The Holy Vote

As I wind through the nonfiction stacks at the library, I slowly make my way through the Dewey Decimal System. I now have found myself right square in the middle of the politics section. Hoo boy. As you may very well know, I am an avid "soapboxer" who loves getting sucked into political debate, with the downside being that I often wind up getting frusturated with the state of American politics. As a result, I avoided the books that would get me really angry (written by Fox News hosts) and ones containing blatent lies and slander from both the right and the left, and wound up with basically only two choices from this bookshelf. I wound up with Ray Suarez's The Holy Vote.

As a political Christian, I always am intrigued by people who write about where faith and politics meet. Suarez reviews a number of hot-button faith-related issues and covers the feelings coming from both sides of the political spectrum. Each chapter focuses on one issue and usually zooms in on one or two case studies. Gay marriage, abortion, taxes, poverty, the role of Christianity in federal government, and religion/prayer in schools join all have their own chapter, as does the history of Christian politics and the racial divide in faith-based politics.

Suarez finds Christian arguments of a wide range for each issue, but devotes more of his time to the Religious Right's opinions, largely because that's what tends to dominate the debates. Suarez did a really nice job with that, although I'm already familiar with the different sides of these issues. I appreciated his careful inclusion of reasonable and intelligent quotes from religious leaders. He intentionally avoided most of the arguments of the most sensationalist media figures.

I was really bothered, though, by Suarez's insertion of his own opinions. This occurred typically only once per chapter, but felt out of place. Suarez identifies himself at the beginning of the book as a faithful and practicing Christian, but never identifies his political affiliation. It doesn't take a Sherlock Holmes to figure it out - Suarez is totally in the pockets of the Democrats. Unlike a Jim Wallis, who is definitely liberal yet consistently calls out errors he sees on both sides, Suarez seems to mold some kind of spiritual position on every stance the Democratic Party takes. While I happen to agree on many of these points, I also feel like it is important to put faith first, politics second. I didn't really get that vibe reading the book.

I'm not sure who to recommend this book to. If you are interested in faith and politics but haven't read a lot on the topic already, then this book is a good place to start.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

80/100