Researchers Note 'God Gap' in Political Parties
by Fred Jackson
August 30, 2004
(AgapePress) - A report indicates that the religious divide between Republicans and Democrats continues to grow. At the same time, many of the delegates to this week's Republican National Convention identify with President Bush's faith as well as his politics.
While some might argue that faith is a personal thing and has no place in politics, many delegates to the GOP's national convention would take the opposite view. For example, Carol Maddux of West Bloomfield, Michigan, tells Associated Press that she became a delegate to promote Christian principles in public life. Maddux considers herself more conservative than Bush, but says she appreciates the role that faith plays in his decision-making.
Debbie Claire -- a Roman Catholic delegate from Parker, Colorado -- says she loves the president and shares what she calls "his tremendous faith in God." She adds that Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry's support for legal abortion shows he is not a real Catholic. And alternate delegate Bruce Whalen -- a Lakota Sioux from the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota -- says that as a Christian he cannot support same-sex marriage, although he has homosexual friends. Whalen says he advises them to turn their lives over to Jesus Christ.
Gauging the Gap
According to AP, political scientists who study polls correlating religious behavior or belief with party alignment say the "God gap" is more significant than most factors, including the "gender gap." Professor Louis Bolce of Baruch College in New York is one of those scientists. He says the Democrats have become the party of most secular and anti-religious voters.
"In 1992, 1996, and 2000, people who had intensely antagonistic feelings toward evangelical Christians voted overwhelmingly Democratic," Bolce says. "And they've become a major force in the Democratic Party."
Bolce says on the other hand, the Republicans have become the party of most devoutly religious voters. "Political science research shows that the more often one goes to church and the more religiously devout one is -- in terms of praying frequently -- the more likely one is to be a Republican," he explains, adding that the less people have those characteristics, the more likely they are to be Democrat.
Bolce adds that hostility against conservative Christians -- which he says has become "a politically correct prejudice" -- is also evident in press coverage of evangelicals. He says analysis of how the press covers evangelical and fundamentalist Christians has revealed an "accepted hostility or prejudiced way of covering their groups -- and it's the type of prejudice that could be acceptable among elites. It's a politically correct prejudice."
