Yesterday I felt trapped by a parishioner who was negatively surprised that I support President Obama, because “sources claim that he is Muslim”. I went into this long explanation about how I had been to Trinity UCC in Chicago and there seemed to be residual admiration from years before for the grassroots work that he and Michelle did there early in their legal careers, and that he was a good and faithful Christian by all accounts – a pillar of the church and the community. I ended up down a rabbit trail about religion and politics. Good grief!

I was in junior high school when Dr. King was assassinated, so I’ve been around for a lot of the more recent struggles that led to this moment in history when a black man is President in America. So what I really wanted to say is: I’m black and clergy, he’s the first black President of the United States of America, and he openly professes Jesus Christ as his personal Savior. Vote cast.  

In fact, the night President Obama was elected, the very first phone call I got at around 11pm was from an elderly white male who grew up in Central Pennsylvania and still lives in the same farmhouse he was born in, in what is still an overwhelmingly white neighborhood.  (I was surprised he was still awake). He called to congratulate me. He said that he could only imagine what this triumph meant to me. I’ll never forget that.