It’s like the old joke goes: a priest, a pastor and a rabbi enter a bar.

Except that it wasn’t a bar that the religious power trio entered last Tuesday. It was The Sheen Center for Thought and Culture on New York’s famous Bleecker Street – although, contrary to what the name might suggest, there is nothing particularly dark on what Rev. AR Bernard, Rabbi Joseph Potasnik and Cardinal Timothy Dolan explored before an enthusiastic audience in the run-up to the 2024 election.

Even if faith is overall decline – while fewer and fewer Americans declare themselves subscribing to a particular religion – Bernard, Potasnik and their guest of honor, the Archdiocese of Dolan in New York, were invited on stage at the Sheen Center for a broadcast in live on their WABC radio Sunday morning. a lecture and discussion on the current state of religion and politics.

The two topics that most people actively try to avoid.

“Getting along is a lot easier than we think,” said MaryLou Pagano, executive director of the Sheen Center, introducing the meeting of religious minds. “They really care about interfaith events. They care be diverse, but get along. And there’s no better time than now.”

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It’s this very inclusion that the feisty trio embodied – not only through the invitation from Sheen, whose board they also serve on – but through the invitation they extended to people of all faiths.

Or, perhaps more aptly, no creed.

October 22, 2024 — Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Rabbi Joseph Potasnik and Rev. AR Bernard embrace at the Sheen Center for Thought and Culture ahead of the 2024 presidential election.

“I think we are facing a crisis here,” Rabbi Postanik said, addressing the decline of religion in America, particularly among younger generations. “But we have an opportunity. Many of these young people do not walk through the front door of the place of worship, but head to a food pantry. They will do something to help others. And they’ll say, “I’m not religious, I’m spiritual.” » And we try to tell them: “what you call spiritual, we call religious”. »

“Ultimately, it’s what you do, not what you say, because belief is measured by behavior.”

— Rabbi Joseph Potasnik, who preaches with the motto “we do not impose, we suggest”

“When you feed the hungry, help the poor and do something to rehabilitate someone else, that’s religious,” Potasnik explained. “Ultimately, it’s what you do, not what you say, because belief is measured by behavior.”

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The trio spoke with Fox News Digital ahead of their show to discuss the upcoming presidential election, which is causing enormous stress and anxiety for many, if not most, Americans.

“The message of Jesus transcended the political landscape of his time, and it transcends the political landscape of our time,” said Rev. Bernard of the Christian Cultural Center. “The reality is that we live in this world and we are affected by policies, systems, structures and practices. And we have to respond. And we respond with voting. And when we think about voting, we are actually giving power to someone to make decisions about our quality of life and the future of our nation, so we should take this very seriously and imagine a nation that is. consistent with our key principles of human dignity and the common good.”

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Rabbi Potasnik, who is executive vice president of the New York Board of Rabbis, compared the current division in the country to the divergence between a book and its film adaptation.

“We are called people of the book. And I think the saddest thing is that today the movie is different from the book. It almost contradicts the book. In our places of worship, we talk about respect. We talk about unity, cohesion, solidarity, cooperation, communication, all these things. But when you come out of the place of worship, you see a whole different world.

“We are polarized. We don’t just disagree with each other. We denigrate each other,” he continued. “I think our challenge is to have the the film and the book look alike. So we need to continue to tell people that it’s okay to disagree. It’s okay to have a different point of view, but it’s not okay to take someone else and completely devalue them, because we are all children of God. If we are children of God, we are expected to act a certain way with dignity and decency. And I hope we close the gap.”

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Cardinal Dolan, who was appointed 15 years ago by Pope Benedict XVI as the tenth and current archbishop of New York, added to the rabbi’s analogy, imploring the people: And politicians – of different beliefs to treat each other with more respect.

“We need to be as passionate and enthusiastic about the issues as possible, but always respect those who advocate for them.”

— Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York

“When the three of us studied preparation for ministry, when we studied debate, when we studied rhetoric, when we studied logic, we learned that the weakest argument is to attack to the person,” Dolan told Fox News Digital. “Stick to the principles. Stick to the policies. Stick to the issues. Don’t lash out. Don’t try to judge motives or pick on the person. We need to be as passionate and enthusiastic about the issues as we can be, but always respecting the people who hold them. And that’s what we don’t need, these ad hominem campaigns, and I’m talking about both sides.

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“Wouldn’t you think if we had a candidate, female or male, who said, ‘I’m going to run a positive campaign. I’m not going to talk about the other person. I’m going to talk about their policies and issues, and I’m not going to I’m not going to talk about myself, I’m going to talk about the problems, and I’m going to talk about what I hope to accomplish… not attack what they say they hope to accomplish,” the archbishop argued. “Does that seem naive? I guess maybe that’s the case. But boy, I wish it was.”

Cardinal Archbishop of New York Timothy Dolan joined Rabbi Joseph Potasnik and Rev. AR Bernard at the Sheen Center on October 22, 2024 for a live episode of WBAC’s “The Rev and the Rabbi.” (WBAC / Sheen Center for Thought and Culture)

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With the election just days away, the trio concluded their evening’s conversations by reminding their audience, as well as ours, that having hope for the nation’s future begins with having faith in its higher power – and that the nature of each requires the other. .

“You cannot be a person of faith without being a prisoner of hope,” insisted Reverend Bernard.

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