Recently in God in the White House Category

On this eighth Sunday of the Obama Administration, props to NYT's Laurie Goodstein for ferreting out the pastors that the still churchless president prays with on a regular basis: Caldwell, Hunter, Jakes, Moss, and Wallis. Conspicuous by its absence is the name of Rick Warren, the inaugural invocator who three months ago seemed to be bidding fair to replace Billy Graham as presidential pastor-in-chief. Either Obama is no longer checking in with Warren or he still is and Goodstein couldn't discover it. As noted in this space a couple of weeks ago, the Sachem of Saddleback seems to have dropped out of public view since the Inauguration, at least so far as national affairs are concerned. Since the serial presidential "debate" at his church last summer, his encounters with Obama have produced more controversy than harmony. I'd say the relationship has cooled.

Dan Gilgoff has sleuthed out that the White House Office of Public Liaison has been vetting the invocations that have been solicited to open the president's speeches on the economy around the country. Is this something to be disturbed by? Not surprisingly, Barry Lynn thinks it is: "The only thing worse than having these prayers in the first place is to have them vetted, because it entangles the White House in core theological matters." Meanwhile, the guy who helped run the OPL in the last administration grumbles that Democrats can get away with something like this when Republicans can't.

I'd say that's pretty much wrong on both scores. If Obama's going to begin these things with an invocation--and that may well be a bad idea--why not make sure it's the kind of prayer that is broadly acceptable? And if the would-be invocator can't live with that--and so far, according to Dan, there have been no objections raised on either side--then he or she is free to walk. And as for the supposed double standard, who says Obama's getting away with it?

New Hampshire's Episcopal bishop Gene Robinson kicked off the inaugural festivities, religion-wise, with a nice liberal prayer to the "God of our many understandings," and why not? "In God We Trust," the national motto, allows all theists to repose their trust just that way--and if you include all other Gods, including the God of Science and the God of Self, well, just about everybody else too. Anyway Robinson is an Episcopal bishop, which is to say he represents the most establishmentarian--we preside, we include--of all American denominations.

My favorite line was: "Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance, replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences." This harks back to George Washington's letter to the Jews of Newport:

It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.

Nice to have the sentiment expressed by an, ah, Anglican hierarch looking out at the Washington Monument.

On the other hand, was it quite appropriate for a white man, and a Southerner (Kentucky-born) to boot, to pray:

Make him color-blind, reminding him of his own words that under his leadership, there will be neither red nor blue states, but the United States.
Help him remember his own oppression as a minority, drawing on that experience of discrimination, that he might seek to change the lives of those who are still its victims.

It seemed pretty smart to have Robinson--who made his support for Obama public before the New Hampshire primary--do his stuff at this opening convocation of, one might say, Obama's base. He would be prominent, but in such a way that conservative religious folks--from the dais to the screen--wouldn't feel that a gay bishop was being inflicted on them at the National Prayer Service. Yet in line with Obama's apparent gift for religious controversy, Robinson's appearance did not go smoothly: It neither was entirely heard by those on the mall nor was it included in the HBO broadcast of the Barackstock concert that followed. Coincidence? Some people don't think so. Most won't care.

One white evangelical male pastor. One black male prophet. One white mainline female priest. Completing the Inaugural Clergy Trifecta of Invocator, Benedictor, and Homilist, the Rev. Sharon E. Watkins, General Minister and President of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), has been chosen by President-elect Obama to deliver the sermon at the National Prayer Service on Wednesday, January 21st at the National Cathedral. She's the first woman to head her denomination. Hear her preach.

Update: And to kick things off, one white mainline gay bishop. Hey, nobody here but us Protestants.

Brody is puffing this little public religion stunt by a couple of B-list Beltway evangelicals. He sees it as an admirable expression of conservative evangelical readiness to pray for the new Democratic president. I don't quite see it that way.

It seems that Rob Schenck of Faith and Action and Patrick J. Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition took it upon themselves last week to bless the Capitol passageway through which Barack Obama will make his way to be inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States. Turned back by Capitol police, they happened upon Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga.), who shepherded them to the place. There, as you can see, amidst the praying for the president-to-be and his family, Schenck anoints the door posts with holy oil from the Holy Land, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

What's up with this? In the video, Schenck declares that he is consecrating the passageway "as they did the furnishings of the Tabernacle and the Temple to the use of God and to His will and to His Word." That would be a reference to what God tells Moses to do in Exodus 30; to wit:

22 Then the LORD said to Moses, 23 "Take the following fine spices: 500 shekels [k] of liquid myrrh, half as much (that is, 250 shekels) of fragrant cinnamon, 250 shekels of fragrant cane, 24 500 shekels of cassia—all according to the sanctuary shekel—and a hin [l] of olive oil. 25 Make these into a sacred anointing oil, a fragrant blend, the work of a perfumer. It will be the sacred anointing oil. 26 Then use it to anoint the Tent of Meeting, the ark of the Testimony, 27 the table and all its articles, the lampstand and its accessories, the altar of incense, 28 the altar of burnt offering and all its utensils, and the basin with its stand. 29 You shall consecrate them so they will be most holy, and whatever touches them will be holy.

Evidently Schenck takes the passageway (which he repeatedly refers to as "symbolic") as symbolizing the entry of the president-elect into the nation's most holy office. Never, to my knowledge, has the presidency been so literally sacralized. Some would call it idolatry.

Schenck belongs to what might be called the establishmentarian wing of American evangelicalism. That is to say, he belongs to the world of the National Prayer Breakfast and other exercises in sacred-nation-building, as detailed in Jeff Sharlet's recent book, The Family. He himself brings a somewhat Judaizing tendency to the enterprise--not perhaps surprising in someone who started life as a Jew. Faith and Action, for example, proposes that Hanukkah (n.b. the feast of the re-dedication of the Temple) be adopted as a Christian holiday. For his part, Mahoney comes out of the anti-abortion activist wing of evangelicalism, but he's also an establishmentarian sort, having put his shoulder to the wheel for Roy Moore's crusade to enshrine the Ten Commandments in the Alabama Supreme Court. Last summer, he turned up at Obama's office building with a sign showing the then presumptive Democratic nominee dressed as Uncle Sam over a legend that read, ""I WANT YOU TO PAY FOR ABORTIONS!"

Their hope, presumably, is that the president-to-be will be led into the path of pro-life righteousness by passing through the anointed portal. Michael Newdow take note.

Once upon a time, presidents tended to choose their own pastors, or reasonable facsimiles thereof, to give the invocation at their inaugurations. The idea was: Here's the guy who presides over my religious life, the guy I go to for spiritual counsel, and so I'm going to honor him by letting him say the prayer over this latest ceremonial occasion of my life. Thus, John F. Kennedy gave the nod to Boston's Cardinal Richard Cushing in 1961 and, in 1981, Ronald Reagan tapped Bel Air Presbyterian pastor Donn Moomaw. From time to time, the invoking cleric would be chosen for symbolic reasons, as when Dwight Eisenhower selected Orthodox Archbishop Michael in 1957 and Reagan, in 1985, chose the president of Georgetown University, Father Joseph A. O'Hare S.J. [Correction: make that Timothy S. Healy S.J.]

But over the past two decades, it appears that a new office has emerged--that of Pastor to the President. This emergence is a bit obscured by the fact that the only actual holder of that office has been Billy Graham. Graham gave the invocations at the inauguration of George H.W. Bush and both Clinton inaugurals, and was slated to do the same at George W. Bush's 2001 affair, but because of illness had to cede the job to his son Franklin. It is, I think, in this context that Barack Obama's choice of Rick Warren needs to be seen. As has been widely noted, Warren bids fair to become the closest thing to Billy Graham that the country has today. At the moment, he's way more controversial than the now sainted Graham, but in his younger days, Billy was plenty controversial himself.

What's important to recognize is that the position of presidential pastor is not entirely bogus. It entails spiritual counseling, advice and friendship, pastoral care. Graham actually seems to have filled that role for Richard Nixon, which helps explain why Nixon tapped him for his first inaugural invocation. The Clintons are both attached to him; according to Burns Strider, who handled faith outreach for the Hillary Clinton campaign, whenever Hillary was slated to make an appearance in North Carolina, she insisted on paying a call on the old man. And of course, George W. Bush has made central to his faith journey that walk on the beach with Billy. Even if that particular event is, strictly speaking, apocryphal, the personal connection seems real.

Rick Warren is of course the head of the Saddleback world, the crusader for AIDS, the best-selling author of popular religious books. But he also, from what I gather, has taken it upon himself to serve as spiritual counselor to the politically prominent. There is every indication that Obama has availed himself of his services. Amidst all the huffing and puffing about Warren's choice to give next month's invocation, hardly raised at all is the possibility that this was, for Obama, as much a personal as a political decision. His family is, famously, between churches, and his relationship with Jeremiah Wright can hardly be what it once was. Warren seems to have given the president-elect good reason to like him and value his advice; the two call each other friend. We may think whatever we want of either, but this may be more about them than us.

Update: In support of this view of Warren, here's an exchange with Steve Waldman from a recent interview:

Did you ever talk to President Bush to try to convince him to change his policy?

No. No.

Why not?

Never got the chance. I just didn’t. In fact, in the first place, I’m a pastor, and people might misunderstand – I don’t deal with policy issues with Barack Obama or President Clinton or John McCain. I just don’t. That’s not my role. My role is to pastor these guys. As a leader I understand stress.

And even when I disagree with positions they hold, they’ve got plenty of political advisors. They don’t need me to be a political advisor. I’m not a pundit. I’m not a politician and that’s why I don’t take sides. But I am a pastor. And I can deal with “how’s your family doing? How’s your stress level doing?”