Barack Obama and His Church

Much has been said about Barack Obama's relationship with his former pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright. The controversy forced the senator to address his relationship with his pastor today in a major speech. More troubling, however, is the theology of his church and as Joe Carter points out, is the more important point.

By continuing to maintain membership in the church for nearly 20 years, Senator Obama is in effect expressing agreement with its theology. Senator Obama may hope that he's put the controversy to rest with today's speech. But there's much more to the story that needs to be explored and the Senator has a lot more explaining to do. How he handles those questions in the coming weeks will speak volumes about whether he's ready to lead this country as its President.

UPDATE: Over at the Townhall blog, Carol Platt Liebau suggests that Senator Obama joined the church in order to develop a political base and is hesitant to leave now for fear of the damage that could be caused by his departure from the congregation. Her concluding paragraph nails the issue:

Whatever the reason, here's why this is so hard to explain away. Whether the vitriolic anti-American remarks were simply insufficiently offensive to Barack, or whether they were offensive but outweighed by personal political considerations, there's simply no justification for them. Ultimately, the whole messy episode does either his judgment or else his character no credit. And there's no spinning that away.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Carol posts again and points to this post by Jim Geraghty raising the point that if Rev. Wright's statements were so troubling then why did he continue to expose his daughters to the Reverend's teachings?