I don't think I am evangelical in my work.

When I was writing 'The Abstinence Teacher ' I really tried to immerse myself in contemporary American evangelical culture.

I'm actually an evangelical atheist but there is something I recognise about religion: that it gives people a chance to surrender.

Once the cry and the cause of a generation of progressives to make America safer fairer and cleaner 'regulation' is now a dirty word in our politics. Even Democrats are quick to talk about cutting regulations Republicans hate them with - how to put it? - evangelical fervor.

I don't know of many evangelicals who want to deny gay couples their legal rights. However most of us don't want to call it marriage because we think that word has religious connotations and we're not ready to see it used in ways that offend us.

The traditional spokespersons for the Evangelicals such as Chuck Colson and James Dobson have become alarmed about this drift away from the 'Family Values' issues that they believe should be the overwhelming concerns of Evangelicals. They have expressed their displeasure in letters of protest circulated through the religious media.

I for one am quite willing to join the 'forgive forget and move on' crowd but it does make me wonder if Evangelicals are going to sound believable when they say that they tend to vote Republican because of their religious commitments to the family.

Most Evangelicals claim to be politically non-partisan and say they only identify with the Republican Party because the Republicans are committed to 'family values.'

It's possible that the 2012 general-election race will be the least overtly religious one since 1972 the last campaign before Roe v. Wade and the rise of Jimmy Carter brought evangelicalism into the political mainstream. That's because faith remains a complicated issue for Obama who is still wrongly thought to be a Muslim in some quarters.

It's a new day for the Democrats when it comes to matters of faith and the younger Evangelicals are aware of this and many of them are moving into the Democratic camp.