God Bless America

In 2003, comedian Chris Rock came out with a movie Head of State where under slapstick circumstances, he ends up running for president against a heavily favored establishment candidate.  Rock's opponent parodied the politician's standard lines, exaggerating them just slightly enough to make the real versions seem, well, silly.  So the line that stuck with me was when the opponent "signed off" every speech by saying: God Bless America and no one else.  

For the past few days there has been an uproar over President-elect Barack Obama's choice to give the invocation at his inauguration.  Obama's choice, Pastor Rick Warren, is by self-description, an evangelical minister of the Saddleback mega-church in Southern California.  The uproar mostly comes from the "left" who are upset that Obama chose not only someone who is emphatically and vocally against gay marriage, but also is a conservative evangelical on many culturally divisive issues such as abortion, women's roles in society, the place for religion in politics.  

Rick Warren came to the national stage because of his writings, mostly which fall into what I call the health and wealth side of religion.  In other words, if you just believe, all good things will come to you, including your health and monetary rewards.  I apologize for being extremely simplistic.  Because of the size of his congregation, he also commands respect from politicians who believe there is a link between voters and evangelical church membership.

The controversy over Warren is primarily focused over his support of Proposition 8 in California, which put into the California State Constitution a ban on gay marriage, essentially overruling the recent California Supreme Court decision last fall that determined gays in California had a right to marry.  Gays, who 99.9% supported Obama, feel the choice of Warren to even participate in the inauguration is an insult to them.

While I am sympathetic to this side of the issue, I think there is an even larger discussion as seen by the line from Head of State.  While I have not researched this, my guess is that there has been some sort of invocation given at almost every inauguration since George Washington (note to self: that would be an interesting thing to find out).  And it should be no secret to anyone who voted for Barack Obama that he very publicly professes his deep belief in Christianity which he expresses through attending church.  While there is a whole continuum of social beliefs expressed in the vast number of Christian religions in this country (I come from the liberal wing of the Episcopal church which itself is having an uproar), from what I have read about Barack Obama, it seems his religion is much more in line with African-American traditions, which are somewhat socially conservative.  It would be surprising, therefore, if Barack Obama gave up on the idea of an invocation at all.

So Obama, it seems from his public statements on the Warren brouhaha, views this moment as a teaching experience.  Something to the effect that as folks who believe in a new way, in hope, in politics of change, you all had better realize this will include people with radically different views than your own ideology.  Or as he said in 2004 at the Democratic Convention: We are all one country under God.  

And therein is my issue.  Just down the street from me is the greasy spoon fish and chips place that I dearly love and try to avoid.  For the past two years on it's reader board as been this message: God bless the world.  For once, I would love to hear our leaders, both political and spiritual, bless all of us.  To understand that all of us, no matter what our values, ideology, beliefs, and especially what country we reside in, are children of God.  

So, Pastor Warren, congratulations on this acknowledgment on this choice.  President-elect Barack Obama has given you an honor and placed his faith in your ability to see past your own values to acknowledge and lead all of us in prayer for a better world.  And President-elect Obama has also placed faith in us, that we can see beyond Pastor Warren's views to see that he, too, is a child of God and the world.