As I was reading a few Newsweek articles on line, I followed a link to Andrew Romano’s blog with this Friday posting: “Obama to Jewish Floridians: ‘Don’t Vote Against Me Because of Who I Am’.” The point was that Barack Obama, campaigning in Florida, has a problem getting the Jewish vote. Blogger Romano provided background with the January comments by a local teacher after a Guiliani event at a local shul. She insisted “that Obama, a Christian, was ‘Muslim.’ ‘He has it in his blood,’ she said when [Romano] corrected her. ‘You can’t take away what’s given to you. It’s given to you for a reason, and that’s who you are. That’s who he is.’”
Setting politically positioning and Jewish-Muslim issues aside for the moment, Christians should argue vehemently that this teacher was wrong – and she’d be wrong from a center-of-the-faith point. When Obama was baptized into the Christian faith, he acquired a community of relationships not based on blood. “As many of you as were baptized ito Christ have clothed yourself with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male or female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:27-28).
Of course it can and will be argued whether Obama is living by this Christian truth. Our record as Christians is not always something to be proud of. On any day we should admit this new reality in Christ often has a long way to go to take root in our lives. But still it’s not so simple that someone should be able to write off Obama as a Muslim because it’s “in his blood.” Recently a wise pastor reminded me of the wonderful line from the now-deceased Lutheran pastor-leader Nelson Trout who insisted about Christian baptism that it was the “water thicker than blood.” Maybe Christians should come to Obama’s defense that he has not the proverbial ice water in his veins but baptismal water – and that fact cannot be taken lightly. In fact, Obama’s baptismal reality offers hope to the world that blood relationships are not ultimate or final.
Tags: Andrew Romano, baptism, Barack Obama, Jewish vote, Nelson Trout
