By KASIE HUNT (politico.com)
HOUSTON — Rick Perry has yet to announce a presidential run, but he’s made clear that his Christian faith will define it if he does.
While most of the announced Republican presidential candidates stumped in Iowa on Saturday ahead of next week’s straw poll, Perry designed and took to his own national stage: The Response, a Christian day of prayer and fasting that the Texas governor started organizing over a year ago, before starting to seriously consider a national run. But instead of running from the controversy sparked by the gathering, with a politically problematic list of speakers and complaints about the blurred line between church and state, Perry stepped to the podium to pray — while hitting the themes that would drive his presidential campaign.
“Father, our heart breaks for America,” Perry said as he led the crowd in prayer, delivering his smooth, emotional 12-minute speech with the cadence of a pastor in the pulpit. “We see discord at home, we see fear in the marketplace, we see anger in the halls of government. And as a nation, we have forgotten who made us, who protects us, who blesses us.”
Perry prayed for people who have lost their jobs or homes in the recession. He prayed for the president. And he choked up as he prayed for the 31 American servicemembers who were killed in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan.
Still, he preached an anti-politics message that, paradoxically, is a central force driving conservative voters: “He is a wise, wise God, and he’s wise enough to not be affiliated with any political party,” Perry said.
His aides insist The Response wasn’t about politics. But the simple act of speaking here — an inconceivable choice for many of his potential Republican opponents — shows that Perry has decided not just to accept the political risk that such a religious event represents. He has embraced it, and is even counting on it — making a bet that he is ahead of another broad current sweeping his state and potentially the nation.
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