Forbes versus LeGrow: In God, only one trusts

WASHINGTON

At his desk in the Rayburn House Office Building, U.S. Rep. Randy Forbes often looks up to his left where a copy of the Declaration of Independence hangs surrounded by 56 individually framed portraits of the men who signed it.

"The Declaration of Independence is, to me, the foundational document of freedom in the United States," Forbes said. "It gave us the legitimacy to be a country.... Now if you look at that document, our founders made a huge proclamation that you and I have a set of rights. But secondly, that those rights didn't come from a committee somewhere up here or from a resolution. They came from God himself, from the Creator."

It is a core belief that has driven Forbes to take a lead role in Congress promoting prayer as a part of government and preserving references to God in taxpayer-funded institutions. Christianity in America, he says, is under assault from atheists and others who constantly try to chip away at any vestige of religious activity in government.

Non believers "have had generations - literally centuries - to compete in the marketplace of ideas. They've just lost. So now their strategy is to try to exclude people of faith from the marketplace of ideas. We have to make sure they don't succeed," Forbes said during a radio interview earlier this year with James Dobson, founder of the Christian group Focus on The Family.

This election season, the Republican's battle against non believers is closer to home.

Dr. Wynne LeGrow, Forbes' Democratic opponent in the 4th Congressional District, is tackling one of the last taboos in American politics - he has acknowledged he is an atheist.

LeGrow, who practiced medicine in Emporia for 29 years before retiring last year and deciding last spring to run for Congress, said he disagrees with Forbes "on just about everything."

Unlike the incumbent, he supports the new health care law and argues that the billions of federal stimulus dollars were necessary to save or create 3 million jobs. He also favors adding a carbon tax or taking some other action to cut the use of oil and coal because of deep concerns about man-made climate change. "We're destroying the planet," he said.

When it comes to religion, LeGrow said, everyone's beliefs - or lack thereof - should be respected and protected, but not included in government.

"Many of the Founding Fathers came here for religious freedom," he said. "They were escaping governments where religious beliefs were forced on people."

LeGrow, 65, said he's been a nonbeliever since he was 16 but kept his feelings mostly to himself until now. Despite a close relationship with his mother and father, who was a Protestant minister, he never told them.

"Most of my younger years I can remember trying to convince myself there was a God. I was not a rebellious child," he said during a radio interview with the National Freedom From Religion Foundation. "Finally, at the age of 16, I reached the point where I said I simply don't accept these teachings of the supernatural."

He said he decided to go public now because "I'm much more comfortable stating who I am honestly and then going on from there."

He hopes that by making his viewpoint known now, relatively early in the campaign, it will not become an issue for voters.

But religion and politics often intertwine on the campaign trail.

A recent civic league meeting in the Cascade Boulevard community center in Chesapeake began, as the meetings often do, with the joining of hands for a Christian prayer. LeGrow, who came to talk politics, quietly joined the prayer circle. His speech made no mention of atheism.

His lack of belief already has cost him the support of an influential politician in the district.

State Del. Lionell Spruill Sr., D-Chesapeake, who has developed strong ties with predominantly black churches that have helped Democrats win key precincts in state and federal elections, said he won't assist LeGrow.

"I can't take him to churches as an atheist," Spruill said. "That would hurt me."

The Rev. Jake Manley Sr., longtime pastor of Bethany Baptist Church in Chesapeake and a regular supporter of Democrats, said LeGrow can visit his church but doubts he'll get a positive response.

"I can't speak for others," Manley said. "I could not vote for a man who doesn't believe in some power higher than his."

Forbes said he doesn't talk about LeGrow's views on religion unless asked.

"He has attacked me for being a Christian," Forbes said. "I've never attacked him for being an atheist."

Forbes, a 58-year-old attorney, has taught Sunday school for decades at Great Bridge Baptist Church in Chesapeake. He has represented the district, which stretches from Chesapeake and Suffolk northwest to Powhatan County, since 2001.

Matters of faith are not his only legislative interest. As a member of the House Armed Services C ommittee, he has opposed the Navy's plans to move a Norfolk-based carrier to Florida and a separate effort by Defense Secretary Robert Gates to shut down the U.S. Joint Forces Command, which provides thousands of jobs in his district.

He started the House's China Caucus to focus attention on what he sees as growing national security and economic threats from the Asian nation.

But it is his reputation as an outspoken defender of religion in government that most distinguishes him in the 435-member House, supporters and opponents agree.

He founded and serves as co-leader of the Congressional Prayer Caucus, which now lists 66 members, all but five of them Republicans.

Part of Forbes' legacy is etched in stone on Capitol Hill. When the expansive $621 million Capitol Visitor Center was about to open in late 2008, Forbes and other caucus members protested that the motto "In God We Trust" and the Pledge of Allegiance were not included. Within a year, the motto was carved into a large stone beam above the center's main hall and the pledge was etched in a wall nearby.

Forbes has backed measures to establish a government-sanctioned national day of prayer. He sponsored legislation that would reaffirm "In God We Trust" as the nation's motto and have it posted in every public building and classroom. He introduced a House resolution that called for placing Abraham Lincoln's Bible in the visitor center and requiring Congress to affirm that "the Holy Bible is God's word." None of the measures have passed the House.

Forbes had the idea to start the Congressional Prayer Caucus Foundation, a nonprofit Chesapeake-based group that is seeking to spread the concept of prayer caucuses to every state legislature. Forbes said he's not directly involved other than making speeches for the group, which is headquartered in an office building he owns. His wife, Shirley Forbes, also serves on its board.

When President Barack Obama said in a 2009 speech that the United States was not "a Christian nation or a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation" but a nation "bound by ideals and a set of values," Forbes fired back from the House floor.

A video of his five-minute speech arguing that the country is firmly rooted in Judeo-Christian beliefs has been a YouTube hit, drawing 3.2 million views.

Last year he participated in a partisan religious broadcast, organized by the Family Research Council, to pray against the "government takeover of health care." Months later, in the hours before a Sunday vote on the health care bill, Forbes organized a bipartisan morning religious service.

Most recently, when commentator Glenn Beck held a rally at the Lincoln Memorial urging Americans to turn back to God, Forbes gave the opening prayer the night before.

Forbes "is clearly one of the go-to guys in the Congress" when it comes to faith-based issues, said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the Washington-based American Center for Law and Justice. The Christian legal advocacy group, founded by evangelist broadcaster Pat Robertson, has often sided with Forbes to challenge what they consider encroachments on religion.

The Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said Forbes is wrongly trying to give those with certain religious beliefs greater legal status than those who have different beliefs, or none at all.

"He essentially says the bottom line is that America is or was created as a Christian nation and we ought to get with the program.... That's fundamentally false," said Lynn, a United Church of Christ minister. The Declaration of Independence, while important, is not part of American law, he said.

"The heart and soul of America's legal system is the Constitution, which does not mention God and deliberately does not," he said. "I truly believe that my religion will not benefit from any help from the government and it is strong enough and powerful enough to survive without any government blessing or government funding."

LeGrow said he's troubled that Forbes "seems to be separating believers from nonbelievers on a constitutional level."

"I was brought up in a household where honesty and integrity were sort of drilled in to me. To me that's not religious - that's what's needed in this world," he said while sitting in his Emporia campaign office. "You cannot have a religious test to hold office."

LeGrow said he's never talked to his patients about his views on religion and has respected their beliefs, particularly if a medical prognosis was not good.

"Some people will say, 'We'll trust in God,' and you just agree with them," he said. "I'm there as a doctor to help people. I'm not there to force my lack of religion or challenge their religion."

Forbes said he's not pushing for a theocracy.

"We don't want faith to control or dominate the marketplace," he said. "We just think it should have a seat at the table."

There is a limit to his support of religious behavior in government institutions, he said.

"I don't think a teacher should be going into a classroom and preaching to children and trying to convert them to Jewish faith, Christian faith or Muslim faith," he said. "The flip side... I don't think they should be proselytizing that God doesn't exist."

Forbes said he welcomes the review of his activities.

"This race is on me - not on him. If people don't like me, fine. If they do - I think they do," said Forbes, as he walked among hundreds of supporters at a campaign rally behind his home on Sunday. "And I think they like what we've done."

Bill Bartel, (757) 446-2398, bill.bartel@pilotonline.com