Do we truly exempt our leaders from any religious test?
“No religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.” So reads part of Article VI of the Constitution of the United States.
“Any office” includes President of the United States. And yet, we find ourselves in a curious position again in American history with people questioning whether the faith of either candidate for president is Orthodox or orthodox enough to live in the White House.
The nominations of Barack Obama and Mitt Romney uphold the Constitution to the letter. They are on the ballot. They are not disqualified in principle due to the faith they profess. Still, some flout the spirit of the law when they say they cannot vote for someone who holds religious beliefs too divergent from their own.
We have three choices: (1) we can vote only for someone who epitomizes the majority religious views of the country, notwithstanding Article VI; (2) we can vote only for someone whose faith is more civil religion than commitment to a particular religious tradition; or (3) we can accept that the best candidate may be a person of completely different religious convictions from our own but whose vision of America is consistent with ours.
The first settlers in America were P