What happened to separation between church and state?

If the United States of America is supposed to be a secular democracy why do we keep promoting Jesus' command of helping the needy and giving to the poor to justify talk about raising taxes and redistributing wealth but ridicule religion and warn against theocracy when anyone recommends voting for someone who actually believes Jesus is the Son of God? Jesus did not say we should let the government take care of people so we don't have to do it ourselves. Why do we so often pontificate about compassion but work so hard to abdicate our own personal responsibility? Could it be because we don't like religion when we might have to change our own lives but we like it a lot when we can force someone to do what we think is best?