We don't talk politics and religion with each other ... why the hell not?

One of our cultural clichés oft-quoted is that we do not bring politics and religion into discussion when friends and family get together.

Why is that?

Is the implication that these topics invariably lead to disagreement and by extension serious disharmony?

Families should NEVER discuss politics and religion? If we do not, who should conduct that discourse for us?

Are we left then with having our only sources of information on politics and religion be those outside our circle of friends, the family culture to which we belong and the personal religious climate in which we live?

Must we form our religious and political opinions from someone else’s magic – someone else whom we assume is more knowledgeable, more spiritual or more “right on the money?”

Here we are stuck with partisan politics and partisan religion driving much of our national political disagreements. Some of our deepest personal convictions continue to be touched as we live in what has become an extremely confrontative and hostile national debate over policy and moral values.

One political perspective has consistently - if at times hypocritically - portrayed itself as standing for high moral value with emphasis on the family, on the sanctity of life, on all the things that Christian believers treasure most.

But it has also used the label "evil doers" quite freely and the label seems to be running loosely in more directions than just toward international terrorists.

Without defending one side against the other, I perceive that many in this country are guided by someone else's magic when it comes to things most treasured by believers.

Based on the mostly one-note talking point badgering of many who criticize the  current administration, are we to assume that the current leadership is somehow  against family values, the sanctity of life and, by extension, supportive of low morale values?

"Enemies of Christ or of God?"

Those labels have already been used by the extreme Christian Right as they've lobbied and campaigned around political issues.

Who really owns or monopolizes morality in this country?

Have we as a people relinquished our own personal authority to others with bigger and louder opinions who are justified in deciding for us what is moral?

... and who we should support?

If so, why have we done that?