Insulting

It is tiring and insulting to deal with the common premise that every American is a practicing Christian.  For example, in Mitt Romney's recent speech defending his Mormon beliefs to an audience of solidly right-wing conservative evangelical Christian Republicans, his language of inclusion contained no mention of those who by choice or inclination cannot believe in the Christian God.  He even invoked the Founding Fathers in an attempt to explain why he would feel comfortable bringing a devoutly pious perspective to the presidency, were he to attain it.  Indeed, Thomas Paine, the most radically free-thinking of the men considered the authors of the nation, was reviled and despised by his peers.  But the men who attended the Constitutional Convention and argued over the form of American government were sons of the Enlightenment.  To varying degrees, as a group they expressed many ideas that seem to put them solidly in line with Deist or humanist principles.  Romney also quotes Lincoln, a man that the Christians seem compelled to convert to their cause, but a man who did not practice religion in his adult life.

Now, I don't believe that Romney is doing anything more than pandering to certain powerful interests in the Republican party, nor do I believe that the United States is brimming over with rabid, dogmatic, fundamentalist Bible-thumpers, but the fact remains that our public discourse certainly implies that it is.  Lack of belief in the "Christian" god is an insurmountable obstacle to election.  Today, Lincoln would have been scorned and mercilessly attacked by political opponents for his lack of faith, or even just his lack of publicly displayed faith.