« Barack Obama
July 1, 2008
Dobson’s Attack Opens the Floodgates
The Right is always saying that candidates can and should bring their faith to the public square, but it seems like the more Barack Obama does it, the more he gets criticized.
As we’ve noted several times in the past, for months right-wing activists like Rob Schenck have been declaring “Obama's Christianity woefully deficient” and demanding that Obama explain, in detail, the basic tenets of his faith so that the Right can judge just “how profound is the religious commitment that Barack Obama has made.” Others have echoed that point, saying that Obama is not a “true Christian,” that “there is a clear requirement for one to qualify as a Christian and Obama doesn’t meet that requirement,” and that Obama’s faith “tramples on the historic teachings of Christianity and the Bible.”
These attacks culminated in a nearly unprecedented episode last week when James Dobson dedicated his radio program to disparaging Obama’s understanding of his Christian faith, which was followed up by a three-part video series in which Focus on the Family Vice President Tom Minnery accusing Obama of having everything from a “completely and utterly ridiculous understanding” of the role of religion in public life to holding sacrilegious views.
And now that attacks on Obama’s faith have been given Dobson’s blessing, it seems as if every right-wing commentator cannot wait to pile on, with Pat Buchanan weighing in with his typically well-reasoned and insightful views:
Obama, however, is now preaching a kumbaya Christianity where leaders who believe abortion is the killing of the innocent unborn are to set their convictions and cause aside in the name of ecumenical amity.
It is Dobson who, in his intolerance of perceived evil, seems in the tradition of the abolitionists, and Barack who appears more like the milquetoast believers of whom Christ said he would spit them out of his mouth because they were neither hot nor cold and whom Dante consigned to the deepest reaches of hell.
For his part, George Neumayr was no less splenetic:
The willfulness he casually assumes in the traditionally religious defines his own stance, as he cobbles together a sham Christianity from scratch that conveniently dovetails with the platform of the Democratic Party, then calls his vote-searching the reconciliation of "religion and politics."
And, of course, the folks at the Christian Defense Coalition could not let any opportunity pass to weigh in as well:
Senator Obama does not have the moral authority to address these issues while supporting the tragic killing of innocent children and diminishing of women through abortion.
"The question must be asked, how can one support faith and values while embracing policies that brutalize children and wound women? Senator Obama cannot talk with integrity about his faith and social justice anymore than a segregationist or racist can talk about their faith, justice or equality with integrity.
And then there is Rick Scarborough of Vision America :
"Like my friend Jim Dobson, I was appalled by the Senator's remarks," Scarborough disclosed. "This speech showed Obama's real views on politics and religion. And, I can tell you, the presumptive Democratic nominee is no friend of Bible-believing Christians," Scarborough added.
Of course, Scarborough has spent the last week loudly complaining that a variety of evangelical leaders even agreed to meet with Obama earlier this month (probably because he wasn’t invited, though he has been trying to make it seem like he was) saying that doing so only confuses right-wing voters:
Senator Obama (D-Illinois), the presumptive Democratic candidate for president, recently held meetings with prominent Christians, including Franklin Graham and Bishop T.D. Jakes. But Rick Scarborough, president of Vision America Action, says evangelical leaders send a confusing message when they meet with Obama.
"This is a man that has never seen an unborn fetus that he wouldn't abort," chides Scarborough. "While serving in the state legislature in the state of Illinois, [he] served on a committee that literally prevented a bipartisan piece of legislation which would have offered medical services to botched abortions," he points out.
Scarborough goes on to criticize Obama's stance on homosexuality. "He's radically pro-gay...even to legislating against sections of the Bible and preventing those of us who embrace those sections of the Bible from preaching biblical truth," he argues. "So I'm troubled by it."
Posted by Kyle at 4:29 PM | Permalink
Dobson Attacks Lack “Intellectual Integrity”
Peter Wehner of the Ethics and Public Policy Center criticizes James Dobson’s attacks on Barack Obama: “There are certainly reasons for evangelicals to have concerns about Obama…But critics of Obama have an obligation to provide a fair and honest critique, and the attacks leveled by Dobson fall terribly short of that standard. If Christian conservatives want to be taken seriously, they need to make serious arguments and speak with intellectual integrity. In this instance, Dobson didn't. He has set back his cause and made some of us who are evangelicals and conservatives wince.”
Posted by Chris at 10:20 AM | Permalink
June 27, 2008
Keeping the Focus on Obama’s Faith – Part III
Focus on the Family has wrapped up its three-part series attacking Barack Obama’s faith and understanding of Christianity. In part one, FOF Vice President Tom Minnery accused Obama of having “a fierce misunderstanding of Christianity,” while in part two he called Obama’s interpretation of the Bible sacrilegious. In the final installment, Minnery said Obama has a “complete and utterly ridiculous understanding” of the role of religion in public life.
Posted by Kyle at 10:18 AM | Permalink
June 26, 2008
Keeping the Focus on Obama’s Faith – Part II
Focus on the Family continues with its attack on Barack Obama’s faith and understanding of Christianity, with FOF's Gary Schneeberger discussing it on Janet Folger's Faith 2 Action radio program while FOF Vice President Tom Minnery continues his three-part video criticism, claiming that Obama’s interpretation of the Bible is such a “sacrilege” that he “could cry”:
Posted by Kyle at 12:27 PM | Permalink
June 25, 2008
Keeping the Focus on Obama’s Faith
After generating a wave of coverage with his nearly unprecedented attack on Barack Obama and his understanding of his own Christian faith in yesterday’s radio broadcast, James Dobson has returned to his standard program format for the time being with a program about “Recapturing the Joy.” But that doesn’t mean that Focus on the Family is about to let the story go or about to back of its incessant attacks against Obama and his faith.
Today, FOF unveiled the first installment of a three-part video series in which host Kim Trobee and Focus' Vice President of Public Policy Tom Minnery criticize Obama’s 2006 Call to Renewal Keynote Address. In it, Minnery claims that Obama still has a long way to go in his “journey of faith” because he’s no where “close to our understanding of what the Christian faith is.” Minnery also gets unnecessarily worked-up about the fact that Obama sought to “compare James Dobson with Rev. Al Sharpton,” when, in fact, Obama wasn’t comparing them at all; he was contrasting them – a key distinction apparently lost on Minnery, Dobson, and the people at Focus on the Family:
Kim Trobee: Tom, Obama explains that he was not raised in a particularly religious household. He talks about his Dad being a Muslim and then becoming an atheist and he says that his mother grew up with a healthy skepticism of organized religion. What does that tell us with regard to his own views on religion?
Tom Minnery: It tells us that he’s on a journey of faith, and that’s a good thing because we think people out to journey toward faith. But from what he says about the Christian faith, who knows where he is? He’s not close to our understanding of what the Christian faith is, by any means.
Trobee: Let’s go ahead and show this first clip of the video.
Barack Obama: Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.
Trobee: Is that true?
Minnery: No, it’s not true. It’s not even close. Senator, we are not an atheist nation. Senator, we are not a Hindu nation. We are not a Buddhist nation. 76% of the people, according to last year’s Pew Center on Religion survey, people identify themselves as Christian. Now, all of them are not practicing, yet 40% still go to church once a week and, by and large, it’s Christian denominations they’re going to. We are, along among the world, a nation still with a strong Judeo-Christian heritage and he is trying to erase that. And he does so at his own peril.
Trobee: In the next clip, he takes aim at Dr. Dobson and that’s something that, up until now, we were unaware had happened. Let’s take a look at it.
Obama: And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's?
Minnery: Wow. For someone on a journey of faith to compare James Dobson with Rev. Al Sharpton is breathtaking. Many viewers will know that Al Sharpton achieved his notoriety as a polarizing, racist figure in American life, a black racist figure. That’s strong language, but that is who he was and who he is and you can find numerous stories about his run-ins with racial incidents in the past, from the Tawana Brawley hoax to the Central Park jogger issue in which he entered the fracas on the side of black racism. And to compare that with Dr. James Dobson, a child psychologist – not even a Reverend – is a fierce misunderstanding of Christianity.
Posted by Kyle at 12:59 PM | Permalink
June 24, 2008
The Right’s New Religious Test
For months now, Religious Right activists have been quietly attacking Barack Obama’s Christian faith. For years, the Right had routinely accused anyone who dared to criticize any Republican or right-wing political candidate for their political views of engaging in an unconstitutional religious test or exhibiting religious bigotry.
But the ascent of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, coupled with his open discussion of his personal faith, has forced the Right to not only jettison its long-held position that attacking a political candidate because of his or her faith was off limits, but to go a step further to include outright attacks on the fundamental tenets of Obama’s Christianity.
For months, activists like Rob Schenck have been declaring “Obama's Christianity woefully deficient” and demanding that Obama explain, in detail, the basic tenets of his faith so that the Right can judge just “how profound is the religious commitment that Barack Obama has made.” Others have echoed that point, saying that Obama is not a “true Christian,” that “there is a clear requirement for one to qualify as a Christian and Obama doesn’t meet that requirement,” and that Obama’s faith “tramples on the historic teachings of Christianity and the Bible.”
Until now, those attacks had been more or less relegated to the right-wing fringe, but it looks like they are about to become mainstream talking points, as James Dobson attacked Obama’s understanding of Christianity on today’s broadcast, as the Associated Press reported:
Dobson and Minnery accused Obama of wrongly equating Old Testament texts and dietary codes that no longer apply to Jesus' teachings in the New Testament.
"I think he's deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview, his own confused theology," Dobson said.
"... He is dragging biblical understanding through the gutter."
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He said Obama, who supports abortion rights, is trying to govern by the "lowest common denominator of morality," labeling it "a fruitcake interpretation of the Constitution."
Listen to Dobson and Minnery discuss Obama and his faith:
The subject of the program was Obama’s “'Call to Renewal Keynote Address” from 2006, in which Obama said “Whatever we once were, we're no longer a Christian nation. At least not just. We are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, and a Buddhist nation, and a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.” To which Minnery angrily replied:
“Well I say, ‘Excuse me?’ 76% of the people identify themselves as Christian. There are only six-tenths of one percent who are Muslim, seven-tenths of one percent who are Buddhist, four-tenths of one percent who are Hindu … so he is diminishing the idea that people of Christian faith have anything to say and then he begins to diminish you.”
Obama apparently “diminished” Dobson with this question:
And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's?
Minnery was outraged that Obama would compare Dobson to Sharpton, accusing Sharpton of having made his name off racial bigotry and saying that many consider him to be a “black racist,” at which point Dobson chimed in to voice his own outrage:
"He equates me with Al Sharpton, who is a reverend. I am not a reverend. I’m not a minister. I’m not a theologian. I’m not an evangelist. I’m a psychologist. I have a Ph.D. in Child Development from the University of Southern California. And there is no equivalence to us ... This is offensive to me. I mean, who wants to expel people who are not Christians? Expel them from what, from the country? Deprive them of constitutional rights? Is that what he thinks I want to do? Why’d this man jump on me? I haven’t said anything anywhere near that.”
After they got over their own hurt feeling, Minnery and Dobson proceeded to zero in on Obama’s understanding of the Bible and the Christian faith, with Minnery accusing Obama of disparaging “serious understanding of the Bible” and calling him “vastly confused about the details of Biblical exposition, [while] painting himself in the highly religious aura.” For his part, Dobson mocked Obama, telling him that he “ought to read the Bible” and blasting him for allegedly presenting himself “as if he’s some kind of Biblical authority," which was an odd critique considering that Dobson had just been insisting that he himself was "not a reverend, not a minister, not a theologian."
But what really got Dobson worked up was this paragraph from Obama’s speech:
Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values. It requires that their proposals be subject to argument, and amenable to reason. I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons, but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God's will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all.
To which Dobson responded by deliberately misconstruing Obama’s point:
What the Senator is saying there, in essence, is that I can’t seek to pass legislation, for example, that bans partial-birth abortion because there are people in the culture who don’t see that as a moral issue. And if I can’t get everyone to agree with me, it is undemocratic to try to pass legislation that I find offensive to the Scripture. Now that is a fruitcake interpretation of the Constitution … Am I required, in a Democracy, to conform my efforts in the political arena to his bloody notion of what is right with regard to the lives of tiny babies? What he is trying to say is unless everybody agrees, we have no right to fight for what we believe. I thank God that that’s not what the Constitution says.
The next line in Obama’s speech was “Now this is going to be difficult for some who believe in the inerrancy of the Bible, as many evangelicals do" - and judging by Dobson’s absurd reaction and interpretation, he couldn’t have been more prescient.
Dobson concluded by justifying the importance of today’s program, saying there is a need to “let people know what Barack Obama thinks about religion and especially Christianity.” And then, in an effort to seemingly appear less partisan, Dobson and Minnery took a moment to blast Sen. John McCain for failing to publicly push for a marriage amendment in his home state of Arizona, saying his silence has been “very disappointing.”
In the end, said Dobson, right-wing evangelicals such as himself are feeling “a lot of frustration with both political parties” this election year.
Posted by Kyle at 3:38 PM | Permalink
June 2, 2008
Obama Demonstrates "Fundamental Lack of Integrity"
Rev. Patrick Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition provides two possible explanations for Barack Obama’s “resignation” from Trinity United, both of which accuse Obama of base political maneuvering: "Only one of the two following options may be true; for the past twenty years Senator Obama was a member of a church fellowship that was the foundation of his spiritual and moral reasoning -- or -- he sat in the pew of Trinity United Church simply for the political gain such relationships could bring….If his church membership was truly spiritual -- then this action shows a fundamental lack of integrity. Obama's resignation of membership in Trinity United Church demonstrates that he will trade even on his faith for political advantage."
Posted by Chris at 5:37 PM | Permalink
April 2, 2008
Far Right Defies Caricature
Two weeks ago we described the right-wing reaction to Barack Obama’s pastor as “generally promoting the idea that Obama is some kind of Manchurian candidate who secretly hates both America and white people.” The reference to “The Manchurian Candidate”—a novel and movie in which a political candidate was brainwashed into becoming a Communist assassin—was intended to highlight the absurdly sinister discussion of Obama’s relationship with his church.
But apparently we underestimated the Right’s absurdity: WorldNetDaily asks, “Is he America's political messiah – or a Manchurian candidate?”
In a few short months, the young and relatively unknown politician Barack Hussein Obama may very well be elevated to the presidency of the United States and command the mightiest military in world history.
Would the eloquent and charismatic Obama unite, inspire and renew a troubled nation, as tens of millions of voters passionately believe? Or is it possible he's a Manchurian candidate – harboring an ominous secret agenda few understand, a man destined to wreak havoc on America should he become president?
That's the question that is explored definitively in the April issue of WND's acclaimed monthly Whistleblower magazine, titled "THE SECRET LIFE OF BARACK OBAMA."
Among other tidbits, the feature promises to present “an intriguing case that Obama, a Muslim in his youth, may still be a closet Muslim.”
Posted by Ezra at 6:14 PM | Permalink
March 17, 2008
What’s Obama To Do?
As a way of dealing with the controversy surrounding the various remarks made by his pastor Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama is set to deliver a speech tomorrow where he promises to talk “about not just Reverend Wright, but the larger issue of race in this campaign .”
Regardless of what he says in this speech, it’ll probably do little to appease the rank-and-file conservative Christian voters in the Republican Party who never liked him anyway and now seem to really, really dislike him, at least judging by most of the comments mailed into CBN’s David Brody:
I am sure Obama was listening to rev Wrights sermon about "America causing this to happen...and that the chickens came home to roost...etc."Right there Obama has lied on TV, to news reporters and to his supporters-claiming he knew nothing of these awful hate filled sermons.
…
Obama being a member of this church for over 20 years and calling this guy his spiritual mentor and having him at present on an advisory committee is political suicide. He should pull out the race now, make a statement that he is leaving this radical black church and try to salvage whatever political career he has left. If he is the dems nominee they are handing the white house to the Republicans. It has been said time and time again that this guy should have been vetted. He is now, which is only the tip of the iceberg. The media has given him a pass.
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[N]ow that he has made that statement, I await the video of Wright spewing a bunch of crap while Obama's family is shown applauding in the pews. I wouldn't be surprised if it's coming.
Of course, the fact that Brody himself has posted on the Obama/Wright issue a total of ELEVEN times so far (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11) - versus the two times he posted about John McCain and John Hagee and the zero times he posted about McCain and Rod Parsley - might have something to do with that.
Anti-gay right-wing activist Harry Jackson also weighed in, saying that it is entirely reasonable that Obama be held responsible for the words of his pastor:
“Should Mr. Obama be judged because of the acts of his pastor.” My answer is yes! Pastor Wright’s worldview and his understanding of race, culture, and religion of the bible will in some measure affect how Barak Obama views the world. Only time will tell whether Obama’s life and message have been helped or handicapped by the ministry of Jeremiah Wright. If Obama says nothing elese, many people will simply label him as a hypocrite who says one thing in public but acts differently behind closed doors. During the next few months it will be important for Obama to set the record straight concerning his faith.
Does that mean that the congregants at Jackson’s own Hope Christian Church ought to be made to answer for Jackson’s anti-gay rhetoric? Presumably.
For his part, Obama has publicly distanced himself from Wright’s comments, calling them “inflammatory and appalling” … and now that has gotten him in trouble with the Right as well:
The National Clergy Council finds Dr. Wright's recent comments extraordinarily indiscrete, inapt, inaccurate and ill-considered, yet we find Mr. Obama's disloyalty even worse. We adjure Mr. Obama to remain faithful to the man who in so many ways shaped him for the campaign he now undertakes.
Mr. Obama's tossing of Dr. Wright under the bus for political advantage is a painful spectacle and is a classic politics-as-usual move.
The National Clergy Council adjures Mr. Obama to stay faithful to his father-in-the-faith and take whatever criticism comes.
Considering that the head of the National Clergy Council, Rob Schenck, has been on a one-man crusade to convince the world that Obama’s Christian faith is “woefully deficient” and that he might really be a Muslim, it is probably safe to assume that his “stand by your man” advice is not being dispensed with the purest of intentions.
Posted by Kyle at 2:15 PM | Permalink
March 13, 2008
Be Careful How You Pray
From their start as the “Moral Majority” through their as the “Christian Coalition” and all the way up to the “Values Voters” who supposedly returned President Bush to office in 2004, Religious Right leaders has long claimed the exclusive right to speak for people of faith in the political arena. In order to bolster that claim, the Right has developed an entire repertoire of attacks against those who might dare to disagree: complaining about perceived anti-religious bigotry, warning that Christians are under constant attack, demonizing and disrespecting other faiths, and accusing Democrats of attempting to dupe faithful Americans into abandoning the only political party that represents a “truly biblical worldview.”
Normally, such attacks were directly solely against Democrats, but they started to get used against Mitt Romney and his Mormon faith when he showed up on the presidential scene. The Right, not knowing know how to react to a Republican candidate who did not subscribe to a faith with which they were comfortable and familiar, began to flail about, giving rise to all sorts of speculation about whether rank and file right-wing voters could ever support such a candidate, allegations that other candidates were exploiting the issue for political gain, worries that Romney’s unique beliefs would somehow hijack the Right’s traditional messaging … even allegations that a vote for Romney was “a vote for Satan.”
Eventually, Romney was compelled to deliver a speech reminding voters that a religious test for candidates and office holders was prohibited by the US Constitution and proclaiming that “no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions. “
The speech didn’t accomplish much and Romney was eventually forced to drop out of the race – and now the Right has been able to get back to what it does best: attacking Democrats.
Amid the strong showing that Barack Obama continues to make in the Democratic primaries, we have begun to notice that Obama’s proudly declared strong personal faith appears to be rankling some on the Right who see his talk of faith as a threat to their perceived hegemony and have begun striking back by attacking not just his positions or policies, but the nature of his faith itself.
Routinely, right-wing commentators have been attacking Obama’s church and declaring that his “Christianity [is] woefully deficient.” Just last week, Rob Schenck did an entire segment on Obama’s faith, suggesting that he might really be a Muslim despite the fact that he identifies himself as a Christian and even questioning Obama’s claim that he “[prays] to Jesus every night, wondering why he would “pray to Jesus” rather than “pray to God in Jesus’ name.”
Apparently, the mechanics of Obama’s personal prayer and his understanding of the Trinity are of great concern to people like Schenck and Mychael Massie who seem to think it is now acceptable to encourage voters to oppose a candidate or office holder based solely on how he or she exercises their personal faith:
Suffice it to say that his comments are objectionable on many levels, not least of which is because the fundamental construct for prayer is given in Matthew 6:6-9, and nowhere in same does Jesus say to pray to "Him." In fact, nowhere in all of Scripture are we told to pray to anyone save God Almighty Himself.
In Philippians 2:9-11, Paul writes that while God has given Jesus a name above all names, and that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, and that every tongue should confess Him as Lord, this is done to the glory of God the Father. Paul, in verse six of the same chapter, writes that, "…in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be known unto God." He doesn't say make them known unto Jesus.
Is it possible Obama doesn't understand the meaning and order of the prayer the Lord instructed us to pray in Matthew 6:6-9? Does Obama presume Paul didn't mean what he said? Or does he place his biblical literacy above him whom God inspired? Perhaps Obama just doesn't understand the true nature and order of the Triune God – allowing that is the case, then it is incumbent upon him to revisit the definition of devout.
Jesus Himself references God the Father as "His God" and "my God." At no time and in no place does Jesus say pray to Him, but rather in John 16:14-28, He instructs the exact opposite.
So word to the wise: if you consider yourself a Christian, you’d better bone up on the details of how to pray properly because otherwise the Right is going to accuse you of being a posturing, ignorant phony whose faith is fundamentally illegitimate.
Posted by Kyle at 10:13 AM | Permalink
Older Barack Obama posts:
| 07/26/07 | Those Cursed Litmus Tests |
| 02/13/07 | Obama’s Religious Test |