I'm flabbergasted that countries have political parties that base and pride themselves centrally on religion. It's really kind of nonsensical from my point of view.
I mean, sure,
Kevin Rudd was a Christian, but no one gave a damn, it probably helped that he never mentioned it. I mean, hell, the
current Australian PM isn't aligned with any religions (Amusingly, she's less popular than Rudd for completely unrelated reasons). Then again, bringing up religion here in politics is basically a death sentence in the polls... people automatically assume that you're a nutcase of some sorts (This probably has to do with the fact that the any religious parties here are seen as extremely conservative to the point of destruction).
Values dissonance at its finest, peoples. I won't drag on any longer, I just felt that I should express my absolute surprise that non-American parties would base themselves so centrally on religion.
I am aware that this reply will most likely result in me being shot in the face akin to a shotgun, but I wish to state that I am in no way against religion and have made this reply to simply state that the differences between the worlds of politics are quite incredible, at least, from my perspective. It's probably worth noting that most Australians don't even really care too much about religion anyway, so what, you worship a god/s, when's the next barbicue?!