That's why Christianity has the strength to shape culture — and that's also why some political interests hate and fear it. It's a lot easier to ignore the personal spirituality of unorganized individuals than the religious convictions of a focused and motivated community.

George Washington reminded us in his farewell address that, "reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle." Screening our religious faith out of our political choices makes no sense. In fact, it only undermines the foundation of our shared public life.

As Catholics, we always need to show respect and charity toward people who do not share our convictions. But "pluralism" can never be an alibi for being silent or failing to act zealously on our principles. We need to wake up from the delusion that our Sunday worship and our public choices run on separate and parallel tracks. They interpenetrate all the time. And they should.

In that light, what lessons can we draw from the national elections earlier this month?

First, every vote really does count. With little more than 100 votes deciding the Beauprez-Feeley congressional race, Coloradans may remember this lesson longer than the rest of the country. But across the nation, many other contests were decided by slim margins on key issues.

Second, the sanctity of life issues continue to exert great force in the public arena. Nationwide, 8 to 10 percent of voters choose their candidate primarily on their views about abortion and related issues. That's a lot of voters, and of those voters, two-thirds are pro-life. In other words, the pro-life core constituency is double the size of the "pro-choice" core constituency, and this had a significant effect on the outcome of numerous races Nov. 5.

It's no exaggeration to say that Senator Jean Carnahan lost her job in Missouri because of her "pro-choice" views. The aggressive "pro-choice" rhetoric of candidates here in Colorado also clearly backfired. The only baffling thing about our political landscape is the complete dictatorship the pro-abortion lobby continues to exercise over one of our major parties.

Third and finally, our public responsibilities as Catholics do not end in the voting booth. No candidate is perfect. No political party has a corner on virtue. Neither major party has a spotless record in defending and advancing human dignity. We need to shape our entire lives, including our citizenship, in the light of our faith in Jesus Christ and the teachings of His Church.

And then we need to hold our elected and appointed officials accountable for building a real culture of life — for every person, at every stage of development.