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Being in the 18% of Evangelical Christians who did not vote for George Bush in 2004, I find the intersection of religion and politics to be fascinating. My faith is deeply entwined with my politics, but unlike many Christians, I refuse to let one or two hot button issues define the morally correct side of politics. I do wish we could lessen the number of abortions (although I believe making it illegal is a very foolish way to do this), but this one issue does not make the Republicans a Christian party. Issues of justice (poverty, pollution's disproportionate affect on the poor and people of color, the marginalization of groups of people (the poor, people of color, gay or transgendered people, women), general environmental quality, an end to violence) are major religious issues too. Michelle Boorstein does an excellent job summarizing the discontent with the GOP in the article:
Pollsters and political scientistssay some religious voters who supported Bush now feel discouraged, either by the war in Iraq , or by the rich-poor gap, or because they feel he didn't go far enough on the hot-button social issues they cared about, such as abortion and gay marriage. And new issues have risen in importance for religious voters that are not seen as GOP priorities, such as the environment.