I think it’s pretty well established that in the United States, the more conservative your political affiliation, the more likely you are to be a churchgoer, to frequently discuss or mention your relationship with God, and to be a devout Christian. What I’m wondering is whether the same thing can be observed in Europe. Naturally, I doubt that even a conservative political leader would say, as George Bush did, that Jesus Christ is his/her favorite philosopher. But is it possible to discern any greater amount of religiousness among the party rank and file? It’s interesting to note that some of the conservative parties, at least in Germany, actually have the word Christian in their names, as in the Christian Democratic Party and the Christian Social Union.
In principle the correlation that Spectre of Pithecanthropus mentions also holds in Germany, but with some important provisos:
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conservatives tend to emphasize their church affiliation (church-going) more than their personal faith, i.e. a conservative politician is apt to let himself be seen attending church functions, hobnobbing with bishops etc. but won’t talk much about how he believes in Jesus Christ as his personal saviour etc - the former is seen as a respectable way to show support for a conservative order of things, the latter as a rather gauche instance of baring to the public something that well-bred people tend to keep private. Also a number of prominent Social Democratic and Green politicians are pastors or church functionaries.
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at the grassroots level there are a lot of progressive/left-of-center/Green Christians. Not a lot in relation to church membership, but active and at times vocal - twenty years ago when the question of stationing intermediate-range (Pershing) missiles was the subject of a passionate debate the forum of much of that debate was church events, and church-based pacifist groups were influential participants. The idea that a true Christian should be a pacifist has much currency.
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The combination conservative/Christian/anti-environmentalist seems to be pretty rare. A socially conservative Christian as likely as not will be moderately environmentalist - “preserving God’s creation” is an idea that resonates with a lot of people.
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the term of being a “Christian” perhaps has another meaning than in US discourse. Non-churchgoers usually regard themselves as Christian as a matter of course, even when they never waste a thought on faith - you are baptized into your church, attend confirmation class, get confirmed, married (even if the church ceremony is legally without force) and get buried by your pastor because this is how things are done - your family is Lutheran, Catholic, whatever because of what part of Germany they are from; faith does not come necessarily into it.
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the topic of abortion does not arouse so much passions these days as it seems to be in the US. When e.g. Catholic bishops speak out against the legal compromise (abortion technically illegal but not to be prosecuted if in the first three months and after mandatory counseling; paid for by medical insurance on a means-tested basis) it is mostly “as in duty bound”. When the Catholic-church-affiliated charities had to withdraw from the mandatory counseling on orders from Rome an organization of lay Catholics soon filled that slot.
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the teaching of evolution is not a political issue for mainstream conservative Christians.
A side note about the party names that Spectre mentioned: when these parties were founded in the late 1940s the “Christian” part was meant to be inclusive rather than exclusive - not having separate conservative parties for Catholics and Protestants was pretty progressive and daring at the time.
As I recall, the Christian Democrats (formed in a late 1970’s merger between two Lutheran parties and one Catholic party) aren’t the right-wing party of the Netherlands- the VVD is.
I can’t think of any Norwegian politician of any party who would mention religion a lot, or make a big point of going to church.
For most of our political leaders, I’ve no idea whether they are Christian, of other religions, or are agnostics or atheists. An exception to this is the Christian Democratic Party, where I’ll expect all politicians to be Christian. They describe their party as “based on the Christian basic values, as seen in the Bible through the Christian view of human beings, love your neighbour, caretaking responsibility, and the ten commandments” (quick and dirty translation from Norwegian by me). It’s socially conservative (for instance against abortion, against the Partnership Act (same-sex marriage), introduced economic measures which encourage people with low income to stay at home with their kids (guess which gender this affects most)), but economically and otherwise it’s pretty close to the center.
The Conservative Party mention “Christian cultural values” in their programme. They are probably more church-friendly than parties to the left, but I’d expect to see signs of this in actual politics, not in any obvious personal behaviour of the politicians. The only non-Christian Norwegian top politician I know of is a former leader of the Conservatives (he’s a jew). (There are several others who I’d guess are atheists, but I can’t remember seeing their beliefs or lack of it mentioned explicitly anywhere.) Of course, by US standards the Norwegian Conservatives are probably rabid commies 
They also make a point of being pro-gay.
Norway’s current prime minister is a Christian Democrat, and a minister (ie. protestant priest). I suppose he mentions his religion in speeches to his own party, but I can’t remember hearing him referring to it when speaking as a prime minister. In his new year speech to all Norwegians, his only reference to religion was urging for greater religious tolerance. (Summary in English, full text in Norwegian.)
A Norwegian politician who made a big point of being deeply religious would probably find him/herself out of touch with the voters. It’s said that most Norwegians enter a church four times in their lives, and two of those times they’re carried
In England it is pretty much bad form to volunteer your religious beliefs unless you are asked, double that if you are a politician. Tony Blair’s personal faith is well know, and he slips in a reference now and then and it does not go down well. So much is it a downer that in briefings his head spin doctor feels the need to tone him down a bit - like recently when he interjected upon Tony was asked a religious related question by a journal ist that, “We don’t do God”. End of question.
Before they merged into the Liberal Party, the Social Democratic Party talked of alternative names and introducing “Christian Democratic” into the name was discussed but quickly rejected as out of kilter with the electorate and too obviously continental in flavour to go down well with the “little englanders”.
Now start talking about “Jesus Christ being your personal philosopher” and you will be viewed as a dangerous crazy, and your poll ratings would plummet. The press would tear you apart.
In Wales and Scotland the Churches and ones religion is more a part of daily life and so there would be less reluctance to be drawn out on religious issues, they might even be some millage in it in more rural conservative (with a small c) areas - for instance the Western Isles which still close down for Sunday. Northern Ireland is a law underto itself when it comes to politics.
In the south of Ireland there’s a religious right party, the Christian Solidarity Party. They do absolutely terribly in elections. Just for kicks a while ago I went through the 2002 election results constituency-by-constituency and in every single constituency the CSP ran in, they were either the lowest vote-getter or very nearly so.
The most right-wing establishment party, the Progressive Democrats, have generally been of the libertarian school of conservatism. Their Minister for Justice is doing his best to undermine that tradition, but AFAICR he’s never used religion to back up his positions, and I think it would go over really poorly with the PDs’ supporters if he did.
I can only think of one prominent politician in the south who is known for their religious views as much as for anything else - Dana Rosemary Scallon - and she was a famous singer before she became a politician, so you can’t really blame/credit her religious views for getting her elected. Most people think she’s nuts.
Denmark:
Religion is of very little concern in Danish politics. I can’t remember when an issue was last debated on religious basis, perhaps the abortion debate some 30 years ago. But as far as there are self identified Christians they are more associated with the left wing. There are two vicars in the parliament I can recall. One in some crazy party that is kinda like the Social Democrats (center). And another on the left wing of the leftist Socialists Peoples Party (a communistic spin off).
There is one political party which calls themselves Christian Democrats, but they didn’t make it past the minimum 2% line at last election. Politically speaking in the Danish spectrum they’re center to left leaning (that’d be way, freaking way, left wing to an American). They’re also pro-abortion, divorce, evolution education and all such things.
The conservatives have some motto like “God, fatherland and the King”. But mostly they speak about law and tax.
If somebody said “Jesus was their favourite philosopher” everybody would think he was joking. And if he insisted, there would be an embarrassed silence until someone would politely try to change the subject before he made more of an ass out of himself.
- Rune