Here’s what Mike Huckabee has to say on his own website: “My faith is my life – it defines me. I don’t separate my faith from my personal and professional lives. “
That is, of course, his right, but if there is indeed no separation between his faith and his professional life, I am at a loss to understand why, as a number of e-mailers keep telling me, the fact that Governor Huckabee’s campaign appears to be unwilling to disclose the text of the sermons he once gave is “irrelevant.” The Roanoke Times takes up the issue here:
In America, a political candidate’s faith is personal. The question should be how he will perform in office, not what god he does or does not believe in. Huckabee’s faith and public service swirl together. He asks voters to support him because he is a Christian. His former life as a holy figurehead is central to his public persona, and he insists his religion would inform his leadership.Voters, then, ought to know what pastor Huckabee believed before they consider voting for candidate Huckabee. What tenets of faith burned so powerfully he proclaimed them from the pulpit…Only Huckabee’s conscience can compel disclosure of his sermons. He seeks to occupy the highest office in the nation, but he secrets away the documents that could grant the greatest insight into his core beliefs, beliefs he publicly proclaimed before he adopted a politician’s careful parsing. When a candidate chooses to wear his faith on his sleeve, he should not hide the details.
Amen.