Obama worship in the age of Roe v. Wade

In a Facebook post some years ago, I sarcastically referred to President Barack Obama as “Obamassiah” (or some other variant spelling), and a black liberal I hadn’t realized I was “friends” with took offense. I first noticed a reverent attitude toward Obama after he spoke at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. My boss at the time was a liberal, white man in his 60s, and Obama mesmerized him. He went on and on about this bright, dynamic young man.

I hadn’t watched that convention, but I read the transcript of Obama’s speech. As I expected, he sounded like a liberal. My boss knew I wasn’t a liberal, but I guess he assumed I’d be impressed anyway. I suspect he thought the fact Obama was half-black would override my values.

The web has been buzzing this week about a digital issue of Newsweek with Obama on the cover with the headline “The Second Coming.” I wonder if my black liberal “unfriend” took offense and told Newsweek exactly what she thought about it.

Newsweek’s editors knew the cover would be controversial. And they were right. People are talking and writing about it. Was the editor responsible for the cover thinking about actor Jamie Foxx’s remarks about giving thanks to God and “our lord and savior Barack Obama”? Such “second coming” plays on Scripture and jokes about worshiping any man are awful. But when we consider that the man in question supports abortion on demand … it reaches a different level of awfulness.

This year marks 40 years since Roe v. Wade, when the U.S. Supreme Court discovered a previously hidden right of privacy in the U.S. Constitution to kill unborn babies. Obama said in his inaugural address Monday that since the country’s founding, “We resolved that a great nation must care for the vulnerable, and protect its people from life’s worst hazards and misfortune.” A great nation must protect the most vulnerable, and what’s more hazardous to them than abortion? Being killed before having the chance to be born indeed is a great misfortune.

WORLD editor in chief Marvin Olasky wrote in the current issue about the continuation of abortion and wondered why. A recent Time magazine story noted that the abortion side has lost some battles. The pro-life side has seen success, but the road to “victory” is littered with dead babies. Olasky wrote:

“But Time’s distress helps me to be optimistic about what God is doing, in His time. Two decades ago we were one Supreme Court vote away from curtailing abortion. More recently we’ve been one Senate vote away, and then one Supreme Court vote away, from stopping Obamacare, which seems likely to extend abortion. So close. So far. Why, Lord, why? But, as Lincoln learned, ‘The Almighty has His own purposes.’”

It is difficult to understand God’s purpose in this matter, or why we have to endure at least four more years of policies that further erode our constitutional rights and confiscate more of the fruits of our labor. Will we ever see the end of abortion on demand? Regardless, I trust God.