Members of the Democratic presidential ticket visited churches in the key swing states of Georgia and Michigan on Sunday. Vice President and presidential candidate Kamala Harris visited two churches, New Birth Missionary Baptist Church and Divine Faith Ministries International, in the Greater Atlanta area, while Minnesota Governor and vice presidential candidate Tim Walz visited Victorious Believers Ministries in Saginaw, Mich.

“The Republican Party is more likely to include religious believers,” observed Southern Baptist Theological Seminary President Al Mohler, but “yesterday it was the Democratic ticket that made news with both the presidential nominee and the vice presidential nominee pretty ostentatiously going to church.”

Politicians have taken their stump to the pulpit for years, even if the candidates themselves have thin religious convictions. Last January, President Joe Biden spoke from Martin Luther King, Jr.’s former pulpit, now occupied by Senator Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), about how to redeem the soul of America through social justice and civil religion.

“Even far earlier in most campaigns, you have presidential candidates who are pretty clear about claiming some kind of specific religious identity. And to be honest, they want to use that politically,” Mohler continued. “If you had a security camera outside America’s churches, you’re not likely to catch a surreptitious Vice President Harris or Former President Trump attending those services. When they attend now, it’s pretty ostentatious. … That’s pretty much true for politicians across the board.” (There are exceptions, of course.)

Even local news coverage seemed to recognize the dissonance of ecclesiastic electioneering that took place on Sunday. “Along with the weekly word, there was another message being sent, but not by a pastor,” recorded The Atlanta Voice. “With only 16 days until Election Day … Kamala Harris was in the pulpit preaching the power of the vote.”

“We face a question of, what kind of country do we want to live in?” Harris proclaimed. “A country of chaos, fear, and hate? Or a country of freedom, compassion, and justice? And the great thing about living in a democracy is that ‘we, the people’ have the power to answer that question.”

Harris also appealed to her memories of Christian teachings. “My earliest memories of those teachings are about a loving God — a loving God — (applause) — a God who asks us to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves and to defend the rights of the poor and the needy.” Proverbs 31:8-9 exhorts, “Open your mouth for the mute, for the rights of all who are destitute. Open your mouth, judge righteously, defend the rights of the poor and needy.”

“To invoke the Christian tradition’s care for those who cannot speak for themselves is deeply ironic,” David Closson, director of Family Research Council’s Center for Biblical Worldview told The Washington Stand. “Kamala Harris has been the most ardent supporter of abortion to run for president in the history of our republic. … Support for abortion is the antithesis of speaking up for the defenseless.”

Walz, meanwhile, urged politicians to practice Christian ethics instead of articulating Christian doctrine. “The folks don’t need a sermon from elected officials, but they should expect us to live one,” he said. “I recognize the separation from our secular from our spiritual side, but you can’t separate what you learned, and how you see people and how you care about people and worship and live your life.”

“Although inarticulately stated, Walz’s point about the difficulty of separating one’s faith commitments from one’s policy work is absolutely correct,” responded Closson. “However, it is worth noting that Walz’s party has championed the supposed separation of church and state for years.” He added that “the governor clearly tried to thread the needle between not offending a Democratic base that is increasingly secular and churchgoers.”

Although Walz acknowledged the interconnectedness of faith and politics, the church appearances only 16 days before Election Day seem more like an afterthought to a busy campaign, rather than a central feature. NBC News called this “a rare appearance” of religion amid “a presidential election that has dwelled less on candidates’ personal faiths than any in recent memory.” Indeed, Mohler said that “both sides seem basically to, at least, until this point, have been basically ignoring, say, church attendance as a matter of political attention.”

“But then, maybe, the vice president felt she had to go to church,” proposed Mohler. “Rather infamously now, last Thursday, a heckler cried out at one of her events, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and the vice president interrupted her remarks and responded, ‘Oh, you guys are at the wrong rally. No, I think you meant to go to the smaller one down the street.’ … It is interesting to see that, on the Democratic side, they decided yesterday to go to church. Just a coincidence.”

As The Washington Stand reported, the partisan crowd joined in Harris’s dismissal of hecklers, which — intentionally or otherwise — sent the message that those who profess Jesus as Lord are unwelcome in the Democratic Party of 2024. By contrast, when a heckler cried, “Jesus is king,” at a rally where Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance was speaking on Sunday, Vance responded, “That’s right, Jesus is king.”

Let no one misunderstand me as arguing that the Republican candidates are sincere Christians, while the Democratic candidates are posers. The Washington Stand has previously covered the faith backgrounds for both Harris and Walz. If Vance is a sincere Christian — which I don’t know — then he is “unequally yoked” (2 Corinthians 6:14) to a Hindu wife, who would certainly disagree with his confession that Jesus is king.

As for Trump, “there should be no delusion that, somehow, Donald Trump qualifies in any sense as an evangelical Christian,” Mohler declared. Even the mainstream media, which misunderstands Christianity in about every conceivable way, recognizes that “Trump’s coalition is powered in large part by evangelical Christians, but their support for him is based more on a shared political agenda than a spiritual connection.”

“In other words, they’re not church people. And that’s not really headline news,” Mohler summarized. “Politicians continue to act like politicians on both sides of the aisle. And [for them] going to church is a political act.”

However, it is noteworthy that politicians in both parties have sought to deemphasize their religious convictions, at least until the closing act. “I think it tells us something about the secularization of this country and about a major shift in the electorate,” suggested Mohler. According to Pew Research Center, 28% of American adults now identify as religiously unaffiliated, outnumbering either evangelical Protestants or Catholics. “An increasing number of Americans … not only have blended families,” Mohler added, but “we have religious mixing in a way that was inconceivable in previous generations.”

Politicians visiting fewer churches may suggest declining Christian influence in American civic life, but it may ultimately prove healthy for churches tasked with preserving the gospel of Jesus Christ. As noted above, politicians usually visit churches to campaign, not to worship. Their interest is in spreading their message about how their political program can provide temporary salvation to worldly problems.

But the church of Jesus Christ preaches a timeless gospel of eternal salvation from a deeper, spiritual problem. Our most pressing issue is not the economy, inflation, immigration, or even abortion, but the righteous wrath of God against our sin. The only way to be saved from this problem is by the grace of God, revealed in Jesus Christ for those who believe in him. Christian beliefs will inform their perspective on politics and move them to take action out of love of neighbor, but it should never allow a temporal political program to eclipse the one, true gospel.