Welcome to my city
By Erick Posted in 2008 — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
This morning, in Macon's Telegraph, we learn that Reverend Wright is headed here to preach -- again.
Not only that, our new mayor, a white man elected in this majority black city, has drawn on Reverend Wright's more innocuous sermons in the past. More shocking, however, the mayor here is willing to give Reverend Wright a pass. Oh, naturally the mayor is an Obama supporter.
Reichert compared Wright's preaching to the Socratic method, which involves extensive questioning of the facts of an issue."But do you remember what happened to Socrates?" Reichert asked.
According to Encyclopedia Britannica, Socrates was condemned to death by an Athenian court for charges of "corruption of the young" and "neglect of the gods whom the city worships."
"Because he kept asking questions," Reichert said. "So when people say, 'the United States is the greatest country in the world' - why do you think that the United States is so great? Sometimes the fiercest patriot can be misconstrued as un-American by raising some of these issues."
We should point out on this Good Friday morning that Wright believes in the Marxist tinged theology of liberation that has Christ as both redeemer and liberator. The problem is, of course, this misconstrues Christ's liberation. He did not come to help the lower classes overcome the upper classes, but rather to liberate us from our sins.
And while it may be Socratic, it is still crap. And while it may be Socratic, it is still anti-American rhetoric.
Again though, Rev. Wright is entitled to his views. These statements say more about people who listen to and follow him that they do about Reverend Wright.
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Last night I attended our Church's Maundy Thursday service, complete with the ceremonial washing of the feet.
Within this service, of course, is the Great Commandment (giving "Maundy Thursday" it's name, from the word for "command") that we should all love one another as Jesus loved his disciples.
I am not one to be critical of other denominations or their preachers, but as I reflected on this commandment of love, I couldn't help but wonder where its echoes could be found in the excerpted sermons that we have seen endlessly replayed over the past week, or in the radical political gospel that seems to lie beneath.
BRASSBAND77
Oh, please.
As the resident expert on things Socratic, may I simply note that my namesake's questions were always intended to winnow, never to incite. If he asked a question which was out of bounds, and he rarely did, he knew it was out of bounds and was expecting an answer to bring the focus back into rational bounds.
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Socrates: Do you suppose that white people invented AIDS?
SANE ANSWER: I thought it came from monkeys.
Socrates: Perhaps they invented that story.
SANE ANSWER: Do you have any evidence of that?
Socrates: I'll ask the questions here.
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The whole thing just doesn't work, because it's built on the premise that Wright doesn't believe his own rhetoric. If he doesn't, then he's far more guilty, and Obama even more so for knowingly accepting the poison and implicitly endorsing it with his presence.
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Gone 2500 years, still not PC.
Read all about it here.
he asked questions which are different than making accusations. especially of a vile nature. The mayor left out that Socrates never questioned the right of the city to try and even execute him. I wonder if Reverend Wright would sit still for that.
"a man's admiration for absolute government is proportinate to the contempt he feels for those around him". Tocqueville
He did not come to help the lower classes overcome the upper classes, but rather to liberate us from our sins.
I was discussing the whole Wright situation with a coworker (she isn't an Obama supporter, she is however a liberal democrat and likes Hillary better). She didn't understand why I was bothered by the whole "Obama spent 20 years in the pew listening to this stuff" situation. She said pastors say offensive things all the time.
And I think this is it-I have been a member of various Baptist churches my whole life, and I have never heard anything remotely close to what Wright's preached. The kinds of things my pastor's preached about were things that dealt with my heart, my sin, and what I needed to do to stay focused on God and to stay to His path. It was about personal growth, it was about my personal relationship with God.
Did a pastor sometimes say things that weren't right in line with my thinking? Sure, but it was still centered on the personal relationship, or something that was tangental theology (not really salvation doctrine itself).
I don't think I would stick around to listen to a preacher too long though that was all about affirming my victimhood, hating my country and blaming everyone else for my troubles.
Maybe it really is a cultural thing.