Evangelicals Going Left?
Could this election cause some evangelicals to move back towards the Left, there once-upon-a-time political home? The Southern Baptist Convention's Richard Land fears just that, and is trying to remind the value voters that, all other values aside, the abortion issue is their biggest one.
Land says he's working to convince evangelicals that they should not abandon "the prioritization of the sanctity of human life and ... the sanctity of marriage."
"It seems to me that when you say to someone, 'Well, you're too narrowly focused on abortion and same-sex marriage.' That's like telling [the Rev. Martin Luther] King he was too narrowly focused on racial reconciliation and racial justice," Land says.
He says Republican Sen. John McCain's stance on abortion should help him keep the support of evangelicals in the coming presidential election.
"If you have a pro-life candidate running for the Republicans ... and he's running against someone who is pro-choice and who is running on a party platform that has never met an abortion they couldn't at least live with — if they didn't like — you're not going to see a lot of movement among evangelicals when it comes to presidential elections," Land says.
Listen to his commentary on NPR - it's mind-boggling to hear a Christian Right big wig in a desperate plea to keep his flock to the right on The liberal media outlet.
left, evangelicals, richard land, value voters, southern baptist convention
