Amidst the vast variety of religious identities claimed by Americans, one label just doesn’t seem to sit well–atheism. In national surveys–including large samples of the American population taken in 2001 and 2007–very few people claim not to believe in a god or some divine power. It’s usually no more than 1 percent who so describe themselves. And the proportion would be even smaller when it comes to people who seek a public role in political life.

Other surveys–the ones that probe Americans’ opinions about religion and politics–typically find an outright majority of Americans say they would never vote for an atheist. There’s nothing particularly new about that: Indeed, it was our first president, George Washington, who once said that personal religious belief was an essential if individuals were to possess the “virtue” necessary to govern themselves in a republic. Ever since, it has been exceptionally rare for any politician to assert that he or she lacks some form of religious identity. Doing so would be the equivalent of swallowing political poison.

And because of that, it’s rare to hear of a candidate being called an atheist, even by his or her opponent. That’s not to say it can’t happen. Throughout his campaign for the White House in 1800, Thomas Jefferson was repeatedly accused of being an “infidel” by supporters of his opponent, John Adams, then the incumbent president who had strong backing from New England’s clergy. Jefferson won; still, the calumny he endured stung him personally.

This week, another politician found herself accused of atheism, this time in the hard-fought contest for a U.S. Senate seat in North Carolina. The incumbent, Republican Elizabeth Dole, unleashed a television advertisement against her Democratic challenger, State Senator Kay Hagan, accusing her of having ties to an organization called “Godless Americans.” Hagan took the charge seriously enough to strike back hard on two fronts. She put out her own commercial, unequivocally stating that she believed in God and had taught Sunday School. And she also took the matter to court, filing a defamation suit against Dole.

It may help to know here that North Carolina has long been considered part of America’s Bible Belt, where evangelical Protestantism is dominant and religious belief and practice is widely considered even more important than in other regions. Is it a place where an accusation of a weak or non-existent religious belief could pass unchallenged in politics? As Hagan has shown, the answer is emphatically no.

As I noted in a previous posting, the religious/political landscape can be highly dynamic in the United States when it comes to how broad religious groups seem to side with political parties. Yes, as I said earlier, the Mormons tend to vote Republican, as African-American Protestants tend to be reliable Democrats.

But that evidence of stability should not obscure larger changes in the political affiliation of religious groups. The biggest of these shifts has occurred over the last three decades and can be described in three parts. First and foremost, white, evangelical Protestants–a group that comprises more than 20 percent of the population–steadily moved from mainly supporting Democrats for president in the 1970s to going overwhelmingly for Republican presidential candidates in the last two elections, an obvious benefit to the current incumbent President George W. Bush. Evangelicals are generally defined by their regard for the Bible as their highest authority and their experience of being “born-again”–that is, making a conscious decision to accept Jesus as their savior.

Secondly, non-Latino Roman Catholics, another once-reliable Democratic constitutency, moved toward the center, to the point that those Catholics–another fifth or more of the electorate–now reflect American voters in general. That is, if a Republican wins the election, analysis of the results finds that a majority of non-Latino Catholics supported him; if it is a Democrat who wins, it is with the same Catholic majority. That pattern has held true since the early 1970s.

Finally, in the third trend, mainline Protestants–Episcopalians, Methodists, Presbyterians–have become slightly less Republican in their voting preferences than they were three decades ago.

Where are these groups now, with the 2008 presidential election only a week away? Well, an answer may come from a survey released a week ago by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. The center reported that according to its polling between October 16 through 19, evangelicals favored Senator John McCain, the Republican candidate, by 67 percent to 24 percent for the Democratic candidate, Senator Barack Obama. (Notably, this is a smaller percentage than the proportion of evangelicals who supported Bush in 2004.) Non-Latino white Catholics were supporting Obama 49 percent to 41 percent for McCain. And mainline Protestants were backing Obama, too, albeit by a slightly smaller percentage, 48 to 43.

Will those numbers hold? We’ll know soon enough.

With only a week left to go in a very long presidential campaign, pollsters are working intensely to gain a clear sense of voters’ moods. With something like 200 million Americans aged 18 and older scattered among 50 states, no shortage of ways exist for professional politcal surveyors to take apart and examine the electorate.

Unsurprisingly–in a population that values religious identity–one way is to study how people affiliated with a particular religious group vote.

The results can affect the electoral map, a crucial consideration given that the U.S. Constitution ensures that presidents are elected by a majority of votes assigned to the states. In setting up the Electoral College–which these days assigns 55 votes to California and eight to South Carolina, for example–the nation’s Founders ensured that no American president would be directly elected by a simple popular majority. The race between major party candidates is to see who can get a minimum of 270 electoral votes.

How does religion play into this? Well, the members of some faith groups tend to be more closely identified with a particular party than those in others.

Take the Mormons, for example. Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints tend to vote Republican in a greater proportion than almost any other major religious body. And that matters in states where there are high concentrations of the church’s members–in Utah, home to the church’s headquarters (5 electoral votes), Idaho (4 electoral votes) and Nevada (another 5). Of those three, only one–Nevada–has lately been identified as a “battleground state,” for grabs between the campaigns of Senator Barack Obama, the Democrat, and Senator John McCain, the Republican. Nevada’s status as a poltical “toss-up” has much to do with a recent and ongoing influx of Latinos, a largely Roman Catholic group who tend toward the Democrats.

If Mormons have a counterpart in party loyalty, it may be among African-American Protestants, who in a higher proportion than any other religious group, trend Democratic. Their numbers in certain big metropolitan areas–southeastern Pennsylvania, northeastern Ohio, southeastern Michigan and the swath of Maryland that connects Baltimore with Washington’s northern suburbs, to name a few–gives Democratic politicians a solid leg up in any contest.

But the religious/political landscape is hardly as static as that might make it appear. If anything, some major changes have taken place in recent years that have deeply affected politics in the United States. But that will be the subject of my next post.

Earlier today, I received an e-mail from a former student, telling me she would be performing classical South Indian dance in an upcoming student festival. Her plans seemed fully appropriate, as the festival will celebrate Diwali, a major Hindu holiday, organized at my university by the Hindu Student Council.

The announcement got me thinking: What, these days, should we call an American religious holiday? To many people who associate the United States with its largest faith group, the answer’s easy–Christmas. Well, yes, December 25 marks the day Protestants and Roman Catholics celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. But although those groups do, when taken together, make up a solid majority of the American population, Christianity has never been the sole religious identity to be found within America’s spiritual landscape. After all, Jews have been part of the American scene for more than 350 years.

My university (and many other educational institutions, too) shuts down to allow Jewish students to observe Yom Kippur, the 24-hour period of fasting that is the holiest day in Judaism’s calendar. And we recognize Eid ul-Fitr, which concludes the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, a time of dawn-to-dusk fasting that for Muslims forms one of their faith’s Five Pillars, which set it apart from all others. There are students and faculty who celebrate other days vital to their faiths, for example, in Buddhism, Sikhism, Native American traditions.

None of this makes Syracuse unusual. Other educational institutions exist (and other cities, too) in the United States where other traditions are observed, or where there are considerably larger groups to do the celebrating. In each case, there lies an opportunity to feel a connection to a wider community. Protestants and Catholics who celebrate Christmas (along with Orthodox Christians, too, on a somewhat different calendar) know they do so with Christians worldwide. Jews in Syracuse who mark the High Holidays know their counterparts in Europe, Russia, Latin America and Israel are doing the same.

If I needed to be reminded of this, it came earlier this week through a colleague with deep connections to India, who was thinking about Diwali, and, in particular, how people in the Indian state of Bihar might face the challenge of fully celebrating it. Diwali is a multi-day festival involving the kindling of lights to remind celebrants of the victory of good over evil. Because important elements of the festival traditionally take place in the home, my colleague said, she feels a particular concern for the estimated millions rendered homeless in Bihar by massive floods several weeks ago. Based on material she showed me, a relief effort is underway for those families, but one that, like so many, could probably use more help. For my colleague, the imminent arrival of Diwali, here in the United States (now home to at least 1 million Hindus) as well as in Bihar, makes it all the more possible to be conscious of other people’s plight. In the holiday itself lies a global connection.

We’re excited to announce that R. Gustav Niebuhr, Associate Professor in Religion & the Media at Syracuse University in New York, will be a guest blogger for a full week here at the Talking Faith blog starting today.

With over a 20-year career in journalism, most recently at the New York Times and, prior to that, at the Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and the Atlanta Journal/Constitution, Niebuhr has established a reputation as a leading writer about American religion. He’ll talk about religion and the election, and some upcoming religious holidays.

Do you have questions for Professor Niebuhr about religion in U.S. Society? Just leave us a comment here and we’ll try to get them answered.

Yom Kippur, known as the Jewish day of atonement, begins at sundown October 8 for Jews in the United States and throughout the world. President Bush, in a message on October 7, said “From the time the Kol Nidre is recited until the Shofar is sounded, Jews around the world will draw nearer to God through acts of atonement, fasting, and prayer.”

Some residents in the United States who can’t attend services at a Synagogue, for various reasons like age or infirmity, will be able to hear the Kol Nidre (the prayer sung at the beginning of the service on the eve of Yom Kippur) and the Shofar (a horn used to sound the end of Yom Kippur) over the radio or on the Internet. An interesting article from Rochester, New York’s Democrat and Chronicle newspaper, For many Rochester-area Jews, technology sustains Yom Kippur tradition, says that congregations are increasingly using the internet, radio, and social networking Web sites such as Facebook to connect to congregants.

Synagogues are not alone – many Churches and Mosques are also Going High Tech, as we’ve reported earlier.

So here’s my question to you: Does technology interfere with traditional religious worship, or is it a benefit to congregations?

In the United States and other countries throughout the world, Jews are observing the High Holy days – ten days that begin with the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah and end with Yom Kippur.  

Today I was reading a blog posting by the producer of Speaking of Faith (a U.S. public radio weekly program on religion) about the soundtrack to a episode about the “Days of Awe” another name for the High Holy Days. Producer Colleen Scheck talked about music celebrating the Days of Awe that included a contemporary jazz composition about Rosh Hashanah, a song about a Psalm based on a 1960’s Jamaican reggae trio, and a song sung by a former Hollywood actress turned cantor.

It got me thinking: what’s the role that music plays in religion? Whether the call of the muezzin, hymns at a church, or the cantor in a temple, what is it about music and song that evokes a spiritual feeling in many?

The composer Johann Sebastian Bach said:

“The aim and final end of all music should be none other than the glory of God and the refreshment of the soul.”

What do you think?

You can listen to the music mentioned above here.

Guest blogger Jenan Mohajir is extensively involved with the Muslim community through several grassroots initiatives in Chicago, Illinois. She currently serves as the program associate for the Outreach Education & Training program at the Interfaith Youth Core, where her primary focus is on building relationships between the Muslim community and the Interfaith Youth Movement. She received her Bachelor’s in Elementary Education from DePaul University in 2002 with a concentration in Islamic Studies. Jenan is originally from India and grew up in Qatar and the United States.

Prayer beads, iridescent by day, glowing green by night. They waited every night by his pillow, for the early hour when his withered fingers would reach for them. He had bought them while returning from prayer in the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. He was my Nana; he was my grandfather.

For as long as I can remember, my grandfather would recline in his chair next to the open door of our home in India, his eyes cast upon the main gate, his lips softly moving, and his fingers, gently keeping count of his supplications on his beloved prayer beads. Their green glow helped his aging eyes find them when he woke in the early hours of dawn to begin the routine of his morning prayer, which he read in all three different languages that he spoke: Arabic, Urdu and Tamil.

And for many, many years, every morning, his beads never left him.

When he passed away a few years ago, I inherited his prayer books and his beloved prayer beads. For a long time they just sat on my book shelf. But today they sit on my nightstand by my Quran. Some nights, I fall asleep with them near me, only to find them tangled in my fingers when I wake the next morning.

For many years during my childhood, my parents would fly us back to India to celebrate Eid-ul-fitr, the first of the two major Muslim holidays, with our grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. Eid-ul-Fitr, celebrated by Muslims all over the world, commemorates the end of Ramadan, the holy month of fasting. One particular Eid-ul-Fitr in my childhood resonates with me. On the eve of the holiday, I had spent the night watching the FIFA World Cup finals with my grandfather. We both could barely contain ourselves all day in anticipation of the game. While my mother and grandmother spent the day preparing all of the traditional holiday treats, my Nana and I discussed the possibilities of Argentina defeating Germany and winning the world cup. Would they have a lead early in the game? Would Maradona kick the winning goal with seconds to spare?

The game finally began in the late hours of the night, with my grandfather planted on his favorite chair, wearing his signature white t-shirt and plaid blue lungi (which looks like a longer, wrap-around version of a Scottish kilt), his walking stick close by, and his prayer beads in hand. I sat on the couch next to him, sporting my fabulous purple pajamas. For the next several hours we sat anxiously following the soccer ball back and forth across the screen of our modest TV screen. We cheered when the teams scored and we ate grilled corn-on-the-cob brushed with lime and red chili powder.

When I think about Eid-ul-fitr, and my family’s traditions that surround our holidays, I remember memories like this one. And it’s not a memory of traditional family celebrations unique to a specific culture, or to any one particular part of the world. Instead, it is a recollection of my eight year old self sharing some fond memories with my late grandfather. And then it occurred to me – that’s exactly what celebrating Eid is about – making memories with the people we love.

Guest blogger Moustafa Moustafa, a junior in the Honors College at the University of Michigan studying Islamic Spain, talks about service to others during Ramadan.  Moustafa is currently a fellow at  the Interfaith Youth Core. Originally from Egypt  he has lived in the United States since the age of eight. After college, Moustafa plans to go to medical school.  

Islam commands Muslims to live the very best life they are capable of leading—to constantly strive to attain beautiful manners and character, to uphold the prayer, to enjoin in what is good and forbid what is evil, to struggle—perform jihad ul nafs—against the self and elementary desires. Yet for many, to live a life of such constant struggle—a life of perfection is very difficult, if not impossible. Ramadan offers a window, a finite space in time during which the Muslim can strive a little extra towards a life of righteousness. A life which is not only filled with prostration, but time spent in service to others. The Prophet (peace be upon him) said, “The best among you is the most beneficial to mankind.” Fasting trains both the body and the self to be patient, to persevere humbly and quietly through hunger and want, allowing one to focus more on doing good in this world. What I find is that Ramadan leaves me changed. Just as the hand that is subject to constant friction becomes rough and calloused, so I find my self, after Ramadan, toughened against temptations and strengthened with patience. It is a holy time, chosen from the other months of a year like certain men were chosen from among others to become prophets or like certain land was chosen from the rest of the earth to be deemed holy.

Ramadan offers me a time to live my Islam as much as possible. It is reported that the companions of the Prophet sometimes used to take years to memorize chapters in the Quran that can be memorized in a matter of weeks. This was so because they not only memorized, but implemented in their lives every verse they learned before moving on to the next. I often find that there is so much confusion regarding religion and worship. There is often the idea that being religious means only praying a lot or that fasting embodies only the abstention from food and drink and temptation. Yes, that is certainly part of the Muslim definition of worship, but there is so much more. There is a verse in the Quran that speaks of righteousness:

Righteousness is not turning your faces towards the east or the west. Righteous are those who believe in God, the Last Day, the angels, the scripture, and the prophets; and they give the money, cheerfully, to the relatives, the orphans, the needy, the traveling person, the beggars, and to free the slaves; and they observe the Contact Prayers (Salat) and give the obligatory charity (Zakat); and they keep their word whenever they make a promise; and they steadfastly persevere in the face of persecution, hardship, and war. These are the truthful; these are the righteous. (Quran, 2:177)

Ramadan is about fasting, prayer, and worship, yes, but a heightened religiosity also means Muslims are more active in service to others during this month, spending time and money on the poor, the sick and the orphaned. The Quran describes these people as righteous, saying, “And they give food, in spite of their love for it, to the Miskin (the poor), the orphan, and the captive (saying): “We feed you seeking God’s Face only. We wish for no reward, nor thanks from you.” (76:8, 9)

My memories of Ramadan are filled with recollections of brotherhood and sisterhood and laughter over fancy feasts, made all the more memorable by delicious aromas of Desi spices and happy sights of mounds of rice and lamb and desserts of every color. I recall the mosques being packed with rows of people standing in prayer throughout the night, enjoying the fatigue and pain incurred because it is for the sake of God alone. But above all I remember the generosity of Muslims during this holy month. Every night, trays upon trays of food are donated to the needy. Indeed, people compete over who can feed the most people during this month, driven by a belief that he is best who is most beneficial to mankind. There is a story in our tradition in which a man asks the prophet Moses to pray to God to give this man all of his wealth at once. Prophet Moses is at first hesitant, wondering why one would want his lifetime’s wealth all at once. However, after insistence by the man he agrees and makes the prayer. He returns many years later and asks the whereabouts of this man to which people reply that he lives in a mansion on the outskirts of town. When he had gotten his wealth, he used the money to feed and house orphans, and continued to do so with any additional wealth with which he was blessed. Confused, Moses (peace be upon him) communicated with God and asked him how this man continues to have wealth, to which God gave a most profound answer. He asked, “Do you think I will allow my servant to be more generous than I?”

Guest blogger Jenan Mohajir is extensively involved with the Muslim community through several grassroots initiatives in Chicago, Illinois. She currently serves as the program associate for the Outreach Education & Training program at the Interfaith Youth Core, where her primary focus is on building relationships between the Muslim community and the Interfaith Youth Movement. She received her Bachelor’s in Elementary Education from DePaul University in 2002 with a concentration in Islamic Studies. Jenan is originally from India and grew up in Qatar and the United States.

I remember my first attempt at fasting during Ramadan when I was ten years old. I hadn’t eaten all day and decided to sit at the dinner table watching the food, as if somehow gazing at my mother preparing family delicacies would magically make the time fly by faster. I debated sneaking a samosa, a savory potato filled fried pastry, under the table. I gestured for my best friend, a Catholic, to join me; she had come to celebrate the end of my first fast with me.

Growing up, I never really understood the meaning of fasting. I knew we were trying to put ourselves in the shoes of the less fortunate, and that fasting increased our awareness of the importance of giving to others. But the question remained: What is the significance of Ramadan to me, a young, curious American Muslim girl growing up in an culturally Muslim family in Chicago?

As I grew into my adolescence, I came upon bigger questions of Islam my parents could not answer. I grew out of my childhood faith. Fasting became a somewhat mundane ritual, the one connection to my quickly disappearing Muslim identity.

Many years later, in the spring quarter of my freshman year in college, I met my friend Melissa, who had recently converted to Islam. I realized that she knew more about Islam after two weeks of being Muslim than I had learned in eighteen years.  And I was inspired by all that she knew.

Over the next few months, I found a faith that helped me examine all the questions I had once upon a time as a curious child and a faith that helps me navigate the complexities of adulthood.

In Islam, I also found an outlet for my love and commitment to social justice and a hunger to understand all faiths more deeply. Two years ago, I took a job that honored both my love and my hunger.  I began working at the Interfaith Youth Core, a Chicago non-profit that strives to inspire a different kind of conversation about religion among young people — one that focuses on building relationships nurtured by the values we share across faiths to create a global community.

I had been at Interfaith Youth Core for less than a month when we greeted the arrival of Ramadan two years ago. Suddenly, I found myself speaking to groups of people around Chicago about the significance of Ramadan. I could see my younger self in the excited faces and hear my younger self in the curious questions of the kids with whom I spoke. I was answering those same questions that I had once asked over samosas as we broke fast.

Yet my first Ramadan as a practicing Muslim was a challenge. I wanted my Ramadan to be more than abstaining from food and water, but I was lost. When I confessed my struggle to my best friend, the one with whom I had sat waiting to break my fast for the very first time many years ago, she asked me: “Well, what did Muhammad do during Ramadan?” I did not have the answer to her question.

I started reading about the Prophet Muhammad and filled my hunger with stories from his life. I learned that it was during this month that the Quran, the holy book for Muslims, was first revealed to the Prophet. I learned that he spent his days in service to others, and his nights in worship. I learned that in Ramadan he recommended that we refrain not only from food, but also fast from anger and discontentment. He taught us how to be good hosts, how to show compassion to those around us, how to enjoin good and justice.

This year Ramadan has arrived once again bearing sweet gifts for the soul – a guest with blessings to host in our lives, our homes and our mosques. And though my learning will never be over, I have finally learned how to celebrate fully. I will spend these days with my whole community - from my best Catholic friend from childhood to my Conservative Jewish coworker to my brothers and sisters in Islam – in service, in reflection, in worship.