In
a land where wrong is becoming right, Warren’s great sin was to support
California’s Proposition 8 -- the voting initiative that ended same-sex
marriage.
It
should not come as a great surprise that a Bible-believing, Christian pastor
would actually oppose so-called gay marriage and even consider homosexual practice
to be sinful. It also should not come as a great surprise that a man elected to
the presidency in America would ask a traditional Christian pastor to pray at
the inauguration. Both are sort of the American norm, if you will.
Obama’s
invitation to Warren induced a twofold response from the establishment media.
On one hand, as noted by Colleen Raezler, “ABC, CBS and NBC all devoted
air time to the ‘controversial’ Warren during the Dec. 18 nightly news
broadcasts, none of which featured any supporters of Warren.” On the other, the
major media hailed the Warren invitation as evidence that Obama is the great
healer and uniter. One New York Times writer opined that, “The choice of Mr.
Warren, pastor of a megachurch in Orange County, Calif., is an olive branch to
conservative Christian evangelicals.”
As
a man who is all things to all people, Obama apparently has his own grove of
olive trees.
Mr.
Obama believes he can be all things to all people because, to a post-modern
person there often is no conflict of right and wrong because no objective,
external truth exists to separate right from wrong. The incidents of
pre-Inauguration 2009 illustrate what many already suspect: Barack Obama will
be America’s first post-Christian president.
The
president-elect is the first man to ascend to the presidency, having been
raised in a home (or homes) without the inculcation of traditional biblical
values. Obama’s mother remarried when he was a grade-schooler, and moved with
young Barack to Indonesia where he was exposed to Islam and Catholicism in
school. His mother was agnostic, but spiritual in her beliefs and his
American grandparents with whom he would later reside, tilted to the religious
far left.
“With
the media carefully pretending not to notice,” writes Andrew Walden, “Barack Obama’s choice to hold
a memorial service December 23 for his late grandmother Madelyn ‘Toot’ Dunham
at Honolulu’s First Unitarian Church underlines one part of the story of Barack
Obama's leftist religious upbringing.”
In
a 2006 speech Obama provided some detail:
“I
was not raised in a particularly religious household, as undoubtedly many in
the audience were. My father, who returned to Kenya when I was just two, was
born Muslim but as an adult became an atheist. My mother, whose parents were
non-practicing Baptists and Methodists, was probably one of the most spiritual
people and kindest people I've ever known, but grew up with a healthy
skepticism of organized religion herself. As a consequence, so did I.”
In
a 2004 interview with Cathleen Falsani, Obama said
that: “My mother was deeply spiritual . . . and [would] give me books about the
world’s religions, and talk to me about them.”
Mr.
Obama stated that he was rooted in the Christian tradition, but added, “I
believe that there are many paths to the same place, and that is a belief that
there is a higher power, a belief that we are connected as a people.” When
asked whether heaven is the place to which the many paths lead, Obama said,
“[W]hether the reward is in the here and now or in the hereafter, the aligning
myself to my faith and my values is a good thing.”
Nevertheless,
Obama later claimed that he “reaffirmed” his “Christian faith” at Rev. Jeremiah
Wright’s black liberation/social justice church, at the conclusion of the
sermon titled, “The Audacity of Hope.” Reading the transcript of the sermon, over and over, one
is hard-pressed to find anything that remotely resembles a Christian faith to
reaffirm.
Unfortunately,
it is more likely that Obama affirmed Wright’s bitter, racist, America-hating
brand of religion for socio/political reasons. He became well-connected in
far-left Chicago politics, thanks, in part, to Rev. Wright’s forum.
Obama
says he is a Christian and in the sense that he is a Unitarian, Universalist,
religious leftist, he is a fine Christian gentleman without a moral compass.
After
the invitation to Pastor Warren was extended, Bishop Robinson told the New York Times that, “I’m all for Rick Warren
being at the table . . . but we’re not talking about a discussion, we’re
talking about putting someone up front and center at what will be the most
watched inauguration in history, and asking his blessing on the nation. And the
God that he’s praying to is not the God that I know.”
Well
said, Bishop Robinson. The God of traditional America is not the God he knows
-- and, based on the evidence, is likely not the God Obama knows. Barack Obama
and Bishop Gene Robinson appear to share the same moral-relativism-based Christian
faith of the far left.
Addressing
the question of his forthcoming inaugural prayer, Robinson recently said: “I want this to be a
prayer to the god of our many understandings and a prayer that all people of
faith can join me in.” That would be a prayer of universalism and not a prayer
to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob -- that is, the God of the
Judeo-Christian tradition.
There
once was a time in America when a minister could beseech the blessings of the
Almighty for the country, at say, an inauguration, and no controversy existed
as to whom the prayers were directed.
Therein
lies the heart of the culture war. Whose God shall we trust to bless and
protect the country? Does it matter? If God is simply an anthropological
phenomenon, then the prayers for his blessing are mere exercises in vain
ceremony. But if God is real and really watches over, blesses and protects
those who trust in Him, then nothing is more important than securing the favor
of heaven. Should we trust the God of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, the
Supreme Judge of the World, in whom the patriots relied upon to watch over the
cause of liberty as they pledged their lives, fortunes and sacred honor? Or
should we pray to the god of the Gay Nation?
If
the latter, then we like Thomas Jefferson, should fear for our country that the
wrath and justice of God cannot sleep forever.