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I don't believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute. The idea that the church can have no influence or no involvement in the operation of the state is absolutely antithetical to the objectives and vision of our country.
I believed what my father taught me about the separation of church and state, so when I was President I never invited Billy Graham to have services in the White House because I didn't think that was appropriate. He was injured a little bit, until I explained it to him.
There's no doubt that the Christian right has gone to bed with the more conservative elements of the Republican Party. And there's been a melding in their goals when it comes to the separation of church and state. I've always believed in the separation of church and state.
We have this idea in our minds that there's this separation of church and state in America, which I think is a good thing. And we extend that to our politics - not just church and state, but it's also there's a separation of religion and politics. But of course there isn't.
There are some who invoke separation of church and state - to try to get the government out of the business of morality - but this is antithetical to what the founders wanted. The founders wanted to keep theology out of government so that government could focus on the proper business of morality.
Each of us has the choice to attend the church we want to, or none at all. Separation of church and state allows for religions to have their own set of rules as to whom they will accept and who they won't, and the practices they support and the ones they don't. They will continue to be able to do so.
Ultimately, the court is heading to a doctrine of 'separation of campaign and state.' This doctrine, like separation of church and state or separation of military and civilian authority, is not explicit in the Constitution but flows naturally from its structure and commitment to freedom and democracy.
The 1950s felt so safe and smug, the '60s so raw and raucous, the revolutions stacked one on top of another, in race relations, gender roles, generational conflict, the clash of church and state - so many values and vanities tossed on the bonfire, and no one had a concordance to explain why it was all happening at once.
It is true that traditional Christianity is losing some of its appeal among Americans, but that is a religious, not political, matter. It is worth remembering that the Jeffersonian 'wall of separation' between church and state has always been intended to protect the church from the state as much as the state from the church.
I would bring a $100 bill, and I would say, 'Alright, first person' - and everybody has their iPhone - and I would say, 'First person to find in the Constitution the phrase 'separation of church and state' gets this $100 bill'... And you know what - and everybody knows that, right? - that phrase isn't in the U.S. Constitution. It's nowhere.
There's no question that a public official of either party can take it too far, and it's up to the candidate to be able to strike that balance, the balance that is the separation of church and state. The way I've always looked at this is that every candidate has a right to talk as much or as little about their faith as they deem appropriate.
Kennedy believed in religious liberty and the separation of church and state. He did not believe in the right of elected officials to impose their religious views on others. He was the first Catholic ever elected president, and he spent much of the 1960 campaign defending his religion and assuring voters he would not take orders from the Vatican.