Tomorrow will be my 50th post here at eyesonobama.com. In my previous 48 posts I have not disagreed with Barack Obama on a single major issue and criticizing him, especially now, at a time where Clinton, McCain and the media seem to be ganging up on him, is not an easy thing for me to do.
I consider myself a strong supporter of Barack Obama and I strongly believe he is not only the best candidate available this year, but he is the best candidate for President this nation has seen in my 29 years so far.
That being said, I am uncomfortable with one aspect of who Barack Obama is. That is his religion.
No, I have not been duped into thinking Sen. Obama is a Muslim, like 13% of the blissfully ignorant voters in this country have been. I know he is a Christian, just like I was raised to be.
I come from a Catholic background and attended church at least once a week as a child, twice a week during the school years I spent at a
At 18 I left
About a month into my college career I began feeling guilty about not going to church on Sunday. I could almost hear my grandmother yelling at me from
So when a friend asked if I wanted to join him the following Sunday at church I agreed. In an event that may seem shocking to the people who know me best, I woke up, got dressed and made it to St. Mary's Catholic Church on 14th and ‘K' street in
Little did I know, I would only consider myself a Catholic for another 45 minutes.
The first piece of the mass seemed pretty normal. I tried to stay awake and focused on some mind bogglingly boring gibberish while occasionally, out of habit, chanting along with the rest of the congregation and the priest when appropriate.
Then came time for the sermon, the point I always looked forward to as a kid as the longest consecutive part of the hour in which I was not forced to either stand or kneel. I could just sit.
As an adult, however, I made a real effort to pay attention now. It was time for me to start taking these things seriously and take some responsibility for my own spiritual life.
But what I heard coming out of the priest's mouth was shocking to me. The sermon was basically a ten minute, right-wing nut-job, fundamentalist rant. I didn't even know what a fundamentalist was back then, but I knew I didn't like it, and I knew it made me feel very uncomfortable.
I didn't remember hearing any of that type of talk at the Catholic Church back home, so I was a bit confused as to how the same church could have such drastically different styles and teachings.
Years later I found out that the Bishop of the
So I guess my initial intuitions were right.
I never returned to the Catholic Church in
Had I continued there, and let some of those right-wing rants slide, Bishop Bruskewitz could have eventually become my Rev. Wright or my John Hagee.
As I said before, this is what bothers me about Barack Obama. I am uncomfortable about the fact that he was unwilling to make the choice to leave Rev. Wright's church. I am also uncomfortable with the fact that Sen. Obama so openly flaunts his religion at times.
Religion should never come into politics. It is a personal matter, period. I understand that Obama's case may be different than the average politician in that he happens to have a potentially Muslim sounding name at a time in which that can be a major political liability. And I also understand that, sadly, no politician who claims to be agnostic, atheist or spiritual rather than religious would have a snowball's chance in hell to get as far as Obama has, but it still bothers me.
While the political advantages behind being viewed as a Christian are obvious, a candidate must also accept the political risks that come with the territory. And the fact is if you are personally close to many hard-core religious-types, they're going to say some crazy things. Those crazy things are going to make a lot of sense to a small portion of people, but they will be viewed as crazy, absurd and even dangerous by a much larger segment of the population.
Sen. Obama may have dug his own hole on this one by associating with Wright in the first place, but despite this lack of comfort I have in regards to Obama's religion, the Senator's initial handling of Rev. Wright's remarks prove to me that Barack Obama will not put his religion before his country. Obama has continually distanced himself from Jeremiah Wright and there is no doubt that Wright does not in fact speak for Obama.
So there, I've said my piece and no it's time to move on. The multitude of other facets of Barack Obama's personality, career, and experience more than make up for this one flaw, Barack Obama is not perfect, but he is the best equipped person to lead this country.
To miss out on an opportunity to move this nation forward and to repair the damage done by eight years of George W. Bush just because of a personal friendship with one religious nut-job would be a tragic mistake.
For more on the Rev. Wright controversy from the talented folks at eyesonobama.com check out ChasingAmerica's recent post "Wright is Scaring Me."
