This week we learned about how political views can coincide with religious beliefs. In recent debates, the separation between church and state has become something of question. With the proposed cancellation of funding for planned parenthood, the nation has divided into pro-life or pro-choice. Already on my own, I was able to recognize that it was more common for religious conservatives to support pro-life and non-religious liberals to support pro-choice. After reading, chapter eight of, “American Religion”, I learned that this assumption was true. Chaves writes, “Actively religious Americans are more politically and socially conservative than less religious Americans” (Chaves 94). I find this interesting because it makes me question what “actively religious” could be defined as. In most cases, I would it to consider to mean that they personally follow what their religion guides them to do, but religion can be taken literal or it can be interpreted. This also makes me question how much separation there is between the church and state and how much there really can be. It is more common for people with conservative beliefs to be in the Republican party (Chaves 95), so when the presidential seat changes parties, I think the gap between church and state would shift. However, because a person’s opinions and beliefs are influenced by religion (or absence of it) it is very difficult to keep the church completely separated from state. Whether we intend to or not, religion has impact on who we choose to be and how we make decisions.