The November election wasn’t the last word on religion and politics. It was only the start.

Conservative voters who said moral values influenced their presidential selection already are pushing the White House to pick the right judges. Liberals who were caught off guard by the moral values brigade are holding seminars to figure out religion and politics.

What matters next is how we have this discussion. One of my favorite theologians, Reinhold Niebuhr, loved to say that the tone of a debate is as important as the subject. If we approach this volatile subject wrong, we’ll tear ourselves up.

The Rev. Jim Wallis hopes to set the right tone in a new book, “God’s Politics: A New Vision for Faith and Politics in America,” which reads like a primer for Howard Dean and George W. Bush. It requires left and right to rethink their assumptions.

Editor of the liberal evangelical Sojourners magazine, Wallis argues that the left doesn’t get the natural mix of religion and politics. He then pivots and says the religious right gets the mix wrong.

He’s correct on both counts. Let’s start with the left, which really struggles with this issue.

If confused Democrats come away with anything from this book, it should be that faith is not a private affair. Whether it’s because of prophets like Amos or the Sermon on the Mount, the Scriptures naturally lead Christians and Jews into the public square.

They certainly led Martin Luther King Jr. there. And Democrats should look for the many believers today who consider poverty its own moral issue, as King did.

Wallis’ next word of advice is that many liberal evangelicals and Catholics who care for the poor also want to stop abortions. To them, it’s a seamless web of justice. And Democrats make a mistake if they ignore these voters. Plenty of Christians, Wallis notes, are with Democrats on peace and poverty but can’t stomach their support for abortion.

So who gets this message?

My bet’s on Hillary Clinton. She suggested last month that Democrats search for common ground with those who oppose abortion. She was smart and gutsy to say it. Why can’t left and right work together on, say, decreasing teen pregnancies?

Now, to the right, about which Wallis is equally correct.

Many conservative evangelicals have conformed themselves to what he terms “the political Right and its agenda that favors the wealthy over the poor and middle class.” As a result, he says, they’ve turned Jesus into a “pro-rich, pro-war and pro-only-American” figure.

President Bush, as the unchallenged leader of today’s Christian right, can change this and set a different tone.

If he tries, I’ll bet he finds support within his ranks. Look at the environment. Polling data shows conservative evangelicals favor green policies as much as liberal environmentalists. More talk from the president about environmental stewardship could move his side in a new direction.

If left and right re-examine their assumptions that way, maybe we can have a positive, productive discussion about religion and politics.

That’s Wallis’ hope, and he’s not the only one. The Call to Renewal movement he spearheads involves Catholics, mainline Protestants, evangelicals and others working on common goals, like reducing poverty. This broad group is just one example of how some Americans are looking to reshape the way we think about religion and politics.

We don’t need a cultural war. We need a new vision for faith and politics, as Wallis suggests. We’ll get one if we move beyond left and right.

— William McKenzie’s e-mail address is wmckenzie@dallasnews.com.