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Not good enough for YOU, Hillary???Clinton stokes up Obama pastor rowEwen MacAskill in Washington guardian.co.uk, Tuesday March 25 2008Hillary Clinton stoked up the row over Barack Obama's fiery pastor today when she claimed she would have left any church where such intemperate remarks had been made. "He would not have been my pastor," Clinton said, in her first public comments since the Reverend Jeremiah Wright row began more than two weeks ago. more at the linkWikipedia article on Wright - a spiritual and inspirational man, a hero, a veteranEducation and military service
From 1959 to 1961, Wright attended Virginia Union University,<1> an historically black school in Richmond. He then joined the United States Marine Corps and served in the 2nd Marine Division with the rank of private first class. He subsequently transferred to the United States Navy and entered the Corpsman School at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center, where he graduated as valedictorian in 1963<5>. He was trained as cardiopulmonary technician at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland and graduated as salutatorian in 1967<5>.
Wright then enrolled at Howard University in Washington, D.C., where he received a bachelor's degree in 1968 and a master’s degree in English in 1969. He also earned a master's degree from the University of Chicago Divinity School. <5>Wright holds a Doctor of Ministry degree (1990) from the United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio, where he studied under Samuel DeWitt Proctor. Hillary - you are not worthy to polish this man's shoes!Career as minister Jeremiah Wright (center left), in 1998, greeting President Bill Clinton during a prayer breakfast at the White House.Wright became pastor of the Trinity United Church of Christ on March 1, 1972, at a time when its membership was only 87 members. <1> Wright has received a Rockefeller Fellowship, and has also been a professor at Chicago Theological Seminary, Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary and other educational institutions. Wright has also served as the Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Black Theology Project, and as a member of the Board of Trustees of Virginia Union University and of the City Colleges of Chicago. Wright has received seven honorary doctorate degrees, including from Colgate University, Valparaiso University, United Theological Seminary and Chicago Theological Seminary. <5> Wright, who began the "Ministers in Training" ("M.I.T.") program at Trinity United Church of Christ, has been a national leader in promoting theological education and the preparation of seminarians for the African-American church.<6> Wright has received three presidential commendations and was named one of Ebony magazine's top fifteen preachers.<7> Relationship with Barack ObamaBarack Obama, a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president, first met Wright and joined his church in the 1980s, while he was working as a community organizer in Chicago before attending Harvard Law School.<8> Obama and his wife, Michelle, were later married by Wright, and both their children were baptized by him.<9> Obama's book The Audacity of Hope was inspired by one of Wright's sermons<8> and he credits his own introduction to Christianity to Wright.<9> The public invocation before Obama's presidential announcement was scheduled to be given by Wright, but Obama withdrew the invitation the night before the event.<10> Wright wrote a rebuttal letter to the editor disputing the characterization of the account as reported in the New York Times article.<11> In late 2007, Wright was appointed to Barack Obama's African American Religious Leadership Committee, a group of over 170 national black religious leaders who supported Obama's bid for the Democratic nomination;<12> however, it was announced in March 2008 that Wright was no longer serving as a member of this group.<13> ControversySermon clipsDuring 2008 Presidential campaign, Wright's alleged beliefs and previous remarks became heavily scrutinized, due to his relationship with Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama. Wright had officiated at Obama's marriage, baptized his children, and Obama was a member of the congregation of the Trinity United Church of Christ for over 20 years. Critics have accused Wright of using Black liberation theology to promote black separatism.<14> Wright has rejected this notion by saying that "The African-centered point of view does not assume superiority, nor does it assume separatism. It assumes Africans speaking for themselves as subjects in history, not objects in history." <15>In one sermon Wright is quoted as saying "All of God's children white, black, red, yellow, male, female, all together".<16><17> Wright once stated that Zionism has an element of "white racism", but the Anti-Defamation League says it has no evidence of any anti-Semitism by Wright.<14> In March 2008, ABC News caused a public uproar by broadcasting spliced sound bites from a sermon that Wright gave shortly after September 11, 2001,<18><19> in which Wright paraphrased Edward Peck,<20> former U.S. Chief of Mission in Iraq, former deputy director of the White House Task Force on Terrorism under the Reagan Administration and former U.S. Ambassador to a number of countries, who was appearing on Fox News, as allegedly having said: "We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye...and now we are indignant, because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought back into our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost." Wright went on to state: "Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred. And terrorism begets terrorism. A white ambassador said that y’all, not a black militant. Not a reverend who preaches about racism. An ambassador whose eyes are wide open and who is trying to get us to wake up and move away from this dangerous precipice upon which we are now poised. The ambassador said the people that we have wounded don’t have the military capability we have. But they do have individuals who are willing to die and take thousands with them. And we need to come to grips with that."<21> In another sermon from which sound bites were taken out of context and widely aired in March 2008<19>, Wright first makes the distinction between God and the government, and points out that many governments in the past have failed:"Where governments lie, God does not lie. Where governments change, God does not change."<22> Wright then states: "And the United States of America government, when it came to treating her citizens of Indian descent fairly, she failed. She put them on reservations. When it came to treating her citizens of Japanese descent fairly, she failed. She put them in internment prison camps. When it came to treating her citizens of African descent fairly, America failed. She put them in chains, the government put them on slave quarters, put them on auction blocks, put them in cotton field, put them in inferior schools, put them in substandard housing, put them in scientific experiments, put them in the lowest paying jobs, put them outside the equal protection of the law, kept them out of their racist bastions of higher education and locked them into positions of hopelessness and helplessness."<22> Wright concludes by stating:" The government gives them drugs, built bigger prisons, passes a three strike law, and then wants us to sing God bless America. No, no, no, not God bless America, God damn America, that's in the Bible, for killing innocent people. God damn America, for treating her citizens as less than human. God damn America, as long as she pretends to act like she is God, and she is supreme. The United States government has failed the vast majority of her citizens of African descent."<22> In other sermons, Wright is quoted as saying:"The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color"<23>
Critics have accused Wright of promoting black separatism.<14> Wright has rejected this notion by saying that "The African-centered point of view does not assume superiority, nor does it assume separatism. It assumes Africans speaking for themselves as subjects in history, not objects in history." <15>
Wright's church has criticized the media for recent coverage of his past controversial sermons, saying in a statement that Wright's "character is being assassinated in the public sphere."<24> As well, Dean Snyder, the senior minister of Foundry United Methodist Church in Washington D.C., which the Clintons attended while in the White House, released a statement defending Wright and decrying his treatment in the press that said in part, "He has served for decades as a profound voice for justice and inclusion in our society. He has been a vocal critic of the racism, sexism and homophobia which still tarnish the American dream. To evaluate his dynamic ministry on the basis of two or three sound bites does a grave injustice to Dr. Wright, the members of his congregation, and the African-American church which has been the spiritual refuge of a people that has suffered from discrimination, disadvantage, and violence."<25> <26>
Eminent theologian Martin E. Marty defended Wright by focusing on his church and explaining, "For Trinity, being 'unashamedly black' does not mean being 'anti-white.' <...> Think of the concept of 'unashamedly': tucked into it is the word 'shame.' Wright and his fellow leaders have diagnosed 'shame, 'being shamed,' and 'being ashamed' as debilitating legacies of slavery and segregation in society and church." Marty went on to criticize the "incomprehension and naiveté of some reporters who lack background in the civil rights and African-American movements of several decades ago".<27>
Mission to Libya
Wright traveled to Libya and Syria with Rev. Jesse Jackson and Minister Louis Farrakhan on a peace mission that resulted in the freeing of United States Navy pilot Lt. Robert Goodman, whose fighter jet had been shot down over Lebanon. At the White House on January 4, 1984, hours after the group arrived back in the U.S., U.S. President Ronald Reagan welcomed Lt. Goodman and said that the "mission of mercy" had "earned our gratitude and our admiration."<28> <29> <30>
Wright has stated that his trip implied no endorsement of either Louis Farrakhan’s views or Gaddafi’s.<14>
Works
Wright, Jeremiah A. Jr. and Jini Kilgore Ross, What Makes You So Strong?: Sermons of Joy and Strength from Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr., Judson Press, November 1993, ISBN 978-0817011987
Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. and Colleen Birchett, Africans Who Shaped Our Faith (Student Guide), Urban Ministries, Inc., May 1995, ISBN 978-0940955295
Wright, Jeremiah A. Jr. and Jini Kilgore Ross, Good News!: Sermons of Hope for Today's Families, Judson Press, December 1995, ISBN 978-0817012366
William J. Key, Robert Johnson Smith, Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr. and Robert Johnson-Smith, From One Brother to Another: Voices of African American Men, Judson Press, October 1996, ISBN 978-0817012502
Jawanza Kunjufu and Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright, Jr., Adam! Where Are You?: Why Most Black Men Don't Go to Church, African American Images, June 1997, ISBN 978-0913543436 (also African American Images, 1994, ISBN B000T6LXPQ)
Frank Madison Reid, III, Jeremiah Wright Jr. and Colleen Birchett, When Black Men Stand Up for God: Reflections on the Million Man March, African American Images, December 1997, ISBN 978-0913543481
Wright, Jeremiah A. Jr., What Can Happen When We Pray: A Daily Devotional, Augsburg Fortress Publishers, June 2002, ISBN 978-0806634067
Wright, Jeremiah A. Jr., From One Brother To Another, Volume 2: Voices of African American Men , Judson Press, January 2003, ISBN 978-0817013622
Iva E. Carruthers (Editor), Frederick D. Haynes III (Editor), Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. (Editor), Blow the Trumpet in Zion!: Global Vision and Action for the 21st Century Black Church, Augsburg Fortress Publishers, January 2005, ISBN 978-0800637125
Ernest R. Flores and Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., Tempted to Leave the Cross: Renewing the Call to Discipleship, Judson Press, November 2007, ISBN 978-0817015244
Wright has written several books and is featured on Wynton Marsalis's album "The Majesty of the Blues," where he recites a spoken word piece written by Stanley Crouch.<31>
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