The poll received so much attention and response that the White House released a rebuttal reiterating that President
Obama is “a committed Christian.”
The fact is Americans are more baffled now by Obama’s personal religion than they were when he first came into office.
John Green, University of Akron politics professor and senior fellow with the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, concluded, “I haven’t seen any example — and I’ve been following polling of presidents for a long time now — of where we’ve seen increased confusion about religiosity the longer they’re in office.”
With all the confusion and quandaries about Obama’s religion lately, I rearranged the order of this four-part series to detail today exactly what President Obama believes, including his beliefs about prayer, heaven, the Bible and the person of Jesus, based upon a rare in-depth interview by a religious reporter for a major newspaper publication.
To me, this interview — which took place March 27, 2004, when Obama was a candidate for the US Senate — is by far the best documentation of Obama’s faith. In it, Obama gave often lengthy responses about his faith and practice to a series of questions from then- Chicago Sun-Times religion reporter Cathleen Falsani, though he often seemed confused and even obtuse in his replies.
To the question “do you pray often?” Obama replied, “Uh, yeah, I guess I do.”
“Guess”? When asked whether he had read the Bible, Obama responded: “Absolutely. [But] these days I don’t have much time for reading or reflection, period…. I’ll be honest with you; I used to all the time, in a fairly disciplined way. But during the course of this campaign, I don’t.”
In answering reporter Falsani’s question about whether there was a role model
who combined everything Obama
said he wanted to do in his life and
faith, Obama’s fi rst response was, “I
think Gandhi is a great example of a
profoundly spiritual man.”
Gandhi? A Hindu? How about
Jesus, seeing as Obama claims to be a
“committed Christian”?
When Obama was asked pointedly,
“Who’s Jesus to you?” he immediately
responded with a nervous
laugh, followed by a rather sarcastic
“Right.” He proceeded, “Jesus is an
historical fi gure for me, and he’s also
a bridge between God and man, in the
Christian faith, and one that I think is
powerful precisely because he serves
as that means of us reaching something
higher. And he’s also a wonderful
teacher.”
Could that “reaching something
higher” possibly be heaven?
In answering the question on
whether he believed in a literal
heaven, Obama retorted back: “Do I
believe in the harps and clouds and
wings? ... What I believe in is that if
I live my life as well as I can, that I
will be rewarded. I don’t presume to
have knowledge of what happens after
I die.”
Obama went on to explain his faith
in these all-encompassing ways: “I
am a Christian…. On the other hand, I
was born in Hawaii, where obviously
there are a lot of Eastern infl uences. I
lived in Indonesia, the largest Muslim
country in the world…. I believe
that there are many paths to the same
place…. I retain from my childhood
and my experiences growing up a suspicion
of dogma…. I’m a big believer
in tolerance…. I’m suspicious of too
much certainty…. There’s an enormous
amount of damage done around
the world in the name of religion and
certainty…. I fi nd it hard to believe
that my God would consign four-fi fths
of the world to hell…. That’s just not
part of my religious makeup.”
So it’s no wonder that when asked
to describe the moment at which he
went forward in response to an altar
call in his and the Rev. Jeremiah
Wright’s church in 1987 or 1988,
Obama said, “I think it was just a
moment to certify or publicly affi rm a
growing faith in me.”
It is also no wonder that Americans
are confused about Obama’s religion,
because he himself sounds confused
about it.
Remember, this is the president
who emphatically stated to the Middle
Eastern world that it is part of his
“responsibility as president of the
United States to fi ght against negative
stereotypes of Islam wherever they
appear.”
Yet on June 28, 2006, two years
after his interview with Falsani, then-
Sen.
Obama publicly perpetuated
negative stereotypes of Christianity.
From the pulpit of a church, speaking
to a live audience about religious
diversity, Obama sarcastically belittled
America’s Judeo-Christian heritage
and degraded its adherents with trite
remarks typical of any atheistic antagonist:
“Whatever we once were, we
are no longer a Christian nation”; “the
dangers of sectarianism are greater
than ever”; “religion doesn’t allow
for compromise”; “the Sermon on the
Mount [is] a passage that is so radical
that it’s doubtful that our own Defense
Department would survive its application”;
and “to base our policymaking
on such commitments [as moral absolutes]
would be a dangerous thing.”
And the whole time I consider
Obama’s anti-Christian diatribes
and religious rubbish, I keep coming
back to the words of President
George Washington in his presidential
Farewell Address, advice our current
president would be wise, especially
now, to heed: “Of all the dispositions
and habits which lead to political
prosperity, religion and morality are
indispensable supports. In vain would
that man claim the tribute of patriotism,
who should labor to subvert
these great pillars of human happiness,
these fi rmest props of the duties of
men and citizens. The mere politician,
equally with the pious man, ought to
respect and to cherish them.”
“A committed Christian”?
I guess I completely don’t understand
what the word “committed”
means.
