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I’ve not heard the name Stephen Mansfield before but I have seen the book, The Faith Of George W. Bush. Apparently the same writer has written a similarly titled book about Obama. The timing of the release and the title of this book is quite curious. The book about Bush came out after he was elected, thus having little, if any, bearing on future elections. This book bears the exact same title and is being released August 5.

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Mansfield’s book is addressed to Evangelical readers, and it raises some questions about Obama’s own faith, including his willingness to see contradictions in the bible, his belief that religions other than Protestant Christianity provide other “paths” to a “higher power,” and his doubts about the afterlife.” You can read the rest of this article here.

I join in the conversation occasionally at an APU alumni site called addisonrd and here are some observations I had regarding a post by Michael Lee in his post called “Testing Faith”.

I was reading the Sermon On The Mount this morning and thought of your post. I’m with Ryan about Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness and have a couple of thoughts (see Matthew 4:1-11NKJV). This temptation came with Satan challenging Jesus to use his power to prove he was God. Why would Satan do that? Surely he didn’t think Jesus would bite - or was Satan so full of himself that he believed his own power was beyond that of Jesus. Since Satan was originally the highest angel in heaven and was cast out for seeking to overthrow God himself and take the throne, maybe he thought “here was another chance”. I guess what I’m seeing here is that all temptation for us, regardless of how it manifests itself, is our desire to be God and run things. The other aspect I see here is the fact that we are told that Jesus, while still fully divine, was also fully human and was tempted in every way that we are. Thus, he was enticed to prove he could best Satan, yet did not give in. Satan was pretty clever when he used quotes from the old testament as part of the temptation, but I like the way Jesus fights fire with fire and quotes even better back at him.

On May 7, 2008 in Washington, D.C., a group of Christian’s published and presented a paper they call “An Evangelical Manifesto”. This sparked a discussion at Out Of Ur blogsite so I am re-posting my comments from that blog here:

It’s been interesting to read this exchange of thoughts and I have a few observations. Prior to Roe vs Wade (abortion on demand compliments of the Supremes - 1973) few Christians were actively involved in politics, but with the legalization of the killing of innocent babies things had to change. Many Christians opened their eyes to the fact that to some degree they had allowed this to happen because they found politics so distasteful - and it is! Thus was born the “Moral Majority”. Why? because a group of judges who were appointed for life found an unwritten ‘right’ in the constitution that none had found before and the American people (not just the church) were caught completely by surprise. These people were not politically savvy and began to look for representatives who would champion this cause and the only ones they found were in the Republican party. One can hardly call these people ‘useful idiots’ with any degree of honesty. While for some, the life issue has become a form of self-righteousness, this does not diminish the necessity of staying the course.
The Democrat party on the other hand, had already become self-righteous by caring about the poor - with other people’s money. I think this is where Shane Calibourne may find himself a ‘political misfit’. He cannot justify the pro-abortion stance of the Democrats but is drawn to the re-distribution of wealth philosophy they hold. The problem is that if I take money from you that you have rightfully earned by your work and give it to my choice of poor people, I am not thereby made righteous in God’s sight. However, if I allow you to give of your own free will, then it is a different story.
Sadly, the Republican party today is not much better than the Democrat party. Christian people gained a tremendous amount of influence there in the ’80’s, but the old guard has fought back and wants to dump the true conservatives.
So, to the Evangelical Manifesto: After having read it and then Richard Land’s explanation as to why he did not sign it, I would definitely side with Richard Land. Why do we need “manifesto’s” anyway? It sounds so Marxist to me.

Here is the most well reasoned review of Donald Miller’s book, Blue Like Jazz , that I have read to date.  It is enlightening without being offensive.

“Test it out: Look for a nation without Christian roots that truly supports diversity, undergirded by a sense of essential human dignity. You won’t find one.”

Sadly, the great theologian Dr. Ravi Zacharias has bowed to the pressure to leave the name of Jesus out of his official prayer for our nation. If you go to the NDP website and find the button that says, “How Prayer Works” you will find this unique explanation which also fails to mention the name of Jesus. DO NOT GIVE UP! If you click on the link at the bottom of the page you will end up here. Billy Graham is not afraid of the name of Jesus. Are you?

Since Brigitte Bardot has been fined four times and faces possible imprisonment for statements that are deemed by the French government to “incite racial hatred”, could it happen that if Obama were elected we could loose our freedom of speech, too?  Until I read the following article, I didn’t realize that other western countries do not necessarily enjoy the same freedoms we do.