President Bush once said that marriage is a sacred institution and should be reserved for the union of one man and one woman. If this is the case - and most Americans would agree with him on this - then I have to ask: Why is the government at all involved in marrying people?

Most of my fundamentalist brothers and sisters - and I am an evangelical, so I can say most of my fundamentalist brothers and sisters - are quite willing to pack women off and send them as missionaries to dangerous places where they might get killed.

Often, we ignore the fact that our spiritual condition and psychological state of mind are highly affected by what is happening to us physically. Sometimes depression is simply the result of exhaustion.

In America, evangelical churches have often been bastions of conservatism, providing support for the status quo.

I propose that the government should get out of the business of marrying people and, instead, only give legal status to civil unions.

The real problem that I think those of us who are evangelicals and Democrats have to face up to is that the political right controls the religious media.

Of the 22 industrialized nations of the world, we're dead last in per capita giving to poor people.