Dan Gilgoff: May 2008 Archives

Coming on the heels of Rev. Michael Pfleger controversial sermon there--in which he bashed Hillary Clinton for expecting to win the Democratic nomination out of a sense of white entitlement--it would be easy to take Barack Obama's resignation from Trinity United Church of Christ as a rebuke to his longtime church. Not so, says a source close to the Obama campaign who is familiar with the process that led to senator's resignation. Here's what this well-placed source just told God-o-Meter:

They [the Obamas] let [Trinity UCC senior pastor] Reverend Moss know this after quite a lot of talking and praying. They have been in discussions with Rev. Moss for some time. He made it with a fair amount of sadness. But it’s become clear in the last few months and weeks that anything that anyone says at Trinity will be imputed to Senator Obama, even if they totally conflict with his own views. And Moss and the church is suffering as a result of the campaign. Every aspect of its ministry is being scrutinized, the news media has been harassing people in [Trinity’s] nursing homes, and it’s not fair to the church’s other members. So the bottom line is that something that they [the Obamas and Moss] have been counseling on for quite a while now.

So this is not a rebuke of Trinity UCC in light of Reverend Pfleger's sermon last weekend?

I would not say it’s a rebuke. It’s an acknowledgement of the tremendous scrutiny on the church. Ever guest speaker, every sermon, every bulletin is put under a certain litmus test. I’m sure many churches would make news if they were under the same test. I would not call it a rebuke. It’s just an acknowledgement of life as it is right now.

When's the last time Senator Obama spoke with Reverend Moss? Did he tell him a resignation letter was coming?

They’re friends. As Senator Obama has said, Reverend Moss is a man of deep faith and is close to God. They’ve talked about this several times over the course of the last few weeks. And there is an understanding that this is best for everyone it involved.

Barack knows that living out your faith is not something you just do in church. It’s something you do every minute of your life.

Barack Obama has resigned from Trinity UCC, which played a central role in so many milestone events of Obama's life: his coming to Christianity, his start as a community organizer--and, by extension, a politician--his ability to finally identify comfortably as an African American after being raised by a white mother, not to mention his marriage and the baptisms of his two daughters. The move comes after a guest sermon by Rev. Michael Pfleger at Trinity UCC put the church back on front pages of newspapers, weeks after Rev. Jeremiah Wright had done so (again). As surprised as God-o-Meter was by the announcement, after a third round of national controversy at Trinity UCC's hands, how must choice did Obama really have?

The lead from today's Wall Street Journal story says it all:

As the general election approaches, a contentious battle for the Democratic nomination continues right up to the convention between the two remaining candidates. The Republican contender is a military hawk, loathed by the religious right. And the country has the possibility of the first African-American president. Campaign 2008? No, the plot for "Dark Horse," a political thriller by Ralph Reed.

Mr. Reed, the 46-year-old former head of the Christian Coalition and a onetime darling of the Republican Party who fell from grace, has penned a work of fiction that mirrors the current political landscape. But he put his own twist on the race. The defeated Democratic candidate becomes a born-again Christian and wins the White House as an independent....

In an interview, Mr. Reed calls the book "a fable of sorts." "If the Republican Party were to try to chart a course without the faith-based constituency that has become critical to its success," Mr. Reed says, "it will find itself in permanent minority status."

What's noteworthy about Reed's warning to McCain is that Reed is not one of those my-way-or-the-highway Religious Right figures, a la James Dobson. As the Executive Director of Christian Coalition during the 1990s, Reed drew fire from conservative evangelicals who said he was more devoted to the GOP than to the movement. That criticism peaked with Reed's behind-the-scenes role helping GOP presidential nominee Bob Dole, who many in the Christian Right saw as way too moderate. That Reed is disappointed in McCain's treatment of evangelicals is really saying something.

Like the Chicago Tribune editorial says this morning,

After everything that happened with Rev. Jeremiah Wright, how on earth does a priest, or any religious leader, take the pulpit and behave as Michael Pfleger did?

If you haven't yet, watch Rev. Pfleger's pulpit remarks from last Sunday about Hillary Clinton's tears over her "white entitlement" dreams being shattered by Barack Obama--delivered at Obama's Chicago Church--here:

The conservative Catholic League has issued a statement attacking Pfleger. No surprise there. The Cardinal who leads Chicago's archdiocese says Pfleger has agreed to stay ot of the political fray for the remainder of the presidential campaign. That Catholic Church did Obama a favor there.

From here on out, God-o-Meter guesses that politicians will highlight their personal faith and how it informs their lives and positions without drawing lots of attention to their pastor and their church, as Obama did (at least before he launched his presidential campaign). George W. Bush is the modern master of religious outreach and messaging, but does anyone know who his pastor is? Or what church he attends?

Two weeks after the California Supreme Court legalized gay marriage, The New York Times reports that New York State will begin recognizing gay marriages from California, Massachusetts, and other countries.

And because California, unlike Massachusetts, lacks a law preventing gay marriages granted there from being recognized elsewhere, other states may follow suit. At the very least, gay couples will return from wedding ceremonies in California to sue for legal recognition of their unions in their home states.

To the Christian Right, this is the nightmare scenario that it has spent the last few years arguing merits a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. The movement is determined to make this an issue in 2008. How long can John McCain hold out on weighing in?

When John McCain threw pastors John Hagee and Rod Parsley overboard last week, God-o-Meter was struck that both pastors issued statements absent of any ill will toward the presidential candidate. Pretty gracious, thought GOM--would the broader Christian Right be so...

Though he lost Catholics overwhelmingly to Hillary Clinton in the Ohio and Pennsylvania primaries, a new AP analysis shows that Barack Obama would more or less split Catholics with John McCain in a general election matchup. Significant blocs of voters...

Yes, he upset the Christian Right by throwing John Hagee and Rod Parsley overboard. And by staying quiet on the California Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage. And by entertaining the possibility of Charlie Crist as his running mate. And...

Marc Ambinder says the Christian Right's fears about John McCain picking Charlie Crist as a running mate are misplaced. What the movement really ought to worry about, Ambinder says, is McCain picking pro-choice former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge: I don't...

Like God-o-Meter said last week, one of the potential running mates who John McCain invited to his Arizona ranch over the weekend is not like the others. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Mitt Romney both have major support among Christian...

While God-o-Meter was making the case that McCain's pastor-dumping last week was the clearest indication yet of his abysmal religious outreach operation, the McCain camp gave David Brody a story about ramping up is faith-based efforts: Two campaign aides for...

John McCain hasn't said much about the California Supreme Court's legalization of gay marriage earlier this month. In fact, God-o-Meter's pretty sure that he personally hasn't said anything whatsoever about the case, even while campaigning in California. The conventional wisdom...

Over at Spiritual Politics, Mark Silk notes that there was no great clamoring for McCain to reject John Hagee's endorsement, especially after Catholic League president Bill Donohue forgave him for his long record of anti-Catholic remarks: One of the odd...

Like John McCain today, Ronald Reagan had his work cut out in winning over the Christian Right during his 1980 campaign, when a new organization called Moral Majority was mobilizing evangelicals and other conservative Christians in a way not seen...

Now John McCain is rejecting Rev. Rod Parsley's endorsement, too. Like God-o-Meter was just saying just a few hours ago, after McCain finally disowned John Hagee, the Arizona senator is still a novice at religious outreach. So which Christian Right...

John McCain's rejection of John Hagee's endorsement today is the starkest example yet of McCain's ham handed approach to dealing with the Christian Right and with handling religious matters generally. It's a striking contrast to era of George W. Bush,...

This story is getting legs. In March, Mother Jones magazine dug up some anti-Muslim rants of Rev. Rod Parsley, an Ohio-based evangelical minister and rising Christian Right star who campaigned with John McCain at a time when Mike Huckabee was...

Kinda strange that Wright is self aware enough to be postponing or outright cancelling so many public appearances since the flap over his videotaped sermons broke in March--presumably to keep from doing further harm to Barack Obama's presidential bid--but that...

John McCain's meeting with potential vice presidential runnng mates Mitt Romney and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal this weekend at his Arizona ranch suggests McCain is sensitive to the Christian Right's ongoing misgivings about his presumptive nomination and wants to put...

That was quick. Especially by IRS standards. An Internal Revenue Service inquiry into whether the United Church of Christ violated IRS rules against church politicking by giving denomination member Barack Obama a speaking sport at its annual meeting last year...

Hillary Clinton's campaign emailed word last night that Clinton's Kentucky blowout was more evidence of her lock on values voters: There continues to be no emerging trend lines other than the one established at the beginning of the Democratic Primary:...

That's according to Bob Novak: An invitation for Sen. John McCain to meet with evangelical leader James Dobson at his Focus on the Family headquarters in Colorado Springs, Colo., so far has been rebuffed by the McCain campaign. God-o-Meter doesn't...

Hillary Clinton’s victories in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana gave her campaign a second wind, and largely thanks to Catholic voters. In Ohio, where Catholics made up a third of the electorate, Clinton won them 63-percent to 36-percent over Barack Obama....

God-o-Meter recently posted video of John McCain backer Rev. Rod Parsley sermonizing against Islam as "an anti-Christ religion that intends, through violence, to conquer the world." American Prospect reporter/Christian Right foe Sarah Posner says there's another controversial side to Parsley,...

For all the news media's tut-tutting about Barack Obama strained relations with Jewish voters, Salon points out that he's actually in pretty good shape in that department: ...a Gallup poll last month -- in the midst of the Wright drama...

As John McCain continues to keep a low profile on the California Supreme Court's legalization of gay marriage, the Philadelphia Inquirer's Dick Polman has a helpful reminder about McCain's personal experience with gay marriage bans. While the bans have passed...

While John McCain and the GOP continue to keep quiet about last week's California Supreme Court's legalization of gay marriage, the party's Religious Right base continues to be just bit more exercised over the decision. Here's popular radio host Dennis...

Did you catch the New York Times' harrowing front pager last week on Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe's crackdown on Anglican priests and worshippers in advance of an expected runoff election there? Here's the opening vignette: The parishioners were lined up...

The Wichita Eagle reports today on Sam Brownback's role as a Catholic organizer for John McCain. Seems like Brownback is still doing the same macro-level Catholic outreach that God-o-Meter reported on months ago. But GOM caught a whiff of a...

Spiritual Politics tipped God-o-Meter off to a Revealer post showcasing a Holocaust-themed sermon from John Hagee, the Texas televangelist and John McCain endorser. Apparently from the 1990s, the sermon has Hagee blaming the Holocaust partly on the Jews and framing...

It was just a coincidnece, apparently. Hillary Clinton attended church services in Bowling Green, Kentucky yesterday in advance of the Bluegrass State's primary this week, and the pastor happened to deliver a lengthy sermon on adultery. CBS News sets the...

After the California Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in the Golden Gate State last week, God-o-Meter called Gary Marx, a Bush-Cheney '04 hand who helped lead the campaign's effort to turn the 2004 legalization of gay marriage in Massachusetts to...

There's an emerging consensus among political types that Barack Obama, in order to solve his white working class problem and to blunt criticism that, despite his national unification rhetoric, is actually a doctrinaire liberal, needs to adopt a traditionally conservative...

Douglas Kmiec, the Catholic legal scholar and former counsel to Republican presidents, reports that he was recently denied communion for publicly supporting pro-choice candidate Barack Obama. It's getting more common for the Catholic church to instruct pro-choice politicians to refrain...

Marc Ambinder noted yesterday that the Republican Party greeted the California Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage with near total silence (except for a statement from second-in-command House Republican Roy Blount that denounced the ruling.) Twenty four hours later, the...

Yesterday's California Supreme Court ruling overturning the state's gay marriage ban gave John McCain a big open to reach out to his party's conservative Christian base, especially the Christian Right leaders who continue to be openly skeptical of his candidacy...

If John McCain wanted an opportunity to make common cause with the Christian Right, he's just been handed it: the California Supreme Court's decision to overturn the state's gay marriage ban. One of the Christian Right's biggest grievances against McCain...

At a time when Barack Obama is working overtime to shore up Jewish support, President Bush takes a shot at him direct from the Isreali Knesset: JERUSALEM (CNN) – In a particularly sharp blast from halfway around the world, President...

Will this be the year a Republican presidential candidate peels of serious Jewish support from Democrats? The Wall Street Journal makes a convincing case: Many Republicans think so -- particularly with Barack Obama likely heading the Democratic ticket. That calculation...

The Lexington Herald-Leader reports that the Christian literature Barack Obama is distributing in Kentucky is just one part of a wider campaign aimed at marketing Obama as a Christian. A TV ad and two radio ads with that goal are...

A dispatch on a Barack Obama Kentucky field office, courtesty of a Bluegrass State blogger who filed to the conservative Race 4 2008 blog: I had just finished doing an undisclosed activity at Church and a friend asked me to...

Hot Air's Ed Morrisey has posted a copy of Obama campaign literature from Kentucky (pictured below) that shows him in front of a beaming cross (it's literally covered with glowing bulbs) beneath the words “Faith," "Hope," and "Change." Given the...