01 July 2008

Obama's Faith-Based Campaign

Senator Obama continues to hope he can exploit Evangelical distrust of Senator McCain by pandering to religious groups. His latest stunt is to promise an enhanced version of President Bush's initiative to aid faith-based charitable organizations. He's brought in some of Bush's old evangelical advisers, who had since grown disillusioned with Dubya, to lead the cheers for his own plan. Obama promises that no government money will go to groups that discriminate in hiring based on creed or attempt to proselytize in their charitable work. Bush himself made similar promises, but monitoring these groups is another story. Who, after receiving aid, is likely to run to the authorities and denounce an aid group for proselytizing? It would seem ungrateful, and in any event I suspect that Obama will be as indifferent in practice to any allegations of proselytizing as Bush has been. After all, if you feel that you can delegate the civic responsibility of mutual aid to groups whose charitable work is often an unmistakable expression of their religious creeds, how bothered will you really be if aid recipients hear a praise jesus or two.

If Obama were as serious as he claims about maintaining the separation of church and state, he would propose a system that encourages the formation of non-sectarian or ecumenical charitable organizations based on community affiliation rather than national churches. If these people want simply to do good works, they should be willing to combine their efforts with those of people with different creeds. If this is too much to ask any particular group, then they're probably not to be trusted with government funds.

I may be prejudiced on this point, but I don't like the idea of people being dependent on any sort of religious group for their survival. I don't like the impression that will form inevitably that it's God helping those poor people rather than the government that would actually be subsidizing the alleged omnipotent one. I'm reminded of James Clavell's Children's Story, the anti-communist fable that was starkly and unofficially dramatized in Ron Ormond's film If Footmen Tire You What Will Horsemen Do? The story is set in a classroom where the children are being indoctrinated against religion. The teacher asks the children to close their eyes and pray to God for candy, which predictably enough does not appear. Then the teacher asks the little dears to close their eyes and pray to "the Leader" (Fidel Castro[!] in the Ormond version). When their eyes open, there's candy on each desk, and "the Leader" is proven more powerful than God. Neither Clavell nor Ormond would have anticipated the way that "leaders" like Bush and Obama propose to split the difference. The Leader will in fact leave the candy on the desk, but when the kids open their eyes, he'll say it was actually God -- his personal friend.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

"No government money will go to groups that discriminate in hiring based on creed..." Basically, that means all the money will go to black organizations that white people have no business being involved in. They don't discriminate, they just try to make the rest of us white folk feel uncomfortable because we're white.

Reversed racism again from Mr. Balack Oblackma.

It's tough to say leave religion out of it -- out country was founded on Christian ideals -- and NO WHERE in the constitution does it mention a separation of church and state.

I think we need to leave RACE out of it.

Anonymous said...

I call Balack Oblackma's campaign, "The Audacity of a Black Guy Thinkin' He Gonna Be The Next Commando in Chief."

Samuel Wilson said...

Evangelicorp: please pay attention. Obama said there should be no discrimination based on CREED. That means no hiring or firing based on your religion. He did leave race out of it.

And if the constitution says that Congress shall make no law respecting religion, that pretty much separates church and state, don't you think?

And why don't you just call the Democratic candidate Blackety Black and get it over with, Whitey?

Anonymous said...

You guys are whack. And who you callin' whitey?

The Constitution (with a capital C) implies a lot of things...

Bottom line, whenever we talk of creed, the southern black baptists are the ones we're really talking about. No one else even knows what the heck a creed is. How many times do you as a white trash redneck talk about your creed??? Only black people discuss creed.

I say it again... "no where in the Consitution (with a capital C) does it mention a separation of church and state." I did not have sexual relations....

And what the heck does Apollo Creed have to do with anyone's hiring decisions. You guys watch too much TV.

hobbyfan said...

Evangelicorp: Where in Sam's message was Apollo Creed mentioned? Answer: NOWHERE!

Friends, Archie Bunker is alive and well. Well, alive, anyway.

Samuel Wilson said...

Evangelicorp: Since you seem to want to play the role of a professional White man, I thought I'd do you the courtesy of addressing you by your job title. Your ignorance of the word "creed" suggests a need for some remedial cultural literacy work, while your association of the term with blacks is, as you might say, whack.

Anonymous said...

When you said "creed" Chrymethampheticon was thinkin' Apollo Creed. That's why I said that, cuz I got psychic abilities like that. I know what you thinkin before you thinkin it. See. Ooop there it is again. I know what you thinkin.

You say I'm crazy, I say thank you.