With Palin On the Ticket, Evangelicals Are Energized

On Tuesday night, 700 antiabortion activists are expected to attend the "Life of the Party" reception at the Crowne Plaza ballroom in St. Paul. Palin had been selected as the guest of honor long before she became McCain's running mate, but since the announcement, Parro said, calls have been flooding in from delegates wanting tickets.

In hotels and restaurants throughout St. Paul and Minneapolis, evangelicals are discussing how best to steer their party toward the right even as its candidate has played down his conservative credentials.

Several evangelical leaders said Sunday that the glee in their community may be more intense because of a sense that they avoided something much worse. For days leading up to last week's vice presidential announcement, evangelicals and conservative Christian voters were tightly coiled, ready to explode in anger if McCain picked a supporter of abortion rights as his running mate.

Conservative activists working on the party's platform traded worried e-mails, discussing how to react if McCain betrayed their values by choosing Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) or former Pennsylvania governor Tom Ridge, both of whom favor abortion rights.

"There was such a palpable fear of what might happen to the party had McCain gone in a different direction," Reed said. "Given the often complex and difficult relationship that McCain has had in the past with this pro-life community, he has exceeded their expectations."

Reed said McCain's public flirting with Ridge and Lieberman was a brilliantly executed "head fake" to make people even more excited when Palin's name was announced. "It made the normal enthusiasm go off the charts," he said.

Although evangelicals across the country and those in town for the Republican convention heaped praise on Palin, many acknowledged that they were still researching her policy positions and personal background. Chung said he is focused on the fact that she is "pro-life, pro-family, pro-smaller government," even if he doesn't know to what church she belongs.

"I'm more concerned that the candidate hold the same views that I do than if they have the same religion as I do, though it would be nice," Chung said.

At the New Hope Church north of Minneapolis, the Family Research Council's Perkins preached at two services Sunday morning about the responsibility of Christians to be involved in their communities. But afterward, he said, everyone wanted to talk about Palin.

"The campaign has turned around in the past 72 hours in terms of the enthusiasm," he said.