Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest

In my Avis Rental car yesterday, I was treated to an XM Radio discussion on POTUS08 with the author of "The Faith of Barack Obama"; there were several misstatements of Black Liberation Theology as well as what Obama's faith means to him and although I do not have as large a podium as an internationally - indeed, intergalactic - broadcast radio program, I do want to address those with you here in this letter.

First, clearly Black Liberation Theology is too complex for someone such as the author to grasp in the one weekend he spent at Trinity United Church of Christ, so perhaps he is to be forgiven for the mistakes he made of mischaracterizing this theological viewpoint. Even so, his references to the church and its former pastor as "cult-like" are beyond insulting and are no doubt due to his ignorance, as opposed to any specific teaching he may have heard or read about. By example, let me delve into the author's statements that Dr. Cone's phraseology of equating "black" with oppressed and "white" with oppressor is a confusing construct, in that these theological terms of good and evil are not specifically mapped back to the equivalent racial terms; i.e. - being black racial does not equate to being automatically good spiritually and the same is true for white people in that they are not - by theological definition - automatically evil. What the author should have said is these terms were confusing to him - as someone not culturally educated with a view of the world through the eyes of a black man - and especially not the eyes of a black man in the 1960s when Black Liberation Theology was defined. Seemingly the task of attempting to understand the black experience is too difficult for the author, as he was manifestly unable to imagine just how a black man of the 1960s could have many examples in his life of white being equivalent to his oppressor and this makes the author unable to make the spiritual and theological leap that Dr. Cone was seeking to use as a pathway to open the heart of man to the Lord.

Second, the author describes how central doubt is to Obama's faith - and then he criticizes him for having the temerity to express doubt in an example given in his second book, when he was discussing the afterlife with his child. Whereas the author has certain faith, an unquestioning faith, Obama has a faith that says he believes - without requiring specific knowledge of the Lord's intention or his plans. Which one of these men has placed his trust in the Lord and which one has boxed the Lord into a position? More importantly, rather than attempting to gauge the quality of one's faith against another, Christians are called to welcome one another as brothers and not perform faith checks upon one another and call those out whom we find lacking according to a standard of man - and not a standard of God.

Let me close with one example of how the author substituted his own standard for faith: he praised McCain's swift and sure answer to the question: when does life begin? McCain answered immediately - conception - whereas Obama demurred and said that question was above his pay grade. The author criticized Obama for his answer - but provided no example text from the scripture to back up his criticism. This surely means the answer came from the word of the author and not the word of God.

Now, I know not the mind of God so I have no idea whether the author and John McCain are right when they posit that life begins at conception; what I do know is that for that to be the case, the number of abortions that pro-lifers like to put forth as having occurred since the advent of Roe v Wade is woefully inadequate. They are simply talking about doctor-aided abortions; the human female aborts embryos all of the time - we call these miscarriages in some instances. In other instances, a fertilized egg - meaning post conception - is simply allowed to exit the uterus as it occurred to late in the cycle to reach implantation in the uterine wall. As a lay person, I know not the word for this case, but here is the point: if life begins at conception - any fertilized egg that does not reach birth is an abortion - according to McCain, meaning that it is the taking of another human life. As a legislator, McCain has never sanctioned murder, so the logical conclusion of his position and the author's, is that every instance of a fertilized egg that does not result in a human birth must be investigated to determine if a murder has occurred. Does McCain really want to add to the trauma of a miscarriage with the trauma of a police investigation? And how would he even be made aware of the passage of an egg that was fertilized and not implanted? Would he mandate the collection of tampons and maxi-pads for forensic analysis? And would he then fill the jails with women who had sex too late in their cycle for implantation of the egg to take place? They would be knowingly risking the act of conception - creating a human life - with no hope of that life to continue living? Would McCain classify that as murder, manslaughter or criminally-negligent homicide?

Yes - McCain received a roar of adulation from the crowd for both his response and the author's, but this answer was as equally thoughtless as it was swift; perhaps the first response is not always the right response. Perhaps having a President who knows that is a good thing.

Sphere: Related Content

Isn't it ironic - dontcha think?

I was watching Morning Joe on MSNBC today - as I am wont to do - and the eponymous host was in fine form today, this time revisiting a favorite them of his: the efficacy of torture. I was going to less this pass by unremarked, except for this sequence of events:

• The show went to break over the strains of an old rock tune that I am familiar with and yet uncertain of
• I immediately paused the TiVo and hit the internet, in search of enlightenment
• A search on the partially heard lyrics: "at the party she was kindness in the hard crowd" led me to a really excellnt online book site called: Reason to Rock; and the song, "White Satin" by the artist, Cream
• An exploration of the rest of the site revealed a discussion on another oldie but goodie - the Rolling Stones song, "Sympathy for the Devil".

This is a great site. by the way; I love the exposition of the songs discussed herein. And I as began to read over "Sympathy for the Devil", I kept seeing more and more parallels (from the mockery the Devil made of Jesus to the vilification that He endured from the authorities of the day) with things going on today - especially concerning these wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the willingness of so many Americans to support the torture of our fellow human beings.

And that started me to think: why do Christians - who mourn the martyrdom of our Lord and Saviour - find the concept of torture to be so irresistible?

How is it that we Christians - who are seemingly so devout in our prayers and who most recently saw a film that recounted the tale of our Lord's crucification in gruesome detail - have forgotten how He was tortured and taunted, how He was pressed so mightily to reveal His divine nature before His accusers?

And how have we forgotten that all of the torture came to naught?

By what process have the sons and daughters of Christ become the legions of Roman centurions, blindly following the dictates of a second-rate Caesar into treating "the least of these" as though they were beneath us?

We have lost our way as Christians and as Americans, if we believe that we can save ourselves through the mistreatment of others.

Sphere: Related Content

Rev. Wright was right

I know that I told myself that after hearing Barack ask us all to turn to the better angels of our nature and seek a unified path away from our long, long stalemate . . . .

But it is hard for me to just stand around and let people score cheap and malicious points of people I respect.

What did Rev. Wright really say? He said Hillary "ain't never been called a n-----". If that is not a true statement, I certainly have not heard Hillary step forward and explain when and where it happened. I can tell you this: every black person I know can tell you what it was like the first time they were ever called by that name. It usually happens with such a jarring degree of hate that it jolts you from whatever reverie you might have been peacefully and happily ensconsed within. And it almost always happens to us when we are children, so the concept that there are people out there who might have some visceral, uncontrollable, pent-up storehouse of rage against us is the most inconceivable sort of thing.

Picture yourself back when you were just a child - perhaps just entering your first few years of schooling. There may be kids there you do not click with or people who do not share their toys, but hate? What child expects to encounter someone who hates him or her?

Of course, your parents know this day is coming. For they recall going through it as well. I imagine - as I do not have children of my own - that there is almost a timer that starts as soon as the child is born and then you make an oath to yourself to push that day so far into your child's future that the impact is just that much less jarring - that you know she or he will be just that much more prepared for that day than you were.

What else did Rev. Wright say? Well he blamed the impact of AIDS on the black community on the government of the USA. I know that most white people protect themselves from knowledge of the evil that their own government perpetrates in their name, but it is a fact that our goverment - our own goverment - conducted a decades long study of the affect of syphilis on the human body, by injecting it into black men and then letting them spread it through the black community. Years of conducting this study, collecting data and telling people you were treating them, when all the while the people who said you the patients, "I'm from the government and I am hear to help" were perpetrating one of the most evil acts known to man. This kind of evil leave a long memory - a psychic memory - in the group against which it was perpetrated, even while the group on whose behalf it was done whistles past the overflowing graveyards of those who have died. Did the government of our own country purposefully infect us with HIV? I honestly do not know; is it wise for me to ever completely absolve the same government that has done a very similar act of malfeasance? And knowing that they followed up their prior bad acts with an almost willful disregard for ensure that the poorest of our citizens - which is often a corollary to the blackest of our citizens had any meaningful pathway to the sort of medical care that could have prevented the infection from every occurring or at least have provided the sort of treatment that could have kept it manageable - to proclaim that "well, at least they didn't infect with the deadly virus - this time" is to damn the government with the faintest of praise.

But we all know that these two "crimes" are not what has riled up the "nutroots" of the American populace. No, the best way to get them going is to appear to be even the slightest bit "unpatriotic" - which is why we have to witness our politicians drap symbols all over their chests - flag pins, eagles, Statues of Liberty emblems - to bear silent witness to the depths of their patriotism. It is this theme that has struck a resonant chord with those anonymous email chains that proclaim - erroneously - that Barack Obama does not cover his heart with his hand during the Pledge of Allegiance. It is this meme that is most dangerous of all.

And yet it is most empty.

For what business is it of a pastor to be a loyal servant to any government of man? Jesus asked us to "render under Caesar that which is Caesar's and to render unto God that which is God's". Jesus never asked his followers to swear loyalty oaths to any government of man - indeed, he has commanded us to not put any false god before his Father. And what is a proclimation that any nation is flawless is but the anointing of a false god?

So - on the Sunday after 11-September-2001, when the rest of white America was securely seated in their home churches, hearing their pastors' transform the Prince of Peace into a god of war - the member of Trinity United Church of Christ had a little history placed before them. Rev. Wright told his flock that what happened to them the previous Tuesday was vile - yes - but how different was it from other acts that have taken place, other acts that were executed in our name by our government. Now, I have not heard his whole sermon, but I do know that he compared the events of that awful day (and I was in NYC that day; it was where I worked at the time and across the Hudson River from where I lived) to the bombing of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki. What is important to note here is that Rev. Wright did not say that it was those two atomic bombs that caused the attacks on us that day; what he said was analogous to: "if you go around the world, deciding who lives and who dies, you can't then act surprised when someone decides to give what they got".

(Didn't I hear a man say once to do unto others as you would have them do unto you?)

Now, I put out all of these words in defense of Rev. Wright - not because he needs a defense from me, but because other's need to hear people attempt to speak truth to power. And I know that these words will not convince anyone of anything, but they can at least bear silent witness that the truth is indeed out there.

And there is one other reason I have stayed up into the night to write these words; to ask this question: why have I heard people preach all week long that the "Christian" thing for Barack to do when he heard or was informed of the things his reverend - his pastor - had said was to turn his back on the man and leave that houst of worship - when the Jesus I read about in Sunday School taught that we should be slow to take offense and quick to forgive. Why have I continued to hear "Christian" say the most hateful things about Rev. Wright, when the Christ I learned about oh so long ago made it his duty to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable? Why is it, that in the end if the only things Rev. Wright are guilty of is saying that:

1. Racist slurs have never been thrown in the direction of Hillary Clinton;
2. The US government has a history of infecting its own black citizens with the most vile of diseases; and
3. The US government has a history of visiting violence around the world and that violence begets violence (did someone say to turn the other cheek when struck?)

- then where is the cause for all of this vitriol?

Sphere: Related Content

Can you tell a Sunni from a Shia

So, this is not my primary area of interest, but war should have the ability to focus ones thinking, no?

Very good question posed by this Jeff Stein; one has to wonder why no one has ever asked President Bush this question. But the boundaries of this "global war on terror" have expanded so wildly, that this question is no longer enough.

One of the poster here has pointed out that Iran is a Persian country and there is a lengthy history of animosity between Persians and Arabs (who are the majority of Iraqi's of any religion) that goes back much longer than the recent war between these two nations.

But now the word "nation" has introduced another hole into which the GWOT (or here) has stumbled, as Persia (Iran) has a long and storied history (which makes the idea of "regime change" there seem somewhat like an even loftier pipe dream; on the other hand, Iraq is just a creation of the west - for us, by us, in classic "FuBu" style - and its purpose was to serve our interests. So Iraq (and Kuwait too) are not nations in the classic sense like an Italy or a France or an England; peopled by folks with a history a common identity and an interest to want to live in a political union. Iraq was created by the west (Britain) to provide us with steady access to the oil that lay underneath the sand; we cared not about democracy or anything else that might hinder the oil flow. We can debate whether we truly believe in a democratic Iraq today, but the model is imprecisely applied as Iraq was never a nation to begin with.

The southwestern boundary was a compromise with King al Saud; the southeastern boundary was truncated to create Kuwait - as a means to siphon of the oil (a classic divide and conquer move to prevent oil from being in the control of just one country - as well as to prevent easy access to the Persian Gulf for Iraq, placing a premium on the pipeline builders); the western boundary was rather haphazardly drawn adjacent to Jordan and Syrian; the norther boundary was drawn to divide up any potential future Kurdistan dreams, by dividing up the Kurdish population between Turkey, Iraq and Iran - the nation that boarders Iraq on the East and probably has the most realistic (natural?) boarder of any nation with Iraq.

So into Iraq - this cauldron of peoples and religions - comes the most uncurious George we have ever had as a president; Shia versus Sunni is the start of any questions that need to be asked - not the end.

Be a good question to ask before you start a war - regardless of the urgency or the imminence of the threat, as that is a good way to know if you are going after a single bee or stumbling into a hornet's nest.

Sphere: Related Content

In Defense of Islam

What a wondrous world we live in, when wealthy, liberal (?), journalists (?) can so ably diffuse religious tensions inspired by a tendentious pope with but a few words. The new pope - the illustrious (?) Pope Benedict the 16th - has caused quite a stir, what with his gratuitous quotation of a 14th century Byzantine emperor:

"Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."

They say context is king and there is so much surrounding those remarks that entire volumes of encyclopedia have been written.

A Byzantine emperor? That very name evokes the old Roman empire and that introduces Constantine into the story, the Roman Emperor who transformed the religion of Christianity from that of the persecuted to that of the persecutor.

Sorry, but this is my blog and I do have the right to editorialize as I choose.

So here we have a 21st century pope, quoting the words of a 14th century emperor - the literal descendant of Constantine. In the 1000 years between Constantine and Manual II Palaeologus, Rome had fallen to the Huns and a vibrant new religion was threatening Nova Roma (Constantinople) from the South - Islam. There is no need to wonder why an emperor who is beset by opponents might feel such venom, so the real question is why would his figurative descendant (the pope, who perhaps in his mind still thinks of himself as the Holy Roman Emperor) be recalling those days?

In these times - less than 1000 years later, but not by much - Catholicism is again beset. Having cast their lot with the Europeans, Catholics have seen their star wax and wane; now, birth rates in Europe are declining; now, citizens of Europe are less likely to accept the solemn dictates of a bunch of men who have removed themselves from society to better control it; now, the growth of the Catholic church is coming from the nations of the Southern hemisphere (a different sort of man [can the Europeans really entrust them with the keys to the kingdom?]) - and here on all side Catholicism is once again beset by the rise of Islam.

Of course the pope knew he was insulting Islam; Islam is a threat to him and his power base. Of course the pope is against Turkey joining the European Union; a thriving nation placed side-by-side with nations who are growing weaker daily - an Islamic nation at that - would send a definite message to the remaining nations of Europe and a message with which the pope would prefer not to contend.

So, surely the good Mr. Friedman must be kidding when he tells us that the pope was actually treating Islam with respect. Surely he can also see that the pope was merely protecting his turf - as any good gangster would do.

Sphere: Related Content