It may seem strange to open a post entitled "The UCC, and why Jeremiah Wright matters" with a reference to Yom Kippur, but the connection is as follows: On Yom Kippur (which began the night before last and extended through most of yesterday) the congregation whose service I attended held that service at a church of the United Church of Christ, Jeremiah Wright's denomination. (They have for many years used churches as venues for their High Holiday services, because they get large attendances on those days and need places much larger than their usual service locations. For the past 20 years they've met for High Holidays at a Presbyterian church a few blocks from the White House, but that church is under renovation, so they used this UCC church this time.)
While waiting for the service to begin, I spent some time looking at the church's hymnals, which were found in the pews. The UCC hymnal turns out to contain much more than what I expected in a hymnal; it had a lot of material on the forms with which the ICC services are to be conducted and it turns out that (not surprisingly, since it was formed by the combination of a number of originally separate Protestant denominations) it tolerates a lot of diversity of doctrine. Even on the doctrine of transsubstantiation, which is generally, among Christians, a major doctrinal difference, it seems that UCC pastors are given the freedom to determine whether they will allude to it in serving the bread and wine.
And this is why I think that Jeremiah Wright matters. It is true, and nobody can deny this, that Barack Obama was essentially a secular person until Rev. Wright converted him. And it is, therefore, likely that Sen. Obama's religious views were formed by Rev. Wright. Each UCC minister clearly has the power to make his congregation over in the image of his own religious ideas, and Sen. Obama was converted by Rev. Wright, attended Rev. Wright's church for over 20 years, and remained a communicant of Rev. Wright's church until it became politically embarrassing.
So Barack Obama has to be charged with Rev. Wright's religious ideas. Wright does matter.
While waiting for the service to begin, I spent some time looking at the church's hymnals, which were found in the pews. The UCC hymnal turns out to contain much more than what I expected in a hymnal; it had a lot of material on the forms with which the ICC services are to be conducted and it turns out that (not surprisingly, since it was formed by the combination of a number of originally separate Protestant denominations) it tolerates a lot of diversity of doctrine. Even on the doctrine of transsubstantiation, which is generally, among Christians, a major doctrinal difference, it seems that UCC pastors are given the freedom to determine whether they will allude to it in serving the bread and wine.
And this is why I think that Jeremiah Wright matters. It is true, and nobody can deny this, that Barack Obama was essentially a secular person until Rev. Wright converted him. And it is, therefore, likely that Sen. Obama's religious views were formed by Rev. Wright. Each UCC minister clearly has the power to make his congregation over in the image of his own religious ideas, and Sen. Obama was converted by Rev. Wright, attended Rev. Wright's church for over 20 years, and remained a communicant of Rev. Wright's church until it became politically embarrassing.
So Barack Obama has to be charged with Rev. Wright's religious ideas. Wright does matter.
No comments:
Post a Comment