Faith

Allen Hunt's latest article is on the role that faith should play in our national politics, using the race between John McCain and J.D. Hayworth as his touchstone.

Both McCain and Hayworth reduce faith and debase it. McCain reduces it to a relic socked away in the recesses of a memory. A lifeless, fossilized relic not to be examined or even given much credence. Hayworth reduces faith to a predictable, mathematical equation. Stake out five clear positions and call yourself “a good Christian.” In these reductions, we discover problems not just with John McCain and J.D. Hayworth, but also with America's inability to discern the proper role faith should play in one's life and in our public life together.

It's an interesting article, albeit one that uses the unfortunate metaphor of worms in the underwear. Basically he says that neither Hayworth or McCain give him actual insight into how faith has influenced their lives. McCain because he says nothing; Hayworth because what he says is simply a checklist. He's not wrong on this point. That said, Hayworth is following his approach because it's clear that significant number of Conservative Christians want to hear it formulated that way, and, more to the point, want to believe that McCain is a bad Christian because he fails to follow this articulation (and because of his middle of the road stances on a number of issues, in fairness.