Edwards and the Christian Left

Following up to my previous post about the Edward's campaign's misstep:

Apparently the affair has upset some on the Christian Left. I really feel for these people--especially those that have been laboring for years in the fields of social justice.

"We're completely invisible to this debate," said Eduardo Penalver, a Cornell University law professor who writes for the liberal Catholic journal Commonweal. He said he was dissatisfied with the Edwards campaign's response. "As a constituency, the Christian left isn't taken all that seriously," Penalver said.

"We have gone so far to rebuild that coalition [between Democrats and religious Christians] and something like this sets it back," said Brian O'Dwyer, a New York lawyer and Irish-American leader who chairs the National Democratic Ethnic Leadership Council, a Democratic Party group. O'Dwyer said Edwards should have fired the bloggers. "It's not only wrong morally – it's stupid politically."

...O'Dwyer e-mailed a statement to reporters saying: "Senator Edwards is condoning bigotry by keeping the two bloggers on his staff. Playing to the cheap seats with anti-Catholic bigotry has no place in the Democratic Party."

The Christian Left has led the way for many years in the Democratic Party, some are alive today that spoke up and stood up and marched in the 1950s and 1960s civil-rights era. Hated and vilified by the Dixiecrats, they stuck to their beliefs and were vindicated when the nation had a change of heart. They have been a conscience to the party (and at the best of times to the entire country.)

And now some nasty little haters have stepped in and not only taken a high place at the table, but taken it after shouting that the Religious have no real place at the table.

I do disagree with much of the Christian Left and I speak out when I feel that they are missing the mark. But I am glad that they do not seemed to be disheartened. We need their voices, now more than ever, on the other side of the aisle.