This Week In God (Maddow Blog)

"First up from the God Machine this week is the prospect of a religio-political breakthrough in the 2016 presidential election, which hasn’t yet generated much attention.

In American history, just about every president has been a Protestant of one form or another, except John F. Kennedy, who was Roman Catholic. (I say “just about” because labeling Thomas Jefferson’s faith gets a little tricky.) But the Washington Post reported this week that Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has the potential to bring some diversity to that group – possibly in more ways than one.

First, Sanders would be our first Jewish president. And second, while Sanders is culturally Jewish, he has said that he’s “not particularly religious” and has been described by some as agnostic.

Asked during an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel’s show [on Oct. 22] whether he believed in God, Sanders demurred.

Sanders doesn’t dodge many questions, but when the ABC late-night host asked the senator whether he believes in God, Sanders replied, “I am who I am, and what I believe in and what my spirituality is about, is that we’re all in this together. That I think it is not a good thing to believe that as human beings we can turn our backs on the suffering of other people…. This is not Judasim. This is what Pope Francis is talking about – that we cannot worship just billionaires and the making of more and more money. Life is more than that.”

It’s worth emphasizing that the Vermont Independent has not identified himself as an atheist. On the contrary, as the Post’s piece noted, Sanders told USA Today in September, “I believe that there is a connection between all living things, and that my belief in God requires me to do all that I can to follow the ‘Golden Rule,’ to do unto others and as I would have them do unto me.”



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the whole shebang

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/week-god-103115?cid=sm_fb_maddow