COMMENTARY | According to USA Today, President Barack Obama is attempting to gain evangelical voters by ramping up his references to Christianity and God in his speeches. John Green, a senior fellow at the Pew Forum for Religion and Public Life, says Obama did not mention his Christian faith much in his first two years of office but has recently quoted Psalms from the Bible in two occasions while speaking about the 10th anniversary of September 11. While Green is correct that Obama is using Christian rhetoric to secure voters, Obama did reference Christianity early in his political career, or rather, he mocked it.
In a 2006 speech, Obama said that Jesus’ “Sermon on the Mount” was so radical that the Defense Department would not survive its application. What is worse than these actual words is how sarcastic Obama acted when he said it. Obama gave the implication during this speech that using any part of the Bible as inspiration for action is absurd.
Watch the video of Obama mocking Jesus’ “Sermon on the Mount” here.
In addition to mocking Christianity and the principles of Jesus, Obama has also caused the public to speculate over whether he is even Christian, or a Muslim. Nicholas Kristof, a columnist for the New York Times, said in his article that Obama told him that the Islamic call to prayer (the adhan) is “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth.”
Now of course this does not make Obama a Muslim, but it is worth noting that Muslims and Islamic leaders have not spoken out against Obama being a Christian, despite the fact that his father was a Muslim. In Islam, the children of a Muslim father are Muslim- no matter what the mother’s religion is. In fact, every Muslim I know thinks Obama is a Muslim, and is just hiding this fact for political reasons.
Just quoting Psalms from the Bible a few times is not enough evidence that Obama is a true Christian. All the monotheistic faiths, Christianity, Islam and Judaism, use Psalms as inspiration because these writings (which were written primarily by King David) do not indicate a specific religious doctrine.
Obama’s sudden interest in the Bible is not enough to convince evangelical voters that he is a Christian president. You’ll have to do better than that Mr. President.