Dialog and Diversity of Views Matter in Obama’s Church

The Rev. Dr. Jim Antal
March 19, 2008

More Christians will attend church this week than any other week of the year.

Newsflash: they won’t all agree or accept what they hear from the pulpit!

An unexamined assumption that is fueling the discussion of the relationship between Barack Obama and the former pastor of his church, the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr., is that unless they denounce something, churchgoers agree with and accept what they hear from the pulpit.

In my twenty years as a local church pastor, and now as the leader in Massachusetts of over 400 United Church of Christ churches, I’ve had the opportunity to test this assumption on almost a weekly basis.  Churchgoers know that it is customary, upon exiting worship, to say a few words to the pastor as they shake his or her hand.  After a thousand or so sermons, I can testify to the fact that rarely do I not hear a word of criticism. 

In our tradition, we welcome the meaningful dialog that can ensue from such a discussion.  When Pastor Robinson preached his “send off” sermon to the UCC’s spiritual forebears, the Pilgrims, he said, “There is still more light and truth to come forth from God’s Holy word.”  Today we echo that view when we declare, “Never put a period where God has put a comma.” 

All of this is relevant to the headlines because for almost twenty years Barack Obama has been a member of Trinity United Church of Christ.  Like UCC members all over the country, Trinity UCC members do not check their minds at the door.  United Church of Christ churches, along with other Mainline Protestant denominations, do not expect their members to agree with, or toe the line expressed by their pastors.  We recognize that God holds each of us accountable to draw our own conclusions – utilizing scripture, reason, experience and tradition. 

With a membership expected to think for themselves, for nearly four centuries we have respected dissent and protected the freedom of the pulpit.  We expect our pastors to consult with the Holy Spirit.  We believe that God did not issue a final word 2000 years ago, but that God is still speaking, and our pastors’ responsibility is to faithfully proclaim what they understand God to be saying.

Freedom of the pulpit and independent thinking in the congregation – this is familiar territory for the United Church of Christ.  But this does not represent the popular understanding of the relationship between a pastor and the people in pews.

For over 30 years, the loudest Christian voices heard in the public square have represented Christianity as a religion of ideological and doctrinal alignment. Churches in which the words from the pastor are taken as authoritative and not to be questioned have dominated America’s understanding of Christianity.  With this as the milieu, UCC pastors constantly hear from people visiting our churches that they can’t believe that a church like the UCC exits – a church which embraces diverse points of view and encourages people to draw their own conclusions.

But this is the false assumption – that all Christian believers subordinate their moral reflection to that of their pastor – that underlies this public discussion.  The vast majority of Mainline Protestant congregations do not take the words of their pastors as pronouncements from on high.  Nor do they believe that following Jesus requires ideological alignment.  That is what accounts for the fact that so many UCC churches are neither “red churches” nor “blue churches” but are “purple churches” – with members who read the same Bible and engage each other in their diverse understandings on how those teachings should get played out in the public arena.

Among America’s many strengths are several flaws, one of which is how readily we are distracted from the matters of substance that will determine not only our future, but the future of the world.  As millions of Christians fill their churches for Holy Week services, I hope that America’s citizens can fill their minds with the compelling and consequential issues at stake in this nomination.