Of all the things we didn't know about Barack Obama because the Press wouldn't report them, who knew he was a closet conservative? That is at least one reading of Obama's decision to have Rick Warren give the inaugural "invocation," which is like a prayer, except that it sounds sophisticated enough for the folks at the New York Times to sit through. But Rick Warren? What purpose drove Obama to choose the Purpose Driven Pastor, unless it was to drive the American left to distraction? Suddenly it's the Left that has a Pastor problem.
Granted, the Left has been releasing cute little micro-grunts for weeks now. So many of Obama's appointments have been so centrist, and to the average Nation staff writer, centrist looks like Count Metternich of Austria. Where is Hyde Park Bolshevik that conservatives have been warning us about? But the Warren thing has finally made the left mad at their hero.
On the other hand, why not Rick Warren? He does have the reputation for being modestly green on the environment and really nice in his attitude about AIDS. To really right wing Christians, Warren probably looks like Rosa Luxemburg. So far as I can tell, the indictment of Warren rests on the following:
First, Rick Warren isn't Black. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But even Rod Blagojevich had sense enough to invite Black reverends to his home when he felt the need to be seen with reverends. Chicago Sun-Times columnist Mary Mitchell was clearly not expecting Warren.
Some people were outraged that Obama bypassed prominent black pastors and selected a wildly popular white evangelical minister to give the sacred prayer on an occasion that has special significance for generations of African Americans.
Second, Rick Warren is opposed to gay marriage. That looks like a real sin against the piety of the Left except, isn't Obama himself opposed to gay marriage? Maybe the thing is that Warren is really against gay marriage, whereas everyone understands that Obama is just pretending. Okay. But then can't we let him pretend a little more? Being in favor of gay marriage myself, I would prefer people who have the courage to come out and say what they think.
Third, Rick Warren believes that only believing Christians are going to Heaven. Here is Christopher Hitchens, who believes that all believers are going to Hell:
It is a fact that Rick Warren, pastor of the Saddleback Church in Orange County, Calif., was present at a meeting of the Aspen Institute not long ago and was asked by Lynda Resnick—she of the pomegranate-juice dynasty—if a Jew like herself could expect to be admitted to paradise. Warren publicly told her no. What choice did he have? His own theology says that only those who accept Jesus can hope to be saved.
Well, if Hitch says it's a fact, then it's probably a fact. But I am sure this is misleading. No genuine Christian can believe that a Jew can't get into Heaven. That would have meant that Jesus himself was locked out. If Warren believes that a Jew can get in only if he or she accepts Jesus, then he believes what nearly all Christians believed until, I don't know, Walter Cronkite. And most believing Christians around the world still believe this.
I don't believe it. In fact, I think that the idea that a perfectly loving, wise, and powerful Creator could allow a single soul to end up in Hell is logically self-refuting. For then He would have done something that turned out badly. That means, of course, that God has to obey the rules of logic. But Thomas Aquinas says the does, and I'm with Tom.
But here's the thing: shutting Warren out for this belief means shutting a really big chunk of the American electorate out of the circle of respect. Those who object to the choice of Warren really think that only the right kind of Christian is publically acceptable. Most liberals were not the least bit offended by Jeremiah Wright's wacky ideas, though they certainly didn't share them. That's because Wright, crazy uncle though he may have been, was still one of the family. Warren is one of them. Like Sarah Palin, he is beyond the pale.
Obama is choosing Warren because he really wants to lay foundations in red as well as blue America. That looks like brilliant and courageous politics to me. But of course, it gives the right inroads into his Administration. This is really interesting.
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