Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput said that "religious witness has always had a vigorous and positive role in American public life, including the nation's political life."

It's what the Founding Fathers "intended, and that's the way it should be," he said in an interview with the Denver Catholic Register, the archdiocesan newspaper, about his new book titled "Render Unto Caesar: Serving the Nation by Living Our Catholic Beliefs in Political Life."

In the book, he talks "about the right role of Catholic faith in American public life." Published by Doubleday, it hit bookstores Aug. 12.

"Democracies need people of moral conviction. (Pope) John Paul II said that, and so did George Washington," the archbishop said. "Free societies thrive on public moral debate, and they need a moral consensus to survive.

"They need to stand for something. And that 'something' needs to be something more than the latest flat-screen television," he said.

"Genuinely free societies need to be free for some principles of human rights and dignity, and some higher ideal of the human person," he continued. "A society of individuals based on freedom from each other's beliefs really isn't a society at all. It's a collection of hustlers."

Because the American experience has religious roots, "religion isn't a 'problem' for American politics," according to Archbishop Chaput.

He said people who have religious beliefs enrich the democratic process because they bring moral conviction to their consideration of political issues.

"That takes courage, because acting on one's beliefs will always bother somebody, somewhere, and create conflict," he said. "And in the face of that conflict, only love --- an unselfish commitment to the common good --- makes courage possible."

He said that "Catholics have a Gospel duty to work for justice through our nation's public policies." Politics involves power and how that power is used "has moral consequences," he said.

"How we live our Catholic faith in our political decision-making has implications both for our nation's moral health and our own relationship with God," he said.

U.S. Catholics "have a deep reservoir of moral witness" but they need to remember who they are "as believers," why they're here and how to live their faith live authentically, "in a culture that makes it easy to dumb down our taste for God, truth and real moral growth with a menu of material success and distractions," Archbishop Chaput said.

Being a faithful citizen, he said, means having one's priorities in order.

"Our first obligation is to God. Nothing is more important than that," he explained. "Every other duty in our life is enriched if we're first faithful to him and his church."

The "greatest gift" Catholics can give their country "is the moral witness of our faith --- in our words, our choices and our actions," he said.

In the book he notes that there is a "crisis of faith" among American Catholics. To change that situation, he told the Register, Catholics must first step back and examine their lives "for consistency."

"If we claim to be 'Catholic,' what does that actually mean in our behaviors?" he asked. "We can't have it both ways. We can't live one way in church on Sunday, and then ignore or conveniently amend our Catholic faith the other six days of the week.

"We need to choose. We need to be honest. If we want to live as Catholics, then we need to give ourselves fully to what the Gospel and the church call us to be -- real disciples. If we have that humility, will and desire, then God will provide the rest," he said.

Explaining Christ's words "render unto Caesar" in the title of his book, he said that "Christians owe respect and appropriate obedience to secular authority, because that authority ultimately draws its legitimacy from God."

But "secular law does not trump God's law," he said. "When a nation passes bad laws, Christians have a duty to work to change them."

The archbishop said Catholics must respect those with different views, "but that never excuses Catholic silence or inaction in the face of evil public structures, policies or laws."

Catholics must vote, he said, but guided by their faith, they also must "pray and challenge" themselves about their political choices.

One's political party is not important, Archbishop Chaput said. What is "vital is fighting within our parties and public institutions," he said, "to turn them toward protecting and advancing the sanctity of human life -- from the unborn to the elderly; from the moment of conception to the moment of natural death."

---CNS