The black moderate blogger discusses Rev. Jeremiah Wright (pictured right), the controversial pastor of Sen. Barack Obama who argues that black Americans should not sing "God Bless America" but instead "God Damn America", calls America "KKKA", and says the United States is to blame for the 9/11 terrorist attacks: "All this ish is coming out about Barry's minister and its [sic] not good. This dude is saying some seriously foul things and very un-preacher like if you ask me. I was never a big fan of that church anyway because it was full of upper class snobs (except for my friends that still go there), but that's another post. To tie him to this man will do wonders for those who want to paint Barry as anti-American because the statements are very clear. But what do you do? We all have relatives or friends who say stupid and offensive things. We don't end a 20+ year friendship because a friend doesn't have the same view as we do. I have a few anti-Semitic or racist relatives and I still love them even thought I disagree with everything they say and give them my 2cents about it. I have friends who are so far to the left they see a conspiracy against the black man in everything. I think they're mentally challenged personally, but I'm still friends with them. I keep telling them if they hate this country so much just leave. If they left, I'd still answer their e-mails and texts. I'm not arguing the scrutiny. I know that running for President is different and your associations are more important, but if denouncing the statements isn't enough, what is? For the people demanding this, I don't think anything would be. He could curse the man to hell and those people still wouldn't vote for him."
My response: If you've been going to a pastor's church for 20 years and he married you and baptized your children, you agree with most of what that pastor says. Rev. Wright was clearly also not being mindful that his congregant is running for president. Sure, America has done some jacked up stuff. What country has not? However, despite his anti-Americanism, Rev. Wright ironically is aware that there is no country that provides more opportunity and freedom for black folks than America. I've been to Trinity United Church of Christ a couple of times. I'm not even Christian, and was not as conservative as I now am when I attended with my friend. Even then, I found the church promoted a political agenda - it is definitely a Pan-Africanist church, which in itself is good although that church promotes a socialist version of Pan-Africanism that I don't support - to the exclusion of a spiritual one rooted in biblical teachings. Or as one of my uncles says, Trinity United Church of Christ is an Afrocentric and not a Christocentric (or even an Afrocentric-Christocentric) church. That fact will not help countering the claim that Sen. Obama is "an undercover Muslim" bent on destroying America from within by joining with anti-American forces. The rhetoric from folks close to Sen. Obama (his pastor, his wife) is not matching the one-America rhetoric that he is putting out there, and opponents will exploit that fact. When even my Grandma, a moderate Florida Democrat backing Sen. Obama's campaign who is in Chicago right now, is crying foul about Rev. Wright's comments, arguing that he is not Christocentric, and that Sen. Obama should leave his church then I know something is up.
Angela Winters on Pastor Problems
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3 comments:
Shay, thanks for your insights. I had the same inklings about the lack of Christocentricity. When I heard the "God damn America" excerpt, especially, I was left wondering how this reconciles with Jesus' instructions to bless your enemies and do good to those who spitefully use you. Even in the OT, God wouldn't let Jonah get away with washing his hands of the Ninevites. He (the Lord) made sure Jonah preached to them ... and, whadda ya know, they repented. Much to Jonah's consternation, as he would have preferred to see them all Gomorrah-ed.
I'm not asking Pastor Wright to be angelically inhuman. If he can't bring himself to sincerely sing "God bless America," I think can understand that on a certain level. But "God damn America"? Weren't there any alternatives? Like "God forgive America," "God save America," or "God heal America"? I would even endorse "God chasten America," since I myself think we as a nation have LOT of things we need to be chastened for. Painful as Biblical chastening is, though, it is always done in the context of a continuing relationship with God -- "He chastens those whom He loves." And so asking for chastening, while desiring correction and understanding that it comes with pain, is not the same as asking for abandonment by God (ie, damnation).
Does Rev. Wright *really* want to live in a country that has been abandoned and damned by God? If he thinks blacks and/or poor folks have it hard now, just watch what would happen when all spiritual forces for good were withdrawn. There would be *no* protection, none, zip, zilch, against naked aggression and the most depraved of violent appetites. How would the poor and the powerless fare then? By asking God to damn America, the Reverend is in effect wishing indescribable suffering and destruction upon those whom he claims to champion.
This is the problem with hatred when it is applied to people and not sin. People-hatred is a conflagration with vicious and indiscriminate blowback. Which is why God condemns it. Which is why Paul counsels against it ("Do not overcome evil with evil; overcome evil with good"). Which is why it has no place in a Christian church.
My problem with the "God damn America" mentality is not just that it is anti-American; it is profoundly un-Christian. Even if Senator Obama chose to ignore the politics of Rev. Wright's sermons (or if, as the Senator seems be claiming, he did not see them as particularly political to begin with), the spiritual poison from Trinity United's leader should have been self-evident (as it was to your Grandma), and reason enough to find another church at which to worship.
You didn't even touch on the Bill Clinton was "riding dirty." comment. I think this is devastating. i don't even think people realize how devastating this situation will be because it is the antithesis of what his campaign is supposed to be about and I think it definitely plays into the whole "Obama is a muslim" whispering campaign that is out there. The campaign isn't managing this story well at all and with a month to go to Pennsylvania, there isn't anything out there to stop it.
This story goes way beyond Obama and to what is being preached in the church.If it's more of what has already been shown than clearly this is a case of a wolf in sheep's clothing leading people astray.
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