c. 2004 Religion News Service

(Rabbi Rudin, the American Jewish Committee’s senior interreligious adviser, is distinguished visiting professor at Saint Leo University.)

A June 2004 Time magazine poll reported that 79 percent of Americans believe that religious beliefs should serve as a guide to voting. As a result, you can forget Iraq, terrorism, health care, unemployment, outsourcing of jobs, and education as the major concerns of the current presidential race. They are secondary to the real issues: the famous “three Gs” of God, gays and guns. Sometimes this trio in G is conveniently lumped together into a single code word _ values.

Because the issue is raw and the Democrats are sensitive to being labeled “secular humanists,” it was neither surprising nor accidental that Sen. John Kerry received his greatest ovation at the 2004 Democratic National Convention when he declared: “I don’t want to claim that God is on our side. As Abraham Lincoln told us, I want to pray humbly that we are on God’s side.”

All surveys indicate that voters who frequently attend worship services usually vote for Republican candidates. Indeed, I have recently seen a bumper sticker asserting the letters GOP (Grand Old Party) really stand for God’s Own Party.

The Bible, God’s own book, became part of this year’s campaign when Christine Iverson of the Republican National Committee admitted her organization had sent mailings to voters in Arkansas and West Virginia warning that if elected, Democrats would seek to ban the Bible. The negative and mischievous Republican mailing included the word “banned” on the Bible.

Although the Charlestown, W.Va. Gazette editorially asked: “Holy Moley! Who concocts this gibberish?” it’s clear both parties have ardently pursued God as the Great Undecided Voter.

The drive in the U.S. Congress to enact a Constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriages and the recent overwhelming votes in Louisiana and Missouri rejecting such unions represent the most visible signs that gays and lesbians are part of the political campaign. The voting results came as no surprise.

Religion News Service analyzed the voting and discovered that evangelical Christians played a major role in the September 2004 vote in Louisiana to ban same-sex marriages and civil unions in that state. In 10 of Louisiana’s 64 parishes or counties, more than 90 percent of the voters supported the constitutional amendment. Among the 10 were six of the most heavily evangelical parishes in the state.

Statewide, 78 percent of Louisiana voters supported the measure, and more than 70 percent of Missouri’s voters rejected same-sex marriages in their state.

This November 11 additional states from Maine to Oregon will have similar proposals on the ballot. Most observers believe the same-sex marriage ban will be adopted in 10 of those states; only Oregon appears to be a battleground where the outcome is in doubt.

At the same time two Christian groups, Focus on the Family and the American Family Association, urged a boycott of Crest toothpaste and Tide detergent, two popular Procter and Gamble products, because the Cincinnati-based corporation opposes a city statute that would prevent gays and lesbians from receiving special legal protection from discrimination.

Guns matter. Both political parties recognize that fact and tailor their messages accordingly. The power of the National Rifle Association in Washington is another undeniable fact. Because the right to bear arms is guaranteed in the Constitution’s Second Amendment, gun control has been a fevered issue for decades.

Many Christian and Jewish religious groups have adopted a stream of resolutions urging strict gun control in America, but like many other such statements, they usually end up in denominational annual reports.

Both political parties are aware of a voter disconnect on the gun issue. It’s the old religious maxim that people do not live “by bread alone.” Economics by itself does not decide a person’s vote or fundamental values.

But in an ominous development, gun ownership now includes attempts in some states to allow residents to carry concealed weapons just like cell phones, and there are bills pending that would reduce penalties for carrying guns in schools.

Will the “Three Gs” trump jobs, health care and education? We’ll all know the night of November 2.

MO/JL END RUDIN