The Rev. Wright’s comments show the pretence in US society
By Noble Johns
New York (BNW) — Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama’s pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s comments — those shown over and over again on TV — underlies the pretence in race relations in America. They, white Americans, pretend that slavery, racism, lynching, systematic discrimination in education, health, and criminal justice don’t make a difference in the behavior of Black Americans, and Black Americans pretend that they don’t hate whites for it!
While the Rev. Wright’s comments have considered by some as "revolutionary," inflammatory" and "unAmerican," that's how most Blacks feel about racism in this country.
It now seems that Senator Obama's bid for the White House has suffered a significant set back due to his association with the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. Yeah, the Cat-is-out-bag, and you know how we really feel about you… most Blacks feel the way the Rev. Wright do, but they will never say how they feel because they may lose their jobs.
Rev. Wright, former pastor at Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ, married the Senator and his wife, baptized his children and preached to him on Sundays for more than 17 years. Senator Obama told Major Garrett of the Fox News Network that he frequently made donations to the church and hired Rev. Wright to assist as a campaign advisor. Senator Obama also prayed with Rev. Wright before the Senator announced his run for the presidency.
What’s wrong with that?
Sen. Obama is lucky to have a great man like the Rev. Wright to be his mentor for twenty years.
In a sermon on the Sunday after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, Wright suggested the United States brought on the attacks. Yeah he said it… and all Blacks believe it! Everything is based on the way you treat US.
"We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye," Wright said. "We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back to our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost."
In a 2003 sermon, he said Blacks should condemn the United States.
"The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people. God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme."
Is the man telling a lie? That is the question… Is the Rev. Wright telling a lie? No!
He also gave a sermon in December comparing Obama to Jesus, promoting his candidacy and criticizing his rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton.
"Barack knows what it means to be a Black man to be living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people," Wright told a cheering congregation. "Hillary can never know that. Hillary ain't never been called a nigger."
The Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. performed Barack Obama's wedding ceremony and held a largely ceremonial role on a campaign committee. The Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. performed Barack Obama’s wedding ceremony and held a largely ceremonial role on a campaign committee.
Leaders of the Black American community appeared on several TV talk shows last night and this morning to say that White people don't understand the Black church or Black culture.
The problem is: people do understand that when one hints or implies that America caused a justifiable 9/11 attack upon the World Trade Centers and the Pentagon the accusation is unfounded an inflamatory.
Senator Obama has denounced the preacher and removed him from his team of advisors.
Senator Obama has said that he was not present in the church during Rev. Wrights most disconcerting sermons -- but people are asking how the Senator could have participated in that church for so long and been so close to Rev. Wright without realizing that the preacher's rhetoric was going to cause him problems down the road someday.
The problem is: the road is here now. And the video tapes of Rev. Wright's sermons will likely hurt a steamrolling Obama campaign.
Subnote”
*Sen. Barack Obama's pastor says blacks should not sing "God Bless America" but "God damn America."
*The Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama's pastor for the last 20 years at the Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's south side, has a long history of what even Obama's campaign aides concede is "inflammatory rhetoric," including the assertion that the United States brought on the 9/11 attacks with its own "terrorism."
* In a campaign appearance earlier this month, Sen. Obama said, "I don't think my church is actually particularly controversial." He said Rev. Wright "is like an old uncle who says things I don't always agree with," telling a Jewish group that everyone has someone like that in their family.
*The United Church of Christ blog has more on the attacks on Obama's controversial pastor.
An ABC News review of dozens of Rev. Wright's sermons, offered for sale by the church, found repeated denunciations of the U.S. based on what he described as his reading of the Gospels and the treatment of b Some of Rev. Wright's sermons have been called "revolutionary," inflammatory" and "unAmerican."&Mac197;lack Americans.
"The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people," he said in a 2003 sermon. "God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme."
In addition to damning America, he told his congregation on the Sunday after Sept. 11, 2001 that the United States had brought on al Qaeda's attacks because of its own terrorism.
In January the United Church of Christ backed Wright and denounced the smear campaign attacking the good minister.
Obama says that rather than advising him on strategy, Wright helps keep his priorities straight and his moral compass calibrated.
“What I value most about Pastor Wright is not his day-to-day political advice,” Obama said. “He’s much more of a sounding board for me to make sure that I am speaking as truthfully about what I believe as possible and that I’m not losing myself in some of the hype and hoopla and stress that’s involved in national politics.” …
In his 1993 memoir “Dreams from My Father,” Obama recounts in vivid detail his first meeting with Wright in 1985. The pastor warned the community activist that getting involved with Trinity might turn off other black clergy because of the church’s radical reputation.
When Obama sought his own church community, he felt increasingly at home at Trinity… Later he would base his 2004 keynote speech to the Democratic National Convention on a Wright sermon called “Audacity to Hope,” –also the inspiration for Obama’s second memoir, “The Audacity of Hope.”
Though Wright and Obama do not often talk one-on-one often, the senator does check with his pastor before making any bold political moves.