Noah Feldman, professor of law at Harvard Law School, encouraged students in Tuesday’s forum, “Few are Chosen: Comparative Religion and the Public Sphere,” to engage in open conversations about comparative religion in the political realm.

Feldman drew parallels between various Massachusetts presidential candidates whose elections were heavily influenced by religion. He also discussed how Americans have responded to political candidates’ religious beliefs and how they can better respond in the future.

“[We] need a broad and diverse community of other believers,” Feldman said, “to speak openly, to speak freely, to speak regularly, to speak unabashedly and to speak in an engaged way with others in the public sphere about religion, about comparative religion and about the ideas thereof.”

He first cited the re-election campaign of John Adams, a Congregationalist, against Thomas Jefferson in 1800.

Feldman said many proposed that Jefferson was unworthy of presidential candidacy because of his atheism.

In the 1960 John F. Kennedy campaign, Kennedy was under heavy scrutiny from Protestant ministers, who worried Kennedy would be influenced by Catholic leaders and beliefs.

In a speech Kennedy actually sacrificed some of his Catholic beliefs for a Protestant mindset to appeal to his audience.

“He in effect adopted a Protestant vision of what it was to be an American politician,” Feldman said, “according to which private conscience was more important than religious teaching.”

In the 2008 presidential election, Mitt Romney found himself in a similar situation, when he too felt he had to give a speech explaining how his religion would or would not affect his presidency. 

Instead of taking a stance similar to Kennedy’s, Romney said religion was an essential part of public life and people needed it to make sense of their beliefs and values. However, Romney also said religion should not be a deciding factor in a person’s legitimacy as a presidential candidate.

Feldman said the quandary is how to keep religion in the public sphere without it limiting those who are qualified to run for office.

He encouraged students to speak openly and engage in conversations of comparative religion.