For the past few days, i was looking for transcripts of Reverend Wright’s sermons, as this whole “God damn America” and “Chickens coming home to roost” regarding 9/11 seemed mighty fishy. How could it not? There was some controversy regarding Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson agreeing with each other that God allowed 9/11 to happen because of “moral decay,” listing abortion, the ACLU, and homosexuality as examples. Both of these men had Bush’s ear with those Faith Based Initiatives, and the media hardly balked at that. However, Wright is now somehow out of bounds for his words, and Obama is an unAmerican radcial. It’s nonsense.
Obama has already handled the controversy beautiful, addressing problems with race. However, is Reverend Wright really anti-American? No, absolutely not.
The sermon from which the clip of “Chickens coming home to roost” was drawn. First, he was paraphrasing the words of Ambassador Edward Peck, and second, he was preaching how violence begets violence. How is this inflammatory compared to the words of Bush’s pals Falwell and Robertson?
The sermon from which the clip of “God damn America” was drawn. In context from which it is drawn, it’s not instructing anyone to hate America. It’s about striving to create a more perfect union, about not being complacent in the face of injustice. He does proclaim a loyalty to God more than to the government of the United States but his God is one of compassion. This is not a bad thing.
As this Daily Kos post points out, it seems that the “God damn America” was riffing off Jesus’ words in Luke 6:24-26. Jesus was not some simpering pansy who sat around watching rainbows and stroking lambs when it came to condemning social injustice. It is highly unlikely that Jesus would have been cheering institutionalized racism.
I’m still curious as to what followed the “God damn America” lines, as from the content of the rest of the sermon, he would be exonerated further.
Reverend Wright? He seems like a pretty good man so far. I’m glad that Obama didn’t play along with the misleading sound bytes.
Tags: 9/11, Barack Obama, Reverend Jeremiah Wright
My opinion: Wright is radical and I find him as offensive as Falwell. However, Obama joined that church, not because he is a deeply religious man, but because as the prep school product of a white woman and an African he needed credibility with the Chicago urban black vote to get started in local politics else he would have been decimated by a native son.
i’ve since read some stuff that is pretty radical, more radical than anything in those sermons, but i still find it hard to put him at the same degree of extremity as Falwell. I can see where it’s inflammatory to certain people, but nothing that i disagree with essentially. (Sooner or later, i’ll find something that raises my hackles, but i’m not even a Christian. Why would i agree with that much with what Wright says?) Then again, i’ve always leaned pretty far to the left of you. Oh, well… so it goes.
and yep, i just caught some nutty off-the-cuff comment about the crucifixion of Jesus being an Italian styled lynching. I definitely don’t agree with that, but it’s a little too absurd for me to take it seriously.
Never doubted you pointing out Wright being a cred builder for Obama, but he had to be rolling his eyes at crap like that.
He’s an over the top preacher within a tradition that is not at all uncommon in the realm of black preachers. I don’t think its actually that big a deal for Obama, but I think its fair game for Clinton or McCain to go after.
You probably already saw that article from awhile back about Hillary praying with James Baker’s wife.
Wright’s blustering makes better headlines, but Clinton’s equally pragmatic “religious” affiliations are troubling. Pointing out that Hillary hangs out with a lot of the people who are tight with Poppa Bush, especially one who delivered Florida to Dubya in 2000, just doesn’t tickle that reactionary 9/11 bone in the American public.