WRIGHT IS WRONG
by Greg Williamson (c) 2008
This page relates to issues surrounding Barack Obama's former pastor,
Jeremiah Wright. While this is intended primarily as a theological
resource, it is political in that the black liberation theology Jeremiah
Wright espouses is very much political (socialist) in nature.
Liberation Theology
Obama's Pastor
Denounces United States (03-14-2008)
Obama's
former pastor opens up in PBS interview (04-28-2008)
Wright
defends controversial comments (04-28-2008)
Obama and Black Liberation Theology: Has It Shaped His World View?(05-02-2008)
Liberation Theology
[Liberation Theology is] a movement which originated among Roman Catholic
theologians, especially Jesuits, in Latin America in the late 1960s. It
sought to apply Marxist analysis to the situation of the poor in an
attempt to create a theology which would speak to the masses. Using
stories from the Hebrew Bible, such as that of the exodus, they sought to
interpret the new testament message of Jesus in terms of political action
and redemption from oppressive social conditions. Although popular in
intellectual circles in Europe and North America, the movement seems to
have had little local support in Latin America due to internal
contradictions, such as the refusal of many advocates of liberation
theology to accept birth control. ... As a movement it inspired black
theology and provoked strong criticism from writers like Michael Novak in The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism (1982). [ref] (quoted verbatim)
Liberation theology is a theological movement that has attempted to unite
theology with the social/economic concerns of the poor and oppressed
people, particularly in Central and South America. The movement, however,
is even broader in scope, including blacks (which may be separately called
"black theology"), feminists (which may be separately called "feminist
theology"), and others.
Theology of James H. Cone. James H.
Cone (b. 1938), professor of theology at Union Theological Seminary in New
York City, is perhaps the leading exponent of black liberation theology.
He has written A Black Theology of Liberation in which he identifies Christian theology with liberation
theology ... Cone identifies liberation with the gospel of Christ; the
gospel is helping the oppressed. Biblically, Cone bases his theology of
liberation on God’s deliverance of Israel from oppression and what He did
within the community of the oppressed within Israel. Cone concludes, "The
consistent theme in Israelite prophecy is Yahweh’s concern for the lack of
social, economic, and political justice for those who are poor and
unwanted in the society. Yahweh, according to Hebrew prophecy, will not
tolerate injustice against the poor; through his activity the poor will be
vindicated. Again, God reveals himself as the God of liberation for the
oppressed." According to Cone, Jesus did not come to bring spiritual
liberation but to liberate the oppressed. The resurrection of Christ means
"that all oppressed peoples become his people. ... The resurrection-event
means that God’s liberating work is not only for the house of Israel but
for all who are enslaved by principalities and powers. ... It is hope
which focuses on the future in order to make men refuse to tolerate
present inequities ... to see also the contradiction of any earthly
injustice." [ref] (quoted verbatim)
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Obama's Pastor Denounces United States
by Jim Brown
OneNewsNow
March 14, 2008
Democratic presidential frontrunner Senator
Barack Obama's longtime relationship with his former pastor and spiritual
mentor Jeremiah Wright is coming under increasing scrutiny from some
national media outlets.
ABC, MSNBC and Fox News have been airing excerpts from
some of Pastor Wright's sermons, including one in 2003 when he denounced
the United States for its treatment of blacks. "The government gives them
the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law, and then
wants us to sing God Bless America," shouts Wright. "No, no, no, not God
Bless America - God d___ America, it's in the Bible for killing innocent
people."
Wright has also raised eyebrows for saying 9/11 was a case of "America's
chickens coming home to roost" and that Zionism has an element of "white
racism." In addition, he has accused the government of infecting black
Americans with HIV.
New Jersey pastor Clenard Childress, founder of the website BlackGenocide.org, says Wright has a long
history of spewing anti-American rhetoric and mocking anyone who disagrees
with his radical views. "The hypocrisy of that is that he often talks
about American policies that have killed innocent people, but yet he and
Barack Obama endorse the abortion industry's agenda," he notes. "[The
abortion industry] targets African-Americans and has killed far more than
9/11 or many of the other atrocities that he talks about."
Childress says if the mainstream demands more in-depth answers from
Senator Obama (D-Illinois) regarding Wright, the pastor will likely resign
from Obama's presidential campaign. The pastor believes the Illinois
senator needs to do more than just say he does not always agree with
Pastor Wright.
"[H]e needs to say [that] indeed he does not agree with the mockery of
other Republicans and people who do not have his views [and that] he is
not in agreement with the root cause of 9/11," Childress contends.
But according to Childress, the media may not push the issue. "There are
many things that Barack Obama could do," he continues, "but as I stated,
he'll wait to see [if the] mainstream media is going to give him a pass on
this, like they have been doing for quite some time; or [if they will]
demand answers and demand some type of explanation, which mainstream media
has not done."
Wright, who has said Jesus was a black man who was killed by rich white
people, has stated from his pulpit that Senator Hillary Clinton does not
understand the struggles of African Americans because she has never been
called the "n-word."
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Obama's former pastor opens
up in PBS interview
by Jim Brown
OneNewsNow
April 28, 2008
In an interview with liberal
journalist Bill Moyers of PBS, the controversial Jeremiah Wright has
opened up about the media storm he created.
Presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama's (D-Illinois)
former pastor says he has been made the "target of hatred" and unfairly
branded "unpatriotic ... un-American" and "filled with hate speech."
Pastor Wright says it was "unfair" and "unjust" for media
outlets to publicize sound bites of sermons in which he condemned the U.S.
and Israel, and accused the government of infecting blacks with AIDS and
flooding their neighborhoods with drugs. And during the interview with
Moyers, Wright said the clips from his sermons were circulated for
"devious reasons."
But Mark Tooley with the Institute on Religion & Democracy
(IRD) says Wright's decision to stand by his remarks only adds fuel to the
fire. "Reverend Wright could have ended almost all of the controversy
about his incendiary remarks if he had come out earlier and strongly
disavowed them," he notes. "But it sounds like even now there is no
disavowal; he's simply criticizing the media for having publicized them."
Tooley contends that a Christian pastor is to shepherd his
congregation by providing protection and truth, not by spreading paranoia
and fear. Consequently, says the IRD spokesman, there is no justification
for the "baseless and incendiary rhetoric" Wright has used over the years.
Wright is scheduled to appear this morning at the National
Press Club to give a presentation titled "The African American Religious
Experience: Theology & Practice."
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Wright defends
controversial comments
by Jim Brown
OneNewsNow
April 28, 2008
Speaking at the National Press Club this
morning, Barack Obama's former pastor defended his assertion that the U.S.
deserved the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and rejected
accusations that he is unpatriotic.
Pastor Jeremiah Wright is not backing down from his past
sermons condemning America and accusing its policymakers of doing the
bidding of the Ku Klux Klan. Instead Barack Obama's spiritual mentor is
launching a massive public relations offensive.
Wright was in Washington this morning to give a speech at
the National Press Club on what he calls the "prophetic tradition of the
black church." Wright was asked by a reporter to explain his now infamous
remark in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks in which he said from the
pulpit of his Chicago church that "America's chickens are coming home to
roost."
"If you heard the whole sermon, first of all you heard
that I was quoting the ambassador from Iraq - that's number one," noted
Wright. "But number two, to quote the Bible: 'Be not deceived, God is not
mocked. For whatsoever you sow, that you also shall ... [Wright paused, to
which the audience replied] reap.'"
"Jesus said do unto others as you would have them do unto
you," the controversial pastor continued. "You cannot do terrorism on
other people and expect it never to come on you. Those are biblical
principles - not Jeremiah Wright, bombastic, divisive principles."
In addition, Wright addressed charges that he is
anti-American. "I feel that those citizens who say they have never heard
my sermons, nor do they know me, [are basing their] unfair accusations ...
from sound bites and that which is looped over and over again on certain
channels," he said. "I served six years in the military. Does that make me
patriotic? How many years did [Vice President Dick] Cheney serve?"
'Attack on black church'?
Wright attempted to explain the theology behind those
incendiary sermon sound bites, which have dogged Democratic presidential
candidate Obama during the campaign. Recent criticism of his preaching,
asserted the United Church of Christ pastor, is not an attack on him, but
"an attack on the black church."
He explained that the black religious experience is "invisible" to the
dominant culture, but he hopes one day the religious tradition will
achieve the status of "invaluable visibility." He also talked of the
"prophetic theology of the black church," also known as liberation
theology. The prophetic tradition of the black church, said Wright, has
its roots in Isaiah 61 and was preached during the days of slavery to
people in spiritual, psychological, or physical bondage.
"Black music is different from European and European [sic] music.
It is not deficient, it is just different," he said. "Black worship is
different from European and European-American worship. It is not
deficient, it is just different. Black preaching is different from
European and European-American preaching. It is not deficient, it is just
different. It is not bombastic; it is not controversial - it's
different."
According to Wright, "the Christianity of the slave holder is not the
Christianity of the slave."
Pastor Wright also finds himself in agreement with President Bush that the
god of Islam is the God of the Bible. When asked how he could reconcile
Muslim teaching with Jesus' claim to be the Way, the Truth and the Life in
John 14:6, Wright referenced John 10:16 and the words, "Other sheep have I
who are not of this fold."
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Obama and
Black Liberation Theology: Has It Shaped His World View?
by L. A. Williams
Christian Action League of North Carolina
May 2, 2008
“Too extreme” for North Carolina - that’s how a recent GOP ad
characterizes Barack Obama as it challenges Democratic gubernatorial
candidates Beverly Perdue and Richard Moore for supporting the “most
liberal person in the United States Senate.”
Meanwhile, Obama has finally taken issue with the extreme and divisive
racial rhetoric of his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, an
outspoken advocate of Black Liberation Theology who has categorically
condemned the very government that the Illinois senator aspires to lead.
But the question remains, how many of Wright’s views does Obama
secretly share even as he shuns the man who was his mentor for more than
two decades?
“Obama’s relationship to his church and pastor, Jeremiah Wright, are no
small matter. Some may declare we need to move on to the issues, but this
in itself is an issue of great consequence,” said the Rev. Mark Creech,
executive director of the Christian Action League. “Here is a Presidential
candidate, mind you, who has been the longstanding member of a church that
subscribes to Black Liberation Theology - a theology that has its roots in
Marxism, racism and anti-American sentiment. Obama contends the views of
his pastor are not his views. Yet he makes remarks about the purpose of
religion that are remarkably similar to that of Karl Marx. He refers to
his Caucasian grandmother as ‘a typical white person.’ He is unwilling to
wear a flag lapel pin. His wife says that for the first time in her adult
life, she is proud of her country.”
As Obama and Hillary Clinton were making whirlwind tours of North
Carolina on April 28, the nation was learning more about the beliefs of
the Rev. Wright as he strutted back and forth on the stage at the National
Press Club, claiming to represent the Black Church in America, singing the
praises of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and accusing the
government of playing a role in the spread of AIDS in an attempt to kill
off African Americans.
Obama called a press conference in Winston-Salem on Tuesday to denounce
Wright’s speech and distance himself from the former and longtime pastor
of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, but many Christian leaders
find little comfort in the candidate’s assurances that his ideologies are
very different from his mentor’s adherence to Black Liberation Theology.
“If you examine the history of Trinity United Church of Christ and
Wright’s tenure there, there is no question that this has been a
consistent message and practice,” said the Rev. Rob Schenck, president of
Faith and Action, who welcomed Wright to Washington, D.C. the day of his
Press Club speech and urged him to abandon his Marxist theology. “It
appears that in earlier times Wright was actually more radical than he is
now. He visited with Gaddafi in the 1980s and had a close association with
Louis Farrakhan. So when Obama would have joined the church that would
have been at the peak of Wright’s activism and association with violent
extremists.”
“This is not the same as guilt by association. There is a legitimate
inquiry here,” Creech said. “Are we to really believe that the world view
of Barrack and Michelle Obama - potentially our Commander-In-Chief and
First Lady - have not been shaped by the false and dangerous theology they
have willing[ly] subjected themselves to for such a long time?”
Getting its start in Latin America around 50 years ago, the liberation
theology movement teaches that God is the liberator of those oppressed by
ruling classes. Imported to the U.S. by theology professor James Cone, who
was influenced by Malcolm X and the Black Power movement, Black Liberation
Theology (BLT) teaches that all Scripture must be interpreted through the
black experience.
“Cone believed that Jesus was black and that everyone must ‘become
black’ to be saved … When you join the side of the oppressed, you become
black,” said Bishop Van B. Gayton of the International Community of
Christian Churches as he pointed out the ideology’s shortcomings. “Cone
denies the fact that God is for all people.”
The bishop was among a number of African American pastors who were
quick to speak out against BLT.
“Although there are elements of truth in it, all it takes to produce a
heresy is a measure of truth wrapped in a lie,” he told Schenck during a
phone interview earlier this week.
Schenck said BLT promoters pick and choose certain Scriptures rather
than taking the Bible as a whole.
“There is no question that throughout the Bible and history, God has
come to the aid of the oppressed, but that is in a spiritual and moral
sense,” Schenck said. “What Black Liberation Theology teaches is that
there is no release until you have defeated the oppressor. If you can’t do
that in a non-violent way, then you may employ violence.”
Cone has gone so far as to liken the white church in America to the
Antichrist.
“This country was founded for whites and everything that has happened
in it has emerged from the white perspective. What we need is the
destruction of whiteness, which is the source of human misery in the
world,” Cone has written as he called for “divine love as expressed in
Black Power” - “the power of Black people to destroy their oppressors here
and now by any means at their disposal.”
As for how the movement has influenced Obama, Schenck cited Cone’s
assessment that Wright and Trinity Church are among the best examples of
putting BLT into practice.
“This permeates every aspect of the church’s life, its mission, its
preaching from the pulpit. It is impossible for me to believe that a
Harvard educated attorney as intelligent as Obama would not be wholly
affected by these teachings. He would not only know exactly what it is,
but would have to embrace it to belong there,” Schenck said. “I can’t
imagine that anyone could sit there and be opposed to it and remain in the
church.”
Former Assistant Secretary of State Alan Keyes is not surprised by
anything he hears about the man he says “represents the glamour of evil.”
Referring to Obama’s voting against the banning of live birth abortion,
Keyes said he “sincerely doubts that someone who defended the idea that it
was legitimate to kill innocent babies can lay claim to a Christian
faith.”
Trinity’s promotion of its 12-point Black Value System, asks members to
measure the worth of all activity in terms of “positive contributions to
the general welfare of the Black Community and the Advancement of Black
People toward freedom,” while pledging adherence to the Black Worth Ethic
and “Allegiance to All Black Leadership Who Espouse and Embrace the Black
Value System.”
It’s that allegiance that concerns Schenck.
“As Christians, ultimately our allegiance is to God, to Jesus and to
His Word. When you bring in other elements such as fidelity to black
leaders, you confuse who the allegiance should be to,” Schenck said. “You
have people misappropriating their allegiance to a particular ethnic group
and history. These should be side issues, not the central core of the
belief system.”
But with Black Liberation Theology, the cry is for political liberation
instead of spiritual salvation.
“There is no individual salvation in Black Liberation Theology;
salvation comes when the community overcomes oppression,” Schenck said.
“Black Liberation Theology does not reflect the Bible message nor does
it convey what the majority of black churches preach and practice,” said
Schenck, who has discussed the issue with a number of African American
Christian leaders across the nation, who reject the movement’s idea that
everything, even Biblical truth, be interpreted only through the Black
experience.
“When you compare truth and culture, truth must always transcend
culture,” said Gayton, offering the example of Jesus’ conversation with
the woman at the well and the conflict between Jews and Samaritans. “Jesus
does not take sides. He transcends them both.”
Keyes decried the whole idea that Christian individuals would allow
themselves to be defined by race.
“Once one has been defined by his relationship to Christ, we are to
look upon all people in terms of the way God sees them,” Keyes said. “It
doesn’t mean we don’t have identities, but it also wouldn’t mean that our
view and understanding of everything would be characterized on the basis
of race.”
Others also oppose Wright’s extreme Afro-centric approach.
“There are many Black people who were offended by his anti-American
slurs, because we, as Black people have a vested interest in this great
country. We came here as slaves, but it was our blood, sweat and tears
that helped to build this country,” said Day Gardner, founder and
president of the National Black Pro-Life Union in Washington. “I’m tired
of being made to feel - by our own people sometimes, such as Rev. Wright -
that we are disconnected from what we are. I am an American.”
Keyes said he does believe there is a consistency between Wright’s and
Obama’s view of the world and what many of those supporting Obama believe
- that “some kind of group solidarity is required because of skin color.”
“That is literally racism in the worst sense. It takes a physical
characteristic and pretends that it constitutes a community,” Keyes said.
“Human communities are formed by common values, a common sense of
justice.”
So amid all the controversy surrounding Wright and, more recently, his
replacement at Trinity, the Rev. Otis Moss III, who seems equally
committed to Black Liberation Theology, is there hope for common ground or
even productive discussion of Christian values and race on the campaign
trail?
“We must talk about these things honestly, openly, and with great
intentionality,” Dr. Richard Land, president of The Ethics & Religious
Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, wrote in a recent
column.
“We, as Americans, must work these things out. If we don’t, others with
less hopeful and constructive agendas will work them out for us in less
healing and far more hurtful ways,” he added.
Schenck quoted John Flavel: “Man’s extremity is God’s opportunity.”
“God can bring great good out of this otherwise negative
ordeal,” he said, if people would examine their own beliefs in light of
the Gospel. “The truth shall make you free. If people want to be free,
they need to know the truth with a capital T. They need to hear Jesus and
respond to him in all of this.”
Keyes agrees that the focus of the race talk must change.
“The thing I find interesting and a little disturbing as this
discussion takes place about Christians and Black Liberation Theology and
the Black Church is that there is so little talk about God and God’s Word
and God’s will,” Keyes said. “We need to help people see through a lot of
false rhetoric that the real issue isn’t about how black folks are treated
or how white folks feel. The real issue is what is God’s will for all
human beings. As we see that clearly, the rest falls into place.”
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