The Obama campaign called it a “groundbreaking moment for faith and politics… the first time a Democratic candidate has participated in a forum like this with Hispanic Evangelicals.” The forum was a meeting between Barack Obama and 200 Hispanic evangelical leaders in a prayer service near Brownsville, Texas on Friday.
Obama couldn’t have bought better Christian press coverage of the event than what The Brownsville Herald offered:
Sen. Barack Obama’s address to Hispanic clergy Friday was more like a minister speaking to parishioners than a candidate convincing potential voters of the merit of his words.
With these heart-to-heart forums with religious leaders, Obama is going further than any candidate besides Mike Huckabee in discussing the particulars of his own religious experience and outlining a model for a working relationship between faith and politics. Sure, Hillary Clinton granted an interview to the Christian Broadcasting Network last week. But that was a departure from the kind of venue she usually pops up in. For Obama, appearing in overtly religious settings has gotten to be a habit.
One of the results is that, even though Obama talked specifics on Friday about how he came to Jesus, much of it echoed his January interview with Christianity Today:
So one Sunday, I woke up at 6 a.m., brushed the lint off the only suit I owned, and went over to Trinity United Church of Christ on 95th Street on the South Side of Chicago. And I heard a sermon about the audacity of hope. And during the course of that sermon, I was introduced to someone named Jesus Christ. I learned that my sins could be redeemed and that if I placed my trust in Christ, He could set me on the path to eternal life.
God-o-Meter isn’t proposing that such redundancy is bad for Obama. To the contrary, Democrats need message discipline among religious voters more than other constituencies because speaking directly to religious audiences is still so new to them. And Obama went further in discussing his belief in a purpose-driven life in Friday’s service than he had previously:
[W]henever I hear stories about Americans who feel like no one’s looking out for them, like they’ve been left behind, I’m reminded that God has a plan for his people.
God has a plan for the father who goes to work before dawn, and lies awake at night wondering how he’s going to provide health care for a daughter who’s ill.
God has a plan for the boy who’s watched his parents hauled off in an immigration raid.
God has a plan for all those men and women serving tour after tour after tour in a war that should have never been authorized and never been waged.
God has a plan for his people. But it’s a plan He’s left to us to fulfill.
9
posted March 3, 2008 at 7:29 am
Mr. Obama should read his Bible instead of just being taught it. There is no place for the marxist style politics and legislation in the faith preached by Jesus and His Apostles. He’s acting like a pastor. Which, by his actions, show he is not. He strikingly ignores “The War”. He ignores the anti-Christian immorality literally put into law by the Democrat party. Before this man gives a speech to Evangelicals, he had better remove the logs of same-sex marriage, promoting homosexuality as a norm taught in public schools, abortion as birth control, promiscuity and fatherless homes, taxing the family of morally sound people into poverty (like Cook County Illinois does), that remain well lodged in his own eyes and hands. This man is hardly fit to speak to a Christian congregation as a role model or leader. READ THE NEW TESTAMENT AND SEE. This is alarming, nobody is testing this man? Nobody is studying this man? Have we not learned about Koreh’s rebellion? Balaam’s error? Sodom and Gomorrah? Rome?
posted March 3, 2008 at 11:16 pm
Wake up! -
Have you ever heard of compassion? Maybe you should read that part of Jesus’ teachings. I’m pretty sure Jesus said to take care of the poor and powerless and downtrodden. And I remember from my studies of the Bible that Jesus thought EVERYONE was important, and forgave people their sins (like promiscuity – remember Mary Magdalene?). I thought the most important commandment was to love your neighbor as yourself. And I believe there are also passages in the Bible about not judging other people. Just a thought…
posted March 4, 2008 at 12:01 pm
Wake up,
“Mr. Obama should read his Bible”
Why do you think he hasn’t?
“instead of just being taught it.”
Maybe he should just be more wary of WHO, precisely, GETS to do the “teaching”.
“There is no place for the marxist style politics and legislation in the faith preached by Jesus and His Apostles.”
That would be very big news to Jesus.
“He’s acting like a pastor.”
Sounds to me like he is acting like a Christian.
“Which, by his actions, show he is not.”
I see e3xactly the opposite.
“He strikingly ignores “The War”.”
He does??? THen how come he spends so much time talking about bringing soldiers HOME from it?
“He ignores the anti-Christian immorality literally put into law by the Democrat party.”
Such as?
“Before this man gives a speech to Evangelicals, he had better remove the logs of same-sex marriage”
Obama is not in favour of same-sex marriage. Sadly, he is on the side of the distinctly UN-Constitutionally un-equal institution of “civil” (HAH!) unions.
“promoting homosexuality as a norm taught in public schools”
Homosexuality IS normal – for homosexuals. It is not and cannot be “prmoted”. Eiother one is or one is not. As far as teaching that homosexuals exist and (should) have equal rights before the law, why shouldn’t what the Constitution ‘promises’ be taught in schools?
“abortion as birth control, promiscuity and fatherless homes, taxing the family of morally sound people into poverty (like Cook County Illinois does), that remain well lodged in his own eyes and hands. This man is hardly fit to speak to a Christian congregation as a role model or leader. READ THE NEW TESTAMENT AND SEE. This is alarming, nobody is testing this man? Nobody is studying this man? Have we not learned about Koreh’s rebellion? Balaam’s error? Sodom and Gomorrah? Rome?”
Alarmist much? Fear monger much?
You sure type like “Donny”.
P.S. If you read Ezekiel, you will find out what the true “sin of Sodom” was, and it’s gonna be a big surprise, ‘cuz it sure as heck wasn’t homosexuality.