In a profile of Mike Gerson, an evangelical Christian and chief speechwriter for President Bush, Karl Rove summarized Gerson’s contributions thusly: “You can count on Mike to ask how a given policy will affect the least among us,” Rove said in an interview. “The shorthand, political way to say it is that Mike is the one always wondering how we can achieve liberal goals with conservative means.”

Of course this the “political way” to get at it, but Rove’s expression points to how an authentically Christian view of politics must transcend partisan agendas and political ideology.

This excellently written profile goes on to describe the backgrounds of Gerson’s life, including an interest in Catholic Social Thought:

“Catholics have long believed that the state has a role to play in alleviating poverty, but that this is not necessarily a role it plays directly,” says Catholic scholar Luis Lugo, director of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. “What has happened in the U.S. is that Protestants have embraced this — first with school vouchers, and later with prison outreach, poverty, and other issues. It’s a growing alliance between Protestants and Catholics to help the less fortunate, and Mike Gerson is at the intersection of these two ing together.”