NAACP Speech Pres. Obama's View of Church

[saint143]

Did anyone catch the end of President Obama’s speech to NAACP. Here’s a link of the whole speech, but the comment about the Church is right at the end 34:00.

video.google.com/videosearch?q=obama%20speech%20NAACP&hl=en&ned=us&tab=nv#

 

[Dale_M]

Is there a point you want to make in mentioning this segment of the speech?

And we will move forward. This I know – for I know how far we have come. Some, you saw, last week in Ghana, Michelle and I took Malia and Sasha and my mother-in-law to Cape Coast Castle, in Ghana. Some of you may have been there. This is where captives were once imprisoned before being auctioned; where, across an ocean, so much of the African American experience began.

We went down into the dungeons where the captives were held. There was a church above one of the dungeons – which tells you something about saying one thing and doing another. (Applause.) I was – we walked through the “Door Of No Return.” I was reminded of all the pain and all the hardships, all the injustices and all the indignities on the voyage from slavery to freedom.

But I was reminded of something else. I was reminded that no matter how bitter the rod, how stony the road, we have always persevered. (Applause.) We have not faltered, nor have we grown weary. As Americans, we have demanded, and strived for, and shaped a better destiny. And that is what we are called on to do once more. NAACP, it will not be easy. It will take time. Doubts may rise and hopes may recede.

But if John Lewis could brave Billy clubs to cross a bridge – (applause) – then I know young people today can do their part and lift up our community. (Applause.)

If Emmet Till’s uncle, Mose Wright, could summon the courage to testify against the men who killed his nephew, I know we can be better fathers and better brothers and better mothers and sisters in our own families. (Applause.)

If three civil rights workers in Mississippi – black, white, Christian and Jew, city-born and country-bred – could lay down their lives in freedom’s cause, I know we can come together to face down the challenges of our own time. (Applause.) We can fix our schools – (applause) – we can heal our sick, we can rescue our youth from violence and despair. (Applause.)

And 100 years from now, on the 200th anniversary of the NAACP – (applause) – let it be said that this generation did its part; that we too ran the race; that full of faith that our dark past has taught us, full of the hope that the present has brought us – (applause) – we faced, in our lives and all across this nation, the rising sun of a new day begun. (Applause.)

Thank you, God bless you. God bless the United States of America.

washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jul/17/text-obamas-speech-naacp/?page=6

 

[saint143]

Is there a point you want to make in mentioning this segment of the speech?

washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jul/17/text-obamas-speech-naacp/?page=6

Paragraph 2. It’s posted on you tube. Have you seen it or just read it?. My States has acres of headstones of men from the Church who gave life and limb fighting for their freedom during the civil war. Wives made widows, children made fatherless.

 

[Dale_M]

Paragraph 2. It’s posted on you tube. Have you seen it or just read it?.

Both, I just find that text is easier and quicker to process than video, so wanted to give others the option of reading the speech.

My States has acres of headstones of men from the Church who gave life and limb fighting for their freedom during the civil war. Wives made widows, children made fatherless.

Yes, but I still don’t understand your point in mentioning this portion of Obama’s speech.

 

[saint143]

There was a Church above one of those dungeons where the slaves were held

which tells you something

about saying one thing, and doing another.

 

[Dale_M]

There was a Church above one of those dungeons where the slaves were held

which tells you something

about saying one thing, and doing another.

Yes, Christians should never have participated in the slave trade. It was a barbaric practice totally at odds with human dignity and compassion. Jesus said the two greatest commandments were to love God with all our heart, and to love our neighbor as ourself. Slavery is the exact opposite that second teaching.

Eventually many Christians worked to ban slavery, and as you pointed out, fought to overturn it. But here in the US, Southern Christians often pointed to the Bible to justify keeping slaves.

 

[saint143]

The President seems to have alot of bitterness for the Church after all this time. I think you would have to see and hear how it was delivered to catch it.

 

[a_cermak]

Eventually many Christians worked to ban slavery, and as you pointed out, fought to overturn it. But here in the US, Southern Christians often pointed to the Bible to justify keeping slaves.

Bless those Quakers who did the early heavy lifting at getting an abolition movement going (and did an awful lot of work in the underground railroad, especially the “stations” around Pennsylvania). The Moravians, some Catholics (they really weren’t big players due to demographics of the time), some Presbyterians (they were split), some Episcopalians (these were split until the Civil war when the confederacy had its own Episcopal church), some Baptists (SBC broke off to support slavery), just about all Lutherans (who if they didn’t support abolition at least weren’t on the other side).

The existence of slavery in this nation from its founding is enough to indicate it was not founded as a Christian nation. Among the founders they either endorsed slavery and practiced it themselves or valued the idea of liberty for themselves and their posterity so much they were willing to steal it from others. And it’s no use saying they didn’t know any better. At the time of the Revolution, the Quakers were already against slavery and writing pamphlets and trying to get the issue raised in the Articles of Confederation.

 

[saint143]

If you have ever driven through Fredericksburg you would see large areas of land preserved and frozen in time. It always struck me how God’s grace and the power of forgiveness healed and reunited a country. I thought that was what everyone walked away with.

1 Corinthians 13:5
Love does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,

I wish I would have never brought it up. I was just astonished that the President of the United States would have.