***Please categorize as religion***
washingtonpost.com/opinions/pete-buttigieg-is-thinking-big-about-religion-and-politics/2020/01/16/a40eadd8-38a7-11ea-bf30-ad313e4ec754_story.html?outputType=amp
DES MOINES — If the 2020 presidential campaign has accomplished nothing else, it has revealed the extraordinary talent of Pete Buttigieg. Sitting in a sparse meeting room in a nondescript office park near the Des Moines airport, the 37-year-oldformer mayor of South Bend, Ind., seems entirely comfortable on the main stage of American politics. Some have likened his political skills to Bill Clinton’s. The better comparison is Tony Blair. Instead of empathetic warmth, the mayor displays earnest intellectual engagement and remarkable self-possession. His willingness to respectfully disagree comes across as a form of civility — a graciousness displayed through genuine discourse. On the morning after the last debate before the Iowa caucuses, on a day that brought four town hall meetings, our topic was religion and politics.
Buttigieg (himself an Episcopalian) is not merely using generic “God talk” to appeal to religious voters. His intention is both more specific and more ambitious. “The biggest thing I’m trying to accomplish is to be transparent about my worldview and my motivations,” he told me. But also: “We’ve reached a period where it’s almost assumed that faith connects you to the religious right. I think it is important to puncture that.”
The puncturing of religious presumption has a distinguished history (which includes the founder of Christianity). But it is hardly normal campaign fare. “I recognize,” he told me, “there are two different levels I’m talking about. The level where I insist that God doesn’t have a political party. And then a more focused level where controversial political beliefs are connected to my faith.” And his vision of faith, he affirms, “has progressive implications.”
The question for discussion is: How much of an asset is religion to Pete?
