From Neil Steinberg's column in today's Sun-Times:
Rev. Billy Graham pooh-poohed the emerging civil rights movement, mocked peace protesters and sang amen to Richard Nixon's anti-Semitic slurs. Yet he is our nation's revered elder reverend. Rev. Jerry Falwell blamed the 9/11 attacks on American feminists and gays. Yet John McCain gave the commencement address at his Liberty University in 2006.
Most any clergyman will, over a career, utter comments ranging from ill-advised to idiotic. Which is why I have resisted -- until now -- the urgings of readers to weigh in on the controversy over Barack Obama's pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. My initial reaction was, "Who cares?" But the issue continues to echo, so people must care.
Who? People already looking for something to bash Obama with, I'd say. If guilt by association with Wright is the best they can do, they're in trouble. Were Obama the standard hack, he'd have already dumped Wright. But he isn't, and he hasn't. Obama had the rare -- in my mind, courageous -- response of acting not like a politician, but likea real person. Who challenges their religious leader over dumb utterances? I've heard a lot of rabbis utter a lot of nonsense over the years and never once went up afterward to say, "What a load of b.s., rabbi." Only in political fairyland do you automatically denounce clergy for expressing an extreme opinion. In life, you squirm and move on.
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