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Bush the Christian
Few Americans look beyond the headlines on the war in Iraq, but a lot of believers nonetheless have confidence that George Bush is doing the right thing there. After all, they say, "he’s such a good Christian."

The notion that Christian faith preserves us from error does run deep among some believers, and clearly Karl Rove expects them to be part of the 20 million evangelical votes he thinks George Bush needs to win in November. But their well-intentioned confidence overlooks the sober common sense of the church as it has been expressed over many centuries. John Henry Cardinal Newman put it as simply as anyone: "Being a great theologian doesn’t make you more holy. It only makes you more guilty when you sin." ...