Rev. Wright Cautions: Obama 'Ain't Jesus'

[Beacool]

Hey, look who popped up again:

President's longtime minister, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, says his former congregant is just like any other president and that he "ain't gonna improve your child's reading score."



SELMA, Ala. -- President Barack Obama's longtime minister, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, gave an assessment Thursday of his former congregant's short time in the White House: Obama is just like any other president.

Speaking in a brief interview with The Associated Press before giving a speech at a civil rights landmark, Wright smiled at the mention of the name of the nation's first black president.

"He's like any other president," Wright said. "He's a politician and he's got to do what politicians do."

Wright's remarks were similar to those he made after his fiery preaching became a campaign issue last year, forcing Obama to distance himself from his longtime pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.

Obama resigned from Trinity United and, ultimately, cut ties with Wright because of the uproar caused by videotaped snippets of some of Wright's sermons, in which he shouted "God damn America" and accused the government of creating AIDS.

On Thursday, Wright was addressing more than 700 people at a mass meeting that kicked off the 44th anniversary celebration of the 1965 Selma-to-Montgomery voting rights march.

The event was held at Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church, site of the first mass meeting that led to the watershed voting rights movement in Selma.

During his address, Wright cautioned against putting too much faith in Obama.

"Barack's name ain't Jesus. Barack ain't gonna improve your child's reading score. There are things we've got to do on our own," he said.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/first100days/2009/03/05... /

[AllentownJake]

1. and Rev Wright is correct in everything he had to say in that article

He was also mostly right in the God Damn America sermon if you have any understanding of the Bible or have ever read an old testament prophet

[Beacool]

4. The man can say whatever he wants,

but when he chooses to say it from the pulpit, then it becomes a different story altogether. The church should have lost its tax exemption just for the 2007 Christmas sermon in which he famously proclaimed that Hillary had never been called a ni****. Politics have no place in the pulpit.

As for his GD America, if he feels that way about the US, he's more than welcome to move somewhere else. But, where else would he get a church to build him such a lovely mansion?

My Lutheran church has two women pastors at the moment, one is white and the other one is AA. If either of them had spewed some of the things that came out of Wright's mouth, I wouldn't be a member of that church anymore. Furthermore, they wouldn't be pastors there either, the church council would have rescinded their contracts.

[AllentownJake]

5. To be quite frank

You can love your country and feel that it might be encouraging God's wrath for its actions at the same time. Conservative churches say it all the time over abortion, gays, and sexual immorality. Why can't Rev. Wright say it about how we treat people in lower economic circumstances, if you read the old testament and the new testament, it appeared to me that the powerful using their power to oppress the poor made for a wrathful God. I highly doubt that the prophets in Israel hated Israel.

Do I think he's kind of a prima donna and probably could be a little bit more humble as a pastor, sure. However, I'm not going to critque him for a sermon where he said things I agree with, i.e. that this country is in peril for its treatment of the least amongst us.

As far as him going after Hillary, do you think that really hurt Hillary in anyway. Having worked the primary, being white, and having to explain Rev. Wright to white voters, trust me it was more of a hinderance to Barack.

Seperating politics from the pulpit will never happen. The key is seperation of church and state i.e the church and the government are seperate entities and there is no established state church, not making the church a no politics zone.

[MzShellG]

9. AMEN!!

No pun intended. But you're right on all points and wrote it very eloquently.

[Beacool]

14. I agree that oppression of the poor should be condemned.

I don't agree that a preacher should be damning the US from the pulpit. He may disagree with the actions of our government (goodness knows that they have oppressed or helped to oppress plenty of people here and throughout the world), but our government is not the sum total of the nation. Its people are what makes this country and we are basically good and caring people. The American spirit is resilient and we are survivors. Neither wars, disease nor natural disasters have destroyed us and we will survive this economic downturn too. So, I don't appreciate some two bit preacher GDing America.

I know that his rant didn't hurt Hillary, as offensive and shocking as it was to hear it. My point was that there is a separation of church and state and he crossed the line. He jeopardized the church's tax exemption.

[Solomon]

16. Sheesh. You just don't get it. You really don't.

[Beacool]

19. Well, then why don't you explain it to me?

[wsmyth]

22. No violation and why did he do it.

The rules on tax exemption for a church are that they can't endorse a candidate. I know of no occasions when Rev. Wright actually endorsed Obama from the church or during a sermon and he didn't endorse him in his Christmas sermon. So there was no violation. And they were reviewed by the IRS.

I think the more interesting question is why did he include this bit in his Christmas sermon. This sermon was prior to any primaries. Hillary Clinton was the front runner. Obama wasn't given much of a chance to win the primary contests at that point. His support in the African American community was not a given. The charge by some at that point was that Obama wasn't black enough.

So why did Rev. Wright feel the need to defend Obama to the Trinity congregation? Rev. Wright certainly couldn't have predicted the coverage the sermon was going to get. So it was a message to his own congregation. And the message was that Obama can relate to their life experiences.

BTW: the message of the whole sermon was that Jesus' life experiences on earth demonstrated that Jesus could also understand their life experiences.

[Critters2]

17. The prophets told their people that God would damn them

if they didn't change their ways, too. Would your church have rescinded the contracts of Elijah, Jeremiah, or Ezekiel. Or Luther, for that matter? They were saying the same things...God does not smile on nations who don't exhibit appropriate moral behavior.

[mkultra]

34. yeah sorry but

i personally feel that alot of the things this nation has done have been reprehensible. I'm not leaving either, if you don't like that, you can leave.

[eleny]

2. Nor is he the demon that people like Hannity and Keyes like to portray him

[RandomThoughts]

3. of coarse President Obama is not Jesus.

And of coarse we don't put our faith in men, we put our faith in God.


But in civic matters, he seems to be a good President

[otohara]

6. If His Real Birth Certificate

would ever surface....we might find out that this Obama name is just a front to cover up his real name, Jesus Hussien Christ

Did you ever think about that Reverend Wright?

You can't run for POTUS with a name like Jesus and expect to win.

[Arkana]

7. Well, he's right--but the message will get lost because of the shit he's said

in the past.

[firedupdem]

8. Why are they even talking to him? Fishing for controversy.

Anybody with a functioning brain knows Barack's name isn't Jesus and that he can't improve my child's reading scores. Doesn't he have a congregation to serve?

[Beacool]

15. No, he retired February 2008.

One of his last sermons was that "uplifting" tirade against Hillary delivered on Christmas. While most priests and pastors were preaching about love and peace in that most holy of days, he found it appropriate to lambaste from the pulpit a presidential candidate who happened to be the opponent of one of his parishioners.

Charming.......

[wsmyth]

24. He didn't attack Hillary in the sermon.

He didn't attack Hillary in that sermon. The only reason she was referenced at all was because she was the front runner. I really don't see how saying a statement of probable fact that Hillary has never been called the n word is an attack on her. The overall message of the sermon was that Jesus' life experiences on earth were a demonstration that God could relate to the life of suffering people.

[NatBurner]

10. no one on the left ever calls him that.

[firedupdem]

13. You're right. Jesus, messiah, etc are right wing descriptions for

our President. I still don't understand why they are talking to him and writing about what he has to say. They are looking for any and everything to smear him with.

[asphalt.jungle]

11. Jesus never improved a child's reading score either.

hopefully people aren't out there thinking these things can be improved by Jesus or the President.

[Jackeens]

12. Magnificent point!!

[PurityOfEssence]

18. Wright: "He ain't Jesus, I AM!!!"

Religion really just brings out the best in people, doesn't it?

Wright feels cheated of his rightful place in the warm adulation of fame, and can't accept that it's his own gargantuan ego that sent him packing.

[wsmyth]

25. So cheated that he limits coverage of his sermons and speeches

Rev. Wright has had and continues to have a very active preaching and speaking schedule. At most of the events he now insists that their be no video coverage. This was true in Selma. If he was seeking fame and adulation I would think that he would encourage the coverage. The down side of that is there is less of a record and therefore most of us only see cherry picked statements.

I think it is also interesting to see the impressions of people who have attended events versus how the media reports on them.

As an example I offer the following.

http://www.nhregister.com/articles/2008/11/07/news/doc4...

one who was there wrote on Nov 7, 2008 9:44 AM:

....Coming from one who was staunchly opposed to this man and going last night greatly enjoying the thought of Rev. Rankin putting him in his place and then seeing the media coverage this morning of the event, my mind was changed and I have come to distrust the media at a whole new level. If the media is your only source then you are sadly missinformed. I would put one caveat on that by saying this article was the most fair and accurate coverage I have seen so far of the whole event. It was actually very good and I have a sense of appreciation for Rev. Wright and for Kingdom Life allowing the Reverends to use their church. "

[PurityOfEssence]

33. I saw the footage of the Detroit speech in its entirety

That was a display of a massive, aching ego, drenched in quite a bit of righteous racism and sanctimonious grandstanding. It was also downright stupid in some parts: you don't mock the way a whole race worships, as he did with his mocking of the way caucasians meekly mouth praise to their lord, instead of the OBVIOUSLY truer, deeper, more pure display of the full body and vocal way he prefers. That was insulting, intolerant and just plain stupid.

One's life shouldn't be judged on single events, but when a particular event is a pivotal one where the speaker knows that this is his/her "big moment", then much weight can and should be put on that performance. That was a nauseating display and disruptive to the aspirations of his old friend.

HUGE ego. DESTRUCTIVE ego. If he's limiting coverage, that can also be explained by such a personality trait: a need to control.

No, he's basked in the attention brought by his histrionics and it's enough to make one gag. Cute snipes at Obama like this are puerile and just plain mean.

[wsmyth]

36. So your aren't buying his different is not deficient line.

So in spite of his repeated claims that being different does not make one group deficient, you still think he sees a particular way of worship as superior?

From the NAACP speech.
In the past, we were taught to see others who are different as somehow being deficient. Christians saw Jews as being deficient. Catholics saw Protestants as being deficient. Presbyterians saw Pentecostals as being deficient. Folks who like to holler in worship saw folk who like to be quiet as deficient. And vice versa.

I believe change is going to come because many of us are committed to changing how we see others who are different. One is not superior to the other. One is not normal with the other being abnormal. One is not deficient because it doesn't follow the same methodology of the other. It is just different. Different does not mean deficient. Tell your neighbor one more time.

I also doubt that he viewed this as his "big moment". He has achieved so much in life that the NAACP speech probably isn't high on the list. He had plenty of opportunities over his career to have his ego stroked if that was his goal, but he remained true to his calling as a pastor. The thriving congregation that he built at Trinity was his "big moment".

The following is how Stephen Mansfield described the environment that Rev. Wright's "destructive ego" created at Trinity in his book "The Faith of Barack Obama".

Obama would also find at Trinity encouragement for his intellectual and professional quest. It is not a coincidence that he attended Harvard, practiced law, ran for public office in Illinois, and sought the presidency all after his connection to Trinity began. Trinity called for people to rise, created an environment of learning and achievement, and modeled the pursuit of intellectual excellence. Another pastor might joke about a seminary being a cemetery and about how believers could "get their learning and lose their burning." Jeremiah Wright, a man with four earned degrees, used, as Obama later wrote, "twenty-five-cent words" with regularity. He hired only well-educated staff, put university professors in charge of Sunday school classes, and worked to send the youth of his church to the most reputable schools in the land. Understanding a single Jeremiah Wright sermon might require knowing something of Middle East history, Greek, Hebrew, the amendments to the U.S. Constitution, the causes of World War II, the politics of the Sudan, and the details of how syphilis is spread. Obama thrived in such an environment. It fueled his intellectual curiosity, answered his theological questions, and honored his intention to rise on the strength of his mind.

[PurityOfEssence]

38. That is correct. No sale.

"You love somebody? Yes. (with a mocking "white" voice) Oh how I love Jesus because he first loved me. No. No. No. If you feel it - I come from a religious tradition where we shout in the sanctuary and march on the picket line. I come from a religious tradition where we give God the glory and we give the devil the blues. The black religious tradition is different."

Protest as he may, he's glorying in the proclamation that this kind of worshiping is superior and more real. Black worship good, white worship feeble. Period. The mocking little pursed-lipped white mouthing of love for Jesus reeks of it being a lie. At the most charitable, he's showing that this kind of worship is just going through the motions, but in the worst interpretation, it's shown as a pathetic inability to truly "feel".

This was ugly and just plain stupid. I can't stand religion, but I have enough respect and sense to not broadly mock people's expressions of faith, and I CERTAINLY wouldn't if I had become an embarrassment and impediment to a friend. This was bald-faced bullshit of the first order. The white method of clapping was snickered at as inferior, the marching band types were much the same approach. The broad assumption that blacks learn in the right hemisphere of the brain instead of the stodgy, cold, blase, pathetic left-brain is not just a reminder of non-judgmental "difference", it's a claim of superiority.

He came not to bury Caesar, he came to piss all over his grave.

Watch that clip that I quote in the first paragraph and tell me that he's not showing this "white" way of worshiping as clueless and inferior.

This guy's got an ego the size of the Great Plains, and he's got a deeply reckless mean streak.

[wsmyth]

39. I've seen the clip multiple times.

He wasn't trying to be mocking, he was trying to be humorous. I've seen the NAACP speech multiple times. I've also listened to his remarks at a seminar on musical traditions in churches. I've seen him go out of his way to refute a person who was critical of the European religious music styles. He reminded them that just because it wasn't the style they preferred didn't make it bad or deficient, just different. So this wasn't something he made up for the NAACP speech. In fact it is a common theme in many of his speeches and sermons.

Rev. Wright also returned to this theme in the NPC speech. In fact he claimed it to be central to the theology of the black church, which is probably why it is common theme in his writing and speaking.

This principle of "different does not mean deficient" is at the heart of the prophetic theology of the black church. It is a theology of liberation.


The prophetic theology of the black church has always seen and still sees all of God's children as sisters and brothers, equals who need reconciliation, who need to be reconciled as equals in order for us to walk together into the future which God has prepared for us.

Reconciliation does not mean that blacks become whites or whites become blacks and Hispanics become Asian or that Asians become Europeans.

Reconciliation means we embrace our individual rich histories, all of them. We retain who we are as persons of different cultures, while acknowledging that those of other cultures are not superior or inferior to us. They are just different from us.

We root out any teaching of superiority, inferiority, hatred, or prejudice.

And we recognize for the first time in modern history in the West that the other who stands before us with a different color of skin, a different texture of hair, different music, different preaching styles, and different dance moves, that other is one of God's children just as we are, no better, no worse, prone to error and in need of forgiveness, just as we are.

Only then will liberation, transformation, and reconciliation become realities and cease being ever elusive ideals.

[Politicalboi]

20. "he ain't gonna improve your child's reading score."

And where did Wright pick up his grammar? Bush's old school?

[Beacool]

21. He's a well educated man.

He was just trying to be down with the folks.

[Politicalboi]

26. I know he's well educated

But you think he would have used different words that's all.

[JTFrog]

23. Some folks are awfully orgasmic over Fox turds these days.

Oh yea...

The primaries are still over.

[Beacool]

32. The article is originally from the AP, FOX just reprinted it.

[mkultra]

35. from the AP to fox straight to your ear eh?

[jenmito]

27. Has Wright not been listening to Obama? OBAMA calls for parents to "parent" and to teach their

kids responsibility such as "putting away the video games" so their children's reading scores will improve. Has Wright started believing the RW line that Obama THINKS he's the Messiah?

[wsmyth]

28. The are both on the same page on this issue.

It is hard to tell for sure from the AP report, but I'm pretty sure Rev. Wright did not mean this as an attack on Obama, but call to personal responsibility and self reliance. A very common theme in many of Rev. Wright's sermons.

In fact Obama acknowledged this in his Philadelphia speech.

For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances - for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives - by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.

Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons.

[jenmito]

29. I think so, too...

which is why I don't like how the article seemed to pit Wright against Obama and how WRIGHT seemed to pit himself against Obama with his line about Obama not being Jesus...

[burning rain]

30. Well, of course Barack Obama isn't Jesus.

Barack Obama demonstrably exists, while it's highly likely that Jesus is a character of fable from beginning to end. Also, by New Testament accounts Jesus had highly questionable family values, teaching that one must renounce and despise one's family so as to follow Him properly, and "give no thought for the morrow" as the Kingdom was supposedly at hand. All too similar to what apocalypse-preaching hucksters like Hal Lindsey and Tim LaHaye teach.

Barack Obama on the other hand has a realistic and humane program for improving family life in this world with no recourse to superstition; I'll take him over an itinerant holy man of legend any day, blood-soaked Old Testament prophet particularly.

The religion business has made Mr. Wright very wealthy; the anger prophet market has always been very lucrative -- the approach is largely to grow and hold on to your flock by encouraging them to hate, and posing as their protector in the struggle with the wicked. He doesn't need anyone's pity. Neither will I exonerate Mr. Wright based on his AIDS ministry (where his claim that the US government created the AIDS virus encouraged radical distrust of modern medicine to the detriment of black Americans especially) and poverty charity work, etc.; Jerry effing Falwell after all did charity work as well. Better to tax more and have government secure social justice, and not depend on religious entrepreneurs. Yes, I'm also sure that Mr. Wright doesn't really hate all whites; I know he lives in a rich largely white neighborhood. I'm sure he hobnobs in just a friendly way as anyone and people with IQs above room temperature understand the anger prophet crap is to fill the collection plates and his bank account. But I don't admire cynics.

[Frank Booth]

31. Blasphemy!!!

The Reverend just doesn't know when to quit!

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

37. But they share the same middle initial ...

Barack H Obama
Jesus H Christ

Coincidence?

[Forkboy]

40. Learning about Wright was one the highlights of the campaign for me.

[EFerrari]

41. Me, too! I love him.

[Forkboy]

42. I'm already hearing him sampled in music all over the place, too.

This is one of the better examples....

Paris - The Violence of the Lambs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPcPknizEzU&feature=rela...