Is Obama more religious than George W. Bush and can atheists trust him?

Atheists and secularists in America are trying to work out what to think of Barack Obama. Is he a true secularist who wants a nation that respects religion but keeps it well away from politics? Or is he even more religious than his predecessor, George W. Bush?

Two interesting articles on this topic appear on the Politico website in the USA. They are worth reading for their contrasting views. There is no doubt (or is there?) that Obama is personally deeply religious. And there is no doubt that he didn’t deliver on his promise to stop “faith-based” groups that are receiving tax-payers’ money from discriminating in employment and service provision. Nor has he followed through with his promise to lift the ban on homosexuals in the military.  Speaking about this failure to move on the “don’t ask-don’t tell” policy, Gene Robinson, the gay bishop at the centre of the Anglican schism, says in an interview that “patience with Obama is wearing thin in the gay community.”

On the other hand, he has not compromised his pro-abortion stand, something that has flummoxed the Vatican, entranced as it is by his religious fervour but deeply disapproving of his refusal to follow its line on abortion and homosexuality. But then again, he has appointed an anti-abortion Catholic to head the “Center for Faith Based Initiatives” – which has alarmed some liberal Catholics.

Indeed, the only known atheist in the House of Representatives, Rep. Pete Stark, commented apropos of the “faith-based initiative”: “Look at all the stuff he is trying to do in the White House. I mean, come on. I think that is probably not constitutional.”

However, last week, Obama once more acknowledged the existence of the large non-believing population of the USA and elsewhere. In his speech at Normandy to commemorate the D-Day landings, he said: “Citizens of all faiths and no faith came to believe that we could not remain bystanders to the savage perpetration of death and destruction. And so we joined and sent our sons to fight and often die so that men and women they never met might know what it is to be set free.” That was a rebuke to those sneering American Christians who love to say “There are no atheists in foxholes”.

These are still relatively early days, but surely these are the times — when furthest from the next election — that Presidents should implement their most radical policies. Obama has given hope to the atheists, the homosexuals, women, the non-fanatical religionists, but he has yet to completely satisfy any of them.

Read the Politico articles here:

Is Obama more religious than George W. Bush?