I saw the most amazing thing today.
Sun Apr 27, 2008 at 08:50:51 PM PDT
I have just had the most amazing Sunday. I will admit that I was a little nervous about today because I am a HardCore Barack Obama supporter, and I knew that the media was waiting for this speech from Jeremiah Wright to see if he said anything crazy, but he didn't. But that is not where my amazing Sunday began, it began on my way to church with my mother who is a former Hillary Clinton supporter.
I was woken up this morning by a phone call from my mother. She called much like she did every Sunday and asked me if I was going to church. While I view myself as a very spiritual person, I don't go to church as much as I should, or as much my mother would like me to. Something told me to get up this morning and go, I told my mom that I would go to her house and ride with her.
On the way to church the conversation turned political. Although we are Black my mother was a huge Hillary Clinton supporter, (I know we are all supposed to vote for Obama because Black people vote soley on the basis of skin color, but we don't.),but this morning she suprised me. She said that if Hillary gets the nomination she is not going to vote for president in November.
I was completely floored, I know that I was having the same feelings, but I didn't dare share them with my parents. All my life, I was told the importance of voting, that it is a RIGHT that we should never take for GRANTED. But this morning, my mother told me the importance of not being TAKEN for GRANTED. She said that she taught me all my life never to let anybody take me for granted; not boyfriends, not friends, and not any others. She said, that when you do things for people they should appreciate it, and when they stop appreciating it, and start expecting it, you should stop doing it. She said that it shouldn't be any different with politicians and political leaders. And if the politicians that we donated to, volunteered for, supported, and voted for started treating us as 3/5ths of a voter, that we should not vote for them. But that wasn't the only amazing thing that happened, I was still reeling from my conversation with my mother...When I walked in to church.
Before I tell you what happened when I got to church, I need to tell you about my church. My church is a traditional Black, Baptist Church, my pastor preaches a social gospel, but his basic philosophy is that we as Christians should love everybody as Christ loved the church. He is very non-discriminatory, we have gays, straights, Blacks, Whites, just about some of everybody. Our church is deeply rooted in the civil rights struggle. Our former pastor is the Rev. Dr. Benjamin L. Hooks, he is the former executive director of the NAACP, and he is the one who built our church into what it is today. And while some of the sermons are on the edges of the political, it is usually rooted in furthering civil rights for all Americans, not just Blacks.
When the Pastor started preaching his sermon, about Jeremiah Wright and Barack Obama. His sermon was based on the premise that the controversy about Rev. Wright was not about Rev. Wright, it was about Barack Obama. That some people were not ready to have a Black President, and that those same people were trying to find anything to connect him to to make him unacceptable to White America so he couldn't win. He ended his sermon saying that Black people shouldn't feel like they should have to automatically vote for the Democratic candidate. He said that that theory was anti-thetical to the teachings in the bible, that people should stand up for their morals and what is right. That is what Jesus did when he allowed himself to be crucified on the cross. He said that if the process is deemed unfair, that if the person with the most delegates, the most popular vote, and the most states won, lost, then we need to re-consider our vote. He said that we should not be afraid that if we don't vote that McCain will get in, that we have survived Bush, Bush Sr., Reagan, The Vietnam War, 2 World Wars, A great Depression, A Civil War, Slavery, Jim Crow, Segregation, and a Revolution, we will be OK!
And Amazingly, 2000 people stood up in unison and gave him a standing ovation.
My church has a mostly Black Congreation, (although all races are welcome)there are young and old, poor, middle class, and upper middle class; and all of them were standing and clapping. It was amazing on many different levels.
First of all, to see all of those people agreeing on something, (which is truly unusual)
Second, to see all of those people, having the same feelings that I was having, that I kinda thought were just andectotal stories expressed on liberal blogs such as Daily Kos was refreshing.
Then I started to realize that I live in the State of Michigan, my church is in the city of Detroit and NO democrat has ever won the State of MI without Detroit and I wondered how many churches in this community were preaching the same sermon, how many of their parishioners were standing in unison.
I realized superdelegates aren't stupid, they know that they can't win without the support of Obama supporters, they know what is going on across America, they know that Blacks, Liberals, Progressives, Young and Old people will not allow themselves to be taken for granted. That we will not work this hard for a candidate, to have that candidate play by the rules, and then take it away from that candidate. Because they know, if they screw us, we aren't coming in Novemeber. I realized that our politicians in the State of MI, will not allow our votes to count as is, that would be the equivalent of political suicide. So in the word of Jim Clyburn, we just need to "chill out," because it will all work out in the end.
UPDATE: Thanks guys - I've never made the rec list before.
I just want to clarify a few things. My pastor was not advocating for a certain candidate, he was advocating that Christians do what Christians are supposed to do, stand up for what is right. He was saying that voting for the lesser of two evils is not necessarily the best thing to do for the future, that we as Americans have other options.
