As the director of Catholic outreach for George W. Bush's presidential campaigns, Deal Hudson says his Democratic rivals made his job easier. "The Al Gore and John Kerry campaigns operated as if all Catholics were quasi dissenters from the church who liked the pope personally but didn't agree with him," says Hudson. Neither candidate, for instance, attempted to soften his pro-abortion rights position for Catholic audiences, although that stance was clearly at odds with Catholic teaching. That may help explain how Bush beat Kerry, the first Catholic presidential nominee since John F. Kennedy, among Catholic voters.
Now, as a conservative Catholic activist working against many of President Barack Obama's policies, Hudson's job is more difficult. "They've packaged Obama as someone who respects the church, its teaching, its moral authority," Hudson, who runs the website Inside Catholic, says of Obama's...