Friendly Fire May Bomb Obama
March 23, 2008 by nunoftheabove
The Easter sermon from Barack Obama’s Trinity United Church of Christ condemned the press for “lynching” the former pastor Jeremiah Wright.
Sunday’s sunrise sermon, delivered by Rev. Otis Moss III, was called “How to Handle a Public Lynching” and focused primarily on the media firestorm that has focused international attention on this Chicago ministry, which is the church attended by the Democratic presidential candidate.
Read the entire story: In Easter Sermon, Trinity United Pastor Compares Wright to Jesus
This is the type of inflammatory language that caused Obama to have to distance himself from Wright, his mentor and pastor for 20 years. Reverend Moss seems intent on continuing the rhetoric that has caused many moderate black and white supporters to rethink their opinion of the candidate.
“No one should start a ministry with lynching, no one should end their ministry with lynching. The lynching was national news.”
The repeated use of a term so often associated with segregation and racism is an obvious attempt to add more fuel to a story which had been almost tamped out by the end of the week with Bill Richardson’s endorsement of Obama. Today’s sermon will serve as gasoline on the embers of the story that is only a negative to the Illinois Senator’s campaign.
Moss seemed most concerned with retribution for the way in which Wright has been treated by the press, and particularly ironic was his specific reference to NPR. Not satisfied with whipping up his congregation by his lynching comments, he made the ultimate martyrdom analogy by comparing Wright’s recent tribulations to the sacrifice of Jesus.
“In order to crucify him you’ve got to lift him up … he had more visibility on the cross than he did during his entire ministry.”
And continuing the Easter metaphor, the passing of the offering plate was punctuated by the need to finance a crusade to battle against the defamation of the church.
Moss issued several pleas to congregants to donate to what he called the “Resurrection Fund,” stressing that during this time of battle, money is needed to defend the church.
This latest diatribe of racism from Obama’s church will no doubt cause another round of unwanted negative attention and damage control for the candidate. Is it possible that his campaign will be mortally wounded not from the Clinton machine but from his own Judas church?
Goodness… although Obama was correct when he said that church is an outlet for expressing frustrations (be it personal, professional or political), I think some frustrations are best discussed over a frappuccino at Starbucks vs the pulpit.
Your last paragraph summed it up. His church may be the death of his campaign.
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Lynching is an emotionally charged term that is used in order to get maximum effect. Wright’s church is without a doubt an America-hating paradise. Isn’t it interesting that Obama and family were “on vacation” this weekend. Media pressure is tough, isn’t it?
More irony is that in an already taped interview, Obama invites the interviewer, to attend the Sunday services to see for himself how “mainstream” the church is.
Being under the media microscope doesn’t seem to change the tone of the words from the pulpit. Looks like Obama will be doing more damage control this week. I guess this made HRC’s weekend.
[...] of nunoftheabove provides Friendly Fire May Bomb Obama: After a week of trying to distance himself from the inflammatory remarks of his former pastor, [...]
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Thank L&OT…
There are just so many things to write about and not enough time to blog. Break is over today and so I will be overwise occupied until the end of May. Such a shame to have to work for a living when I could be having so much more fun elsewhere.