Posted on 04/15/2008 3:41:58 AM PDT by markomalley
Presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton took a momentary detour Sunday night from the campaign drumbeat of the economy and Iraq war to answer at times deeply personal questions about how faith influences their decision making and policy.
The two candidates, who appeared separately at Messiah College in Grantham, responded to questions that ranged from abortion and abstinence education to whether they thought God wanted them to be president.
The event was part of The Compassion Forum, an attempt to highlight sometimes overlooked issues in the religious community. The questions came from two moderators” Campbell Brown from CNN, which broadcast the event live, and Newsweek editor Jon Meacham” and religious leaders in the audience.
Republican nominee John McCain declined his invitation, leaving the two Democratic candidates to share one of their final spotlights before the state’s fast-approaching primary April 22.
One of the issues discussed, abortion, elicited lengthy responses from both candidates, who sought to identify themselves as pro-choice while respecting the opposite viewpoint.
Sen. Clinton, of New York, who spoke first, said government must trust people to make the correct decision.
“Because the alternative would be such an intrusion of government authority that it would be very difficult to sustain in our kind of open society,” she said.
“The potential for life,” she said, starts at conception.
Clinton and Obama both emphasized they would try to make abortion rare by supporting adoption and trying to undo factors that sometimes make it necessary, such as teen pregnancy.
Sen. Obama, of Illinois, said teaching children about contraception is one way to reduce unwanted pregnancy. If that fails, he argued, the mother and her family should be allowed to make a decision.
He said both sides need to recognize the other’s viewpoint to find common ground.
“What I know, as I’ve said before, is that there is something extraordinarily powerful about potential life and that that has a moral weight to it that we take into consideration when we’re having these debates,” Obama said.
Each candidate also expressed cautious support for euthanasia for those people suffering from a terminal illness.
Clinton and Obama are locked in a tight race to win Pennsylvania, the largest state left in the primary race. Obama has closed to within 9 percentage points, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released last week, down from the 16-point lead Clinton held earlier this year.
Neither Clinton nor Obama would point to a specific instance when she felt “the grace of God.”
Clinton said it has been an essential part of her life since childhood.
“I don’t think that I could have made my life’s journey without being anchored in God’s grace and without having that, you know, sense of forgiveness and unconditional love,” she said.
One clergyman in the audience asked Obama how he can reconcile science and religion, a question that came after Meacham asked him how he explains to his daughters that God created the universe in six days.
The senator said the Bible’s explanation of six days might not be six 24-hour days as most people understand them.
Religion and science are compatible, he argued, including on issues like evolution.
“There are those who suggest that if you have a scientific bent of mind, then somehow you should reject religion,” Obama said. “And I fundamentally disagree with that.”
The candidates, each responding to a question from the audience, stressed their commitment to helping developing countries combat disease, such as AIDS, and fighting poverty at home and abroad.
They also emphasized the role religion has played in their lives.
Clinton, who also said President Bush should consider not attending the opening ceremonies at this summer’s Olympic Games in Beijing as a protest to human rights abuses there, said her decision-making process is rooted in faith and study” often by surrounding herself with people who disagree with her viewpoint.
“I think that for a lot of us, decisions are ones that you don’t just make and put on a shelf,” she said. “To be fair, to be constantly struggling and challenging yourself, you have to keep opening up that decision and asking.”
Meacham later asked her if she thought God wants her to be president.
“I don’t presume anything about God,” she responded.
A moderator asked Obama if he thought religion was too influential in politics.
He said it should neither be excluded from politics or completely embraced. Great leaders, he said, can make religious language speak to everyone.
“And both Lincoln and King did this and every great leader did it, because we are not just a Christian nation,” Obama said. “We are a Jewish nation, we are a Buddhist nation, we are a Muslim nation, Hindu nation, and we are a nation of atheists and nonbelievers.”
Quote well worth remembering.
Barry forgot to mention his college trip to Pakistan until he met with those SF Billionaires. How much more of this sort of “lie by omission” has to come out before people realize how dangerous this guy is?
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/04/obamas-college.html
No Hillary... you're wrong. Life starts at conception. It's only potential when you decide to destroy it.
That’s like saying, “The potential for life starts at 15,” because, after all, you might not live to 16.
Good Morning. Am anxious for Pope Benedict to arrive.
Should be fun to watch.
Well Barry, you forgot to mention the place you’ve been attending for the last 20 years, the United Church of Christ, led by non other than the Rev. Wright. Anyone who spews out such hate, or listens to it for 20 years, is not a Christian in my book. I suppose he expects to get the same “street cred” for this as well.
Another question that needs to be answered about the false messiah is the changing of his first name. Throughout the time he grew up he used the first name Barry. Right around the same time he joins this “Christian” church he changes his first name to Barak. Why would someone who joins a “Christian” church start calling himself by a muslim name? Just wondering...
My pastor is headed up north to see the Pope. Maybe he’ll bring back warmer weather :-).
Good morning to you too!
The bible is not an interpretation of God, it is the WORD of God.
That depends.
If you hold to the Holy Bible as the standard of Truth, life begins before conception.
This is a very chilling statement. For someone who "wouldn't presume anything about God," how is it that she presumes to define when life begins, as if by fiat?
Hillary's fiat.
Why?
We are a SECULAR nation bound together by a faith that seeks morality and justice and the guidance of a loving God through religion. Religion is a thing of the heart. It is the soul of man.
Atheism?? I think it was John Adams who said (more or less): That's their problem.
"As predicted, the "compassion forum" was just a bunch of Marxist socialism, that equated compassion with government's role. The Democrats define "compassion" as socialism. "
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Pope John XXIII, On Establishing Universal Peace In Truth, Justice, Charity, And Liberty, April 11, 1963 Excerpts:
"Man's personal dignity requires besides that he enjoy freedom and be able to make up his own mind when he acts.
In his association with his fellows, therefore, there is every reason why his recognition of rights, observance of duties, and many-sided collaboration with other men, should be primarily a matter of his own personal decision.
Each man should act on his own initiative, conviction, and sense of responsibility, not under the constant pressure of external coercion or enticement.
There is nothing human about a society that is welded together by force.
Far from encouraging, as it should, the attainment of man's progress and perfection, it is merely an obstacle to his freedom."
"Hence, a regime which governs solely or mainly by means of threats and intimidation or promises of reward, provides men with no effective incentive to work for the common good.
And even if it did, it would certainly be offensive to the dignity of free and rational human beings."
"Consequently, laws and decrees passed in contravention of the moral order, and hence of the divine will, can have no binding force in conscience, since 'it is right to obey God rather than men.' " ~
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"[Some are involved in] a disastrous confusion between the poor of the Scripture and the proletariat of Marx." ~ Pope Benedict XVI Theologies of Liberation
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Pope Benedict XVI, notes that proper stewardship of our environment is one of the individual Christian's responsibilities toward God - - - BUT only in this order:
"..an authentic...theology: [is] one that puts:
[1] God and the life of the spirit first,
[2] DIRECT charitable care of others second,
[3] and only then draws consequences for a just social order."
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C.S. Lewis: "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under live robber barons than under omnipotent moral busibodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good, will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."
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Video archives of The Compassion Forum
The Church Communication Network (CCN) will broadcast the event to tens of thousands of people of faith in at least 1,000 congregations nationwide on April 20, the Sunday evening before the Pennsylvania primary.
"The Compassion Forum will give the candidates a chance to talk straight to voters about what they'll do as president to fulfill God's command that we be our brothers' keepers," said Governor Mike Huckabee, a supporter of the event. "I'm proud that the faith community is taking the lead in asking the candidates to confront the most pressing moral challenges of our times."
[.....]
..Other nationally prominent members of the Compassion Forum Board include Dr. Paul R. Corts, Council for Christian Colleges and Universities; Dr. Joel Hunter, Northland A Church Distributed [Orlando, Fl. area]; Rev. Richard Cizik, National Association of Evangelicals; Dr. Oran P. Smith, Palmetto Family Council; Father Larry Snyder, Catholic Charities USA; Rabbi Steve Gutow, Jewish Council for Public Affairs; Gary Haugen, International Justice Mission; Dr. Syeed Sayeed, Islamic Society of North America; David Neff, Christianity Today; Rev. Jim Wallis, Sojourners; Rev. Dr. Tyrone S. Pitts, Progressive National Baptist Convention; Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference; Rev. David Beckmann, Bread for the World; Rabbi David Saperstein, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism; Rev. Dr. Vashti McKenzie, African Methodist Episcopal Church; and Sammy Mah, World Relief. [...]
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Richard Cizikembarrasses himself HERE
Because we’re cold.
Ping to read later
Thanks for the ping!
You’re welcome!
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