Local Ramifications of Obama’s Speech
I was really glad that Chris posted Obama’s speech from Tuesday. It may honestly be the most inspiring modern political text that I’ve read or witnessed. As soon as I read it, I knew it would be a speech that really stuck with us. Obama’s phrases will likely be haunting racial issues for decades. However, in spite of this certainty, I was a bit skeptical when I read the New York Times article “Obama’s Talk Fuels Easter Sermons.” I didn’t believe that pastors and preachers and ministers and reverends would have the guts to mix religion with politics, even though racial prejudice is so clearly a moral issue.
I was wrong. In my 84% white hometown of Conway, AR, I heard an Easter sermon about prejudice this morning. I wanted to stand up and cheer. The preacher at the Robinson and Center Church of Christ (just a visiting speaker, mind you, so perhaps he felt he had some extra leeway) used the Resurrection story of Luke to discuss inclusion and tolerance. After all, Luke, a gentile himself, focuses on including the outsiders like Samaritans, Gentiles and women all throughout his gospel account. Obama was never explicitly mentioned, but it was as if his name and his words were in the air, just waiting to materialize.
The preacher also told us a story about an African American actor named Desi Arnaz Giles who had the audacity to play the role of Jesus in a Passion Play in Union City, NJ. When groups found out that a black man was playing the role of Jesus, some cancelled or switched their reservations to the night when a white actor was playing Jesus. One potential play-goer was quoted as asking for the date, “when the White actor is playing. I don’t want to see that Black thing.” Giles actually received death threats for having the courage to portray Jesus. The irony is killing me. Imagine what white Christians would do to a Jew who plays Jesus in one of our passion plays. The sticking point for me was when the preacher asserted that we must still love those who harbor prejudice. This is exactly what Obama was talking about when he mentioned that fact that his white grandmother, whom he loves dearly, occasionally “has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made [him] cringe.” It’s a tall order to be both unprejudiced and not at all self-righteous about your own lack of prejudice.
I was just curious: did anyone else hear an Easter sermon about race? And if you did, did it bother you that Easter Sunday was mixed with current events?
If our churches aren’t going to apply Christian ideals and principles to modern issues, then what is the point? As long as they do it in a non-partisan, non-dogmatic way, I think it is great to engage important social and political issues from an official Christian perspective.
I, unfortunately, did not hear an Obama-Easter sermon.
David M. Manes
24 Mar 08 at 10:16 am
Applying religious ideals and principles to the real, living world is preferable. Quite honestly, I don’t want to hear the story of Jonah (for the 500th time). I want to know how Christians should be living today. Church is infamous for a multitude of anachronisms.
How should Christians treat homosexuals? How to we approach racial inequality? What about income inequality? Politics? Finance?
I’ll have to be honest, I didn’t go to Church on Sunday, nor I have been going to Church for some time. I typically leave Church vexed and sometimes frustrated.
What’s so special about Easter Sunday, anyway? How’s it any different than any other Sunday is suppose to be?
Nonetheless, Kudos to the visiting speaker.
S.C. Denney
24 Mar 08 at 12:10 pm
I think Easter Sunday is special because it’s one of two days a year, the other being Christmas, on which many people who don’t normally go to church do decide to attend. Speakers are able to reach ears that don’t usually hear what they’ve got to say. Thus, I thought it was extra special that our speaker decided to use his infrequent opportunity to reach a wider audience to talk about prejudice.
kcross
24 Mar 08 at 12:16 pm
Indeed it was, and I commend him for it.
S.C. Denney
24 Mar 08 at 12:22 pm
Christianity has to go global. We have to address the way our actions affect people in other countries. We have to identify the ways we have Americanized our faith. This race issue with Jesus is very telling. The world is global. Christianity has to get in step with that fact.
Go fair trade!
Chris McNeal
24 Mar 08 at 11:58 pm
I’m not bothered by sermons that mix current events and Christianity. Mixing politics and religion is another issue. I’m personally in favor of keeping politics out of religion. Religious principles should be applied to political questions; but bad things traditionally happen to the church when the two mix. However, racial issues within the U.S. transcend politics (in my opinion) and should be addressed by anyone with a microphone, including preachers. I’m a little envious, I would have loved to hear that sermon.
Curt Sullivan
27 Mar 08 at 11:08 am