Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Rick Warren and Barack Obama


In the 2008 presidential campaign for The White House there was something referred to as a ‘polling anomaly’ surrounding Barack Obama.

The evangelical and Born-Again Christians, that took polls, showed significant support of the candidacy of Barack Obama and held numbers higher than Bush’s numbers from 2000 and 2004 to a very significant degree. [PEW Research]

Those who were watching closely know exactly why Obama picked up a recordable amount of support in these religious fundamental communities, in fact it is fairly obvious.

Obama, unlike McCain, never once shied away from the topics of faith in the media circus. Beyond that his words and visible convictions regarding religion, Jesus and God have been forward and direct instead of evasive and vague.

In the mind of many evangelicals the resistance to speaking openly about Christ translates to a resistance to Christ’s message in your life.

Essentially, if the name ‘Jesus’ or the word ‘God’ cause you any discomfort then you must be against spreading The Word.

Obama has never once spoken directly to the evangelical and born-again movements of America in his national rhetoric, yet he has somehow gained some amount of notable political support from them.

Any politician worth his salt takes every advantage afforded to him when it comes to being able to represent the people that elected him into office. Obama saw all the same numbers I did and I imagine found it confounding for a time that a group which normally doesn’t support Democratic Party agendas was showing support for his presidency.

This is a question I would ask of him among others should I ever have some of his time.

Rick Warren, along with hosting the second Presidential Debate, is a strong advocate for evangelical ideology and fundamental views of religion.

His rhetoric doesn’t provide equality for the gay community or for the views of the so-called radical religious movements of America (New Age ideologies.)

I completely disagree with his political positions and his opposition of Proposition 8 in California which I personally voted against.

This is what my point is in regards to the disgust expressed to his inclusion in coming public national events:

“Since when does agreeing with someone have anything to do with loving them?”
-Rick Warren, 12/21/2008

Rick said it for me. Since when does loving one another in a lawful and peaceful nation have anything to do with agreeing with your neighbor’s politics?

I believe that given time we will have legal same-sex marriage but it could take awhile. In the meantime we need to not rip each other’s throats out every time something like this happens in America.

If Rick Warren were to be presented with a ‘Religion Czar’ or ‘National Spiritual Adviser to America’ position or anything smacking of that … well then I’d be out in the streets throwing a whole big fuss about it.

Much love, as they say these days. Nobody gets left out when I say that.



Eric Lightborn
http://americapress.wordpress.com/
December 23rd 2008

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