President Barack Obama invited Doug McClure, a missionary to India out of Shiloh Church in Oakland, CA, home, to play cello at the National Prayer breakfast. McClure, who has played for dignitaries and royalty around the world, was scheduled to have 15 minutes.
Perhaps some are confused. After all, there was an e-mail curculating saying Obama cancelled the event.
This happened because, in an effort to show he is everyone's president, he invited Muslim clerics in this country to pray at the Capital in 2009. Of course, that only proved to many he was a Muslim—there were also pictures circulating showing him respecting their tradition of removing his shoes.
Nevermind all of that controversy when his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, proclaimed "God damn America" in one of his sermons. Obama addressed race (you know, that card his opponents claim he always plays) for the first time, saying he could no more condemn Wright than he could his white grandmother who was prejudiced against blacks. He could only condemn his statements.
Since that time, Obama has not joined a new church—something a member of my own church claimed. But contrary to these biases, he has been to many churches. He has also had many pastors come to the White House, and according to CNN's coverage of the Prayer Breakfast, said that he opens each day with a prayer, has a daily scripture devotion and has fallen on his knees many times since meeting Billy Graham.
Still, a KFAX radio commentator exclaimed on-air that he could claim he was a giraffe and that would not make it true. Obama, he said, was no more a Christian for claiming it.
It is time for Christians to stop selling and even buying these claims. We do not know what is in another's mind or heart. We should not assign someone insincerity in their faith just because some of their views run counter to ours, even if they were formed by our faith.
Labeling someone a heretic is something we should keep in the Church's past. Engaging in one-sided misinformation suggesting he was not born in this country, Osama bin ladin was not killed in an operation he signed off on, or that he is a secret non-Christian or socialist is un-Christian behaviour.
Shiloh prays for and supports each and every president, and its diversity extends not just to race but politics, with members on both sides of the political aisle. As I said in one of my first columns, God's angels would not fly with only a right or left wing.
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