Barack Obama has a peculiar, confusing and ambiguous relationship with God.
I’m not saying he doesn’t have one. I’m not saying he is not a believer. I’m not saying he is a Muslim masquerading as a Christian. What I am saying is his beliefs are cryptic, befuddling, mystifying, equivocal and muddy.
And it manifests itself just about every time Obama references God.
If Obama were a chronic stutterer, I could imagine he would have a tough time saying the word “God.”
He’s not a stutterer. But yet he seems deeply uncomfortable with the God of the Bible and those who believe in him.
What are we to make of this?
First of all, let’s look at the evidence for what I am saying:
- Let’s take his recent Thanksgiving proclamation: Thanksgiving is a national holiday that is, like it or not, all about God. Did Obama mention God? Yes, he did – by quoting Abraham Lincoln: “When we offer our thanks, we mirror those who set aside a day of prayer. And when we join with friends and neighbors to alleviate suffering and make our communities whole, we honor the spirit of President Abraham Lincoln, who called on his fellow citizens to ‘fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation, and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union.” Obama added: “This Thanksgiving Day, let us forge deeper connections with our loved ones. Let us extend our gratitude and our compassion. And let us lift each other up and recognize, in the oldest spirit of this tradition, that we rise or fall as one Nation, under God.” What Obama did not do is to suggest Americans should be thankful to God, which is the actual purpose of the holiday.
- Just days before, Obama released a reading of the Gettysburg Address he did at the request of filmmaker Ken Burns. What were the only words missing from the actual Gettysburg Address as delivered by Abraham Lincoln? “Under God.”
- In 2012, he invoked God to explain why he was in favor of same-sex marriage. Even though God explicitly labels homosexuality as an abomination in the Bible, Obama theorized that the Golden Rule, in place since the time of Moses, somehow displaced God’s condemnation of aberrant sexual behavior, which is labeled as an abomination in both the Old and New Testaments.
- In his 2012 nomination convention, Obama’s delegates literally denied God three times. First, God was stricken from the platform. When that decision was reported in the national media and criticized by Republicans, Obama himself stepped in and pushed for restoration of references to “God-given potential” and affirmation of Jerusalem’s status at the capital of Israel. But the controversy didn’t end there. The platform amendments had to be ratified by the delegates on the floor. On the first vote, the “ayes” and nos” seemed equally loud. The convention chairman, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, tried a second vote. The results were the same. After a third try, Villaraigosa announced that that “ayes” had the necessary two-thirds vote to carry the amendments. It was then that the decision was met with a wave of booing, with delegates shaking their heads that the threshold for approval had not been met.
- In 2010, Obama dropped the word “Creator” from the Declaration of Independence – not once but twice. WND reported exclusively on the first incident, Sept. 15, when Obama told a meeting of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus that the document states, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, endowed with certain inalienable rights: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” The incident created headlines for several days. The actual quotation is: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” But, within a week, he did it again! “If we stay true to our values,” the president said, “if we believe that all people are created equal and everybody is endowed with certain inalienable rights and we’re going to make those words live, and we’re going to give everybody opportunity, everybody a ladder into the middle class, every child able to go as far as their dreams will take them – if we stay true to that, then we’re going to be able to maintain the energy and the focus, the fight, the gumption to get stuff done.”
- In 2009, Obama announced in Turkey, of all places, that America was no longer a Christian nation. “We do not consider ourselves a Christian nation or a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation. We consider ourselves a nation of citizens who are bound by ideals and a set of values,” he said.
- Campaigning for the presidency in 2008, Obama cynically commented that heartland voters who didn’t embrace his hope and change message because there were too many bitter Christians clinging to “guns and God.”
- Also in 2008, Obama did something that I believe is inexplicable for any Christian to do – refer to his own “Muslim faith.” Obama, speaking to ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on “This Week,” was talking about what he described as “smears” that were claiming he was a Muslim when he maintains he is a practicing Christian. “Let’s not play games,” Obama stated. “What I was suggesting – you’re absolutely right that John McCain has not talked about my Muslim faith. And you’re absolutely right that that has not come.” Stephanopoulos immediately interrupted Obama, stating, “Christian faith.” Obama took the cue. But can anyone imagine a genuine Christian make such a slip of the tongue?
[jwplayer ApGC4e67]
- Also in 2008, Obama called the recitation of the Shahada, the Muslim confession of faith, “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth.” In an interview with Nicholas Kristof, published in the New York Times, Obama recited the Muslim call to prayer, the Adhan, “with a first-class [Arabic] accent.” The opening lines of the Adhan (Azaan) is the Shahada: “Allah is Supreme! Allah is Supreme! Allah is Supreme! Allah is Supreme! I witness that there is no god but Allah I witness that there is no god but Allah I witness that Muhammad is his prophet … ” According to Islamic scholars, reciting the Shahada, the Muslim declaration of faith, makes one a Muslim. This simple yet profound statement expresses a Muslim’s complete acceptance of, and total commitment to, the message of Islam.
Is this a complete and thorough history of Obama’s uneasy relationship with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? Hardly. He sat in the pews of the hate-mongering Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who performed the wedding ceremony for the Obamas and baptized his children. Later, Wright would be dispatched when he became an indefensible political liability.
So what is this uneasy, idiosyncratic relationship between Obama and God all about?
“Confused” would be too kind.
“Befuddling” would be too charitable.
Let’s just face facts.
Obama is hostile to Christianity in any orthodox form. He’s hostile to Catholicism. He’s hostile to evangelicalism. And he seems to be hostile to the faith that formed the root of all Christianity – the faith of Hebrew patriarchs.
Should we stop being surprised, then, when Obama censors words like “God” from important American historical documents?
I think not.
He is simply shaking off the vestiges of hypocrisy he clung to publicly to win the presidency. Today, Obama’s antipathy to the God of Israel is right out there in the open.
|
