If Bush was anything, he was "on message."
The crisis forced Bush to examine both the law and his beliefs. Bush was being asked to act based on the religious conversion of an inmate. As sincere as Tucker might have been, jailhouse conversions were commonplace, and if he were to act in Tucker's case based on her conversion to Christianity, how could he refuse to do so if an inmate converted to another religion and made the same claim? It was beyond the range of human wisdom and beyond the scope of the law, Bush came to believe.
Like many extroverts, he drank because he thought it extended him: "Drinking magnified aspects of my personality that probably don't need to be larger than they already are. After [one particular] night of drinking, I came back to the hotel room and told Laura I was through." He looked in the mirror and said, "Someday, I might embarrass my father." And he never took another drink.
The ability to follow through on his commitment reveals the kind of man that faith was making him. Whether he quit initially because he found it something he could not control or so as not to embarrass his father, the all-important point is that he found the discipline to serve a cause greater than himself. He made a major, life-changing move based on something that heretofore had been lacking in his life: purpose.
"Good, good," Bush replied evenly. "I'm a married man. I'm glad she got the signal."
To make sure that everyone understood his meaning, Bush usually traveled with an aide and asked the man to stay in his hotel room until late at night as a safeguard against rumors about women.
It was not an act. Bush was on a flight one evening with a senator and a congressman. The two other men were downing scotch & sodas and discussing how they kept their girlfriends from wives and journalists.
Bush said. "I'm a lucky man to have Laura." The senator and congressman went silent. Bush continued cheerily, "Let's toast Laura."
Bush moved directly to the point. "I am a Christian," he declared, "but I believe with the psalmist that the Lord God of Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps. We will stand up for our friends in the world. And one of the most important friends is the State of Israel. A top foreign policy priority of the administration is the safety and the security of Israel. My administration will be steadfast in supporting Israel against terrorism and violence, and in seeking the peace for which all Israelis pray."
It was a general statement, but a reaffirmation of America's continued support for Israel nonetheless. The president would never say such a thing and then let Israel flounder.
And yet he also falls outside some of the stereotypes of his generation. He seems less imprisoned by its destructive narcissism. He is not very introspective and does not seem to be caught in the cycle of extremes that dizzy many in his generation. He is less easily impressed, more energetic, and a bit more respectful than his peers. And he has seldom veered far from his mooring in family, faith, and a sometimes too simple political philosophy.
Dyslexics who operate in the public eye tend to overcome their verbal gaffs by becoming actors, meaning that they emphasize connecting with the audience in nonverbal ways and with short, memorized scripts that make the chances of a blurted inanity less likely. They are personable, make quick studies of people, and often master the body language and quips that draw people in.
He found it suited him better, as he explained years later: "The Episcopal Church is very ritualistic, and it has a kind of repetition to the service. It's the same service, basically, over and over again. Different sermon, of course. The Methodist Church is lower key. We don't have the kneeling. And I'm sure there is some kind of heavy doctrinal difference as well, which I'm not sophisticated enough to explain to you." His change of church was typical of his brand of decision-making: relational, practical, nonintrospective, and defined in the simplest terms.
In 1984, as Bush later wrote, "Midland was hurting. A lot of people were looking for comfort and strength and direction." [He heard] famed evangelist Arthur Blessitt, billed as "Decision '84." Bush looked at Blessitt and said, "Arthur, I want to talk to you about how to know Jesus Christ and how to follow Him."
The evangelist asked, "What is your relationship with Jesus?"
"I'm not sure," Bush replied.
Blessit probed, "If you died this moment, do you have assurance you would go to heaven?"
Bush did not hesitate, "No," he answered. The evangelist then began to explain what it meant to know and follow Jesus.
Would you rather live with Jesus in your life, or live without Him?
"With him," Bush replied.
Baseball inspires Bush. When he talks about the game, he rises to his philosophical best. It is his natural religion. Listen:
"Baseball inspires the Muses. Baseball does not have time limits or clocks; we are under no artificial deadlines except 3 outs to an inning. The true baseball fan loves the dull spots in a game, because they allow you to think and remember, to compare the present with the past. The competitor in me also loves the challenge of baseball, a challenge all of us identify with, because baseball is a sport played by normal-sized people."
The fact is that George W. Bush in not unique as a president because he speaks openly of religion. All American presidents have done so, and it has become part of our national lore. In the first century and a half of our history, most Americans were religious and understood their lives and their country in religious terms. By the early decades of the 20th century, however, religion had declined as an influence in the US, but presidents still spoke religiously of the nation as a nod to a Christian memory and as an attempt to baptize the American culture of the day.
There can also be no doubt that this president will be remembered as the man in the White House on September 11, 2001.
There is another likely pillar of George W. Bush's legacy. This is the matter of his religious faith and his attempts to integrate faith as a whole into American public policy. It is here that we come to one of the most unique characteristics of the Bush presidency and very possibly to one of the most defining issues of our time.
He issued an Executive Order making Texas the 1st state to establish the option of using private and religious charities to deliver welfare services. He set up a level playing field for both religious and nonreligious groups for Texas social service contracts, abstinence education grants, and poverty-fighting initiatives. He made Texas the 1st state to permit a state prison unit to be operated by a ministry. He recommended and signed a law requiring governmental agencies to develop welfare-to-work partnerships with faith-based groups in a way that respects those groups' unique religious character.
Even detractors soon realized that Bush was actually doing what conservatives had talked about in theory for decades.
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The above quotations are from The Faith Of George W. Bush, by Stephen Mansfield. Click here for other excerpts from The Faith Of George W. Bush, by Stephen Mansfield. Click here for other excerpts by George W. Bush. Click here for a profile of George W. Bush.
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