If I belonged to a church. Which I don't. If I went to church. Which I don't. But if I did, and the church's preacher gave a hell on wheels hate mongering diatribe sermon at high volume I don't think I would return the next Sunday. Let alone stay in his flock for more than 20 years. Or give the preacher more than $20 thousand.If a week after 9/11 I was in an American church and heard the preacher say what America has wrought overseas has now come home to roost, that America deserved to be attacked, that America has been deserving this attack for over 60 years, ever since America dropped A-Bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I don't think I would return the next week for another sermon.
If I went to a church and the preacher gave a sermon in which he said that America caused AIDS for some nefarious purpose, I don't think I would return the next week for another sermon.
If I went to a church and the preacher gave a sermon in which he derided America's treatment of a minority and suggested that that minority should not be saying God Bless America, they should be saying God Damn America, I don't think I would return the next week for another sermon.
I know I would not join a church where such things were said by its preacher. I sure would not ask that preacher to perform my wedding ceremony. I sure would not let my kids go to such a church and listen to such vile rhetoric. I sure would not say that such a preacher had great influence over me or that he gave such an inspiring sermon, named Audacity of Hope, that I decided to name my book after it.
And one more thing, if in my background I had such an obviously difficult thing to explain, that being staying in such a church, supporting such a church and saying this preacher gave me guidance, well, I know I would have the sense to know that this would be a deal breaker if I should suffer the delusion that I should run for President of the United States.
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