Thursday, December 18

One of the reasons why I voted for Obama

"Barack Obama has an ability to be friends with people he disagrees with."

What an idea! 

Conservatives may find it pandering, liberals may be mortally offended, but I like Obama's choice of Evangelical Pastor Rick Warren to give the prayer at his inauguration. Perhaps some people are peeved by his choice, but it makes me proud to support our new President. We live in a pluralistic society. We often disagree on major issues, and the President has the job of uniting all of us. We all have differences of opinion, and sometimes they're pretty big. I believe we can always find some common ground, however. While Obama and Warren obviously do not agree on gay rights (nor do I), how can we really claim to believe in diversity if we don't accept those who don't accept us?

Perhaps liberals can embrace Obama's efforts, and truly become the party of tolerance:
"And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the [Re]publicans so?"

 

8 comments:

  1. I agree completely. It's one of the reasons I voted for him, despite some serious concerns, as well.

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  2. So does this mean you are coming for the inauguration?

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  3. I call this denial. Just like the family members of an alcoholic ignoring the alcoholic's problem enables the alcoholism to continue.

    Another example is would be the parents of a delinquent child enabling their child's bad behavior by ignoring it.

    Who is Obama going to look out for? The people who hold him accountable for everything he does, or the people who make excuses for everything he does?

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  4. I call this denial.

    Anonymous, what is it that I am in denial of, exactly? Thanks for your comment, I'm just trying to get a better handle of what you mean before I respond.

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  5. I like the 'team of rivals' strategy. No choice would have been acceptable to everybody; Obama is doing missionary work in the dark continent of the religious right. I'd never heard of Warren but apparently he is widely known and loved in the mainstream christian world, has written a bunch of books (The Purpose-Driven Life) or something, has big AIDS charity projects going in Africa...so just when you're starting to want to like him, he opens his mouth and says he thinks gay marriage is just the same as incest and pedophilia and (no!) -- Yes--Polygamy.

    It's perfectly natural to be offended by comments like that. What if I said hetero marriage is just the same as rape? And it's murderous - one of the number one causes of death of pregnant women is being shot by their husbands? Or that straight boys' attraction to girls is an appetite or an addiction, or a compulsive behavior like kleptomania? Why is it so hard to grasp that we all have the same kinds of feelings for and about the people for whom we have feelings?

    Let Warren pray at the inauguration, because anybody Obama picked for that task would have offended somebody. Maybe Jeremiah Wright wasn't available that weekend. He is giving us the opportunity to see what's still, sadly, in the heads of a lot of otherwise good 'christian' people. If you are told a lie but it fits with your biases, no amount of facts will stop you from believing it. Until the equality movement figures out how effectively to confront and address the unconscious biases and fear (the 'ick' reaction people have), for which they use religion as a prop or a mask and an excuse, I don't know if 1) people can get equal recognition of their families and committed relationships and 2) people will get much if any long-term positive benefit or spiritual growth from the practice of their religion. These things are way down deep and I don't think it's possible for any religious person, conservative or liberal, to be honest about his or her motives all the time. Getting to some amount of honesty sometimes is basically enlightenment for all practical purposes.

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  6. I don't think anonymous is coming back, but I've been thinking a little (which I do from time to time!) about "denial" and "making excuses," and it seems to me that anytime anyone supports any decision, there are going to be people crying foul.

    We all see the world according to what is in us, not what is actually happening. If anonymous doesn't agree with Obama's decision, then of course anyone who supports it is in denial or "not holding him accountable."

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  7. This is definitely one aspect of Obama that I've been impressed with. He does seem to be making efforts to involve a lot of different groups, even those that don't agree with him. That's a very encouraging trend.

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