Coulter: President Obama is not a Muslim...
From Ann Coulter at TownHall.com...
The nonsense about President Obama being a Muslim has got to stop. I rise to defend him from this absurd accusation by pointing out that he is obviously an atheist.
Leave aside Obama's fanatical opposition to allowing Illinois hospitals to save the lives of babies with God-given souls inadvertently born alive during abortions...
The only evidence for Obama's Christianity is that he faithfully attended the Rev. Jeremiah Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ for 20 years....Attending Wright's church is the conscious, calculated decision to immerse yourself in hate-filled demagoguery and call it "Christianity."...Some conservatives have cited Obama's near complete refusal to go to church...But that's not your proof, Christians. To the contrary, it's Obama's church attendance -- back in Chicago -- that proves he's an atheist.
This was inadvertently admitted by...Richard Wolffe...[on] Monday night. Wolffe acknowledged that Wright's liberation theology was not Christianity, but then forcefully distinguished Obama from the Rev. Wright –- i.e., Obama's sole character witness for his alleged Christianity...
posted by Eric Schansberg @ 2:20 PM
8 Comments
8 Comments:
My favorite line is the last one and the reason I usually can't stand the "religious right". Anyone that can claim with a straight face that Huckabee is a conservative (fiscally) is a dolt!
Coulter is crossing a line when she characterizes Wright's preaching as "hate-filled demagoguery." What did Wright preach on any given Sunday? Anti-American diatribes? Apparently, at least once or twice. But my impression is that the primary message at his church is that his congregants, and African-Americans in general, should take responsibility for their own lives and communities.
Now this may or may not be a valid Christian message; perhaps Wright does not preach nor believe the Gospel as conservative Christians understand it. But I'm queasy at the thought of calling someone not Christian. I recall what my grandfather told me—he was devoutly Roman Catholic, and the Roman Catholic Church teaches that outside of the Church there is no salvation. But my grandfather said only God knows who is in His Church. (At the time, I was Episcopalian, as I still am.) My guess is that Obama is a sincere but liberal Christian; he thinks of himself as a Christian even if he doesn't have a literal belief in doctrines such as the Resurrection, and instead focuses on the ethical content of the religion (compassion, charity, goodwill).
Mr. Obama certainly doesn't appear to produce the fruit that a life (dead and resurrected) in Christ Jesus would produce. I'm not saying it couldn't happen. With God, all things are possible. "Whatever the Lord pleases, he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps." Psalm 135:6. That's a comfort, not a calamity.
I was thinking the same as Donnie.
Basically she is saying in her Coulterish way:
Matthew 7:16 By their fruit you will recognize them.
And William, seriously, - How can one think they are a follower of Christ yet not believe in his Resurrection? Have such people even given the gospels an honest read?
Isn't the Resurrection the whole point?
As Coulter discusses, Obama's practice of "Ethical content" (compassion, charity and goodwill) applies only to those humans beings who are developed to the extent they can breathe outside the womb - and maybe not even then? It's hard to identify that as "Christian"
I love C.S. Lewis' comparison of how the word "Christian" has evolved just as the word "gentleman' has evolved. Gentleman used to mean specific things such as "landowner" but evolved over time to mean (and I'm paraphrasing) a nice man. Same with Christian. It used to mean someone who subscribed to the tenants of the Christian faith. Such tenants would include the Resurrection as one of the nine essentials of an evangelical church. In matters of doctrine, unity, in matters of opinion, liberty and in all things love. The Resurrection is clearly a doctrinal issue.
I think we all agree that to be Christian, you need to believe in the Resurrection; or as St. Paul (1 Corinthians 15, writing only three decades after the event) affirmed, if the Resurrection did not happen, our faith is futile. But Obama is likely to be one of those many liberal folks who think to be Christian you need merely hold to the ethics or values of the religion, as exemplified by the Parable of the Good Samaritan, or the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats [Matthew 25]. These are the folks who read books authors like Bishop John Spong, who claims that Christianity must advance beyond its mythology to survive in the modern world. (I recall browsing Spong's book on the Resurrection years ago. I think what he claims is that the Resurrection was a doctrine that grew out of the realization by the followers of Jesus that His teaching that God loves us is still true even though He got crucified. I thought as I read that, what's the point of being Christian?)
PianoMom, you highlight an enormous gap in the ethical reasoning of liberals: abortion. The Supreme Court doctrine of viability (and their invented categories of "trimesters") is clearly obsolete. At the very least, we should make the ability to sense pain the criterion for protection of an unborn child (the central nervous system becomes active at week 7). But my sympathies are more and more with the position that human life begins at, or immediately after conception (implantation). Another big gap in liberals' moral understanding is their attachment to sexual "freedom." Irresponsible sexual behavior has lead to an absolutely insane amount of damage in our society.
Some terrific comments..thanks!
I've just now had time to check back and I enjoyed reading the insightful comments from Dave, William as well.
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