The Prophet Obama Says We Have Sinned

Those of you who have studied the health care reform bills and have spoken out against them have sinned.

So says the Right Rev. Barack Hussein Obama.

"There are some folks out there who are actually bearing false witness," he said Wednesday. He peppered his remarks with the "sins" of his political opponents: "lots of misinformation," "extraordinary lies," "all fabrications."

I'm not sure what President Obama was hoping for when he held a "telephone town hall" with members of mostly the squishy religious left, but he is increasingly sounding like a desperate man.

If "patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel," then it is quite possible that "religion is the last refuge of the incompetent politician."

In agreement is Victor Davis Hanson, who reports that there is "something creepy about the sudden invocation of Christian morality by the president to galvanize support for his state-run health care plan, as if his opponents are suddenly to be seen as somehow selfish or even un-Christian. This is an unfortunate, counter-productive tactic ..."

Hanson cites four very level-headed reasons for saying this. I guess my reaction is a bit more visceral, or perhaps less level-headed. As a Christian I am deeply offended when a man who is heavily in the tank for abortion rights and the abortion industry tries to pass himself off as Mr. Morality, and at my expense!

I am deeply offended when the president continues to claim that he has never spoken out in favor of a single-payer (government) health care system when there is video of him, on at least two occasions, saying exactly that! This is called "telling a lie" and it is covered by the commandment against false witness, in case Mr. Obama doesn't know this.

I am deeply offended when the president continues to tell the American people that "if you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan," when according to FactCheck.org (and others) this simply cannot be true.

In fact, there is so much the president said in his 40-minute program that there is no possible way I can express the depth of my revulsion at a president who is obviously co-opting Christian terminology and symbolism to cynically push his political agenda. It is an agenda that has little to do with compassion or health care but much to do with expanding government power into the private lives of every American.

Jesus did not once say, "Render unto Caesar so that he can provide health care for the unfortunate."

He did speak of an individual Christian's responsibilities: "For as often as you did this for one of the least of my brothers, you did it for me."

I will be judged by the Almighty for what I have done or failed to do in my individual choices, with my time, talent and treasure. I will get no brownie points for coercing my fellow citizens to do good works by raising their taxes or supporting new laws that would force them to bow down before an almighty government.

The Church may well insist on a preferential option for the poor as a policy for church activism. Our Republic has no such constitutional provision, and should it be given one it will no longer be a Republic.

That, in my view, is the essential creepiness of this latest Obama tactic.