A new poll finds that most Americans want presidential candidates to have strong religious beliefs — even if those beliefs are different from their own. As\u00a0Gary Scott\u00a0Smith, a history professor at Grove City College and author\u00a0of \u201cFaith and the Presidency: From George Washington to George W.\u00a0Bush\u201d told me:<\/p>\n
That\u2019s a longstanding trend in American culture. Americans want their\u00a0presidents to have a substantial faith and they want to know that they\u00a0are people who pray regularly for guidance, they expect them to use a\u00a0certain amount of religious rhetoric in their speeches, particularly\u00a0ones that deal with moral issues. The president\u2019s often played the\u00a0role of pastor in chief, whenever there\u2019s a tragedy, we expect some\u00a0type of spiritual assurances from the president, whether it\u2019s dealing\u00a0with a shooting, a space disaster, natural disaster, anything of that\u00a0sort.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Understandable… yet an inexplicable chunk of Americans can’t identify the religions of President Obama, Mitt Romney or Michele Bachmann — candidates whose beliefs have made plenty of headlines! Check out my story on the poll here,<\/a> and a follow-up in USA Today here<\/a>.<\/p>\n
I found several other things about this poll surprising, partly because it didn’t quite ask the right questions. How many more Americans would prefer a president with the same religion as them? How many would really vote more based on religious beliefs rather than on party lines? \u00a0Do most evangelicals really not know what Michele Bachmann’s beliefs are — or is it that they don’t know what she specifically believes, rather than that they don’t know she’s an evangelical Christian?<\/p>\n
And as for the 18 percent who still<\/em> think Obama is Muslim — the usual one out of five folks who are generally disagreeable<\/a>, as in that dentist holding out in the chewing gum ads? — how many are people who know very well that he claims to be Christian (remember Pastor Jeremiah Wright?), but just think he’s a secret Muslim anyway? I suspect at least half.<\/p>\n
What do you think? Share your thoughts in the Comments section below.<\/p>\n
*Click here to\u00a0subscribe to Belief Beat\u00a0<\/strong><\/a>and\u00a0click here to\u00a0follow Belief Beat on Twitter<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A new poll finds that most Americans want presidential candidates to have strong religious beliefs — even if those beliefs are different from their own. As\u00a0Gary Scott\u00a0Smith, a history professor at Grove City College and author\u00a0of \u201cFaith and the Presidency: From George Washington to George W.\u00a0Bush\u201d told me: That\u2019s a longstanding trend in American culture.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,2],"tags":[187,14,362,13,8,229,327,329,361,226,148,112],"class_list":["post-920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-politics","tag-barack-obama","tag-christianity","tag-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints","tag-evangelical-christians","tag-islamophobia","tag-lds","tag-michele-bachmann","tag-mitt-romney","tag-mormonism","tag-mormons","tag-muslim","tag-president-obama"],"yoast_head":"\n
Poll: In Godly Presidents We Trust? - Belief Beat<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beliefbeat\/2011\/07\/poll-in-godly-presidents-we-trust.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Poll: In Godly Presidents We Trust? - Belief Beat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A new poll finds that most Americans want presidential candidates to have strong religious beliefs — even if those beliefs are different from their own. 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