Posted on 05/31/2008 6:01:05 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The Rev. Michael Pfleger, who helped reignite Barack Obama's pastor problems by mocking Hillary Clinton, said this evening he's received "thousands of hate threats" since his videotaped pulpit rant.
"They want to kill me," Pfleger told parishioners during a service in a St. Sabina Church chapel on Chicago's South Side this evening. "It's been very ugly."
The firebrand Catholic Priest made his controversial Clinton comments last Sunday at Trinity United Church of Christ, home church of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama's former pastor.
Pfleger mocked Clinton for crying on the campaign trail, and suggested it was "white entitlement" leading Clinton to believe the Democratic nomination should go to her -- not Obama.
His speech was videotaped, and quickly made the rounds on the Internet and on television, leading Obama to express his ÒdisappointmentÓ in the activist priest, whom he has known for years.
Pfleger's boss, Cardinal Francis George, on Friday also rebuked Pfleger for his "personal attack" on Clinton, and said he had received assurances from Pfleger that he would no longer campaign for or even mention the names of political candidates.
In his brief comments this evening, Pfleger did not name any candidates, and said he would address the controversy at a Sunday mass at St. Sabina.
"I'm not going to make a statement," Pfleger told the crowded chapel. "My real statement will be tomorrow."
But he did say it's been a difficult week filled with an unspecified surgery on Tuesday and a deluge of threats.
"It's a very difficult situation," he said. "I've received thousands of hate threats."
He did not offer any specifics from the pulpit, and declined through an aide to comment further. That included declining a specific request by the Sun-Times for a comment on Obama's decision to leave Trinity church.
That bombshell revelation came out Saturday. It followed weeks of Trinity-related headaches for the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Obama was a longtime member of the church. Wright married Obama and his wife, Michelle, and baptized their two daughters. But Obama had to publicly distance himself from Wright after videotaped sermons hit the Internet showing Wright criticizing the U.S. government including exclaiming "God damn America!"
Pfleger has already apologized for his searing sermonizing, saying in a statement, "I regret the words I chose on Sunday. These words are inconsistent with Senator Obama's life and message, and I am deeply sorry if they offended Sen. Clinton or anyone else who saw them."
In his address at Trinity last Sunday, Pfleger began by talking about the need to expose "white entitlement and supremacy wherever it raises its head," according to a video clip on YouTube. Pfleger speaks of Clinton's tearing up just before the New Hampshire primary.
"I really don't believe it was put on," Pfleger said. "I really believe that she just always thought, "This is mine! I'm Bill's wife, I'm white, and this is mine! I just gotta get up and step into the plate." And then out of nowhere came, "Hey, I'm Barack Obama," and she said, "Oh, damn! Where did you come from? I'm white! I'm entitled! There's a black man stealing my show!'"
Mimicking Clinton mopping tears, Pfleger added, "She wasn't the only one crying, there was a whole lot of white people crying."
Well, he called on folks to “snuff” an Illinois gun dealer.....
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2024178/posts
We need to send this guy a bible so he can then be better equipped come Sundays.
Amusing, considering last year Pfleger told anti-gun activists in Chicago that they should find gun shop owner John Riggio and snuff him."
Pfleiger needs to calm down, and have another drink.
No. He is not typical, and I hope the Cardinal takes him to the woodshed. Pope Benedict said recently (paraphrasing) "We don't need a lot of priests; we need GOOD priests." I'd like to know what Pfleger was doing sermonizing in a Protestant church in the first place?
“...it’s been a difficult week filled with an unspecified surgery...”
Bet it was a rectalcraniumectomy.
If you give hate you'll get hate. You reap what you sow.
Why, no, Father Mike! That’s just nonsense. I don’t want you killed. I want you endorsing and campaigning for Senator Obama from now until November.
Pfleger: “I am deeply sorry if they offended Sen. Clinton or anyone else who saw them.”
But if his words did not offend Clinton or anyone else who saw them, then he isn’t sorry he said them??
Obviously he is NOT sorry!
That’s so gay.
Republicans don't...You are far better than any commercial McCain's staff could ever come up with.
He is an extremely dangerous person who should be arrested on charges of "Public Endangerment" and "Inciting a Riot."
Pfleger belongs in a mental institution at best, and a federal prison at worst.
Either way, he does not belong amongst Americans. His comments about "snuffing" John Riggio should have him arrested for encouraging others to murder the man.
So the hate-spreading priest and Kathleen Willey’s cat now have something in common.
Y’know, if he was truly a ‘man of the cloth’, he’d have KNOWN that....
Besides...even if they threaten him, he shouldn’t be afraid of them...rather Someone Else...
“Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord; I will repay.”
“If you give hate you’ll get hate. You reap what you sow. “
Amen, brother.
His bishop rebuked him publicly.
When are they going to revoke his pay and benefits?
I pray for Father Pfleger’s good health. But that doesn’t make him any less of a nasty fool.
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