I just read one of the most moving, truthful and lucid explanations (if that's the right word) for why Barack Obama "stayed in that church for 20 years".
And it comes from the most unlikely of places: Lanny Davis! He wrote on Anderson Cooper's blog that there was a huge reaction to his WaPo Oped and among the e-mails that he received was one from Jeh Johnson, an African-American with whom he worked in the Clinton Administration. Jeh explains his own experience in the black church in a way that Barack probably cannot articulate in today's media circus but one that I think really applies. Not only does his letter help ME understand the black church better (someone who thought I already did understand it) but it is the kind of explanation that would be endlessly effective if we have family members or friends who are still concerned about it.
Excerpts from Jeh's e-mail below the fold.
I am excerpting part's of Jeh's e-mail below, but you should read the whole thing.
I imagine that Jeh, in writing this piece, was trying to disseminate information. This piece is not copyrighted. In other words, I don't think he would mind if I share some parts here...I think that was the whole point of him writing it.
I write this for myself, and not as a representative of Barack Obama or his campaign. I was prompted to write you when I saw your question "Why did he stay a member of that congregation?"
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Historically, the black church is the one place for blacks free of any white influence, something blacks can call all their own. It’s the fraternity, the funeral director, the marriage counselor, the lawyer, the tax preparer, the therapist, the AA anonymous. Black churches such as Trinity are often the center of the black community, the one place where people of different economic classes come together to see each other, worship God, engage in community service and outreach, and it is about much more than the pastor.
I am not biracial and I did not grow up in Hawaii. I did grow up in an overwhelmingly white community, and was constantly plagued by my minority status. I had no place to turn to find my own identity.
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While [at Morehouse], I started attending the Baptist church across the street. It was a real, down-home black church.
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The pastor was often over the top in his sermons, and he drove a Mercedes despite his poor congregation. I would listen to the good Rev. and often disagreed with much of his overheated rhetoric, but I kept going back to this church.
Why did I do that? For the first time in my life I felt like a full participant in the black experience, with no conditions. No one questioned who I was, where I came from, what I had done before to prove my blackness.
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While there I witnessed poor and uneducated black people shake off misery, poverty, addiction, alcoholism, death, sickness, relatives in jail and all the other stuff that makes life challenging in the big city.
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In the course of my own life, I have encountered many very militant and angry elements of the black community.
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It would be an act of sheer hypocrisy for me to try to renounce any of this. For example, at Morehouse many educated teachers and invited speakers blasted the white man, black men who acted like the white man, and condemned our whole society as fatally racist.
When I graduated in 1979, Louis Farrakhan was our baccalaureate speaker and Joshua Nkomo, leader of the armed struggle to liberate Zimbabwe, was our commencement speaker. With Coretta Scott King sitting near the front row, I vividly recall Nkomo preaching "the only thing the white man understands is the barrel of a gun." I certainly didn’t agree with that then, and I don’t now. But I love Morehouse and would rather quit all involvement in public affairs before I had to sever my ties of support to the school.
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The reality is this: Those of us who participate in both the white and African-American experiences will very likely have a Jeremiah Wright in our lives - it could be our teacher, our uncle, our brother, our father, or our pastor. It is simply part of the American experience.
But, here I am, a patriot who - I can honestly say - harbors no "anger" or racial animosity toward anybody, including my white law partners, my white neighbors, or my white family members. I can’t guarantee much about anything in life, but I can guarantee, from what I know about Barack Obama, that he feels the same in his heart and soul.
I have actually e-mailed this letter to some family members. Again, I think it one of the most thoughtful pieces written about why Barack is part of Trinity and we he didn't "disown" Reverend Wright. I honestly cannot imagine that someone could read this thoughtful piece and still not see where Barack is coming from.
Even LANNY DAVIS, a truly empty vessel, was able to see the light.