[Ms. AntiFeminazi]

I've lost my source of this info, but I read awhile back that his father left his family to move back to Africa so he could practice Islam. I'm not sure if it was before or after his dad died, but his mom married a second time - another Muslim! He was raised as a Muslim until he was 12. Add 2 years of Muslim schooling to that, then 2 years of Catholic schooling and he comes out pro-actively pushing PBA and doesn't believe Hell exists. You decide which culture/religion influences him more.

[onyx]

That's right. His father got his PhD from Harvard, moved back to Kenya to "help his country and people" --- traveled once to see Barack Jr. who looked about age 8 at the time and gave him a basketball and some African things --- mother divorced Brack Sr. and married an Indonesian Muslim --- had a daughter with him --- divorced him and she died of ovarian cancer.

He definitely leans Muslim, but will claim Catholic.

[Torie]

When I was in Law School, a friend of mine decided to research hell. He went to the University of Michigan library, which had about 4 million books. The most recent book he could find about hell was written in 1906 (the year of my father's birth, maybe his birth killed it off; connect the dots). Hell is intellectually dead. Nobody writes about it anymore, theologians or otherwise, in book form. In any event, one writer described hell as a ground on which one steps eternally on hotcakes, where the nerves of you feet never die, and are ever sensitive. I suspect the writer was not a big fan of pancakes for breakfast. They symbolism might have been too much for him.

And there you have it.