Panel discusses influence of religion in upcoming elections

Religion and politics converged as four clergy members from different religious backgrounds, met to discus the November election's hot topics. \nThe debate focused on key election issues such as abortion, same-sex marriage, the president's faith-based initiatives and religion's role in deciding the necessity of war.\nThe debate was held in Woodburn Hall 101 and consisted of panelists Mother Linda Johnson, the Episcopal Chaplin to IU and the Associate Rector of Trinity Church; Reverend Rebecca Jimenez, the director of the Center for University Ministry; Matt Nussbaum, lead pastor of Exodus Church; and Rabbi Sue Shifron, executive director of the Helene G. Simon Hillel Center. \nThe debate was formatted to present the opinion of the panelists as well as incorporate audience participation. \nThe moderator, sophomore Joanna Blotner, presented a question and gave each panelist a chance to respond. After the panelists responded, the audience was then given a chance to ask the panelist questions about their response. \n"Overall the presentation was very good," Blotner said. "The panelists gave excellent remarks, better than what I expected."\nThe views the religious leaders held in common varied from question to question. \nOn the subject of same-sex marriage, Johnson, Jiminez and Shifron all were in favor of same-sex marriage, while Nussbaum was against this idea. \n"I would be in favor of gay marriage; I do believe that homosexuality is not a choice," Shifron said. \nOn the topic of abortion once again Johnson, Jimenez and Shifron all took a similar stance while Nussbaum was left to defend his anti-abortion view alone.\nThough three of the panelists were in agreement of not overturning Roe vs. Wade, their arguments for doing so differed.\n"In a liberal democratic state, no religion should be preferenced," Johnson said. "If there were to be an amendment to the Constitution to ban abortion that would be preferencing some religions over others," \nWhen asked if the War on Terrorism had become a manifestation of a religious war, each of the panelists had his or her own opinion on the president's correlation between religion and war.\n"We have preemptively invaded a sovereign nation and there is no one on the globe right now who can call us to high-moral virtues and I find that very sad," Jimenez said.\nThis was in sharp contrast to Nussbaum's views.\n"I think there is a time for a preemptive action to eliminate evil," he said. "I sure, wish somebody in the world would have done a preemptive invasion of Germany." \nTaking after the panelist's contradicting views, the students in attendance had differing views of the discussion as a whole.\n"I thought the overall flow of the conversation was stimulating," junior Colby Gray said. "But, it pained me to hear some of the things that came out of the clergy's mouth."\nHillel professional staff member Aaron Gottlieb had a different view of the panel, \n"I think it is interesting how similar their religious beliefs are, yet how different that makes their political views," Gottlieb said.\n-- Contact staff writer Amber Nicholas at amrnicho@indiana.edu.