Barack Obama says Republicans hijacked faith
Published by Fred Soto• June 23rd, 2007
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Obama says the Religious Right has hijacked faith
I strongly agree that democrats / liberals have been blitzed with propaganda, basically God and Country were taken from them in order to promote an agenda. The backlash is going to be really nasty when it catches up to people who have done the exploiting for political reasons. *waves at fox news, waves at Jerry Fallwell, Waves at people who believe that you can’t worship God unless you belong to small sect of Christian extremists.
HARTFORD, Conn. - Sen. Barack Obama told a church convention Saturday that some right-wing evangelical leaders have exploited and politicized religious beliefs in an effort to sow division. “Somehow, somewhere along the way, faith stopped being used to bring us together and faith started being used to drive us apart,” the Democratic presidential candidate said in a 30-minute speech before the national meeting of the United Church of Christ.
I’ve always hated this about the religious right. I’ve despised Jerry Fallwell, and like many people believe that he is burning in hell for the sins he’s committed against the nation and world. YOU do not dictate religion, YOU do not make the final judgment, YOU do not tell me whether or not I can have a strong relationship with GOD.
“Faith got hijacked, partly because of the so-called leaders of the Christian Right, all too eager to exploit what divides us,” the Illinois senator said.
“At every opportunity, they’ve told evangelical Christians that Democrats disrespect their values and dislike their church, while suggesting to the rest of the country that religious Americans care only about issues like abortion and gay marriage, school prayer and intelligent design,” according to an advance copy of his speech.
Fantastic, I love the guy. Hillary recently talked about how its the Iraqi government fault that we’re stuck in Iraq, also used some war rhetoric to try and rally up Americans. She failed miserably, which prompted me to write “Hillary Clinton is dead to me.“
Barack Obama is looking very good right about now
The rest of the article is below, or you can read it in its original entire context at Yahoo News: Barack Obama says Religious Right hijacked God
“There was even a time when the Christian Coalition determined that its number one legislative priority was tax cuts for the rich,” Obama said. “I don’t know what Bible they’re reading, but it doesn’t jibe with my version.” A call to the Washington, D.C.-based Christian Coalition of America seeking comment was not immediately returned Saturday. Obama is a member of the United Church of Christ, a church of about 1.2 million members that is considered one the most liberal of the mainline Protestant groups. In 1972, the church was the first to ordain an openly gay man. Two years ago, the church endorsed same-sex marriage, the largest Christian denomination to do so. Obama believes that states should decide whether to allow gay marriage, and he opposes a constitutional amendment against it.
Conservative Christian bloggers have linked Obama to what they call the “unbiblical” teachings of his church. Theological conservatives believe gay relationships violate Scripture, while more liberal Christians emphasize the Bible’s social justice teachings. Obama trails Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York by 33 percent to 21 percent in the most recent Associated Press-Ipsos poll among Democrats and those leaning toward the party.
tags:barack obama, Christians, Elections, Evangelical, faith, Politics, Religion
Fred Soto is an Attorney and Entrepreneur from the Silicon Valley.
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This is hilarious as those are some big words for someone who hasn’t exactly done anything. Comparing Fallwell’s life to Obama is incomparable. Actions speak louder then words. His church alone has 24,000 members plus his ministries, university and all the humanitarian work he has done. Being named humanitarian of they year.
Politics are a important part of religious beliefs, you all should read religion and politics.
What if Christians didn’t have a leader to voice their opinions? Then they would hardly be heard. You should respect the opinions of others even if you disagree. These opinions are what the majority of the Christian right think. I see this as a way for Obama to pick up more votes on the left. Fallwell will be remembered in history for what he did for the Christian faith not religion. Obama will be remembered for having a lot of myspace friends until Ron Paul owned him.
I don’t mean to deny Christian’s a right to voice an opinion, I simply think it is dishonest to try and take God and claim it as belonging to the right.
The implication that it is MORAL, GOOD, and GOD-LOVING, PATRIOTIC AMERICAN to be a Republican
vs. IMMORAL, EVIL, PAGAN UNAMERICAN — is disingenuous. If there is anything about Falwell that most liberals despised it was the characterization of a group of ‘people who think differently’ as devil loving sinners.
I have no problem at all with Christians, as I am one– I do have a problem with using God to deny others the right to speak. I have a serious problem with using “THE TROOPS” and “TRUE AMERICAN” rhetoric as a tool to deny liberals or anti-Bush / anti-War people the right to say what they are thinking.
We talk about having a ‘divided’ nation right now and the Politicians always use the “We must unite our nation” speeches, but it never happens. Why doesn’t it happen? The biggest reason is that we accept that it is ‘ok’ to play dirty in politics, after all politics is a dirty game.
Christians have the same rights that any other religious or non-religious group has, they are not above or below them on the pecking order, nor should they be. This is a democracy, like it or not the Constitution was intentionally left as a ‘Godless’ constitution.
Many founders were Christian, many were not.. if you read the federalist papers and some of the discussion going on before the signing of the declaration of independence and the Constitution, you’d see how important it was to the founders that we not allow religious influence to infiltrate the government and justice system. Its not to say religion is evil, but Religion in the hands of the wrong man (with political power) can be very dangerous! Bush or Clinton, Reagan or Carter… it doesn’t matter what your politics, you should stand for the rights of all Americans to be included in the conversation.
In the end, the majority will out-vote and out-voice the minority, but at least in this latter circumstance, all Americans are afforded the right to participate in civil discourse.
Thank you for the thoughtful comment, have a good evening!
God bless America!
Forget about the rest of humanity… just America! Ok god??? Hum, I meant God bless the White Christian Americans of course!
Because, in the whole infinite universe, only the White Christian Americans are worthy of god blessing…
Ah, the beauty of faith (which can be translated as “wishfull thinking”) never stops to amaze me… ^_^
Yes, continue to think that god only loves you and nobody else; that he only talks to you; that you are the center of his pre-occupations…
Man, some people are so aggressive, feeling so superior… when in fact there are so many GOOD, NICE, FRIENDLY and HONEST people out there…
Remember, you won’t be judge by what you say you do; you will be judge by what you do, the good things you do, your kindness, etc…
And I think the Budhists and other “religions” are way ahead of yours…
No, I think that is a fairly accurate assessment of the evil of institutional corruption and problems that stem from Religion and Politics merging into something that we can’t handle.
Buddhism in my experience, is a philosophy– so in many ways, I identify with Buddhist thought, in fact, its probably closer to how I live my life than say — the stereotypical closed-minded religious extremist you just described above.
I understand why America is despised, but the blanket stereotype that you lay on our entire country and people, is just as wrong as a country that seeks to impose its values on the world ™. It as bad as Bush attacking Iraq — hunting terrorists there because Al Qaeda attacked the united states.
Where it bothers me most, is that every side, religion, and country, all people– (sadly even Buddhists) are guilty of believing others are a lesser form of humanity or ‘being’. In reality we are all the same person divided by history, geography and an environment that creates these various voices.
Its easy to attack the U.S. on these grounds because 1) we are very vocal about it 2) the media and our corporate voice carries louder than most 3) super power status and all that garbage creates a –arrogant America– and a hostile/somewhat envious rest of the world.
Status, Power, Greed, Intolerance, Hate– all of these are working together to destroy this world. The religious will call it evil, or “the devil” and urge you to visit their places of worship, for it is there and only there that you will find God… or -enlightenment- or [insert the light at the end of the tunnel phrase here].
Arguing, while agreeing with you, JD,
Fred
My rant was… a rant ^_^ because I am so tired of all this religious circus and also it was some kind of “electro-choc” to try to wake-up the targeted people to realise their hypocrisy and arrogance. But I guess they would not come here anyway.
I know not every americans are like that of course; I have good american friends, who are very nice and friendly people.
But the majority let a minority of religious zealots rule their nation… They allowed the non-official “crusade” going on in the middle-east several times, buying the most blatant (so evident) lies from their leaders (while the rest of the world was like “are they insane?”).
God is on money.
God is in the pledge at school (poor kids).
God here, god there, god everywhere.
PS: I was a skeptic when I was young, now I am agnostic.
PS2: About the pledge, I could go on another rant about patriotism! (Our country/club/group/gang first, whatever it takes… and the rest of the world can …).
Yeah, I think a lot of people are in the same boat. Both sides have common desires to ‘not lose the ability to speak’. Problem is, that when people feel that their speech is threatened, the resistance will be great. Your rant, and the one of the Christian above (bill) is a good illustration of this fact. No one wants to be silenced, and in response to the fear of being silenced a rant of ‘we’re better than you are’ ensues. So then it cycles on and on and the conversation never comes to the middle where everyone can chat about American politics.
Bill: I don’t think I ever referred to Obama as being ‘better than Falwell’ or even comparing the two. What I did say was Jerry Falwell was a bad person (in very strong language) because he basically stereotyped all Americans who fell outside of his institutional reach. He, like Bush, used fear to get Americans in line.. and it worked. Kudos to him for having so much power, Obama and Falwell are not vying for the same ‘job’ in America. One of them requires at least a semblance of objectivity and fairness, while the other requires a bible, a Christian fundamentalist handbook, and ‘knowing’ that everything fed by these people is 100% truth because the bible says so.
In other words, this religion while using the ‘we want to share God with the world’ face is actually wrestling God away from the world and claiming God as property. I know you don’t see it this way, and I know many evangelicals will never view their behavior this way, but I felt like God was stolen from me in the public eye and I’ve despised that for some time now, because the general public doesn’t generally think about these issues– they just want a leader who does.
Senator Obama said he doesn’t know what Bible Christians are reading. I’m reading God’s Word, the Bible, the only Bible. God said in Jeremiah 1:4-5, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; … In Psalm 139:13-16 For You formed my inward parts, You covered me in my mother’s womb …My frame was not hidden from You. When I was made in secret and skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written. The days fashioned for me When as yet there were none of them.” God knew us before we were born, He tells us that in the Bible.
He also says that for a man to lay with a man is an abomination and in I Corinthians 6:9&10 “Do you not kow that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals nor sodomites, nor theives, nor covetous, not drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.”
The Bible says the way to heaven is narrow and few there are that go that way and wide is the road to destruction. So yes Christians are narrow minded, but so is Jesus. He said I am the Way, the Truth and the Life - no one comes to the Father but thru Me.”
That is a beautiful post, Joann. Thank you– I think the issue with how “Christianity” is defined is causing problems for many Americans.
Up until the rise of evangelicals like Jerry Falwell, etc. there was a place for people to turn. There were options for people who wanted to seek out God.
Now, because of the way Evangelical Christians have used a ‘in your face, join me or goto hell’ way of recruiting, many people have been turned off. I know what you are getting at, and I wish all Christians were as nice as you. I still call myself Christian, though I am admittedly of the more liberal persuasion in terms of ‘interpretation’. However, I want the faith to open up to all that seek it, not turn people into Atheists because of the method and message of fear and intolerance.
Maybe fear and intolerance is not at all the intent, but that is what many Americans and even Catholics, Protestants, and (of course Agnostic and Atheists) feel. They feel like a certain segment of America is trying to hold a monopoly on faith, and again as I’ve said before: this is the kind of stuff that causes wars. The attitudes need to change or the divide and a less religious America will result. The sad thing, is that I truly believe Evangelical Christians seek to help and convert others for good reasons, for what they believe is a beautiful thing. Unfortunately, its the message and the way it is delivered that is (in my opinion) turning America into a more Atheistic nation.
I know few will agree with me on that, but consider this as a possible reason for Americans losing faith rather than some other thing like — liberal media or television or whatever. Just my opinion, I hope I was not offensive — it is a matter of perspective and that is what I would like to share, as well as learn from others. Thanks again for commenting.
You should also not confuse the real/honest religious leaders/believers and the ones who use (any) religions as a way to control the masses. Personaly I think that, especialy in America, the later type is the norm…
And a little quote from the Buddha:
“Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.â€