The unprecedented roster of U.S. presidents and lawmakers at John Paul II's funeral on Friday testified to the former pope's role as a history-shaping as well as spiritual figure over the last quarter century.

	Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano The tomb of Pope John Paul II is seen inside the crypt in the grottos beneath St. Peter's Basilica. The tomb bears the letters IOANNES PAULUS PPII, Latin for Pope John Paul II, the dates of his 26-year reign and the first two letter of Christ's name in Greek, a common symbol that has roots in early Christianity. Click photo for larger image.

The politicians' pilgrimage also reflected the importance of the Catholic vote in domestic politics and the role of the church hierarchy in U.S. elections.

For generations, Catholics were a reliable part of the Democratic coalition and key players in fighting for Social Security, civil rights and other liberal initiatives. Over the last half century, however, Catholics have become less homogenous, and often more affluent. Many have become more focused on social issues such as abortion and gay marriage, while others have become estranged from church teaching on issues such as birth control and the role of women in the church.

President Bush won a majority of Catholic votes last November, just as, according to exit polls, the largest share of Catholic ballots have been cast for the winner of the popular vote in every election since 1972. This roster includes former Vice President Al Gore, who carried a slight majority of Catholics in 2000 along with a popular majority despite his defeat in the Electoral College.

One reading of those results is that, as the Catholic vote goes, so goes the nation. But the University of Akron's Dr. John Green, director of the largest ongoing survey of religion and politics in America, argued that it is mistaken to consider Catholics a monolithic voting bloc.

The 2004 election reflected the varied and sometime clashing pieces of the Catholic political mosaic, he said: "There isn't a Catholic vote anymore; there are several Catholic votes."

Bush was courting one of those "Catholic votes" when he visited Pope John Paul II in the middle of his re-election campaign last June. During his audience, the pope pointedly denounced "recent deplorable events," a clear reference to news of the Abu Ghraib prison abuses in Iraq, and the pontiff pointed to his previous statements of concern about the war in Iraq in general. Bush nonetheless identified himself with the pope's teachings against abortion and on other aspects of a "culture of life," a phrase the president regularly repeated on the campaign trail.

The Methodist president's embrace of the papal language paid dividends in November, when he won the overwhelming majority of conservative Catholic votes. Opposition to abortion was the most visible issue raised by the American Catholic hierarchy, with the leaders of several dioceses decreeing that Catholic politicians who supported abortion rights, including Bush's opponent, Sen John F. Kerry, D-Mass., should be barred from receiving communion.

Some liberal Democrats questioned this emphasis.

"I think its very disappointing that we can see 1,500 young people killed in Iraq and very little outspokenness by the same people who have been outspoken on stem cell research and abortion and other issues," said former Rep. William Coyne, a Catholic and a pro-choice Democrat who from 1981 until 2003 represented a congressional district dominated by the city of Pittsburgh.

Other politicians welcomed the church's support on conservative social issues.

Speaking to a largely Catholic audience earlier this year, Sen Rick Santorum, R-Pa., a Catholic himself, said, "We have some in our society today who say you can come to the public square influenced by anything other than faith. If you are influenced by faith that is somehow illegitimate and your faith can only be private. ... I think that is a very dangerous thing."

According to Green, the outspokenness of some U.S. bishops likely will be John Paul II's chief legacy in American politics.

"His own statements on a variety of issues support and critique both the right and the left," Green said. "His big indirect effect is in the kind of bishops he appointed. They tended to be conservative. Over time, an American church that tilted to the left changed to one that tilted more to the right."

But just as there are nuances among the public positions of U.S. bishops, there are differences within the Catholic electorate. Surveys analyzing religion and politics conducted by the University of Akron's Bliss Institute of Applied Politics have segmented Catholic voters into four broad groups: traditionalists, centrists, modernists and Latinos.

The differences among the non-Latinos, who together comprise just over 17.5 percent of the electorates, are based on degrees of belief and religious observance. Traditionalists, as the name suggests, are the most observant and the most orthodox in their adherence to church teachings.

The 2004 election and the activism over the Terri Schiavo "right-to-die" case in Florida underscored a convergence between the political activity of these conservative Catholics and traditionalist Evangelical voters, groups that decades ago never would have joined in partisan harness.

"I can't overemphasize what a remarkable turnaround that is," said Allan J. Lichtman, a professor of American history at American University. "This is one of the biggest stories in American politics."

Lichtman noted that when the National Association of Evangelicals was formed in the 1940s, it was openly anti-Catholic. When former President Ronald Reagan became the first president to open diplomatic relations with the Vatican, Lichtman said, referring to prominent Evangelical leaders, "[Reagan] was so nervous, he had [the Rev.] Billy Graham canvass them."

In a fundamental shift in the nature of partisanship, he argued, "The axis of American politics today is cultural and religious rather than primarily economic, and thus the most reliable Republicans are identified racially and religiously not economically anymore; it's no longer about the Republican haves and the Democratic have-nots."

Green agrees that the convergence between Evangelicals and conservative Catholics is significant and probably enduring, but he said the widespread commentary about a "values election," in 2000 obscured other significant voting currents among Catholics.

In a spring 2004 survey, Democrats held a small edge over Republicans, 44 percent to 41 percent, in the affinities of Catholics. A majority of more conservative Catholics said they were Republicans while Democrats claimed the largest shares of centrist and modernist Catholics. With 8.1 percent and 5 percent of the electorate, respectively, both of these Democratic-leaning groups were more numerous than the traditionalists with 4.4 percent of the total.

When they cast ballots later in the year, however, Bush won an estimated 53 percent of non-Latino Catholics to Kerry's 47 percent, in part because of his strong showing among more conservative voters -- 72 percent to 28 percent for Kerry. But it also reflected a huge swing among the centrists, who, belying their Democratic majority, voted for Bush, 55 percent to 45 percent.

"Where Bush did particularly well in 2004 was with the middle-of-the-road Catholics," said Green. "They were deeply conflicted. Early in the campaign, Kerry was ahead with that group; Bush won them in the end."

More liberal Catholics, by contrast, went for Kerry in significantly larger numbers than their party status would have suggested. A similar trend was seen among mainline, or non-Evangelical Protestants. While Republicans held a plurality in that group according to party status, they split nearly evenly in the voting between Bush and Kerry, while the modernist, or more liberal Protestants, swung heavily toward Kerry.

"Issues like abortion, marriage and school vouchers have brought a great deal more comity and respect between conservative Catholics and Evangelicals," Green said, "But at the same time you're seeing liberal Catholics and liberal Protestants being pulled together."

There were noticeable differences among the Democratic subgroups on other issues as well. A strong majority of traditionalists rejected the notion that organized religious groups should stay out of politics. Majorities of both centrist and modernist Catholics, however, agreed that religious groups should refrain from politics.

An overwhelming majority of the traditionalist Catholics said that faith was as important or more important than other factors in determining their presidential vote. Despite the fact that they also favored Bush, an even stronger majority of centrists said that faith was less important than other factors, or not at all important.

Catholics, overall, were divided on abortion, but, again, there were sharp internal differences. A strong majority of traditionalists said abortion should either be totally illegal or legal only in a few circumstances. A narrow majority of centrists and an overwhelming majority of modernists, however, were at odds with the teachings of their pope and bishops in saying that they supported keeping abortion legal in many or all circumstances.

There was a similar divergence among the three groups on stem cell research, although the overall result was a majority against bans on such research.

Whether the new pope also will be a figure who changes American politics is impossible to predict. It seems inconceivable that the conservative cardinals appointed by a conservative pope would choose a figure inclined to alter church teachings on any bedrock issue.

A new church leader could, however, shift emphasis toward such issues as social justice, Third World development or the role of women in the church in ways that would subtly or overtly influence secular politicians or voters. On the other hand, the strong impulse to use the late pope as a model could reinforce existing dynamics in American politics.

"If you had a pope that gave certain issues a lot of weight and talked about them a lot and appointed people, it could change American politics, but certainly not overnight," Green said.