As Tom Krattenmaker put it in his recent Religion News Service article (ref.), “In about the clearest light imaginable, the situation demonstrates how far our national politics have fallen behind our demographics, and how far the nascent secular movement has to go before it wields political clout commensurate with its numbers.” Tom was speaking in general about current sitting politicians ignoring the broader secular community (and voting bloc) as well as this weekend’s Reason Rally being held on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. The same could be said about Connecticut’s governor, Dannel P. Malloy.
For being one of the country’s most progressive governors, Malloy is still a mystery when it comes to the burgeoning secular demographic in his own state. Connecticut was recently ranked the 47th most religious state in the country in a February 2016 Pew Poll and Gallup has Connecticut’s population at 39% non-religious in their February 2016 Poll. Somehow Governor Malloy refuses to to acknowledge this massive demographic with either a Darwin Day proclamation (refused 3 years in a row) or a National Day of Reason proclamation (refused 2 years in a row). Yet Malloy will kowtow to the minority Evangelical Christians in the state by issuing a National Day of Prayer proclamation (issued 3 years in a row).
The National Day of Prayer Task Force website boldly boasts that it “exists to communicate with every individual the need for personal repentance and prayer, to create appropriate materials, and to mobilize the Christian community to intercede for America’s leaders and its families. The Task Force represents a Judeo-Christian expression of the national observance, based on our understanding that this country was birthed in prayer and in reverence for the God of the Bible.” Really? The cognitive dissonance must be killing the governor.
It goes without saying that Tom Krattenmaker hit the nail on the head in his article… We have our work cut out for us. But we will feel replenished and re-energized after coming back from the Reason Rally this weekend and we plan on re-doubling our efforts to be recognized by our elected officials.
e pluribus unum