Now, Obama was speaking to a room full of Christian activists, and it's perfectly natural for him to talk about his spiritual journey before them. Some politicians will be comfortable with this; some will not. I would hope that most voters would not apply a religious litmus test to candidates -- although some obviously do. That being said, candidates must understand that voters do indeed bring their religious views into the voting booth with them. And all Democrats -- candidates and grassroots -- should understand that given the right encouragement, some people might vote Democratic because of their faith. So the political question is how to appeal to that group, honestly, with dignity, without playing the religious right's game of litmus tests, and with respect to our secular constitution.

Above all things, the Democrats have a problem of message clarity. To my mind, it's a mistake to imagine that any particular set of policy positions will place the Dems in the midst of the largest clump of voters, and that therefore they'll win 50%+1. That's because wonky stuff, however nicely polled and focus-grouped, doesn't work on a national level: No one is smart enough to be able to evaluate policy positions one by one. And even if the proposals are popular, character (in the broadest sense) trumps all. All voters use professions of morality as a shorthand to evaluate how a candidate will act in office in general. Most importantly, Democrats have yet been unable to square the circle of providing moral leadership on issues of class (poverty, health care) -- which have a religious overtone, but are portrayed as crypto-Marxist by the right  -- while still of necessity playing the game of campaign finance: What do you prioritize, kids' health care or a capital gains tax cut? Therefore Democrats find it difficult to run campaigns on broadly shared values -- or even to define what those values are, unlike the "God, Guns, and Gays" Republicans.

So that creates a vacuum for morality-talk that the Right is happy to fill, however ill-fittingly.  In some areas, proclamations of faith are a good enough proxy for a particular set of values -- and indeed, a political agenda, much of which may have nothing to do with faith issues whatsoever. For instance, one often hears that certain voters support Bush because "He's a Christian man" -- and that's good enough for them. Another respectable Christian man, Tom DeLay doubtless prayed loudly with clenched fists and weeping eyes before signing off on slavery in the Mariana Islands -- and we know he meant "beaver" in a strictly Biblical sense. Now, it may be that the Dems will never get those most of the Bush/DeLay-type voters. But certain faith-motivated voters could well vote for a Democratic agenda that was built upon values of compassion, justice, and honesty.

After all, religious belief has played a central part in America's progressive tradition. Abolitionism was fueled by religious feeling, as was the civil rights movement. The religious strand of liberalism has provided an essentialist view of justice that runs counter to the evidence of the free market -- that all human beings have dignity. This has been a moral partner to the more materialist strand of liberalism, which has stressed a quality-of-life agenda, such as the labor movement, the New Deal and Great Society programs.

I am not saying that secular people are somehow excluded from recognizing such morality: Nonsense. But religion is the means in which many, if not most people have come to understand justice and morality. Ignoring that would seem to be folly. If adherents to a particular religious group believe XYZ consequent to their faith, and a candidate believes XY but not Z, he should feel free to appeal to those voters by citing XY. Folks can work in coalition, and overlook some differences in order to realize gains on shared goals.

When it comes to tossing around biblical verses to show that a candidate is hep to religion ... this should obviously be used with extreme caution, if ever. No one wants to see Democrats use Jesus as a sock puppet, the way Pat Robertson does. And such transparent pandering would go over quite badly in most places that have a chance of electing a Democrat, anyway.

Rather than buying into the easy stereotyping that polling encourages, Democrats should keep an ear out to religious folks, and actively seek to build coalitions. Secular folks have absolutely nothing to fear from creating coalitions with non-theocratic religious folks -- in fact, they both have everything to gain.