Another day, another display of Christian Right’s victimhood complex. At the request of a documentary maker seeking to put together a movie on the address , the President recited the first draft of Abraham Lincoln’s (truly moving, I should say) Gettysburg address, which, as it happens, makes no reference to any God. While after the clarification of this point some of the right wing outlets retracted the story, hard core Religious Right is continuing to fume.
http://youtu.be/dlozxPDmFRI
This is just priceless.
The version known by most Americans reads, “We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
President Lincoln wrote at least five copies of the famous speech. All begin “Four score and seven years ago,” but two of the five do not include the words “under God.” President Obama read the “Nicolay copy,” which historians consider a first draft of his remarks.
The words “under God” occur in the best known version, the“Bliss copy,” which is carved on the Lincoln Memorial. It is also on display in the Lincoln bedroom of the White House.
Curious, though, that the two godless copies happen to be the earliest two. No random distribution here: God definitely was an afterthought.
But for the professional whiners of Religious Right, this is too good an opportunity not to drool over:
“President Obama’s omission of ‘under God’ is an insult to the entire Christian population of the United States,” Christian radio host Bryan Fischer of AFR Talk said. “Everybody – everybody – who recorded the Gettysburg Address included the words ‘under God’ except President Obama.”
Indeed Fischer’s outrage is priceless, be sure to have popcorn ready before you watch.
Obama as “deliberately insulted the faith of 300 million Americans,” Fischer said. “There’s no way this was not deliberate and intentional. So, to me, this is just more evidence of President Obama’s anti-Christian bigotry. He is a Christophobic bigot; he has an intolerance, he has a dislike, he has an animus for Christianity”.
But he is far from the only one.
Writer Christopher Banescu asked, “How did Obama the ‘Constitutional scholar’ pick the ‘first draft’ versus the ‘official version’ of the Gettysburg Address? This cannot be just a ‘mistake.’”
“After five years of tearing down religious liberty, it is neither surprising nor unexpected that President Obama disregarded ‘under God’ when reciting the Gettysburg Address,” said Mat Staver, founder and chairman of Liberty Counsel. “He has certainly failed to acknowledge God and Biblical values throughout his presidency.”
Civil War historians say religion was central to President Lincoln’s original address. Dr. Allen Guelzo of Gettysburg College told Albert Mohler that, for President Lincoln, “Gettysburg is almost a religious experience. It’s almost like a revival meeting where citizens come together and experience being born again in the new religion of American democracy.”
Very interesting. If religion was so central (and not metaphorically, either), why aren’t there any other religious references in the address? And why did he fail to mention God for a second time, after the address?
The second draft of the Gettysburg Address, probably made by Lincoln shortly after his return to Washington from Gettysburg, was given to his secretary John Hay, whose descendants donated both it and the Nicolay copy to the Library of Congress in 1916. There are numerous variations in words and punctuation between these two drafts. Because these variations provide clues to Lincoln’s thinking and because these two drafts are the most closely tied to November 19, they continue to be consulted by scholars of the period.
So the two have numerous variations, but the one thing they have in common is that the make no mention of God, and that is precisely what sets them apart from later copies. Further, ” Because these variations provide clues to Lincoln’s thinking and because these two drafts are the most closely tied to November 19, they continue to be consulted by scholars of the period.”
LOL! So much for Religious Right’s historians. Regardless of the exact words uttered by Lincoln, I have to wonder how God feels about being not just an afterthought, but a dispensable one at that.
The screed goes on to claim that Christianity has been the only religion that the President has been unkind to, and that he has shown favoritism for other religions, including Islam…but fails to mention that Muslims believe in a monotheistic God, too. In which case, I have to wonder why the “omission” is “Christophobic” but not “Islamophobic”.
Which leads to another question: If the words “under God” have not just a religious, but specifically Christian, meaning to the Religious Right, then why is the Becket Fund using the claim that it is NOT a religious statement as a strategy to keep them in the Pledge of Allegiance?
