A poll of more than 12,000 Americans taken last month by Pew Research reveals the vast gap between who President Biden says he is and what Americans believe to be true. He claims to be a “devout Catholic,” but only 13 percent of those polled believe him.
Nearly all of those polled (94 percent) said it is “very” or “somewhat” important to have a president who personally lives a moral and ethical life, while two out of three said it’s important for a president to “stand up for people with their religious beliefs.”
So, while half of those polled told Pew that it is “very” or “somewhat” important to have a president who personally has strong religious beliefs, just 13 percent of them believe Biden is very religious.
Among Democrats, less than one out of four think Biden is “very” religious, while almost no Republicans (three percent) hold that view.
Nearly nine out of ten (86 percent) of white evangelical Protestants have an “unfavorable” view of Biden, while three out of four of them hold a “favorable” view of Donald Trump. Even among Democrat or Democrat-leaning respondents, a third of them have an unfavorable view of Biden.
It’s no wonder. Biden has flipped positions on the Hyde Amendment (which bars the use of federal funds to pay for abortions) and the Mexico City Policy (which restricts taxpayer funding of abortions abroad). Months after flipping, Pope Francis publicly criticized Biden, arguing that his pronounced devotion to the Catholic faith and his pro-choice views displayed “incoherence.”
According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception.
From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person — among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.
The catechism quoted from the Holy Scriptures to support its position:
Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born, I consecrated you….
My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth.
It continued, “Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable.”
The Cambridge dictionary defines “devout” as “believing strongly in a religion and obeying all its rules or principles.” But, apparently attempting to straddle the middle, Biden rarely uses the word “abortion” but instead talks about a “remedial operation” in defending the Department of Defense abortion policy that forced Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) to hold up hundreds of military nominations.
But Biden, by his actions and not by his words, continues to promote the death of innocents. He has urged Congress to codify the faux “right” to abortion enshrined in Roe v. Wade, which the high court recently overturned. And he has vowed to veto any attempt by Republicans to pass a national ban on abortions.
Biden’s presidential campaign is attempting to turn his straddle into a political advantage. One of his campaign strategists told The Hill:
I think that the president approaches [the issue of abortion] from where he is, which is somebody who said that he’s not the most comfortable with the idea of abortion.
But I actually think that gives him an advantage with voters, which is: you don’t have to be comfortable with it, you don’t have to make that choice for yourself, but you should at least give people the freedom to make that choice if they want it.
Based on the latest Pew Research poll, this strategy of “defending the middle” isn’t likely to resonate favorably with voters come November.
