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Anyone watching the Democratic leaders in the months since Donald Trump was elected president will likely agree: The party is in nearly complete disarray. There is less consensus, however, about exactly why Democrats are having such a difficult time defining themselves in the post-Trump electoral landscape.

Democratic candidates have fallen in special election after special election this spring, most recently in Jon Ossoffs nearly four-point loss to Republican Karen Handel in Georgias sixth district, despite the historic $23 million Ossoff raised and the extra millions poured into the race by the national Democratic party.

In the wake of that demoralizing defeat, some have suggested that the partys top leadership is the main issue, and Democratic politicians in the House have begun openly grumbling against minority leader Nancy Pelosi. Others on the Left believe that Democratic candidates have been losing because theyve stayed too close to the center, rather than endorsing the increasingly progressive policies some voters desire. Still others have posited that the underlying issue is the partys dismissive attitude toward religious values and even organized religion itself.

While the problems afflicting the party must stem from some combination of these factors, Democrats scorn for religion should be their biggest concern. That scorn is compounded by the partys sudden and dramatic swerve to the Left on key social issues abortion, contraception, religious liberty, and marriage, to name a few in a quest for votes from far-Left, progressive Americans.

Mr. Sanderss non-Christian background may have hurt him in the South; he did poorly among African-American voters, despite his consistent civil rights record. But he did what few other secular candidates have done: He won a sympathetic hearing from conservative evangelicals with a speech that gave a religious grounding for his economic views, complete with biblical citations. When Mr. Sanders spoke at Liberty University, he did not pretend to share evangelical Christians faith, but he showed respect for his audiences religious tradition.

Williams concluded by arguing that Democratic politicians must convince religious voters that they are not enemies of faith, and they ought to do so by grounding their policy proposals in the religious values of prospective voters.

This week, in a New York Times column, Annette Gordon-Reed and Peter Onuf offered an alternative model. The co-authors suggested that Thomas Jeffersons unique attitude toward religion which pervaded his contributions to the nations founding and early government could serve as a model for todays Democrats, especially Jeffersons vigorous embrace of civil religion and peaceful pluralism.

These debates may provide Democrats a method of attaining electoral success, perhaps even in the near future. But while each suggestion hints at a way of combating negative public perception, neither of these models can eliminate the underlying obstacle: progressivisms inherent contradiction of religion.

Progressivism has always been premised on the notion that man has a changeable nature and thus is able to achieve perfection during his time on earth. As a result, progressives consistently maintain that government is responsible for transforming men and women into perfect creatures. They develop programs and reforms suited not for man as he is, but for man as he ought to be (and, progressives would argue, for man as he could become, with the right societal structures).

Against that idea, most religious believers contend that man is flawed by his very nature and incapable of perfecting himself without the help of God, and that perfection is in fact unattainable during earthly life. While sects and denominations differ vastly, religion itself and indeed any dependence on a Creator is a direct contradiction to the progressive conception of man as changeable and perfectible.

In short, progressivism and religion understood as a fundamental reliance on God rather than on oneself or on other men are inherently incompatible. Where progressivism asserts that properly ordered government can and should transform man into a perfect being who lives in a man-made utopia, religion insists that God, not government, is responsible for changing mens hearts.

To be sure, many religious Americans believe that progressive social programs are helping to carry out Gods work caring for the worlds poor and needy. But that underlying contradiction remains a stumbling block for many faithful voters, especially when seen in conjunction with Democrats increasing repudiation of traditional values. Unless Democratic politicians understand and address those legitimate concerns, they wont sway those who reject the notion that government should take the place of God.

READ MORE: You Gotta Lie: The Tangled Progressive Web Backward-Looking Progressives Americas Progressive Auto-Immune Crisis Continues Apace

Alexandra DeSanctis is a William F. Buckley Fellow in Political Journalism at the National Review Institute.

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Why Progressivism and Religion Don't Go Together - National Review