...for Bush.

Apparently, the moral issues motivated the Evangelical and Catholic vote unlike it has for some time before. They also say that the long line of voters in Ohio that the Democrats thought were their voters - the provisional ballots that the Democrats thought would secure their victory - were white, Evangelical Christians who came out to do just the opposite.

What are you guys thoughts on this? Do you think that if someone is opposed to gay-marriages and/or abortion that it could ever outweigh what Bush did with the war? Do you think that a person's faith should influence an important decision like this?

Do you even think that the Christians won the Election for Mr. Bush?

Any other thoughts?

Isn't the whole American population quite religious? At least from my point of view...

So I suppose it might have been like you said that the Christians won the election for Bush, as he was quite strict with certain issues like gay marriage while Kerry was bit more laid back, so to speak.
Sigh...religion and politics should never be mixed but they almost always are.

But I think one major reason why the Democrats lost was because they couldn't attract enough young people to vote. While they had their support, no doubt about that, they just couldn't drag those lazy kiddies from their homes. Of course you can't really blame the democrats for that, it's difficult to get young people interested in politics. Kerry had all those artists, teen idols and whatever supporting him time after time in public and I was really sure that would attract enough voters so he would beat Bush. But bleh! <_<

You just cant rely on that age group.

Hmm yes it's a interesting point seeker.

Yes i do believe that Christians won the war for Bush, America is a highly religous and conservative country in more ways than one and they represent a massive swing of voters. But for Kerry these christian voters were like a double edged sword.

The christian voters liked bush for his stance on abortion gay marriages (in particular) and his handling of "Islamic terrorists" in some ways the war on terror is also a war with Islam for many christians avid christians anyway (it is the US after all the home of fundamentalists no offence to any americas personally) and from here did Bush win many a vote.

Here's Kerry's problem. Bush did a terrible job as president and i mean TERRIBLE. Besides foreign relations going down the toilet and breaking international law (the connotations of that will be never ending) in his own country his economy has quickly head downhill, unemployment is surging to astounding levels, healthcare and education is as bad as ever and he seems to have no interest in the lower classes. Here's the problem. Many of these people are not of the christian faith they are of the other group in american politics (what i call the level headed people). They don't want Bush for his actions etc BUT ALSO because of his stance on these "christian values". Now if Kerry tries to win some of the christian vote by going along to some extent with these ideals then BANG he loses those other voters. If he doesn't he loses the christian vote.

It was always going to be a hard election to win in somewhere like America. But hell i can't talk Australia elected John Howard again.

And yes politics and religion should never mix they interfere with the intended purposes of both.

I'm very surprised to see all of you calling America a highly religious country. Religious sentiment is highly mixed here. Some people are very devout, but the majority are not. Only a minority of people attend church. The Boston Archdiocese recently closed about 30 churches in the greater Boston area where attendance was low. There's almost a shortage of priests now because so few young men are signing up. Convents are closing due to the lack of nuns. I also work at a Catholic School, where the majority of faculty, staff, and parents were voicing support for Kerry rather than Bush.

You can't really make a blanket statement about religious people in this country. There's so many religions that it's very diverse. The Evangelical population is such a low minority that their vote should have no significant impact whatsoever, even if they all voted the same way... and they probably didn't.

I wouldn't say that America is a very religious country at all, and I'm very surprised to hear that you perceive it that way.

I really have don't know how big the Christian population in the U.S. is, but I'm under the impression that it is a non-negligible slice of the pie.

The thing is, though, although it was a majority of the Evangelicals and Catholics who voted for Bush, it was by no means an overwhelming majority. Blacks and Hispanics still voted in majority for Kerry, although they are typically Evangelical and Catholic respectively. However, some of them were tilted to Bush's side because of their religious affiliation.

As for mixing politics and religion...I've never quite understood why that's such a big no-no. Granted, politicians are usually corrupt and religious people shouldn't be. But, for those who take their religion seriously, people's religious opinions influence their entire lives including which policies they will support and who they will vote for. If you're a politician then it would influence you in a similar way; it's just that the precept of separation of church and state in the U.S. restricts that expression quite a bit.

Many Christians supported Bush because of gay-marriage/abortion rights, but what they forget is that good Christians are also supposed to seek peaceful solutions to conflicts. I've heard so many people say that Jesus would be disgusted with the folks at the head of America today.
About the gay rights issue, why do people care? How does allowing two men or two women who love each other destroy the sanctity of marriage anymore than the messed up divorce-prone ones we have now? People aren't supposed to get divorced either but they do it all the time now.
I think people really need to think things through more, and I am personally disgusted with how ignorant "my country" has become. <_<

I look at the U.S as religous not because a majority of the country is of a particular religous faith or anything like that. In that regard the predominant english speaking countries in the world are now identical. I see the difference in the fundamentalist qualities of the U.S (and please no offense is meant by this it is simply my interpretation).

It seems that the mojority of beliefs in the U.S are very fundamentalist in regards to almost everything. War, the constitution, freedom, religion everything seems to be taken so personally and with great passion and in many cases i believe recklessly.

I compare that religous faith with my country (Australia) and the difference seems to lie not in the amount of practisers or their belefs but in how seriously people take them and how obsessed they become by it. We have the same religous issues to deal with but it never seems to get out of hand and does not play any part in an election whatsoever.

Seeker i believe that religion and the state shouldn't be crossed because i am an athiest and generally believe that belief in religion denies reason and thus clouds judgement of every day situations. That however is my personal view and it is perfectly understandable and perfectly reasonable for a religous person to bring that religion into politics i however will never agree with it.

I'm glad you agree with me as it seems incredibly annoying to someone like me who isn't religious at all and doesn't believe in anything but my own judgement.

I suppose you would have to live in some other country for some years before you can understand how religious the average american really is. Where I live most people only go to church once a year at christmas and even that is simply because it's a custom and churches seem so nice during that time of the year. :rolleyes:

I've seen some statistics that quite many of you Americans go to church at least once a week and that seems very religious in my eyes. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it's a bad thing. People can believe in what they want and go to church each and every day for all I care. But I'm just bit surprised that you find it so surprising that we foreigners think the US is a highly religious country.

Human mind isn't always that logical, I'm afraid. We are silly beings who do not like when someone is trying to be bit different. And what seems even more amusing to me is that so many in this world live by a book that some person wrote oh so long ago. The bible is nothing but a very long fantasy novel to me. And I'm not even going to begin what I think about religion in general...

In my country if someone was to base their campaign so heavily on religion and religious issues, like Bush did, he/she wouldn't get anywhere. Politics and religion are two different matters here that rarely get mixed together, and I'm glad for that. The Christian party here is very small and insignificant and only seems to get smaller with each and every year. They hold no power in our politics and I wouldn't be surprised if they would have no supporters in the future as some of the older generations pass on.

I'm not a Christian nor do I have any religion, so I can't judge on what they say--I am blank of religion, so I won't bother commenting--although I've been hearing a lot of perspective from people who do have a religion so I still journeying in other people's shoes. Really though, if you think US is a highly religious country, so are others. Number of cause of war is religion (like the WW's), didn't anyone know that? I don't mean to offend anyone whom I say this, but I quote this one fanfic which I believe has put it in perfectly right words (this goes to humans--not just a country): "They see suspicion in everything and they revel in decadence. Even when they are pious they twist the message of hope into restraints where those who do not conform must be made outcast or killed outright! They place their religions so highly that it is a joy to destroy and murder in the name. Not even my Orcs were so bloodthirsty!" Of course, this does not apply to all/may not be true to some--but our history has this hidden seed of truth. And I am not implying any country. So I'll stay neutral in whether US is religious or not.

I never liked how Bush/Kerry kept on bringing up issues like gay marriage and abortion (whose issues are based on religion, in a way)--which did not have that significant of a place in politics in this time. It divided our country (USA) more than ever and many of the voters turned out to vote for Bush because they believed in what our president believed in issues like gay marriage and abortion. Obviously these are issues that evoke strong, powerful, human emotion that had divided the country--and politicians talk about unity at the same time they talk about unneccessary issues in politics! Pssch. As I am informed, most Christians (because most of my friends who are Christians are against gay marriage/abortion), are against gay marriage/abortion--I've also read the Bible--simply out of curiousity--and I don't see anywhere it is stated clearly that God hates gays/lesbians.

Bush had a clever little scheme to bring those issues up in the first place with his plan to have a Constitutional ban on gay marriage (which contridicts the Constitution and people's "rights")--he got New Mexico 'cause of that. He knew majority of our nation was against gay marriage/lesbian--I mean, the state I live in had voted on the ban with gay marriage, which will also affect couples who are living together/but not married--and used that to his advantage to get more votes. Well, looks like it worked for this election, didn't it?

What I find interesting is that our high school had a mock election and here this what we've voted--which is opposite (sort of) what Michigan voted:
Proposal 1 (Gambling/Casinos): No
Proposal 2 (Gay Marriaage): No--this means no amending/adding the Gay Marriage ban)
Proposal 3 (Marijuana for medical reasons): Yes.

When my parents so that, they commented how it seemed that kids have the morality--even if my parents are emotionally against gay marriage; we can't anyways, we're residents except for my little sister who's a citizen, but she's only nine. I'm the only one in my family who's not against it. I have to say, I'm disappointed in what Michigan voted on Proposal 2.

So everyone's in agreement?

Bah. Boring! :D

lol, yeah, PinkRibbon, the repeated mention fo gay marriage and abortion was intentional, I believe. Bush was going for those opposed to the two, and Kerry for those opposed to the opposition of the two. Kerry tried to juggle that with a his Catholicism (and other unrelated campaign points) so as not to alienate too many people...but that clearly failed.

Well what a horrilbe novel you must think it. No real plot, horrible character development in all but a few places, a few seemingly random letters here, some not-so-random prophecies there, your patented stories like Jonah's and so forth. Makes for tough reading, ne? :P

Nah.

Because it isn't there. I believe God's conditional hate for evil-doers is explicitly mentioned about twice in the Bible; neither time mentions homosexuality. I can't recall where those verses are, though.

But who told you that God hates gays/lesbians?

If you were wondering where in the Bible homosexuality is condemned, then I will point you to Romans chapter 1: Verses 26 and 27, 1 Corinthians 6: 9 and 1 Timothy 1: 10. Some people would point you to some verses in Deuteronomy and Leviticus, but I won't since I shouldn't (cus their direct application to us today is theologically debatable).

I hope that helped clear up some stuff.

I hate to burst your bubble here but that's not really true.

Especially in today's time there have been very few wars caused by religion and in fact the only ones have been the Israeli Palestine war and the wars in recent time can be said to involve religion though it is arguable to say that it is the main cause.

Vietnam - Political (communism)
Bosnia - Cultural (arguably religious)
Korea - Political (communism)

And the first World War certainly wasn't caused by religion. It was caused by a death, a knee jerk reaction an invasion and bang we have a World War on our hands. There was no religion involved whatsoever. I mean thinking about it it makes no sense. Germany against Britain they have a very similar religous identity.

ANd WW2 only occured due to WW1.

Visiting Ultra-Conservative/Christianity sites...I don't remember the links anymore though :P. They say homosexuality was a sin or something like that...and used some excerpts from the Bible to support it or something like that...

I must be naive. I meant that the number one cause of war is religion--my history teacher showed us the stastics by projection slides...maybe I should stop embarrasing myself like this and be guilliable at times. However, I meant WWII--in a sense, if Hilter hated Jews, then he must hate the Jewish religion and everything that the Jewish people stood for--so that was affiliate with religion, doesn't it? Of course, WWII was caused by WWI, but it cannot be doubted that Jews had to do with WWII.

I didn't mean that wars were caused entirely/100% by religion, but that even in some wars, a teeny, weeny part had to do with religion. I hope I don't sound anti-religion when I simplified the complexity that religion was one of the causes of war--religion is faith, and faith is all well and good--but to an extent it was when people went too far with it--that was what I had meant. The way people uphold religion causes war--not religion itself. I don't think I've stated that clearly in my last post. And when the way people uphold religion causes war, it causes conflict--conflict turns into war--recent wars are very covert about religion and what it takes part in war. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm right. Then I guess the real quesiton would be: How do we know when we're right?

And maybe the more correct version of my previous statement (I'm sorry I didn't make it clear before) is that religion is one of the main conflicts between people and can sometimes lead to war. We have a silent waging war between science and religion--there has been since scientists like Gaileo proved that the planets moved around the sun.

Every terror attack of Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda is fueled by his beliefs of his religion. I quote one opinionated "column": His [Osama Bin Laden] basic argument is that Muslims in the Middle East are currently suffering from political, social and economic deprivation for the simple reason that their governments have not fully implemented shari'a , or Islamic law. Because their rulers have failed to do this, bin Laden no longer considers them to be truly Muslim.

Perhaps I am wrong to say that religion is the causes of war (but that was not what I had meant to say so simplified either), but religion does take part in wars, whether it be big or small. People do things (that sometimes result in bloodshed) in the "name of God", doesn't that have to do with religion? But when I mean war, I also mean it in a symbolic, figurative sense too (do I make sense?). For example, Prejudice, is to me, a war--it may not be a war in literal sense, but it is internally--it was a waging conflict in mankind, even today. Prejudice comes hand-in-hand with stereotypes...What in the heck am I saying? I'm rambling again...yet again. <_<

But then again, after reading Seeker and Raist's posts, I've done some research and put thinking into putting myself your "shoes"--and I can see that perhaps you guys are right after all. Maybe religion is an excuse to have war--conquering/power is the real reason... I bow to Raist about the specific examples he gave above--of course, the Korean has nothing to do with religion--I have never said that the Korean war had to do with religion, now did I? ;) I am Korean after all--and I would have agreed with you that the Korean and Vietnam War is untainted with religion if you had asked me when I was in the exact mood when I was posting previous message, and I still agree with it.

I also realize the contridictary of my last message *blushes*. I said that I was blank of religion but yet, I ignorantly stated that religion was one of the number one causes of war just because of stastics my history teacher had showed in class. Ugh, I guess I was lucky you guys weren't shouting at me for my ignorance :P.

Now that I am confused on what to think anymore of war/religion, I will hide in my hole. *goes off to hide in hole*

*crawls out* BTW, Raist, you never burst my bubble, you gave me something to think about...a lot. You and Seeker have helped me think in a different perspective--I want to be open-minded, and I welcome any opinions that differ from mine's :). I'm willing to respect other people's opinions (yes, even CloTi's, although it makes no sense to me, lol :P)--and anyways, just because people have different opinions doesn't mean that the people that have different opinions are neccessarily wrong now, is it? Because Raist and Seeker may be more correct than I am. *crawls back inside hole*

Although Americans call themselves secular, but I think that appeals to only the more modern, elite groups living in the major cities. What about the 'fly-over' territory in the middle of America? They're a bunch of hard-working, religious Christians that voted for Bush because they're scared of the 'Islamist terrorists' and believes that Bush will put a stop to them.

Well, whatever, he still didn't have the right to invade Iraq. I mean, smack in the middle of Aidilfitri, what were they thinking? People there can't even enjoy their religious celebration. It's quite sad.

I don't get it. According to what I heard from I can't remember where, when Bush launched a few rockets to attack was it Afghanistan or Iraq, one of the rockets bombed a hospital with children and instead of feeling guilty, Bush said it was a malfunction and an accident. Unless I heard wrong, that what I heard.

I know they 'mean' 'well' to re-elect Bush, but to put a stop to things at a time when sort of celebrations are going on is very wrong. How would they like it if it happened to be vice versa?