Huckabee on religion and the government

MATTHEWS:  Well, then it doesn’t seem like it matters much because if you’re going to assume your role as a secular leader in cases of executive role, an executive role carrying out the punishment of a court, even if it is the extreme punishment, the ultimate punishment, it seems like the role of Christianity, which you’ve advertised in your public advertising and then you advertise in your public speaking when it comes up, seems to be irrelevant.

What I’m trying to figure out here why is it relevant to run as a Christian leader, if, when I give you particular cases of life and death, perhaps war, you resort to the secular role, which is probably more appropriate to a politician?

HUCKABEE:  Well, because, Chris, frankly, there are times when the Christian Gospel does very much apply — inasmuch as you’ve done it to the least of these, my brethren.  When 75,000 evacuees came to my state from Hurricane Katrina, it was my Christian faith that said we’re not going to wait until paperwork is done to take care of these people. 

These are fellow human beings, and I want them treated like people, not pieces of paper.  It’s why we made sure that they had a place to sleep and that we had food for them, that we had blankets to cover them and clothing for them.

And when people said how are we going to budget this, I said we’re not going to worry about the budget.  We’re going to worry about these people and treat them like we’d want to be treated. 

That’s when I think you’ll see the Christian Gospel coming to be.

Now, did I violate the law in doing that?  Some might argue that I went beyond the authority that I had to authorize the kind of expenditures, not knowing whether we’d be reimbursed by the federal government.  I was willing to suffer whatever the consequences were because I knew that the right thing was to make sure that when that elderly person got off that evacuation airplane, I treated her as if that were my own mother.

MATTHEWS:  This is a hard question.  It’s not a “gotcha” question because it’s something I care a lot about.  Would you be more than less likely to resort to war as an option because of your Christianity?

More or less likely?  Would it affect the way you look at just wars, the — the hair trigger you have in terms of action which would cost people lives?

HUCKABEE:  I think it would make me ...

MATTHEWS:  Does it affect your thinking on those key issues of leadership in this country?

HUCKABEE:  In this way, knowing that war is the court of last resort, knowing that in war, you again are creating something that has irrevocable consequences in the potential loss of life of people not only in your country but in the country of someone else.  Would it affect me?  Yes.  Would I be willing to do it when it was the only way in which I could protect Americans, or best protect our freedom and liberty and future?  But I tell you, it would not be something that I would do without careful prayer, consideration and the counsel of many people.

That’s where I think a person of faith would certainly act not capriciously and not maybe with some sense of a cavalier attitude, but with only very deliberate dispatch, after much thought and much prayer.

MATTHEWS:  You wouldn’t believe, as president, that you were carrying out the will of God, would you?  You wouldn’t have a messianic notion because of your deep religious belief?

HUCKABEE:  No, I think that would be very ...

MATTHEWS:  You wouldn’t have a sense ...

HUCKABEE:  ... dangerous.

MATTHEWS:  ... that because you were elected ...

HUCKABEE:  No, you got to be careful ...

MATTHEWS:  Yes, I think that’s extremely dangerous.

HUCKABEE:  You’re never, ever to be God.  In fact, I think the most dangerous thing that a person has is this messianic complex, where he thinks that he’s not being a servant of people, he’s being God of people.  That’s the opposite of what my faith teaches me.  My faith says that if you want to be great, you become servant.  You don’t lift yourself up.  You’re willing to allow yourself to be put down.

And I think when we see people who think they’re running not for president but to be lord of America, that’s a very dangerous thing.  And I certainly don’t look at it in that way.

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