Obama's Play for the Faithful - TIME

Obama's Play for the Faithful - TIME: "t's safe to say there's no page in the Democratic handbook that recommends sitting down with several dozen right-of-center Christian leaders one week after clinching the party's presidential nomination. So the fact that Barack Obama slipped away Tuesday afternoon to a borrowed Chicago law-firm conference room for some prayer and frank talk about his faith and to face some tough questioning from heavy hitters in the Evangelical, Catholic and mainline Protestant worlds could be the clearest sign yet that he really does intend to practice a different kind of politics. But it's undoubtedly also a signal that he recognizes the damage done to his campaign by a spring that featured the Jeremiah Wright show and rumors about his true religious leanings — and ended with a decision to leave his church."