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N: God bless us, God is with us, these are phrases which US politicians often repeat. The people who gathered today for the conference "Religion and Liberalism" at Columbia University think that politicians use religion for political purposes and that it is not good.
David Rothenberg - professor of philosophy of New Jersey Institute of Technology, said that politicians exploit religion and liberals have to find a way to protect their values.
A David Rothenberg: I do not think it is an appropriate way to use religion in this way, to say the God is on our side. We go to a church, trust us. It is very fundamentalist attitude and from this point of view our country is very fundamentalist country. We should not put the religion to the politics this way. And liberals we have to find a more appropriate way, they did not figure it out yet.
N: Michael Goldman, one of the participants at the conference, said, that liberals and democrats today are weaker then ever before and can not rival the Bush administration.
A: Michael Goldman: And liberal became a dirty word, but no one questioned this question today. The last years academia has been the most politically isolated and impotent as I can ever remember.
N: But Andew Delbanco, an organizer of the conference from Columbia University, said that liberals offer dialogue, which can make politicians be more responsible when they use the name of God.
A Andrew: Andrew Delbanco: The aim of the conference is to provoke liberals and live them up. And speed up the dialogue with politicians and make them responsible for the political conversations.
N: The last question of the conference was where do we go from here. Participants offered to continue dialogue, saying they have to give more credit to the public and believe that Americans can accept wider ideas then those on offer from today's administration.
Galima Bukharbaeva Columbia radio news.