An election factor that hasn't been discussed yet: the Catholic Church!

[IndianaGreen]

The Catholic Church, and I mean the Vatican as well as the US Bishops, are on a major PR campaign against gay marriage demanding that all public office holders take a moral stand against what they see as a "perversion" (their words) against the "sacrament" (also their words) of matrimony. Add to that the very aggressive stance the Catholic hierarchy has taken in denying communion to those that support gay marriage and abortion, one wonders how John Kerry will waffle himself out of confronting his own Church were he to become the Democratic nominee.

President Kennedy had no problem saying back in 1960, before abortion and gay rights became issues, that he was not going to be puppet of the Vatican as he did in his address to Southern Baptist leaders:

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute -- where no Catholic prelate would tell the President (should he be a Catholic) how to act and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote -- where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference -- and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the President who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish -- where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source -- where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials -- and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.

http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/66.htm

The America of today has a very different landscape from the America in which President Kennedy uttered those words of religious tolerance. Kennedy did not conceive of an America in which one of the champions of sectarian intolerance would be his own Church!

We are living in an era where there has been a significant erosion in the wall that separates church and state, and we are on the verge of having the remnants of that wall being swept away altogether.

Can we expect Kerry to take a public stand against his own Church on abortion and gay marriage? I think not! Kerry won't be able to waffle out of this one either, the Church is demanding absolute obedience from Catholic office holders, and Kerry is no Kucinich.