Bernie Sanders’ faith is a major reason for his presidential run, his campaign said in a new interview.
“Bernie is very proud of being Jewish. It is an essential part of who he is as a human being,” a representative of Sanders told the Interfaith Alliance of Iowa, an organization that promotes a “healthy” separation of church and state. “His father’s family was wiped out by Hitler in the Holocaust, and the treatment of Jews is fundamental to how Bernie thinks about the world in terms of ensuring that people from every background are treated with dignity, equality and respect.”
In responding to a questionnaire sent out by the group, the campaign said that “Faith is a guiding principle in Bernie’s life … [He] would not be running for president of the United States if he did not have a strong religious and spiritual foundation.”
“He believes that, as a human being, the pain that one person feels, if we have children who are hungry in America, if we have elderly people who can’t afford their prescription drugs, you know what, that impacts you, that impacts him,” said Sanders. “That’s his very strong spiritual feeling, and that influences his approach to public policy.”
Sanders’ response regarding the influence of his faith mirrors language he used extemporaneously during the 2016 primary race against Hillary Clinton.
“I believe that, as a human being, the pain that one person feels, if we have children who are hungry in America, if we have elderly people who can’t afford their prescription drugs, you know what, that impacts you, that impacts me,” Sanders said during a 2016 town hall. “And I worry very much about a society where some people spiritually say, it doesn’t matter to me, I got it, I don’t care about other people. So my spirituality is that we are all in this together and that when children go hungry, when veterans sleep out on the street, it impacts me. That’s my very strong spiritual feeling.”
Sanders also told the Interfaith Alliance “we must protect” the “separation of religion and state.”
“Bernie knows how dangerous it is historically for governments to enforce religion. That is not what our founding fathers wanted and they were right on this issue,” said Sanders.
Sanders has attracted praise from some progressive Christian pastors, including one who said he “is really resonating with a lot of progressive Christians who are concerned about issues of poverty, lack of affordable housing, labor abuses, things like that.”
