Religious Views & Politics

Idealistic pragmatist cites a very striking poll:

It brings to mind the Macleans year-end poll for 2004, which indicated that the concerns of Harper and Haynes on this issue are not misplaced. One of the questions they asked was: "Do you think political leaders should be using their religious beliefs to guide their actions at all times, sometimes, or never?" and the responses were: "At all times," 9%, "sometimes," 24%, and "never," 65%. Sixty-five percent is a pretty telling number. The truly fascinating statistic, though, was what emerged when they looked at the results from the poll responders who had already identified themselves as evangelical or born-again Christians. At that point the numbers looked more like this: "At all times," 18%, "sometimes," 30%, and "never," 49%. Nearly half of the born-again Christians sampled stated that politicians should never use their religious beliefs to guide their actions.