Features » October 27, 2008
On a Mission From God
Examining Sarah Palin’s ties to the Christian Right
By Chip Berlet and Esther Kaplan (WASHINGTON, D.C.)
Does Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin merely ask God for guidance, or does she believe she is carrying out divine will?
'The vote-for-this-because-God-says-so approach means that those who oppose a particular policy are violating God's will. It turns policy issues into religious conflicts.'
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was the star of the Christian Right’s 2008 Values Voter Summit in mid-September, even though she was a last minute no-show. The Republican vice presidential candidate’s name was tossed around frequently to euphoric applause at the event in Washington, D.C., while the few mentions of presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) drew only polite claps.
Topping the list of concerns at the conference were abortion and same-sex marriage, while other presentations sounded the alarm on the threats to God and country posed by stem cell research, immigration from Mexico, Islamic terrorists, secular public schools, sex education and liberals, in general.
Attendees knew the stakes for this election are high. The next president will appoint Supreme Court justices who will shape legal matters for decades, a point that was made repeatedly from the stage.
While some speakers outlined the political battles ahead in practical terms, others implied that this election reflected a culture war between godly Christians and the forces of Satan — embodied, of course, by Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and the Democratic Party.
One thing was clear: Many in the Christian Right now view electing Palin as a task ordained by God. The unanswered question for the rest of us is: How does Palin see herself? Is she someone who merely asks God for guidance — a fairly common practice for religious people in public office? Or does she see herself as carrying out God’s will on the political stage?
The latter would suggest a theocratic worldview that runs counter to the separation of church and state. But because she has so far declined most interviews, we’re left to sift through Palin’s political and religious history for clues.
Back in Wasilla
All of the four churches Palin has regularly attended as an adult fall on the right of the political spectrum, support conservative social policies — such as opposition to abortion and gay rights — and have ties to key institutions on the Christian Right, from Focus on the Family to Christians United for Israel. Some are pastored by men with strong dominionist leanings — a desire to bring government under the “dominion” of Christian theology.
One church Palin briefly attended is a nondenominational evangelical congregation, but the other three are Pentecostal, including the Wasilla Assembly of God, which Palin and her family joined when she was a child. She was baptized there at the age of 12 and remained a member until 2002, when she first ran for statewide office (in an unsuccessful bid for lieutenant governor).
Former Attorney General John Ashcroft is the most famous politician to come out of the Pentecostal tradition, which grew out of something called the Holiness Movement in the late 1800s.
Its churches are known for a lively and energetic style of worship. They also tend to be, like Ashcroft, theologically conservative and doctrinaire. Its followers have typically been “born again” as adults and are infused by the Holy Spirit during worship, manifested through dancing or speaking in tongues. They also tend to uphold rigorous traditional moral standards in the face of what they see as a sinful world, believe God’s will is revealed to believers through prayer and signs, insist on the importance of prophecy, and view the Bible as the literal word of God.
There are no indications that Palin is atypical in any of these particulars. Indeed, consistent with Pentecostal doctrine, she has taken positions in favor of outlawing abortion and same-sex marriage, as well as instituting abstinence-only education and the teaching of creationism in the public schools. And she has come close to attributing her election as governor to divine intervention, thanking a visiting pastor, Thomas Muthee of Kenya, for her win. “He just prayed for it,” she recalled earlier this year. “He said, ‘Lord make a way and let her do this next step.’ And that’s exactly what happened.”
The Assemblies of God — the fundamentalist denomination shared by Ashcroft and Palin — is generally extremely concerned with Jesus’ Second Coming and the construction of the Kingdom of God on Earth.
Ashcroft translated these beliefs directly into public life: One of his first acts as attorney general was to cover the exposed breast of the giant Spirit of Justice statue in the Justice Department’s Great Hall and to convene daily morning prayer meetings in his office.
More substantively, Ashcroft stepped up pornography prosecutions and tamped down prosecutions related to threats and violence directed at abortion clinics. Like Palin, Ashcroft opposed abortion even in the case of rape or incest. As a senator, he fought for what later became President Bush’s faith-based initiative, which channeled tens of millions of dollars into Christian Right organizations. As attorney general, he increased investigations of Muslim charities.
Palin’s own thin public record is less decisive: She campaigned for governor against benefits for same-sex partners, but once governor, she did not block implementation of a court ruling that ordered the state to provide such benefits. Nor has she tried to mandate the teaching of creationism or abstinence-only sex ed in Alaska’s schools.
But two incidents are troubling.
One is by now quite familiar: In 1996, Palin approached Wasilla’s librarian about whether she’d be willing to censor some books, possibly out of concern over a local pastor’s book arguing for acceptance of gay Christians. The librarian refused to countenance the idea, and a few months later, Palin sought to fire her (though community protest saved the woman’s job).
The second has received less attention: Last winter, when Vic Kohring, the state representative from Wasilla was convicted of bribery, Palin appointed an elder from Wasilla Bible Church to replace him. That man, Wes Keller, has since sponsored a bill to make performing late-term abortions a felony and introduced legislation lobbied for by the Alaska Family Council — a Focus on the Family affiliate — requiring public libraries to install filters to protect young people from “inappropriate” material.
In September, Keller told the Anchorage Daily News that he hopes to win legislation requiring that intelligent design be taught in public schools.
More information about Chip Berlet and Esther Kaplan
-
subscribe to print magazine
-
email this article to a friend
-
Reader Comments
-
register a new account »Posting Security
Appeared in the November 2008 Issue
Also featured
Russia’s Monroe Doctrine
An Unfolding Crisis in the Wake of Mississippi ICE Raid
The View From Ohio
Full contents
Previous issues
Subscribe and save!
