I never said that I didn’t “trust” THE NEW REPUBLIC, I simply wanted to know the credibility of the source before I pass on any information. I’m not that familiar with TNR. See Post #22.
He has told us that he feels a particular closeness to some of the Biblical prophets (so do Muslims, they have the same prophets), and he told us that he believes that Jesus is the son of God, but that he still has some doubts about the supernatural Christian beliefs. Obama says that he was drawn to the admonitions of Christ to love thy neighbor. He has also told us that Wright has read Tillich and Niebuhr. Fine, that doesn't mean much. I've read them, too (although, I'm sure not as depth).
Tillich presents Christ as the ultimate concern, a perfect model sent to people to as an example of how to live our lives. This is something that an apostate Muslim could accept, if he denied any super natural attributes to Christ, which Obama has admitted that he had doubts about.
Niebuhr was a pure communist in his early days and I suspect that his early writings are what the Rev JWright concentrated on. Later, when Niebuhr came to America, after witnessing the suffering of communism, he turned against communism. I really don't remember much about what Niebuhr did preach.
That brings us to the statement that the Rev JWright made that Trinity was a good place for apostate Muslims and former gang bangers in this article, Obama's search for faith". You may wonder why he would say that. The answer is because Liberation theology rejects all hierarchical authority and traditional interpretation of Christianity. It redefines sin and accepts violence on the part of oppressed (the gang bangers, included) as welcomed rebellion against white hegemony.
The Marxists describe Liberation Theology as a praxis, as opposed to a method, of uniting people with religious beliefs behind their cause of liberating the world from the oppression of the white capitalists. A praxis is simply a method of action, rather than a planned technique. To their mind, this sounds less subversive.
Obama's belief in Marxism dates back to his Columbia days. After Columbia, Obama answered a help-wanted ad for a position as a community organizer for the Developing Communities Project (DCP) of the Calumet Community Religious Conference (CCRC) in Chicago. Obama was 24 years old, unmarried, and according to his memoir, searching for a genuine African-American community.
Both the CCRC and the DCP were built on the Alinsky model of community agitation, wherein paid organizers learned how to "rub raw the sores of discontent," in Alinsky's words.
One of Obama's early mentors in the Alinsky method was Mike Kruglik, who had this to say to an interviewer of The New Republic, about Obama: "He was a natural, the undisputed master of agitation, who could engage a room full of recruiting targets in a rapid-fire Socratic dialogue, nudging them to admit that they were not living up to their own standards. As with the panhandler, he could be aggressive and confrontational. With probing, sometimes personal questions, he would pinpoint the source of pain in their lives, tearing down their egos just enough before dangling a carrot of hope that they could make things better."
The agitator's job, according to Alinsky, is first to bring folks to the "realization" that they are indeed miserable, that their misery is the fault of unresponsive governments or greedy corporations, then help them to bond together to demand what they deserve, and to make such an almighty stink that the dastardly governments and corporations will see imminent "self-interest" in granting whatever it is that will cause the harassment to cease.
Here is another link that I just found to an American Thinker article that says most of the same things that I have said, and maybe more, better anyway. Barack Obama, running on his religion