Ignorance and intolerance of the faiths or lack of faith of others is a huge problem in a world where religion is the main motivating force for most people. As Americans we must try to understand and respect beliefs we do not share as long as they are not imposed on us and do not infringe on our own lives in any way.

How do the candidates, all Christians, feel about religious tolerance? Do they honor and respect non-believers, atheists, agnostics and humanists as Americans of decency and morals and values? Do they consider them good Americans, too?

Let's look at the evidence, at what they have said and done. Barack Obama and Joe Biden seem to understand and appreciate and celebrate religious diversity and tolerance. John McCain and Sarah Palin seem to embrace intolerance.

Read Obama's 2006 "Call to Renewal" address. While affirming his own Christianity as well as his belief in separation of church and state, he called on secularists to respect religion. He also said this: "In fact, because I do not believe that religious people have a monopoly on morality , I would rather have someone who is grounded in morality and ethics, and who is also secular, affirm their morality and ethics and values without pretending that they're some one they're not . . . Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism. Have never been greater. Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers."

Obama has been roundly criticized for maintaining membership for many years in a church led by Rev. Jeremiah Wright, now famous for his YouTube rant saying "G--D--- America." Obama didn't walk out of church when that happened -- he wasn't there that day, but he later renounced his pastor's words and quit the church. Obama has made diversity and tolerance a keystone of his campaign.

Now let's look at the religious tolerance records of McCain and Palin.

Years ago, on another planet it seems now, McCain called Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and other extreme right-wing pastors "agents of intolerance." That was during his failed 2000 presidential campaign. This time around, he embraced Falwell -- even after the late evangelist blamed 9/11, in part, on "the pagans and the abortionists, and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians."

Earlier this year, he sought and accepted endorsements from Rev. John Hagee, who has called the Catholic Church "The Great Whore", and from Pastor Rod Parsley, his "spiritual adviser," who calls Islam a "false religion" that should be "destroyed." After negative publicity about both endorsements, McCain finally rejected them.

Last year, McCain said "in all candor that since this nation was founded primarily on Christian principles, personally, I prefer someone who has a grounding in my faith." McCain recanted a few days later, saying "I would vote for a Muslim if he or she was the candidate best able to lead the country and defend our political values."

As for Palin, watch the video of Kenyan pastor Thomas Muthee asking God to protect Palin "from every form of witchcraft." Muthee actually claims he saved a Kenyan village by chasing away a witch. As ridiculous as this video seems. persecution of women as being witches has been around for thousands of years, causing thousands of women to be excecuted, burned at the stake. Nothing could be more anti-woman, more bigoted or biased than to accuse a woman of having a compact with evil spirits. Why didn't Palin walk out on Muthee?

Why didn't she renounce David Brickner, Executive Director of Jews for Jesus, when he spoke earlier this year at Palin's Wasilla Bible Church and described terrorist attacks on Israelis as God's "judgment of unbelief" of Jews who haven't embraced Christianity.

Yes, religion matters in an election because belief matters. What does McCain really believe about "agents of intolerance" such as Robertson. Does Sarah Palin really believe -- as she seems to have said -- that God wants her to build an oil pipeline? Or that the Iraq war is a mission from God? She believes in Creationism and the End Times. These are not trivial matters. We are talking about religious beliefs that could have a huge impact on major domestic and foreign policy issues.

Ignorance leads to fear and intolerance and bigotry and in some cases violence -- as we have seen in this campaign. We can choose leaders who are exclusive, who reject the views of others and want to impose their beliefs on all of us, or we can choose those who are inclusive, who feel that their beliefs are right but who tolerate and appreciate the beliefs and non-beliefs of others.

I vote for tolerance and pluralism.

My response:

Sally,

This is the single most underreported fact of the election.

People need to look at the Theocracy Watch website and understand how Sarah Palin was brought in to capture the religious right against the better judgement of McCain.

Barry Goldwater, the last Republican on the planet, stated in the Washington Post in 1994,

"I am a conservative Republican, but I believe in democracy and the separation of church and state. The conservative movement is founded on the simple tenet that people have the right to live life as they please as long as they don't hurt anyone else in the process."

What would he say about the hatred surrounding Prop 8 in CA and Amendment 2 in FL?

What would he make of the rhetoric from Sarah Palin and her association with Joel's Army, the Latter Rain, Dominionism, and her mixing of religion and politics?

Oddly, it was Goldwater's loss which gave birth to the whole Moral Majority movement, the rise to power of Paul Weyrich and the Committee for the Survival of a Free Congress (CSFC), and one of the first direct mail campaigns in history with assocaition of the American Conservative Union...the birth of the Heritage Foundation and the Council for National Policy (the head of Blackwater Security is a member and major donor).

The "the truth is stranger than fiction" addage is fitting here. I see an Obama victory as a threat to the continued expansion of the Military Industrial Complex (Haliburton and Kellog-Root especially) and since Blackwater is also on the receiving end of the government trough, it is scary to think of the religious-right faction in the armed forces who truly believe that they are preparing for an end-times war in the Middle East. Watching the children of Jesus Camp during indoctrination, stating that they are willing to give their lives to the cause is chilling...and Sarah Palin and Jew's for Jesus would have Israel converting to Christianity. This is philosophically no different than a Jihadist demanding the same thing from the West in respect to conversion to Islam.

The only two problems I have with Obama are the fact that he was a member of Trinity and could not have missed the mission statement of the church in relation to it's focus on Black Liberation Theology and its Afrocentric view of the world,a nd his lack of support for equal rights for marriage for gay Americans. For the greater-good, O voted for him.

I think your post should be read by more people and I hope they understand the underlying, insidious mission which the Dominionists hold.

"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the American flag, carrying the cross."
It Can't Happen Here
1935 Sinclair Lewis