Here's a follow-up discussion to the Evangelicals thread. Link
...Democratic candidates would pick up votes and enthusiasm from faith voters just by explicitly connecting their policy priorities with the priorities, values, and interests of religious communities, but they should also be responsive to areas of concern and disagreement. The party’s ever-leftward, ever-symbolic, and ever-antagonistic policy approach on social issues must be tempered to win the votes of disaffected religious voters in the Trump era.
This does not mean the party must become pro-life, or that the party must move an inch on supporting LGBT rights. Critics of Democratic faith outreach, on both the right and the left, who suggest this is the only alternative to ignoring faith voters have their own interests and are comfortable with the status quo that leads to purity for Democrats and victory for Republicans.
On abortion, one path forward is for the party to reverse its change to the platform on the Hyde Amendment, and return to focusing its argument on the idea that abortion should be legal, rather than a social good that should be encouraged. Instead of viewing Republican extremism as an excuse to move to the left on abortion in 2016, Democrats could have appealed to the broad middle by claiming the historic reduction of the abortion rate under President Obama as a Democratic success story. Unfortunately, the most political, vehement pro-choice advocates do not want Democrats to applaud the reduction in the abortion rate, because they are afraid the American people will then value lowering the abortion rate as an end in and of itself. Well, again, sometimes the interests of advocacy groups will not align with the interest of the Democratic Party or our national politics. How can we let parochial political calculations prevent us from pointing to the data, and saying out loud that a lower abortion rate is a positive development any moral society should embrace?
On religious freedom, Democrats should draw clear lines where they can to stem the fear-mongering that flourished in 2016 because of their silence. Democrats should rule out taking away church’s tax-exempt status. Democrats should make clear that religious institutions should be allowed to organize around their faith without government interference. They should be clear that just as George W. Bush never threatened the religious freedom of churches who supported same-sex marriage in 2004 while he was campaigning for a federal marriage amendment, Democrats do not believe the government’s role is to coerce ecclesial transformation on questions of LGBT inclusion. This is what the separation of Church and State demands. Wherever individual Democratic politicians stand on religious freedom in the context of LGBT rights, the essential and responsible action is for all Democrats to explicitly, clearly draw the line somewhere....
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