Thabiti Anyabwile is a black convert to Christianity from Islam and a reformed evangelical pastor on the Cayman Islands and, although not an endorsement by any means, he has a very thoughtful reflection on Obama’s candidacy. Here’s a longish excerpt:

Advancing Equality. If Obama is elected, what my mama told me for years over the kitchen table in an effort to motivate my school performance and expand my sense of the possible, “You can even be president of the U.S. if you want to be,” will have been realized vicariously in Obama’s successful bid.

And can I be honest? This is probably the only thing my mama ever told me that neither she or I believed. I got her point; strive and achieve and let no one hold you back. But perhaps the insertion of that four-letter word–”even”–betrayed an exaggeration she and I both recognized but never admitted out loud. I never daydreamed about the oval office the way I daydreamed about hitting that last second fade-away jumper to win the NBA finals… or even the way I daydreamed about being a college professor. The presidency was more than daydreaming; it was mythic. And now, in my lifetime, there stands a man who happens to be ‘black’ by social definition making not only a credible run but a compelling run for the presidency. Perhaps you didn’t know that black parents for decades have tried to motivate their children with the promise that they can be president of the U.S. if they set their minds to it. And perhaps you didn’t know that black children and parents for decades have entirely doubted the possibility of that ever really happening. So, perhaps you haven’t recognized the depths of the signal effects of a possible President Barack Obama. I do. And though I think she probably mis-spoke, I know what Michelle Obama means when she said, “For the first time I am proud of my country.” Certainly there are lots of other ways that I (and I would assume she) am proud of my country, but for a lot of Americans there is nothing quite like this candidacy to stir genuine and deep pride.

Upsetting the Phalanx of “Race”. Not only am I proud of my country, and proud in this moment, but I am proud of how Obama has conducted himself and how the country has responded. Here’s what I think is happening in part: very fundamental assumptions about identity and allegiance are being realigned. Personally, if this is an accurate assessment, the re-alignment of racial attitudes and interaction would be an important enough issue to cast a vote for Obama.

Read the whole thing. It’s excellent.

Our brother, Dean, passed away peacefully tonight
at approximately 10:20 PM. Funeral arrangements will be
announced in a later email. Thank you to all who have so
faithfully served Dean through these final days. He was so
grateful for your care and love.

Please pray for the entire family.

I sit in a leather recliner next to the hospital bed that hospice delivered to the house. Out of my left ear I hear the hum and thump of the compressor for the oxygen machine and out of my right I hear the rattle of labored breathing. The bed is slightly reclined and my friend is mostly sleeping because they have increased his pain medication dosages substantially. But on occasion he mumbles something and lifts his hand and puts it on top of his head, as if he wants to scratch it or rub it or press on it with the palm of his hand. Maybe he feels pressure or pain from the tumor swelling or maybe at this point most of his actions are involuntary. I don’t know. Read the rest of this entry »

Which means January 20, 2009 can’t come soon enough.
Unless of course McCain or Billary are sworn in, in which case I think we’ll move to Sweden.

I hear they have really good meatballs.

Scott
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Even though I will concede that the safest and only sure way to make sure you never die while driving a car is to NOT DRIVE,
I have become convinced that some teenegers with permissive parents ARE GOING TO DRIVE ANYWAY!!

So I am opposed to Abstinence-only drivers education as described by this article at McSweeney’s . . .

Thanks for making it out on a rainy Saturday, kids. Slippery out there, huh? Let’s get started. We’re gonna have some fun today!

Car accidents are a leading cause of death for teenagers. The school board and your elected representatives want to make sure that you and your families are spared from such a tragedy, which is why the money for driver’s ed was eliminated from the budget. Whereas last year I was teaching your older siblings how to shift and brake and three-point-turn during a six-week course, it has since been decreed that I actually need just one afternoon to tell you the only piece of safety information I’m permitted by law to share:

The ONLY 100 percent effective method for avoiding car accidents is to ABSTAIN from driving until marriage.

Yes, yes, I know you’ve been bombarded with messages from popular culture about how much fun it would be to get behind the wheel of a red convertible, find an unbroken stretch of country road, and, with the wind in your hair, see what she can do. I know that up until now you had the mistaken belief that getting a driver’s license was a cherished milestone of your young, sweet, innocent lives. It isn’t. It’s a milestone, all right: a milestone indicating terrible pain, degradation, and certain death. . . .

Read the rest of the article HERE and vote AGAINST Abstinence-only Driver’s Ed!!

Scott

in our passionate disdain for Hillary Clinton?

Although I don’t relish the thought of voting for John “We could be in Iraq for 100 years” McCain, its surely a better choice than Hillary Clinton, who thinks that politics is a blood-sport and campaigns should be won at any cost no matter how you have to spin, lie, cheat or steal to get there. Read about the American Leadership Project, a “swiftboat” style group not limited by election donation laws that is trying to raise $10 million for Hillary in the next few weeks by asking 100 fat cats to donate $100, 000 each to smear Obama on Hillary’s behalf. Heres an article about that. Also, here’s an article about the Clinton spin machine. If she gets elected I will have to take a bath every day to get rid of that slimy, dirty feeling.

Yes. Obama is a progressive (that doesn’t bother me and I will blog about that soon) and I have no doubt he would pursue policies with which I would disagree, I also believe he is a man of great integrity and honor and could do our country much good, especially in regards to foreign policy, restoring our respectability around the world, and fighting islamo-fascism.

Scott

This is one of my old posts from FatTriplets.com.

I’ve had too much going on to write anything substantive lately, including responding to some good questions that have been posed to me in the comments. So today I am taking the lazy way. I wrote this on my sons 15th birthday. He will be 18 this year in October.

Scott

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I like to say that it took me a long time to “repent” of going to seminary. Maybe longer. What I mean by that is it took that long for God to begin to break me of the intellectual pride that accompanied the knowledge I gained.

But he He did begin that process 15 years ago today. Read the rest of this entry »

According to the quiz below I am more girly than my wife.

I think its the crying thing that put me over the top. I cry during Kodak commercials for pete’s sake.
So I guess that makes me a girly man. BTW, I took a screenshot of my answers before I clicked on the submit button and you can view that below. Is People considered a gossip magazine?

You Are 24% Girly

You are a pretty hardcore tomboy, and a very free spirit. Gender roles be dammed, you like to do things your way.

How Girly Are You?

I would say that, hands down, my favorite blogger in the Christian blogosphere is Michael Spencer of Internet Monk and Boars Head Tavern fame. He is thoughtful and very thought provoking on many issues that have caused the fundy or TR watchblogs to go after him. I agree with so much of what he writes. If you’re not familiar with him, add him to your blogroll and RSS feed. The main thing I realize from reading Michael is that there are other people like me. YAY! Plus he’s a great writer.

The other day he shamelessly copied C.S. Lewis’ idea from The Screwtape Letters to challenge the evangelical conventional wisdom regarding Christian Schools. Heres an excerpt: (where the higher demon writes the lower demon regarding his concern that his “patient” has been enrolled in a Christian School).

I cannot believe you were unaware that our influence within institutions such as this Christian school has created results that are far beyond anyone’s projections. In the particular school your patient has chosen, more than 80% of the graduates have rejected the Christian faith within three years of graduation. Even with a small rate of remission- often quite temporary- we can expect magnificent harvests from within this particular segment of the enemy’s camp. Impressive, by any standard.

Evangelicals have become great believers in their various systems, institutions and programs. It is a mark of the contemporary church that its illusions of external prosperity have almost completely blinded it to its poverty of actual spiritual power.

Read the whole thing. Its an illuminating, funny, and thought-provoking post.
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Scott

My wife posted this way before me. I need to be on my feet.

Franky Schaeffer is the son of the late Francis Schaeffer, who along with C. Everett Koop provided the philosophical foundation to the Pro-Life movement and the political religious right. Franky’s moved far away from his upbringing and has posted why he is supporting Barack Obama this election.

Here’s a long excerpt.

In 2000, we elected a president who claimed he believed God created the earth and who, as president, put car manufacturers and oil company’s interests ahead of caring for that creation. We elected a pro-life Republican Congress that did nothing to actually care for pregnant women and babies. And they took their sincere evangelical followers for granted, and played them for suckers.

The so-called evangelical leadership — Dobson, Robertson et al. also played the pro-life community for suckers. While thousands of men and women in the crisis pregnancy movement gave of themselves to help women and babies, their evangelical “leaders” did little more than cash in on fundraising opportunities and represent themselves as power-brokers to the craven politicians willing to kowtow to them.

Fast forward…

Today when I listen to Obama speak (and to his remarkable wife, Michelle) what I hear is a world view that actually nurtures life. Obama is trying to lead this country to a place where the intrinsic worth of each individual is celebrated. A leader who believes in hope, the future, trying to save our planet and providing a just and good life for everyone is someone who is actually pro-life.

Conversely the “pro-life” ethic of George W. Bush manifested itself in a series of squandered opportunities to call us to our better natures. After 9/11, Bush told most Americans to go shopping while saddling the few who volunteered for military service with endless tours of duty (something I know a little about since my son was a Marine and deployed several times). The Bush doctrine of life was expressed by starting an unnecessary war in Iraq that has killed thousands of Americans and wounded tens of thousands more.

The society that Obama is calling us to sacrifice for is a place wherein life would be valued not just talked about. As he said in his speech delivered on February 6 in New Orleans, “Too often, we lose our sense of common destiny; that understanding that we are all tied together; that when a woman has less than nothing in this country, that makes us all poorer.” Obama was talking about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, but his words also apply to our overall view of ourselves.

Regardless of the official position of the Supreme Court on abortion, a country in which all Americans are offered some sort of dignity and hopeful future would be a place conducive to the kind of optimism each of us must hold in our hearts if we are to welcome children into this world. But if our highest aspiration is to be a consumer with no thought or care for our neighbor, we will remain a culture in which abortion is not only inevitable but logical.

The whole article is excellent  -  LINK