Race, Faith and Politics

I came across a commentary while browsing on CNN.com called "Race, Faith, and Politics."
I found the article really, really interesting and applicable to our current discussions. I think it would have been helpful in a post that I have already done and also in regards to a couple other posts so I wanted to put the link up so everyone could check it out. The article opens with the fact that Reverend Wright's comments have causes the issues of race and faith to come to the forefront of the political race.

"If a poll were taken, there is no doubt that race, faith and politics would be the most emotional, passionate and divisive topics. Why? Because all three are so deeply personal. What one person sees as a negative, another would determine as a strength." I thought this quote was interesting given what we have heard from Stanley Hauerwas and from other sources in our class. Is faith really personal, or is it something that we should force to become public? Just an interesting quote...

The article goes on to discuss Obama's speech on race in particular but also the issues regarding the intersection of race and faith. For example, the differences that occur in black worship and white worship. "I fundamentally believe that whites, blacks -- and yes, Hispanics and Asians -- reacted differently when hearing the snippets of Wright's preaching. Not solely because of content, but also style. For African Americans and a lot of Southern whites who are accustomed to a certain style of preaching, the thundering voice that drops to a whisper, the weaving of social issues with the theological, is common." It also discusses the differences in black and white culture and how these differences affect their faith and their politics.

The article discuses Martin Luther King and how he made many controversial statements that lost him many supporters, but they were statements that he needed to make because they reflected the anger he felt at a culture that had turned its back on his people. I LOVED what Hauerwas said when he was in our class about the fact that we feel that the Civil Rights Movement has somehow abolished all forms of slavery, but we are far from it. Our culture still imposes structures of racism and slavery among all sorts of minorities and it is time that those issues become part of our political discourse. I think this article is one of many that is addressing these issues and is worth reading to get some perspective not only on faith and politics, but how race has worked its way into these issues in our current election.