Totally recommended. I'm not much of a Bible person, but I have been keeping a pretty close eye on Barack these last few years and think you hit the nail right on the head.

It is also why I hope he'll be able to inspire a whole host (no pun intended) of Christians on the right to demand a new set of expectations from their representatives. They may not run out and join the democratic party, but they may very well start holding their republican reps feet to the fire and, failing that, send more progressive, more Christian replacement in the 2010 primaries.

In both cases, America wins and moves into our post partisan renaissance that is a necessary requirement to get to where we need to go as a people.

This is an exceptional blog! Moving. Uplifting. Analytically brilliant. I would pair your essay with this moving tribute to Obama by Alice Walker:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/20/uselections2008.barackobama

I urge all who've read this blog. Take the time to read Alice Walker's words. They fit so well with the thesis of this blog.

I cannot praise this blog highly enough!

Your insights are very good and important.

Of course, both Obama and our founding principles are informed by the essential and nondogmatic themes and ideas of Christianity. Even the "nonbelievers" amongst the founders revered Biblical ideals and the teachings of Jesus particularly as most plainly seen in Jefferson's Bible. Their reading of the basic religious documents of western civilization were sophisticated and discriminating enough to ignore the dogma and instead they read the Bible looking for the wisdom it held and separated that from the clearly dogmatic, rigid and outdated ideas men had grafted onto the eloquent insights and observations contained therin. It is endlessly ironic to me whenever I hear today's fundamentalists refer to their dogma and rigid theology as "old time" religion when in fact, the liberal Christian approach articulated by Obama is the direct descendant of "the faith of our fathers." It is the fundamentalist mentality that has always been outside the American norm. Most Americans living in the time of the Declaration and the Constitution would be repulsed by the Christian right, it's rigid dogma and it's boorish disrespect for other viewpoints.

It is sad that the inundation of American culture with Christian fundamentalist quackery, particularly through television and radio, has so distorted not only the religious perceptions of Americans but their view of civics, government and citizenship too. Fundamentalism is and always was anathema to the precepts of the American governmental structure and philosophy. Dogmatic religion of all stripes constituted a major roadblock toward civic progress from the beginning. Remember, when we became independent, most of the states had official religions leftover from colonial rule that were thrown off in relatively quick order by the Bill of Rights! Our founding documents are quintessentially documents of the Enlightenment whereas fundamentalism worldwide, but American fundamentalism particularly has always been an agent of counter-Enlightenment.

Fundamentalism and rigidly dogmatic religious beliefs have always been, at best, on the fringe of the American political spectrum and most often outside of it altogether. In the past generation as the bigotry, small-mindedness and stale orthodoxy of Christian fundamentalists has poisoned our politics and our government the traditional viewpoint, as Obama has expressed repeatedly, has receded into the background. The situation has not been helped by the fact that so many Anericans raised in mainstream religious churches of the mainstream have chosen not to provide their own children with a religious education or involve them as they were involved as young people. There is nothing at all wrong with this, but it did have the effect of weakening the mainstream, traditional, Christian perspective at a time simultaneous with the sharp rise of fundamentalist dogmatism. This unfortunate timing has clearly caused America no end of headaches and problems even as we have made some notable moral progress as a society.

The difference between the mainstream, traditional and far less dogmatic (if not nondogmatic) Christian viewpoint and fundamentalism is that it is predisposed to accept changes as they come. In other words, it is essentially open-minded and optimistic where the other viewpoint is closed and pessimistic. It embraces "the other" while dogmatic fundamentalism demands comformity in all ways: in thought and practice in every aspect of life.

The traditional Christian viewpoint has fewer absolutes and more room for questioning and doubt where fundamentalism (relabeled recently as "evangelicals")consist only of absolutes and anything that tends to contradict those frozen, brittle, and inflexible ideas is the work of "the devil". Like the traditional Christian viewpoint, Obama's mind is open where dogma closes the mind of fundamentalists. Obama's traditional viewpoint faces the world with confidence where the dogmatist does so with fearful suspicion. Fundamentalism views the world as a hostile place whereas Christian liberals view the world as an environment of endless possibility that human effort and cooperation can improve.

The traditional American Christian viewpoint is essentially liberal in the traditional sense and by that I mean in the sense that John Stuart Mill would use it. This implies open-mindedness and a spirit of inquiry with an eye constantly pointed toward improvement of the human condition and creating conditions under which human beings might live in an atmosphere of maximum liberty, self-determination, reason, unbiased and unhindered scientific inquiry, respect for the rights of others and where the natural rights of all are mutally respected and protected from the interference of the state or others. This liberalsim also recongizes as a foundational element that human society's organize themselves together for the common good in order to protect all these other ideas and precepts in order to improve the safety, security and prosperity of that society. That organization belongs to the people and is called government.

Within this philosophy the government as an entity has no inherent powers that are not derived from the consent of the governed. All sovereignty lies with the people themselves. Fundamentalist dogmatists can never long abide by this idea without beginning to inject their concept of "God" and God's "will" or "word" into the process and inevitably putting "God" to work inplmenting their own dogmatic beliefs. That fundamentalist proclivity necessarily infringes upon the natural rights and creator-bestowed liberty of the people as a whole.

The joining of liberal political thought with liberal Christian thought (sans dogma and religious tests of any kind) has been a potent and positive influence throughout American history. I think there are many today whose understandably negative view of religion (organized Christian religion especially)causes them to lose sight of this positive contribution. It is understandable because the pervasively negative effect of fundamentalism tends to tar all Christianity with it's deceptive, bellicose and ubiquitous use of the generic label "Christian" as though Christians were some monolithic group when that is as false as their absurd notion that the world was created in seven, 24 hour days.

Obama had excellent liberal Christian instruction as an adult the he tragically was forced to renounce but the lessons remained in tact. Being a good student, and an intelligent and nonfearful intellect, Obama embraced this philosophy as all our great leaders have done. His continued references in this regard are a most welcome and needed instruction to our nation at this point in history.

Our most important, strongest and inspirational Presidents have all shared this non or even anti-dogmatic religious perspective whether Washington, both Adams', Jefferson, Lincoln, Grant, both Roosevelts, Truman, Eisenhower or Kennedy. Indeed, many of them have displayed a downright hostility to dogmatic religious thought and beliefs. Those I've named are not the only ones either. Our "civic religion" has always been closely aligned with this viewpoint without wrecking our civil life with the sectarian religious strife that European nations so long endured or that eat at the soul of so many foreign lands even now. For me, that alone is demonstration of the genius and desirability of it. It balances natural spirituality with pragmatic priorities for ordering society in a way that reduces conflict yet still maintains a focus on the broadest and most important moral values regarding our treatment of human beings.

One need not be a Christian to share the values, optimism, fearlessness, and committment that this liberal Christian viewpoint possesses in common with the liberal political thought that goes hand in hand with it. I think that is part of Obama's message and vitally important. All one need do is to have unshakable but realistic faith in and respect for "the rights of man" as the founders would have put it, for humanity and to believe in the everlasting ability of humans to improve themselves. So in the end it is our belief in eachother that creates harmony among humans and the preservation of room within each of us to find comfort in our religious beliefs or not. It has worked remarkably well for two centuries. Our heritage has provided this for us. That is enough and it is our obligation to pass this on to our posterity unaltered.

It's clear that Obama isn't a Jew or Muslim. I'm not so clear on his devotion to Christianity, tho' I suspect his spirituality and devotion are more than Bush's "born again" facade. I think he uses C. because of Wright's good influence on him and because he knows that C. is still the dominant religion demographically in the USA. It speaks quietly to the masses.

I believe he's also informed by other "religions" and suspect that underneath the C. veneer he's a wannabe pragmatist who needs our help to "keep the faith" while defending the Constitution.