power.

Belief in that Jesus can only be a commitment to model one's life on his teaching and example. Name me one serious candidate for the presidency of the United States who would admit to being radically egalitarian, an economic socialist, a pacifist or a confronter of entrenched power. Name me one.

Yet many of those candidates have paraded their religious pretensions modulated just so, depending on the geography and demographics of their audiences.

It has become commonplace for a U.S. President to end his addresses with "God bless America," but the incumbent topped that by his answer to a question during his first presidential campaign in 1999. The question was with which "political philosopher or thinker" did he identify most?

Bush's answer: "Christ, because he changed my heart." Given the past seven years, you'd have to ask, "Changed it into what?"

The 2008 presidential campaign is awash in silly piety, with each candidate trying to outdo the other in proving his or her religious bona fides. Even the sole Mormon in the contest has been busy trying to be seen as a bible-believing Baptist. The effort is a perfect fit with his chameleon ways.

How strange in a nation that was deliberately founded by religious people as a secular state with a clear separation of religion and government. A big part of America's genius is the First Amendment to its Constitution, which, without nuance, forbids an establishment of religion, and prohibits the state from interfering with its free exercise.

The question, therefore, is not whether candidates for public office are permitted to speak publicly about their religions. Rather, the question is why in America it should matter what a candidate's religious sentiments or persuasions are. The answer to that question is:

It doesn't.

The Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the body of law that has flowed from them contain a surfeit of wisdom, precedent and inspiration upon which to govern. There is no need for Sunday school or catechism lessons to be exhumed for direction in the setting and carrying out of public policy.

No need for any of that. Neither for such subjective boilerplate as "God has spoken to me, and therefore I must do such-and-such." Planet Earth is just now rife with leaders of nations, tribes, kith and clan who claim just such private revelations, and, on the basis of them, proceed to bring ruin upon those they rule.

What has more often than not set America apart from the lot of them is the kind of clear-eyed secularity of its governance. Franklin D. Roosevelt was encouraged early on in his first term by such otherwise progressive types as Walter Lippmann to use his executive powers as a quasi-dictator on the grounds of revealed wisdom to save America's Depression-broken economy. Roosevelt declined. His salvific efforts were confined to working his will through the legislative process and the exercise of permissible executive power.

If any of our 43 chief executives since 1789 could have gotten away with the claiming of messianic revelation by force, they were Abraham Lincoln and Roosevelt - both men of Christian orientation, both familiar with the cadences and eloquence of the King James Version of the Bible, both naturally articulate and focused. Yet neither was willing finally to be led into the messianic temptation.

The idea that President No. 43 - he of demonstrably C-minus abilities whose favorite political philosopher or thinker must be a comic-book character inspired in equal parts by Jerry Falwell and Niccolo Machiavelli - should have been able to establish his faith-based initiatives both foreign and domestic because Christ changed his heart is an insult to both church and state.

Meanwhile, it is probably too late in the game to exorcise all the Jesus and God talk from the rhetorical grab bag of the 2008 campaign. Yet after the "I-Can-Out-Jesus-You" taunts that have passed for the Iowa primary campaign, maybe the American electorate would be willing to avail itself of a rudimentary civics lesson on the First Amendment.

© 2007, Harry T. Cook. All rights reserved. This article may not be used or reproduced without proper credit.