Personally, I find the Christian-ness of Gingrich and Romney more questionable than Obama. I find their general attitudes to wealth to be anathema to the teachings of Jesus.

Kerry’s Jewish ancestry is a better parallel, I agree.

All the talk about whether politicians are hypocritical or not isn’t particularly helpful if one wants to deal with religion from an anthropological or sociological perspective or from a political scientific standpoint. I’ve yet to see where Obama has strayed beyond what would be considered appropriate for a liberal, urban, but still politically centrist Christian.

@isamu, Certainly, with text-based religions like the Abrahamic faiths, which also historically emphasis communal concensus, it is easy to delineate, theologically speaking, who or who is not a Christian, Muslim or Jew, and therefore a statement like post-Christian or a denial of LDS’ Christian status has merit. Within a religion like Christianity there is room for divergence, but at a certain point it no longer makes sense to include extremely heterodox movements within the parent faith. However, if a large enough community makes claim to a certain identity, and are accepted as such by outsiders, then those claims must also be respected. It all depends on which academic discipline you are using to analyze the group in question.

What’s funny is listening to squabbles amongst these groups. The atheist attacks on agnostics in particular remind me a lot of old inter-Protestant theological battles. (Here thinking of some of Penn Juliet’s writings – and for the record I love listening to him but some of his attacks on agnostics seem pretty weak)

There was interestingly a similar move to all this back during the rise of philosophy as a movement among the Greeks. Many refused to break from religion but the old Greek religion became highly allegorized. What was fascinating is how even in late antiquity there were many religious rites practiced by people we’d probably call atheists. (Here thinking of the neo-platonic tradition in particular)

I’m particularly fascinated how how religion remains in Europe among many atheists where the content is removed but the rites and traditions remain. (Look at how many Anglicans love to go to Church yet appear fine with saying they are atheists – ditto for Lutherans in the more northern countries) In many ways it appears to parallel what I see in the ancient world in my limited knowledge of it.

I think, for example, that Romney is a genuine Mormon.

My evidence:

1. Being a Mormon is major obstacle to his election.
2. The man is obliged to tithe, and apparently has done so. Since, supposedly, he’s worth a quarter billion dollars, he must have given about 25 mil to the Mormon Church. That’s sincerity.

In contrast, Newt “Open Marriage” Gingrich is quite another matter.

After the Puritans stopped being called Puritans, the established church (i.e. official state religion) of most of New England was the Congregational Church. Over time, the Puritan fervor faded and this established church was known for its overeducated very theologically liberal ministers — too liberal for average New Englanders. Those pastors continued to have legal control over their local church buildings when the Congregational church was disestablished. Majorities of the local congregations allied themselves with what would become the United Church of Christ (which took its current name after a series of mergers with a number of small immigrant denominations in the Reformed tradition in an echo of the United Churches of Canada and Australia which managed to merge in almost all non-Roman Catholic and non-Episopalian churches in their respective countries — Canadian and Australian Presbyterians denominations were rolled into those country’s respective United Churches). Since the proto-UCC didn’t legally own the church buildings they had to build new ones and the liberal ministers who got to keep the old New England establishment church buildings became the Unitarian Church.

Two notable non-Catholic dissenting churches emerged in New England not long after the direct ancestors of the UCC and the Unitarian Church arose. The Universalists got their start in Boston in the early 1800s and was demographically comparable to the store front Pentecostal churches of a few decades ago, but much more theologically liberal (everyone goes to heaven). The other dissenting denomination that emerged in New England at that time and survived to have an impact was the Church of Latter Day Saints, which was and is conservative and radically outside the theological mainstream in unique directions.

The Unitarians stagnated (like most mainline white New England protestant churches) and the Universalists never got very big. In the 1960s, they merged to establish the Unitarian Universalist denomination that exists today, which is doctrinally a mix of religious humanists who are not specically Christian, secular humanists, and Unitarian Christians. The denomination as a whole at this time is ecumenical to the extent that it is not a Christian religious denomination even though some people who are affiliated with it are Unitarian or Universalist Christians.

The upshot of all of this is that both Mitt Romney and President Obama are formally affiliated with denominations that have their genesis in New England.

Observer (12) I think that’s true. I’m really skeptical of what most politicians say. They are self-selected for a certain personality type. I think even a lot of people who wear religion on their sleeve are really adopting a more Straussian view dividing the private from the public. i.e. religion is important for the coarse masses but not for elites but elites have to portray themselves as part of the masses. (Note here claiming to know much about Strauss – more just what goes under that label a lot)

Politicians are, from my view, a kind of necessary evil. They have some very important skills for democracy to function but their very strengths are often regarded as flaws which leads to some weird selection forces. I think we could have very different sorts of politicians but the public wants someone like them. Given the relative diversity of the public that leads to the types of figures we see.

Why on earth would anyone take any of Obama’s professed religious views at face value?

He’s a politician, for Christ’s sake. He will say what he needs to say to get ahead with the voters, so long as it doesn’t come back to bite him in the posterior. What he really believes about God is, of course, well hidden in the recesses of his cranium. He has, then, free rein to claim any damn thing he wants on the subject.

So why try to get to the bottom of his “actual” views on a subject upon which he most likely has no views?

Nothing.

Liberal Christian theology has evolved to the point where it has rendered all spiritual and metaphysical claims as vestigal. The liberal atheist (and 99% of high-church atheists are liberal atheists) has simply opted to remove the vestigal God-appendix from his belief system. Otherwise, he functions just like a good little insane liberal Christian. Sorry, but your mind is “poisoned” with belief too.

No one can look into a man’s soul to see if he “really” believes. But that does not mean one cannot look at statements and actions and make a reasonable guess. I wouldn’t consider Obama to be a Christian even if he were sincere in his statements because his theology is post-Christian. However, I don’t think he is sincere about his spirituality to begin with.

the romney debate is different because mormons and non-mormons agree on the basic facts and disagree on the criteria. non-mormons have a more stringent set of propositions which define ‘christian,’ which mormons reject (though mormons have their own set). the is-obama-a-muslim debate is much less clear, because many people just disagree with obama’s self-characterization of facts.

I was at a dinner party with a bunch of Turkish guys. They all regarded Obama as a Muslim, Obama’s personal statements notwithstanding, because of his father.

there was a milder form of this with john kerry and his ‘jewish roots.’ and kerry’s connection with judaism was even more tenuous, since it looks like his paternal grandparents didn’t advertise their jewishness at all after conversion.

Michelle is Obama’s real connection to the black community; indeed, I suspect she proved very helpful for him, politically speaking, with the black community. That said, I don’t mean to accuse Obama of a Gingrich-style politically motivated marriage.

On the Muslim question, not to go all postmodern, and call identity simply a relative, contextual category, I do think that a person’s self ascription isn’t enough. Group affiliation is a three way street, with self, group members, and outsiders all playing a role. Look at the debate about whether or not Romney is a Christian.

I am under no illusions as to the negative, bigoted motivations of those who would call Obama a Muslim, but they aren’t the only ones.

Late in the race, when it seemed that Obama was on the verge of winning, I was at a dinner party with a bunch of Turkish guys. They all regarded Obama as a Muslim, Obama’s personal statements notwithstanding, because of his father.

Dwight,

“walk the walk”? You’ve gotten into the man’s head? Save if for Sunday morning or revival week. Based what is known of Obama’s bio, personal and political behavior, it isn’t a stretch to say Obama’s religious affiliation conforms to what one would expect.

Let’s be fair, people join churches for socializing and networking purposes. There’s a reason why doctors and bankers have historically been Episcopalians, not becoming Evangelicals until the later had become more economically respectable. Politicians are social creatures; hermits don’t tend to do very well, politically.

If Obama had gone extremely socially conservative Baptist, that might be seen as a cynical political move above and beyond typical politician behavior, if not an act of rebellion against his mother. And re: “walk the walk,” let’s discuss the personal morality of any number of other church going politicians.