Quote:
In a 2004 interview Obama stated clearly, “I am a Christian.” Yet in the same interview he says “intellectually I’ve drawn as much from Judaism as any other faith” and “I believe that there are many paths to the same place, and that is a belief that there is a higher power, a belief that we are connected as a people.” While his grandparents “joined a Universalist church” his mother (“wasn’t a church lady” ) married a non-practicing Muslim and moved to Indonesia where Barack attended Catholic school: “So I was studying the Bible and catechisms by day, and at night you’d hear the prayer call.”
Obama thinks religion is “at it’s best comes with a big dose of doubt.” He thinks “Jesus is an historical figure . . . he’s also a wonderful teacher” and certainly doesn’t think Christ is the only way to salvation (“I find it hard to believe that my God would consign four-fifths of the world to hell.”). He’s not sure about heaven and defines sin as “Being out of alignment with my values.” Additionally, he says he feels the most centered and most aligned spiritually when he’s being true to himself and that he’s a “follower, as well, of our civic religion.”
With answers like that, is it any wonder people are confused? Whatever that adds up to (Unitarianism?) it sure doesn’t look anything like the beliefs of a secret Muslim.
1 comment:
Stephen Mansfield does a great job exploring Obama's faith in the book "The Faith of Barack Obama."
What it amounts to is that Obama is a product of religious diversity, liberal activism, and liberation theology -- all wrapped together into his own postmodernist, private spirituality. He is definitely not a Muslim, but he's also not a Christian in any kind of evangelical or orthodox sense.
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