No religion needed in politics

..................................................................................................................................
Group’s goal: Take religion out of politics and policy
By Patrick Gavin, January 22, 2013

There were plenty of references to God during Monday’s presidential Inauguration, and one group is hoping that’ll change soon.

Edwina Rogers, executive director of the Secular Coalition for America, thinks that the decision to take the presidential oath with one hand on a Bible seems a bit outdated.

“It’s a bit of an outdated process,” Rogers said. “I would love to see the U.S. progress and eliminate some of those traditions.”

While the president outlined a second-term vision on such issues as the environment and immigration, Rogers has a different plan for the next four years: gaining greater progress and access for nonbelievers in the realm of public policy. Her effort is bolstered by a Pew poll out this month that reported an increase in the number of members of Congress who don’t specify a religious affiliation. Although Rogers’s cause suffered a setback when the first openly atheist member of Congress — Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) — left Congress this year, a new member — Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) — says she has no religious affiliation.

“It’s definitely a trend,” Rogers told POLITICO. “People are wanting to keep [religion] separate, they’re wanting to keep it personal, and you’re starting to see it finally spill over into Congress.”

For the next four years, Rogers has specific issues she wants to focus on — getting religion out of such places as public school science classes, sex education, health care policy and tax policy — but she also wants to persuade more politicians to admit that they are unaffiliated with a religion (a CQ-Roll Call study found 10 members of the 113th Congress who did not specify a religious affiliation, but only Sinema has been public about it).

Rogers believes the reluctance “has to do with the fact that, in order to get elected, you need to be in as many groups and coalitions as you can possibly be in, so having that religion box and that affiliation and getting those people to vote for you is very helpful in an election or a reelection.” She says there is also a perception, which she believes to be false, “that perhaps you don’t have the same morals or the same beliefs and that you’re not as good of a person or as ethical” if you aren’t affiliated with a particular religion.

But Rogers thinks patience will prove she is correct.

“I think it will slowly go away” Rogers said of the political system’s embrace of religious symbols and language. “I think you’ll see us move away in the United States from feeling like God has to be mentioned in everything and anything.” She sees a bit of that momentum, however slowly, in the current president.

“When he talks about religion, he also talks about nonbelievers and includes them in his speeches.”
..................................................................................................................................