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Forum to tackle Wright, Obama, black church
Whites, blacks uncomfortable about differences, pastor says
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Published: May 4, 2008
The Rev. Jeremiah Wrights's fiery remarks about America's standing in the world and relations between blacks and whites fueled the first serious backlash against Sen. Barack Obama's run for the presidency.
The controversy hits America's tender spots of race, religion and politics, and it raises questions about the relationship between pastor and church member, the differences in how blacks and whites view America, and the discomfort that blacks and whites still share in talking about their differences -- more than 40 years after the Civil Rights Act.
And it has introduced much of white America to the passion and pain of black liberation theology.
"My concern is, how does mainstream America understand the African American church?" said the Rev. Sir Walter Mack, the pastor of Union Baptist Church. "The truth of the matter is this is the first time many of them have ever heard of liberation theology. They're going to attach the message to the messenger."
Mack is concerned enough about the situation that he has organized a forum tonight at his church in which panelists will discuss "Is the African-American Church Under Attack?"
The forum begins at 6 at Union Baptist, 1200 N. Trade St. Among the guests will be the Rev. John Mendez, the pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church; Bill Leonard, the dean of the Wake Forest Divinity School; the Rev. Cardes Brown, the pastor of New Light Missionary Baptist Church in Greensboro.
Liberation theology, Mack said, is about speaking to people who have been marginalized in society. It says that God has a special care and concern for people who are oppressed, and God gives them the strength to endure.
Ultimately, liberation theology brings healing to the oppressed as well as the oppressor, he said.
"We have to take people somewhere, and that's to the message of restoration, love, hope, faith," he said. "And leaving them with a sense of optimism that God's way will prevail."
Wright, the former pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, was following in that tradition when he gave a sermon days after the Sept. 11 attacks in which he said that "American's chickens are coming home to roost" after it had dropped atomic bombs on Japan during World War II and supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans.
As the television showings of the controversial video clips multiplied, so did criticism of Obama. Some people questioned to what extent he shared his pastor's views.
Last week in Winston-Salem, Obama denounced Wright's remarks -- and Wright -- to a small group of reporters after an appearance at a town-hall meeting at the Joel Coliseum Annex.
"I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened by the spectacle that we saw," Obama said about Wright's appearance Monday at the National Press Club in Washington.
During his remarks there, Wright had reiterated his belief that the federal government created AIDS as a way to infect and kill black people, and he defended his relationship with Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam.
Usually, the relationship between pastor and church member is confidential, Mack said. He finds it strange that people would be concerned with that relationship now that one church member is running for president.
"What does the relationship have to do with his ability to lead this country through some difficult and trying times?" he said.
Mack noted that no one is worrying about the messages that Obama may have received while attending Harvard or other institutions of higher learning at which exposure to extreme ideas is accepted as part of the process.
"I've been afforded the opportunity to receive from several different information channels," Mack said. "What I learn from one helps me to understand the other. And I don't swallow them wholesale."
He said he hopes that the forum will help people digest what has been largely played out in the media.
Obama had to distance himself from his pastor, Mack said, in order to secure the presidency.
John Mendez, the pastor of Emanuel Baptist Church, said he concurs that Obama needed to distance himself from Wright.
"He's running for president, not for mayor," he said. "He's got to be very inclusive."
Wright represents the particular perspective of black Christians, Mendez said, while Obama needs to represent a far larger view.
Mendez said that for him, the main issue is that Republicans and others who are threatened by Obama have spent days going through tapes of Wright's sermons in order to hurt Obama by association.
"The Achilles heel they were looking for was the black church and Jeremiah Wright," he said.
The aim is to make Obama look like an unpatriotic, nationalist fanatic who would separate and scare white people, Mendez said.
"It's playing the race card in the most subtle way," he said, "to raise Jeremiah Wright up as the bogeyman that everyone can target and shoot at, hate, dislike--and the fallout is on Obama."
As a veteran of the civil-rights era, Mendez said, he knew that Obama would face opposition from Republicans and others who don't share his vision of a broader, more inclusive America.
"We're in a war for the White House, and the old guard do not want to give up power," he said. "It has to be taken from them by this election."
The Rev. Roy Swann, the pastor of Goler Metropolitan AME Zion Church, said that as a child of the civil-rights era, he is cautiously optimistic about Obama's candidacy.
"We realize what we came through," he said. "That backlash could pop up again any time."
He said he is not overly worried about the Wright controversy damaging black churches.
"We've always been a target. They bombed the churches in the '60s," he said. "A verbal attack is nothing new. The media makes it more of an issue than it is."
The silver lining in the controversy, he said, is that liberation theology has gone mainstream, he said. From that standpoint, the media has done black people a favor.
Wright is addressing politics from a spiritual perspective, Swann said. He is saying that America reaps what it sows. America has allied itself to such dictators as Manuel Noriega and Saddam Hussein.
"It's going to be a wake-up call to America," he said, "to examine our own selves. How do we treat others? How do people around the world view us?"
The Rev. Prince Raney Rivers, the pastor of the United Metropolitan Missionary Baptist Church, said he does not believe that the controversy would have a destructive impact on the black church.
Wright is one voice, Rivers said, and everyone who espouses black theology would not necessarily use Wright's language.
He said that some of the discussions he has seen could prove useful in giving people a way to talk about race.
"It would be a wonderful thing," he said, "if there could be a continuing and creative dialogue on the issues that are being raised now."
»Videos: Trinity United Church of Christ Chicago
■ Mary Giunca can be reached at 727-4089 or at mgiunca@wsjournal.com .
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