I believe, after years of nauseating sanctimony from Christian soldiers in government, that this nation is hungry for candidates who speak about morality in an inclusionary rather than an exclusionary way--who appeal to and for a public and a civic morality that can be subscribed to by Americans of any or no religious belief.

It would be a tragedy if the "religious left," whose representatives are to be found mainly within the Democratic Party, tried to substitute its own theology for the theology of the "religious right" during the 2008 campaign. There is absolutely nothing wrong with candidate expressing their religious convictions whenever and wherever they choose, but it is profoundly wrong, and an insult to our constitutional traditions, for any candidate to use religion as a justification for government policies.

In his book God's Politics,Jim Wallis, an evangelical Christian who is extremely influential in Democratic circles, states flatly that President Bush is guilty of "bad theology" in his attitudes about war and social justice and that "the answer to bad theology is not secularism; it is good theology."

This is a genuinely dangerous idea, and it is irrelevant that I agree with Wallis on most political issues. The President of the United States is not elected to be theologian-in-chief. He is not God's representative on earth but the American people's representative on earth.

The great peril in citing religious rationales for any public course of action--say, ending the war in Iraq--is that there is always someone whose religion provides a rationale for doing the opposite. It is not enough for a candidate to tell Americans that God wants us to get out of Iraq, because it is just as easy for another candidate to tell voters that his God wants us in Iraq. In fact, that is what the current occupant of the White House has already done.

One of the worst effects of government by the "religious right" is that it has placed politicians who want to talk about reason on the defensive. Reason was not a dirty word to the founders, and it was not a dirty word to President John F. Kennedy, who made reason the cornerstone of his famous 1963 speech, at American University, calling for nuclear arms control negotiations with the Soviet Union. Speaking of peace as "the necessary rational end of rational men," Kennedy went on to declare that human "reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable--and we believe they can do it again."

I have worked up a little campaign speech, which I often deliver on the lecture circuit, summing up what my ideal candidate would say about the "religious issue." Any Democratic candidate today must challenge--as John Kerry failed to do--the slanderous right-wing assertion that respect for secular government means disrespect for religion.

I am taking for granted, in my theoretical stump speech, that the 2008 Democratic nominee will be a believer in God and a member of some church. Sadly, I think that Abraham Lincoln's refusal to join any church--he didn't believe that his personal faith had anything to do with church hierarchies--would probably disqualify him for either party's nomination today. Anyway, here's what my candidate would say:

"My fellow Americans, I stand before you as a candidate for the presidency of the United States, and I believe that it is my duty to share my views on the proper relationship between religion and government. For eight years, the president and his aides have tried to write their particular religious views into law and have suggested that anyone who disagrees with them is lacking in values and morality. This suggestion is an affront both to God and to a free people, and I will never insult your intelligence or your faith by claiming that I, or my government, speak for the Almighty.

"I believe in God, and I believe just as deeply in the separation of church and state that was America's founding gift, not only to its own citizens but to the world. I will never suggest that my policies are the right ones for our country because my God says so. I will never allow one form of religion to exercise a veto power over any policies that I believe to be in the best interest of all Americans.

"If you elect me, I pledge to you not miracles but a total commitment of my heart and mind to the hard work that lies before us all. Join with me as Americans--whether you are religious believers or religious skeptics--in this great enterprise. Forty-five years ago, President John Kennedy spoke of peace as 'the necessary rational end of rational men.' Today I stand before you and speak of peace, social justice, and human rights--at home and around the world--as the necessary rational ends of rational men and women."