McCain's pastor
I wondered when someone would bring this up:
John McCain's Phoenix pastor, Dan Yeary, is a folksy patriotic Southern Baptist who opposes abortion and believes homosexuality to be a biblical sin, but says Christians have an obligation to love such sinners.That puts Yeary, who heads the church attended for the past 15 years by the Republican presidential candidate firmly in the U.S. Southern Baptist mainstream, and in line with the Republican Party.
He offers a sharp contrast to Democratic contender Barack Obama's former preacher Jeremiah Wright, who has stirred controversy with his fiery comments on race and America.
posted by Matt Friedeman at
3:40 PM
4 Comments:
If there is any liability here, it is in McCain still not having joined the church (apparently) after 15 years of attendance. And he does not seem to have ever asked his pastor for counsel relative to political or "culture war" issues. Of course it would be nice if all the candidates would (could?) just give us plain talk about their faith, instead of us having to guess based on sound bites from their pastors.
And I think this is the part of the story that really needs to be focused on:
"Yeary was sympathetic as a fellow pastor and said while he did not agree with Wright's comments, all preachers eventually got caught in the trap of their own exuberance.
"All preachers have a tendency to overstate because our passion is so intense. But I thought Obama did a fine job in response. He preserved his friendship with his pastor while disagreeing with him," Yeary said."
This entire topic is hypocritical on so many levels. I see that we got off of the topic of race far too quickly to have a meaningful conversation. The reaction to what Jeremiah Wright said was correct. What was incorrect is trying to associated Obama with those comments. It would be different if he would not comment or accepted those comments. Also, we have seen nothing in his own words or behavior to suggest that he thinks anything like that. My problem is that the people crying the loudest are treating Obama much differently than they treated other candidates in the past. In the past, more often than not, a Republican candidate who associated himself with a group that was against interacial marriages or had some racist positions, often got a bump in support. It is definately unfair to try and tag Obama as racist or unAmerican when such things were overlooked or a wink and a nod was given in the past. Any Republican that really wants to be honest knows that there are numerous instances where Republican candidates sought the endorsement of racist groups or people and it actually helped their campaign. The other disturbing aspect of this is that people know that and somehow look at that as being acceptable at the same time shaping Obama with the words of his Pastor.
McCain switched from being an Episcopalian to a Baptist so that he could pander to the religious right. Check out the following article for a fine analysis of McCain's sucking up to Rod Parsley, John Hagee, Jerry Falwell, etc.
http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_fundamentalist_032608
I think all of it is overblown personally, but I really do not see the outrage at a person like Wright and the passes that a guy like Hagee gets. Catholics should be outraged at him. And McCain sought the endorsements after the controversies were publicized. Every Republican President of this era has sought the endorsement of Falwell and he has said some controversial things on a lot of different topics.
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