[Dialogue] the Obama religious discussion

[Wilson Priscilla]

A friend posted this article which I think sheds some light on the  
news uproar over Obama's church.

www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-oppenheimer/how-the-obamawright- 
deba_b_91802.html

How the Obama/Wright Debate Gets Religion All Wrong
Posted March 16, 2008 | 11:57 PM (EST)

I haven't been following the to-do about Barack Obama's preacher-man  
very closely, because I've already read enough to know this: people  
who think that Wright's words have anything to say about Obama don't  
just misunderstand Obama -- whose record on racial harmony seems  
pretty unassailable -- but they also misunderstand religion, too. And  
they misunderstand religion in a way typical of smug, myopic Americans.

Let me explain.

There is, underlying all the debate about whether Obama should be  
held accountable for Wright's sermons, or for the "judgment" involved  
in being so close to such a man, a pretty stark assumption about what  
religion is, and how it functions in people's lives. In short, you  
only think Wright matters is you think that Obama attends Trinity  
Church because of the beliefs taught there. And while it might seem  
obvious that people choose a church (or synagogue, or mosque) because  
they agree with its teachings, that's not necessarily the case. In  
fact, I'd argue that for most people the beliefs of their church are  
a small, often insignificant part of why they attend.

They might attend because of the community there. They might attend  
because the church, like the evangelical congregation I hear  
advertised on WEHM-FM out of Long Island from time to time, offers  
free baby-sitting, plus a short service so you can "get home in time  
for the big game." They might attend because of a cultural loyalty-- 
and this can be true of Jews or Muslims or even Norwegian Lutherans,  
whose church might be their last meaningful tie to the grandparents  
who came over from Northern Europe. They might attend because the  
music and ritual are powerful.

They might attend a church with offensive sermons because having a  
pastor whom they disagree with is more interesting than having a  
pastor who never says anything controversial.

Americans, however, tend to think of religion in a very Protestant  
way (even Jews and Catholics make this mistake). And Protestantism,  
especially the Calvinist kind that set the tone for so much of our  
history and historiography, is the religion of belief par excellence.  
In that mold, ritual hardly matters, culture doesn't matter -- what  
matters is unmediated faith in the Word.

In that American paradigm, attending a church whose pastor you  
disagree with is total folly. But try telling that to the millions of  
Catholics who see no contradiction between fidelity to Rome and  
selective use of its teachings (how many Catholics do you know today  
with ten children?). Try telling it to Muslims with modern wives and  
daughters who attend a mosque with an old-world imam whose own  
daughters cover their heads; they may be worlds away from their imam  
on religion, even on culture, but attending prayer at the only mosque  
for miles around can still be a meaningful act.

Even religious practice -- reciting certain prayers -- can be  
gestural rather than literal. This is not news to philosophers  
(Wittgenstein articulated this idea quite clearly), and in truth I  
don't think it's news to most religious people, who even if totally  
devoted to the literal teachings of their church know others, every  
bit as faithful in their attendance, who are not. When I hear someone  
like Laura Ingraham babble on about l'affaire Wright so  
uncomprehending of these nuances of religious practice, what it tells  
me is not just that she's silly, but also that she's likely not very  
religious.


Priscilla Wilson
TeamTech Press
Mission Hills, KS 66208
pwilson at teamtechinc.com



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