Patch has a video up of Obama talking about his book Dreams About My Father, and candidly about the black church. While there are gotcha moments of him stating that Reverend Wright offers the best the Black Church has to offer (and presumably showing he ditched his pastor for political reasons), what struck me more was the serious and adult way Obama talked about race. I'm going to close the comments on this post, because I don't want people to argue back and forth. If this is the kind of post you like, please just think on it, pray on it, and then consider how you plan to change the conversations about race. It starts beneath the fold.
Barack Obama, I think while he's a state senator, speaks to the interviewer about Reverend Wright, his book, and in it he has a moment of clarity that I think is instructive. What strikes me most about the moment is how far removed we are today from this kind of dialogue about race and faith. And it makes me wonder just what happened to this Barack Obama.
Here is the text of what he is saying, around the 3:00 minute mark:
All the stories and the songs of the church, the HOPE that is embodied in the church, the sense, of, of, LIBERATION that is in the African American, historically African American church, is really something that moves me deeply, and is really the main pillar around which a lot of inner cities are going to be built, and Reverend Wright, who I speak about in a chapter of the book, represents the best of what the church has to offer.
Knowing what we now know about Reverend Wright and some of his sermons, I think it's normal for a lot of people to think that Wright solely spent his time attacking America and discussing race, but this interview tells me something different.
Black churches, the historical African American churches that Obama references, do feel different than Catholic or Protestant churches. There is an energy to them that is rarely seen in non-denominational exurban mega-churches or Boomer churches, an energy born of the history of blacks in America. White churches, even the experiential ones with modern bands and video screens, are often subdued. There is joy, and holiness, and the presence of God there, but it's often kept quiet. Your faith is often your own, shared in community, but shared in a muted voice.
In a Black church, faith is spoken out loud. Pleas to God and Jesus are not just spoken, they are filled with an urgency to know Him, and to speak to Him and worship is communal and collaborative. Hearing simply the word Jesus twenty times spoken as a longing prayer is powerful, and moving. If I were going to sum it up, I'd say that in a black church, you feel safe shouting your faith, and speaking out loud. The walls hold back the world and you know that you are among sinners and saints, but God is there and you are safe from the outside world. That's a feeling that many white Christians don't get. They feel safe most times. That physical safety is also mental safety. You're not worried about the police or government or hard times in the same way when you live outside of an urban center, but you can get a glimpse of that in the black churches. That has been my experience, in churches and weddings and family gatherings of black friends in all the states I've lived.
There is HOPE. There is LIBERATION. It is, as Obama says, the main pillar through which urban communities will be built and thrive. In my personal view, it is the driving force of God that will eventually lift African Americans as a class out of poverty and lift this nation out of so much of the racial antagonism we can't seem to escape.
But I'm just a visitor. And when I leave, I wonder why we can't coalesce around faith, instead of dividing ourselves because the media and hard partisans need us to be separate.
In many ways, I wish the NAACP had never attacked the Tea Party. Half of the statements coming out now from Ben Jealous use the words we want to hear - talking about solutions and forgiveness and not animosity, but then Jealous turns, speaking to a different audience and using the very words of hatred and divisiveness that he just condemned. And when he does so, when he speaks in a forked tongue, we know that friendship and community were never on the table. It always is and has been about power.
And so we miss another chance to heal racial tensions, and instead divide us further.
Obama must sense this. I simply don't believe that a man who said the things he did in this video doesn't understand that America needs leadership on racial issues - the true post-racial presidency that we were supposed to have. But Obama is a Democrat. And for too many power centers in the Democratic base, racism is too convenient of a tool to discard.
Obama has surrounded himself with an incredible number of radicals. They come in all races and colors, but what we mostly see are people who believe governmental power is a weapon to be used against the American people for perceived wrongs. From attacks on business to personal attacks on inconvenient citizens, the desire to run things leads so many of Obama's supporters to try and marginalize their political opponents. With race being such a vital tool in their arsenal, such a powerful weapon in silencing the opposition, the chances of racial harmony stack up to very little when compared to the effectiveness of maintaining power with racial division.
And it makes me wonder why Obama could not end it. Why he tolerated the attacks on his behalf. Why he failed to lead, in matters of faith and race.
If you look at Obama's approval ratings through the prism of race, you'll understand two things. One, he has lost white support because he has proven to be more interested in progressive Democratic policy than being a true leader. As the Tea Party rose in opposition to the arrogance of Washington, Obama's supporters turned to race baiting, and that's when his personal popularity fell. But it's going to get worse. Obama still enjoys astronomically high ratings among African Americans. It's beginning to crack. African Americans have suffered more than other races in these economic times, and they know it. Obama has done little to help them, but he has sought to reward the power centers of the Democratic party. It's not just that any president is powerless to truly fix an economy - it's that what Obama could do, he did for politics, and not people.
As blacks look around, as they are exposed to the ideas of the Tea Party and recognize how the media has lied to them, the scales fall from their eyes. I don't expect them to turn into Republicans, but I do see more and more black people realizing that there is no cavalry - there is no one coming to help. If Obama couldn't help them, who can? And thus the only path left is to find a way to lift themselves up.
It's not easy. In addition to a culture of dependency fostered by 50 years of Democratic lawmaking, blacks have to contend with the hardcore elements in their own ranks. Not the Black Panthers and the Gateway Greens, but instead the black cultural identity that feeds off misery of its people while enriching the select few. The counter balance to that is the black church. It is the Hope and Liberation inside the walls of the home of God that Obama spoke of not that long ago.
I watched that clip, and felt a great sadness - a wistful picture of what might have been. What if Obama had been the president so many had hoped for? What if the country had had the opportunity to debate on the issues of governmental power, spending, and ethics, rather than through the prism of race and class?
But we didn't, and in some ways, there is no victory in sight. Republican victories in 2010 and 2012 won't be able to correct what's wrong with us. They will be seen as a repudiation of Obama, rather than a repudiation of his policies and his style of governing. And that's not going to be helpful for race relations.
But there is hope. There is always hope. There is joy because the tomb is empty, and nowhere have I felt that more powerfully than when embraced in the community of black Christians worshiping our joint savior. And so I pray about the future, for the time when Obama leaves office. Obama will still be a young man, at least for a president. Like Bill Clinton, he will be in enormous demand. I pray that Obama learn a lesson about politics, and instead turn to helping people. I pray that Obama returns to the quiet introspection he showed in this clip, where he focuses on and takes part in the growth of the black community. Growing their economic activity through their own hands so they learn that relying on oneself is the only way to build strength of character. Growing their faith and strength in urban areas to turn back the rise of single motherhood and criminal recidivism. Growing their hope, that God has a plan, and that it includes racial harmony in this God-blessed nation.
Politics divides us. My prayer for President Obama is that when he leaves office, he has the strength and faith to turn from division and back to hope.
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