Gospels Contradict Obama's Idea Of A Socialist Jesus

February 2, 2012
Investors Business Daily

Church And State: President Obama has taken a very powerful name in vain in defense of his class warfare economic policies. In fact, Obama encourages a sin Jesus Christ repeatedly admonished: envy.

Attending the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday, President Obama declared that raising tax rates on higher incomes "coincides with Jesus' teaching that 'for unto whom much is given, much shall be required.'"

It is disgraceful enough for a president to use a religious event to push an economic agenda that has already insured his place in history as the food stamp president.

But Obama began his remarks by claiming there was nothing political in what he would be saying.

He was there, he said, so that he and the attendees could "come together as brothers and sisters and seek God's face together."

After getting "caught up in the noise and rancor that too often passes as politics today, these moments of prayer slow us down. They humble us," the president said, adding that "we can all benefit from turning to our Creator, listening to Him, avoiding phony religiosity, listening to Him."

This from a president who has conspicuously neglected attending religious services during his time in office — until recently, that is, with his re-election campaign revving up.

It looks to be a cynical manipulation of those who hold deep religious beliefs, little more.

Sanctimonious talk about "turning to our Creator, listening to Him, avoiding phony religiosity" from a president leftist comic Bill Maher is convinced is really a secular humanist just like his mother, whom Obama described as having "a healthy skepticism of religion as an institution."

Considering that the rest of Obama's prayer breakfast speech was all politics, how can he not be judged guilty of "phony religiosity" himself?

The president said televangelists "come by the Oval Office .. . and we'll pray together."

Imagine the media clamor if a Republican president said this. But don't expect a peep in the news raising church and state issues about this.

According to President Obama, Jesus's "command to 'love thy neighbor as thyself '" is behind his expansion of government and regulation, and his tax increases.

Everything his administration has been doing, from foreign aid to Uganda to Dodd-Frank making "too big to fail" a permanent fixture of financial institutions, is apparently based on the teachings of Jesus Christ.

Then, a moment later, he shamelessly pivots and quotes C.S. Lewis — a conservative who would be appalled by Barack Obama's ideas — saying that Christianity has no "detailed political program."

In fact, Christ repeatedly warned against exactly the kind of class envy Obama has made the foundation of his economic policies and campaign rhetoric.

When asked if the Jews should pay taxes to Rome, Jesus famously asked to be shown the tribute coin bearing the image of Tiberius and replied, "Render therefore the things that are Caesar's to Caesar and the things that are God's to God."

The left would like to interpret that as, "pay your taxes and shut up."

But it has throughout most of the history of Christianity been used by the church as a restriction on state power — especially as relates to interfering with religious practice.

In the Parable of the Generous Employer, Christ condemns the worker who complains to his boss that "thou hast made them equal to us that have borne the burden of the day" by paying other workers more.

"Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own?" the employer asks in response, in a Gospel passage that eloquently champions private property. Jesus Christ was no socialist.

In fact, unlike the utopians who lead the Democratic Party today, Christ realized that "the poor you will always have with you."