Mara Vanderslice has been appointed Senator John Kerry’s Director of Religion Outreach. Catholic League president William Donohue finds her a curious choice:
“Here’s what we know about John Kerry’s religious outreach person. Mara Vanderslice was raised without any faith and didn’t become an evangelical Christian until she attended Earlham College, a Quaker school known for its adherence to pacifism. When in college, Mara was active in the Earlham Socialist Alliance, a group that supports the convicted cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal and openly embraces Marxism-Leninism. After graduating, Mara spoke at rallies held by ACT-UP, the anti-Catholic group that disrupted Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in 1989 by spitting the Eucharist on the floor. In 2000, she practiced civil disobedience when she took to the streets of Seattle in a protest against the World Trade Organization. In 2002, she tried to shut down Washington, D.C. in a protest against the IMF and the World Bank.
“At first, John Kerry was considered too moderate for Mara, which is why she became Howard Dean’s Religion Outreach Director. She admits that she was a freak in the Dean campaign: her colleagues dubbed her the ‘church lady,’ informing her that Dean was liked precisely because he didn’t talk about religion. ‘How in the world did you get hired?’ is how one staffer put it. Unfazed, Mara contends we have a ‘collective commitment to protect the integrity of God’s creation,’ specifically citing the needs of the ‘least of these.’ Yet she supports John Kerry, a man who has never learned of an abortion he couldn’t justify.
“All the polls show Kerry getting whipped badly by Bush among practicing Catholics, Protestants and Jews. Moreover, the latest edition of Time magazine reports that only 7 percent of likely voters think Kerry is a man of strong religious faith. Given all this, his choice of Mara Vanderslice as his religious point woman is confounding. Her resume is that of a person looking for a job working for Fidel Castro, not John Kerry. Just wait until Catholics and Protestants learn who this lady really is.”
