Faith Abounds at the Democratic National Convention, But Don't Be Surprised

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Religion News Service | Aug 20, 2024

Sitting for an interview at the Republican National Convention in July, Caroline Sunshine, a communications staffer with former President Donald Trump’s campaign, laid plain what she thinks about Democrats and faith.

“I think the left is godless,” Sunshine told Fox News.

But that claim was hard to square with what happened Aug. 19, when the Democratic National Convention kicked off in Chicago. For several hours, speaker after speaker not only heaped praise on Democratic White House hopeful Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, but also referred to religion, Scripture and faith, with at least one supporter delivering a Bible-filled address pundits referred to as a “sermon.”

The faith-fueled messaging may have surprised some conservatives, but it’s hardly news to anyone who kept a close eye on liberals over the past decade or so. The Democratic Party, although home to a growing (and sizable) subset of religiously unaffiliated voters, remains majority religious and majority Christian, according to the Public Religion Research Institute. More to the point: Although people of faith have long been at home among its ranks, religious rhetoric at Democratic Party conventions has garnered more headlines in recent years, with the 2016 gathering featuring a primetime address from a prominent pastor and the 2020 event including an entire section dedicated to faith.

The easiest place to find religious references this year was at the bookends of the day’s session, when faith leaders offered invocations and benedictions. Opening and closing party business with prayers — including non-Christian ones — is a long-standing practice at American political party conventions, and the first night of this year’s DNC was no exception: The evening began with a prayer from Cardinal Blase Cupich, who oversees the Archdiocese of Chicago. He called on God to help Americans "truly understand and answer the sacred call of citizenship” and prayed for "peace — especially for people suffering the senselessness of war."

Cupich, who is one of multiple Catholic bishops who have prayed at Democratic conventions in recent years, closed by citing Pope Francis: He said Americans shouldn’t strive for a country that “narrows our national vision” but rather “dream dreams and see visions of what, by (God’s) grace, our world can become.”

Meanwhile, Monday night’s benediction featured a pair of faith leaders: Rabbi Michael S. Beals of Temple Beth El of Newark, Delaware, and Pastor Cindy Rudolph of Oak Grove AME Church of Detroit.

Beals recited blessings in both English and Hebrew, referring to President Joe Biden’s “selfless, effective public service,” Walz’s “joy” in “public discourse and policy” and a mention of freedom inspired by Harris’ campaign slogan. Rudolph, similarly, used Micah 6:8 — “Do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God” — to highlight the same three figures in her prayer.

“As we look upon our leadership, we see what you require of us: To do justice, like the justice Vice President Harris has championed her entire career,” Rudolph said. “To love mercy, like the mercy Governor Walz has modeled as a lifelong public servant and educator. And to walk humbly, like the humility President Biden has embodied with decades of outstanding servant leadership.”

Religion was also easy to find on the DNC’s main stage. Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, a member of the AME tradition, referenced 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 in his speech, noting, “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair.” Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, who attends a Disciples of Christ church, spoke of the golden rule and the parable of the good Samaritan while discussing the need for abortion access.

The most overtly religious language of the night came from arguably the most likely source: Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia, who is also the pastor of Atlanta’s historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, which was once the pulpit of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. Warnock made many appeals to Christianity, such as referring to voting as a “kind of prayer” and describing the unofficial motto of the U.S. — “E Pluribus Unum,” or "out of many, one" — as the “American covenant.”

Warnock also had harsh words for Trump’s use of the Bible, such as when the then-president brandished one after the clearing of Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C., in June 2020, or when he recently endorsed the “God Bless the USA Bible,” for which he reportedly earned at least $300,000 this year.

“I saw him holding the Bible, and endorsing a Bible as if it needed his endorsement — he should try reading it,” Warnock said of Trump. “It says do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God — he should try reading it. It says love your neighbor as yourself. It says inasmuch as you’ve done unto the least of these, you’ve done it also unto me.”

Warnock then called for people to care for one another, referring to several different groups — including Israelis and Palestinians, as well as people in Haiti, Congo and Ukraine — as “all God’s children.”

Even some of the speakers who didn’t front their faith credentials still emerged out of faith backgrounds. Bishop Leah D. Daughtry, who addressed the assembly as DNC Rules Committee co-chair, is also a pastor, and spoke out earlier this year alongside other Black Christian leaders who called for a cease-fire in Gaza. She brought up her faith in an interview with ABC on Tuesday, imploring her fellow Democrats of faith to “see the divine in each person” as well as find common ground with others who are not religious.

Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware, who spoke shortly before Biden took the stage, is a Presbyterian (PCUSA) and Yale Divinity School graduate. He pointed out during his address that he also spoke at the 2020 DNC about Biden’s Catholic faith.

Religion was even outside the assembly. According to the National Catholic Reporter, some of the pro-Palestinian demonstrators, including people affiliated with Christians for Ceasefire and Jewish Voice for Peace, cited their faith as inspiring them to join the thousands protesting in the city, as did several Muslim groups.

Looking ahead from Aug. 19, religion appeared likely to come up again in and around the convention hall. In addition to religion-themed side events, including the DNC’s own interfaith council, prime-time speakers such as former President Barack Obama, who is prone to reference Scripture in major speeches, and former Illinois Congressman Adam Kinzinger, a Republican and evangelical Christian who voted to impeach Trump, are likely candidates to make overtures to religion.

So too might Walz, who has referred to himself as a “Minnesota Lutheran,” or even Harris, a Baptist who launched her 2020 presidential campaign with a speech that included the line, “To love the religion of Jesus is to hate the religion of the slave master.”

But even if they haven't, religion was still likely to pop up several times by the time the DNC wrapped on Thursday, if for no other reason than to counter the religious rhetoric used by Republicans, some of whom have embraced Christian nationalism. Warnock spoke directly to the dynamic during an MSNBC interview on Aug. 20, bemoaning what he characterized as Trump “weaponizing the symbols of faith.”

“I think it’s important, particularly for those of us in the Democratic Party, to be full-throated in the ways our faith informs our values,” he said. “We’ve got to be full-throated in resisting this idea of Christian nationalism."

Jack Jenkins covers national issues for Religion News Service.