From: puccio@media.mit.edu (Jim Puccio)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.bush,alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.elections,talk.religion.misc
Subject: Religious Leaders Criticize Republican Blasphemy
Date: 30 Aug 92 23:03:58 GMT
Distribution: alt
Organization: M.I.T. Media Laboratory

Found in the New York Times, Sunday 30-AUG-92:

"Using 'God' in the Campaign Is Blasphemous, Clergy Say [AP]

  "Dozens of religious leaders have complained to the Presidential candidates,
especially President Bush and the Republican Party, about the injection of
religion in to the campaign, saying the partisan use of God's name is 
blasphemy.

  "'We need to be very clear that God belongs to no one side, for we believe we
all belong to God,' 23 church leaders, including officers of the National
Council of Churches, said in a letter on Friday to Mr. Bush and the Republican
Party.

  "The letter was one of three statements in recent days by religious leaders
objectsing to the emphasis by conservatives on God in politics.

  "Mr. Bush has criticized the Democratic Party's platform as omitting 'three
simple letters: G, O, D.'  At the Republican National Convention in Houston,
most speakers invoked the name of God, and Patrick J. Buchanan said that in the
'struggle for the soul of America,' George Bush was on the side of right-
thinking people.

                        "Breeding 'Intolerance'

  "The letter issued by the National Council of Churches said that 'any
partisan use of God's name tends to breed intolerance and to divide.'  The
clergymen signing the letter included the head of Mr. Bush's Episcopal 
denomination, Bishop Edmond Browning.

  "It is 'blasphemy,' the letter said, 'to invoke the infinite and holy God to
assert the moral superiority of one people over another or one political party
over another.'

  "The 23 church leaders, including the council's president, the Rev. Syngman
Rhee, and its general secretary, the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, said in their
letter: 'We deplore the suggestion that to be fully franchised one must not
only be Christian but espouse a particular understanding of the life of Christ.
We exhort you to uphold and honor the notion that those who have opinions at
variance with you and your party on moral and ethical issues are no less 
faithful.'

                         'Faith Should Unite Us'

  "Another statement was issued by a group of more than 50 religious leaders
and scholars, mainly Protestants, but also a few Catholics and Jews.  'We are
alarmed at the abuse of religion as a campaign issue,'  the statement said,
adding, 'Faith in God should unite us, not divide us.'

  "That statement, made public by the Baptist Joint Committee on Public 
Affairs, a lobbying group that represents nine Baptist bodies, appealed to both
Mr. Bush and his Democratic challenger, Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas, to
'honor both the spirit and letter' of the Constitution's prohibition of any
religious test for public office 'by refraining from further attacks based on
religion.'

  "'We begin with the proposition that God is neither Democrat nor Republican
nor, for that matter, American,' the group said.  'God transcends all national
and political affiliations.'

  "The third statement by religious leaders was an open letter to Mr. Bush,
signed by 16 members of the clergy, that was issued in Washington by People for
the American Way, a public-interest group.

  "'No campaign should claim to have God on its side supporting its candidate,
platform or policy agenda,' the letter said.  'God is neither a Republican nor
a Democrat."

+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or    |
|  prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of         |
|  speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, |
|  and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."               |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Xref: sparky alt.politics.bush:2977 alt.politics.elections:11604 alt.fan.dan-quayle:2992