By Aaron Good

In an election season where jobs and the economy are consistently cited as the most important issues for voters, it is surprising to see issues of church-state separation making front page headlines. Nonetheless, the past few weeks have been colored by the debate between President Obama and Catholic leaders over the contraception coverage mandate. Even after Obama's "compromise" allowed employers with religious objections to opt out of providing birth control while also allowing women to receive it directly from their health provider, the Religious Right has been eager to keep this issue in the national spotlight. This continues, despite the now-commonly cited fact that 98 percent of women, including Catholics, have used birth control.

Recently, issues of religious liberty were pushed even further into the spotlight when Republican nomination contender Rick Santorum said, "I don't believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute." Regarding John F. Kennedy's landmark 1960 speech defending this principle, he stated, "You know, that makes you want to throw up." Then, Monday morning, he attempted to walk back these statements by saying, "I'm for separation of church and state. The state has no business telling the church what to do." He went on to connect his statements back to the contraceptive mandate issue.

However, Rick Santorum is by no means alone in his challenge of the separation of church and state. Referring to the supposed secularization of the country, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said on Sunday, "You have elites in the bureaucracy, elites in the judgeship, frankly, elites in the news media, elites in the academic world, and elites in politics ? and they would all like to impose on us an America that none of us believe in."

In fact, every contender for the GOP ticket has spoken out against strict interpretation of the separation of church and state. In a 2009 speech, Mitt Romney said, "The founders proscribed the establishment of a state religion, but they did not countenance the elimination of religion from the public square." In 2003, Ron Paul wrote, "The notion of a rigid separation between church and state has no basis in either the text of the Constitution or the writings of our Founding Fathers." Apparently they are forgetting that Thomas Jefferson, principal author of the Declaration of Independence and original advocate for the Bill of Rights, was the person who originally coined the phrase "separation of church and state."

Meanwhile, President Obama's record on church-state separation is riddled with holes. He was quick to compromise on the contraceptive mandate issue, allowing employers to impose their religious beliefs on employees. He attended the National Prayer Breakfast earlier this month, where he spoke about how his religious beliefs have influenced his political views. He has continued and expanded President Bush's "Faith-Based Initiative."

Assuming they all want to get elected, these presidential hopefuls seem to think that the American public is opposed to the strict separation of church and state. However, a recent poll confirms just the opposite. In fact, 67 percent of Americans do agree with a strict interpretation of the separation of church and state, while only 28 percent oppose it.

Right now, the strong majority is being drowned out by the louder voices of the Religious Right. It is time that the majority of Americans, those of us who do support the essential constitutional principle of church-state separation, make our voices heard.

Aaron Good is a political science student at Linfield College in McMinnville.