I thought these words "concerned you", joan? Which words specificly? Or was it the whole speech? What 'concerns" you enough to write hit pieces on this subject almost daily? Are you finally going to admit you are a propogandists for profit in the same mold as rush limbaigh, sean hannity, ann coulter?

I have heard no one take issue witht eh speech. So what changed, joan, from before the speech to after?

"To say "I am a Christian" is not enough. Why? Because the Christianity of the slaveholder is not the Christianity of the slave. The God to whom the slaveholders pray as they ride on the decks of the slave ship is not the God to whom the enslaved are praying as they ride beneath the decks on that slave ship.

How we are seeing God, our theology, is not the same. And what we both mean when we say "I am a Christian" is not the same thing. The prophetic theology of the black church has always seen and still sees all of God's children as sisters and brothers, equals who need reconciliation, who need to be reconciled as equals in order for us to walk together into the future which God has prepared for us.

Reconciliation does not mean that blacks become whites or whites become blacks and Hispanics become Asian or that Asians become Europeans.

Reconciliation means we embrace our individual rich histories, all of them. We retain who we are as persons of different cultures, while acknowledging that those of other cultures are not superior or inferior to us. They are just different from us.

We root out any teaching of superiority, inferiority, hatred, or prejudice.

And we recognize for the first time in modern history in the West that the other who stands before us with a different color of skin, a different texture of hair, different music, different preaching styles, and different dance moves, that other is one of God's children just as we are, no better, no worse, prone to error and in need of forgiveness, just as we are.

Only then will liberation, transformation, and reconciliation become realities and cease being ever elusive ideals.

Thank you for having me in your midst this morning

"

wright

I saw the interview. You ought to be ashamed of yourself for what you wrote.

"MODERATOR: We do want to get in our questions. Thank you. Thank you, everybody.

I do want to repeat again, for those of you watching us on C- SPAN, that we do have a number of guests here today. And so the applause and the comments that you hear from the audience are not necessarily those of the working press, who are mostly in the balconies.

You have said that the media have taken you out of context. Can you explain what you meant in a sermon shortly after 9/11 when you said the United States had brought the terrorist attacks on itself? Quote, "America's chickens are coming home to roost."

REVEREND WRIGHT: Have you heard the whole sermon? Have you heard the whole sermon?

MODERATOR: I heard most of it.

REVEREND WRIGHT: No, no, the whole sermon, yes or no? No, you haven't heard the whole sermon? That nullifies that question.

Well, let me try to respond in a non-bombastic way. If you heard the whole sermon, first of all, you heard that I was quoting the ambassador from Iraq. That's number one.

But, number two, to quote the Bible, "Be not deceived. God is not mocked. For whatsoever you sow, that you also shall reap." Jesus said, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

You cannot do terrorism on other people and expect it never to come back on you. Those are biblical principles, not Jeremiah Wright bombastic, divisive principles.

"

"MODERATOR: Some critics have said that your sermons are unpatriotic. How do you feel about America and about being an American?

REVEREND WRIGHT: I feel that those citizens who say that have never heard my sermons, nor do they know me. They are unfair accusations taken from sound bites and that which is looped over and over again on certain channels.

I served six years in the military. Does that make me patriotic? How many years did Cheney serve?"

As a former soldier I feel this. Someone who joins the military, not for money, cannot hate their country. It is not possible to offer your life for a country you hate.

It enrages me to see joan or rush or hannity or any other fascsit propogandists who makes money off the freedom troops provide, and have never had the courage themselves to serve, to then label a serving patriot fighting for their coutnry as unamerican. The "phoney soldiers" comment from joans freind rush, was the last straw.

How can a vet be un-american? Joan?

that's what I thoguht coward fascsit propogandists.

Thanks for showing yoru faces.

have a good day. God will judge you, many years from now hopefully. I am not your judge.

The good news is, when you fascsits reach the pearly gates, many years from now. You won't be able to claim ignorance. You won't be able to say no one told you or tried to help you from wronging your fellow man.

"And your accountable. Everything that you heard."

In the eyes and ears of God. Your willful ignorance will not save you on judgement day gop clone divide and conquer nazi's.

I have to wonder, because what Joan and the rest of the self-Wrighteous pundit types have been missing is that it usually takes a lot more than a few questionably-worded comments or arguable insights to make an involved church member leave the congregation.

First of all, it is incredibly difficult for families to find a church that "works" for everyone, and when they are lucky--or blessed--enough to find a good fit,they tend to ride out the various storms and disputes that flair up from time to time.

Second, and even more critically, a strong church strives to outlast any pastor, brilliant, dull, saintlike, or obnoxious. (By the way, churches that are entirely dependent upon the personality and message of a single pastor often demonstrate cult-like tendencies and rarely make it past the first generation. The fact Wright's congregation existed before his arrival and continues without him speaks well of the church.) Furthermore, the defection of critical members can be quite traumatic for a church, sometimes even inciting a church split--a destructive, frequently petty and selfish act for which few Christians would want to be responsible. If the Obama family are active, important members of their church, a huffy departure could conceivably do a great deal more harm than good. (Putting it another way, Obama's refusal to repudiate his church could just as easily have been spun as responsible and comforting instead of radical and scary.)

What this trumped-up Wright controversy has demonstrated to me is that Americans--particularly those in media communications--do a lot more talking about church than actually attending services. There's a reason why even such cultural conservatives as Mike Huckabee have spoken in defense of Obama and Reverend Wright, and most serious church-goers know what it is: all preachers say weird things from the pulpit from time to time, and though their congregation may complain, they rarely leave. Let s/he who is without rhetorical sin...