Senator Barack Obama has finally expressed outrage at the antics of Reverend Jeremiah Wright. This comes after Pastor Wright took to the airwaves Monday, making statements potentially damaging to Obama’s candidacy. Until recently, the Senator and his supporters pretended that Trinity United Church of Christ was your typical black American church. A place where animated preachers offer their congregations heated diatribes castigating the U.S. government and their fellow Americans for numerous failings. Truth be told, the black church is just as diverse as the white church. And Obama’s recent repudiation causes one to wonder about his judgment on other issues and whether this is just politics as usual.
Where was Senator Obama’s outrage when some of Reverend Wright’s more incendiary statements became public? Where was his contrition about spending 20-years in the pew and exposing his children to racist rants? How could he have not known that it would be problematic to remain in the congregation of a vocal and fiery pastor bold enough to assert from the pulpit that, “the government gives them [Blacks] the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us [Blacks] 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.” What is scriptural and in the Bible is love and forgiveness of one’s enemies.
Equally damaging is that Reverend Wright has argued that blacks think, act and learn differently from whites. Wright’s message is the opposite of what Senator Obama has been speaking and it contradicts those who argue that race is a social construct. In fact, Reverend Wright’s arguments parallel those of white supremacists who argue that the races are different and that black Americans constitute a nation within a nation who hold different values, ideas, and behaviors than white people. Reverend Wright’s tutorial on racial differences hurts Senator Obama because for some it will trigger negative racial stereotypes about the dysfunctional behaviors that sometimes seem more prevalent in black communities. It will remind many whites that Obama really is black. It will cause second thoughts and second looks because many whites support him because he has made them feel good about themselves and what white America stands for. Some white intellectuals have commented that Obama’s election will make us look good in the eyes of a world where many nations hate us.
People of faith make choices about where they will worship and what they will tolerate coming from the pulpit. Unfortunately, Senator Obama made a wrong choice. His continued presence in Reverend Wright’s congregation contradicts his claim of being a politician who can unite Americans of different races. Repudiating Reverend Wright now seems like no more than political strategy. This is a move straight from the play book of Karl Rove and others who have taken to publicly offering him strategic advice. Will the real Barack Obama, please stand up?
Carol M. Swain is a professor of political science and law at Vanderbilt University.
This op-ed originally ran on The Washington Times’ website.