Alan Keyes
Black America: reaping harvest of racial idolatry?
By Alan Keyes
"In every important respect, Obama's victory in the 2008 presidential election was a victory for racism. First, there was the racist claim that his skin color made his election somehow significant for black Americans with whom he otherwise shares no common moral or historical heritage. Second, his stubborn advocacy of the parent's right to murder her child made it a victory in principle for the racist notion that 'inferior' physical development leaves people with no rights that must be respected by their supposed betters. Third, the U.S. Constitution has been openly set aside on account of fears that racist violence would result from investigating the facts regarding his citizenship at birth (lest they support the conclusion that he is constitutionally ineligible to serve as president of the United States). Truth, right, and the Constitution — all sacrificed for the sake of racist fears and premises."
For all the Democrats' talk of unity, the years during which Obama has occupied the White House seem to me to have left our country more deeply and critically divided than at any time in its history (excepting perhaps the years just before the Civil War). In the column quoted above, I foresaw this result when I went on to write:
"Unity is always on their lips, but their hearts are far from it. Instead of a national government that represents our common heart for justice and liberty, the Obama faction means to create a fractured reflection of all our differences, until we forget how to see, think, and act as Americans, regardless of those differences. With this dissolution of the American identity, they prepare the way for the dissolution of the United States itself, so that a strong sense of our national identity no longer poses an obstacle to their plans for a new, global regime that sets aside our 'provincial' concerns with right and ordered liberty."
Many people have awakened now to the fact that the Obama wing of the elitist faction has been unleashed to turn this country into a demoralized wreck — dissolute, shattered, and economically ruined. Included in this awakening are many people who voted for Obama mainly because they felt their vote would contribute to freeing America from the shadows of racism so often exploited to promote bad policies. Obama's displays of shame and contempt for America have instead lengthened and deepened those shadows. He and his cohorts have used the charge or insinuation of racism as their instrument of choice in efforts to cow the spirit and will of the American people.
Of course, Obama's 2008 victory also depended on virtually unanimous support from many black Americans. Among them were professing Christians, who put aside every consideration of faith and conscience to support someone dedicated to socialism, rooted in the God-erasing ideology of scientific materialism. This dedication led him to take stands on moral issues (like abortion and the law-enforced acceptance of homosexuality) that outrage and directly assault the tenets of the biblical faith these black Christians otherwise profess. But for Obama's sake, they put the idol of false racial pride above their respect for God and His word.
At the Democrats' convention this week, these black Christians saw the fruits of their idolatry. They saw the party that lifted up their idol expunge the name of God from its platform. And when some sought, for cynical political reasons, to mitigate the assault with just one mention of God's name, they saw and heard the wave of sacrilegious scorn and contempt that rose to drown out the feebler voices that were raised to support the gesture. (The proposal passed, but only because the chairman's gavel tolled a lie.)
Did black Christian voters feel the shame of this demonstration of hatred and contempt toward God, whose hymns of praise and honor they profess to sing? Martin Luther King relied on the armor of God courageously to defy the hoses, vicious dogs, and threats of violence by which the racist powers that be sought to put down the Spirit-inspired work he led for Justice' sake. In his dream for America, King surely foresaw the day when people would gather to re-nominate a dark-skinned tenant of the White House. Do you think he ever imagined that among them would be so many who would applaud a platform that erased God's name from every page and then answer with Satan's hiss a simple mention of the endowing authority of God, the authority King so often invoked to demand that Justice be done in America?
"Barack Obama is a dark-skinned man. But how can it be anything but the worst kind of racism to suggest that his skin color has greater significance for good than his dedication to the culture of death has for evil? Whatever significance we attach to the characteristics of the flesh, don't the teachings of Christ, preserved for us in the faithful storehouse of the Church, clearly ascribe essential significance to the characteristics of spiritual life, realized first and foremost in the relationship with God through Christ? Are we now to believe that God is a respecter of skin color, judging good and evil according to the incidental qualities of the flesh, and ignoring the essential qualities that He can see and measure rightly even when the human eye does not?" ("Bishops put race above values of God").
Barack Obama has often, in his speeches, sought to erase God from America's history. It's no surprise that his party should do the same in its platform. But in this, as in so many other ways, his words and policies betray the black American heritage, the heritage that created the moral capital he has so ruthlessly squandered during his tenure in the White House. More than this, however, Obama destroys for future generations the historic moral asset relied upon by Martin Luther King, Frederick Douglass, and countless other black Americans who fought for justice. The famous words of America's Declaration of Independence ground in the will of the Creator God every human being's claim to rights and dignity. Once America's conscience no longer responds to those words, on what basis shall those who are exploited and oppressed by unjust laws appeal against their injustice to the higher tribunal of a national conscience steeped in the fear of God and His righteousness?
Will the Christian conscience of black Americans sleep forever? Or will they rise to join with others who reject would-be leaders, whatever party label they wear, who openly reject God, or who give hollow lip-service to His name but reject His authority in their policies and actions. "Choose this day whom you will serve," said Joshua to the Israelites. American Christians of all ethnic backgrounds face the same choice. Will we serve the idols of human self-worship — of racial pride, mammon, and the lust for power? Or will we serve the God who created the heavens and the earth, whose worship inspired America's creed, and whose grace and forgiveness may yet renew the unity and strength of her people?
September 10, 2012
"In every important respect, Obama's victory in the 2008 presidential election was a victory for racism. First, there was the racist claim that his skin color made his election somehow significant for black Americans with whom he otherwise shares no common moral or historical heritage. Second, his stubborn advocacy of the parent's right to murder her child made it a victory in principle for the racist notion that 'inferior' physical development leaves people with no rights that must be respected by their supposed betters. Third, the U.S. Constitution has been openly set aside on account of fears that racist violence would result from investigating the facts regarding his citizenship at birth (lest they support the conclusion that he is constitutionally ineligible to serve as president of the United States). Truth, right, and the Constitution — all sacrificed for the sake of racist fears and premises."
For all the Democrats' talk of unity, the years during which Obama has occupied the White House seem to me to have left our country more deeply and critically divided than at any time in its history (excepting perhaps the years just before the Civil War). In the column quoted above, I foresaw this result when I went on to write:
"Unity is always on their lips, but their hearts are far from it. Instead of a national government that represents our common heart for justice and liberty, the Obama faction means to create a fractured reflection of all our differences, until we forget how to see, think, and act as Americans, regardless of those differences. With this dissolution of the American identity, they prepare the way for the dissolution of the United States itself, so that a strong sense of our national identity no longer poses an obstacle to their plans for a new, global regime that sets aside our 'provincial' concerns with right and ordered liberty."
Many people have awakened now to the fact that the Obama wing of the elitist faction has been unleashed to turn this country into a demoralized wreck — dissolute, shattered, and economically ruined. Included in this awakening are many people who voted for Obama mainly because they felt their vote would contribute to freeing America from the shadows of racism so often exploited to promote bad policies. Obama's displays of shame and contempt for America have instead lengthened and deepened those shadows. He and his cohorts have used the charge or insinuation of racism as their instrument of choice in efforts to cow the spirit and will of the American people.
Of course, Obama's 2008 victory also depended on virtually unanimous support from many black Americans. Among them were professing Christians, who put aside every consideration of faith and conscience to support someone dedicated to socialism, rooted in the God-erasing ideology of scientific materialism. This dedication led him to take stands on moral issues (like abortion and the law-enforced acceptance of homosexuality) that outrage and directly assault the tenets of the biblical faith these black Christians otherwise profess. But for Obama's sake, they put the idol of false racial pride above their respect for God and His word.
At the Democrats' convention this week, these black Christians saw the fruits of their idolatry. They saw the party that lifted up their idol expunge the name of God from its platform. And when some sought, for cynical political reasons, to mitigate the assault with just one mention of God's name, they saw and heard the wave of sacrilegious scorn and contempt that rose to drown out the feebler voices that were raised to support the gesture. (The proposal passed, but only because the chairman's gavel tolled a lie.)
Did black Christian voters feel the shame of this demonstration of hatred and contempt toward God, whose hymns of praise and honor they profess to sing? Martin Luther King relied on the armor of God courageously to defy the hoses, vicious dogs, and threats of violence by which the racist powers that be sought to put down the Spirit-inspired work he led for Justice' sake. In his dream for America, King surely foresaw the day when people would gather to re-nominate a dark-skinned tenant of the White House. Do you think he ever imagined that among them would be so many who would applaud a platform that erased God's name from every page and then answer with Satan's hiss a simple mention of the endowing authority of God, the authority King so often invoked to demand that Justice be done in America?
"Barack Obama is a dark-skinned man. But how can it be anything but the worst kind of racism to suggest that his skin color has greater significance for good than his dedication to the culture of death has for evil? Whatever significance we attach to the characteristics of the flesh, don't the teachings of Christ, preserved for us in the faithful storehouse of the Church, clearly ascribe essential significance to the characteristics of spiritual life, realized first and foremost in the relationship with God through Christ? Are we now to believe that God is a respecter of skin color, judging good and evil according to the incidental qualities of the flesh, and ignoring the essential qualities that He can see and measure rightly even when the human eye does not?" ("Bishops put race above values of God").
Barack Obama has often, in his speeches, sought to erase God from America's history. It's no surprise that his party should do the same in its platform. But in this, as in so many other ways, his words and policies betray the black American heritage, the heritage that created the moral capital he has so ruthlessly squandered during his tenure in the White House. More than this, however, Obama destroys for future generations the historic moral asset relied upon by Martin Luther King, Frederick Douglass, and countless other black Americans who fought for justice. The famous words of America's Declaration of Independence ground in the will of the Creator God every human being's claim to rights and dignity. Once America's conscience no longer responds to those words, on what basis shall those who are exploited and oppressed by unjust laws appeal against their injustice to the higher tribunal of a national conscience steeped in the fear of God and His righteousness?
Will the Christian conscience of black Americans sleep forever? Or will they rise to join with others who reject would-be leaders, whatever party label they wear, who openly reject God, or who give hollow lip-service to His name but reject His authority in their policies and actions. "Choose this day whom you will serve," said Joshua to the Israelites. American Christians of all ethnic backgrounds face the same choice. Will we serve the idols of human self-worship — of racial pride, mammon, and the lust for power? Or will we serve the God who created the heavens and the earth, whose worship inspired America's creed, and whose grace and forgiveness may yet renew the unity and strength of her people?
To see more articles by Dr. Keyes, visit his blog at LoyalToLiberty.com and his commentary at WND.com and BarbWire.com.
© Alan KeyesThe views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
