Can you imagine the president of the United States attending a church where the pastor says everyone has a bit of “thug” in him and praises a rapper with a criminal record as a prophet?
How about a pastor who calls the biblical patriarch Abraham a “pimp” and says Noah and Moses were thugs, Jesus has a “soft spot for thugs,” and everyone has some “thug proclivities.”
If Barack Obama is elected president, that is exactly what will happen. Now that the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. is retiring from Trinity United Church of Christ, Obama has said he will continue to attend the church.
Explaining his decision, Sen. Obama said that the “new pastor, the young pastor, Reverend Otis Moss, is a wonderful young pastor.” He said he also still values the Trinity community.
Known as the "hip-hop pastor," Otis Moss III has served as assistant pastor of the church for two years. Moss officially takes over in June.
While Moss has not expressed hatred of America and of whites, as Wright did, in a sermon on YouTube, Moss derides middle-class America for not accepting the “prophetic brilliance” of thugs.
Referring to these thugs, Moss says sardonically, “There are times when our prejudice keeps us from hearing ghetto prophets, who preach a brand of thug theology which keeps us from hearing the truth from their lips because of their course language and ragged subject-verb agreement.”
To applause, Moss approvingly cites Tupac Shakur, a “gangsta” rap star with a long arrest record. Before being fatally shot in a drive-by attack in Las Vegas in 1996, Shakur faced a 120-day sentence for probation violations stemming from offenses including assault and battery and a 1994 sexual abuse conviction in New York. Shakur served 11 months in prison for his involvement in the sexual attack on a 21-year-old woman in a New York hotel room. Judge Daniel P. Fitzgerald of the State Supreme Court in Manhattan described it as “an act of brutal violence against a helpless woman.”
Shakur had also been convicted in Los Angeles of assault and battery on a music video producer and for carrying a loaded, concealed weapon.
Most Americans look to places of worship for inspiration and moral and spiritual guidance. Moss’ message is the opposite. Claiming Shakur’s message speaks to our “current condition,” Moss blurs the distinction between right and wrong: He says those who don’t get that a rapper like Shakur is a prophet and biblical figures are thugs are confined by “bourgeois paradigms.”
Instead of condemning those who break the law, Moss says to exuberant applause, “Our society creates thugs. Children are not born thugs. Thugs are made and not born.” He adds, “This is good news for somebody who has a proclivity for 'ghettoistic' conduct.”
Indeed, it is good news for those who do not want to be held accountable for their own conduct. In making that statement, Moss endorses the message of many black leaders who encourage blacks to see themselves as helpless victims of a bigoted society. As outlined in the Newsmax article “Rev. Wright Furthers Black Victimhood,” the victim mentality limits blacks’ aspirations and torpedoes their chances at success.
What is most disturbing about Obama’s continuing attendance at Trinity is the fact that he is exposing his children to its negative message. Instead of uplifting members of his congregation and calling on them to adhere to the best values, Moss denigrates American society and looks to guidance from thugs.
A president is commander in chief and chief executive officer of the government. But he is also a moral leader. When President Clinton was caught having sex with Monica Lewinsky, parents all over the country were embarrassed and disgusted that they had to explain to their pre-teens the meaning of the sexual terms their kids read in newspaper articles describing Clinton’s activities with the 22–year-old White House intern.
What kind of moral leadership can be exercised by a man who sends his kids to listen to sermons denouncing America and whites and now calling Moses a thug and praising a convicted rapper as a prophet? What kind of example is set by a man who does not denounce the destructive message sent by this church to blacks and whites alike?
Tragically for segments of black society, in belonging to Trinity and contributing $26,270 to it last year, Obama is helping to spread the crippling message among blacks that they are victims.
Apologists for Obama will say where he attends church and what he exposes his children to have nothing to do with being president. They are mistaken. It has everything to do with being president.
Ronald Kessler is chief Washington correspondent of Newsmax.com. View his previous reports and get his dispatches sent to you free via
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