{"id":15708,"date":"2008-05-30T13:35:13","date_gmt":"2008-05-30T17:35:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/15708.html"},"modified":"2008-05-30T13:35:13","modified_gmt":"2008-05-30T17:35:13","slug":"there-shouldnt-be-any-such-thing-as-a-gop-priest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/there-shouldnt-be-any-such-thing-as-a-gop-priest\/","title":{"rendered":"There shouldn’t be any such thing as a ‘GOP priest’"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was going through Ben Smith’s blog and noticed this headline: “GOP priest attacks Obama in invocation<\/a>.” This struck me as problematic for a couple of reasons. First, there shouldn’t be any such thing as a “GOP priest,” just as there shouldn’t be a “Dem priest.” Priests are not supposed to serve one party or the other; it’s just not in their job descriptions.<\/p>\n

Second, an “invocation” is a prayer. I don’t claim to be a theologian, but for a priest to use a prayer to level a partisan attack against a party rival (and fellow Christian) strikes me as bordering on sacrilege.<\/p>\n

And yet, Ben’s headline was, unfortunately, spot-on. Pay particular attention in this clip to the fact that the priest, Jim Lisante, seems to revel in his blurring the line between piety and partisanship.<\/p>\n

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“One more thing, Lord,” Lisante said to wrap up his invocation. “Please tell Sen. Obama that maybe change is a good thing and maybe he should think about changing his favorite preacher. I know a lot more of us would be comfortable with his judgment skills if he hadn’t sat for 20 years through those words offered by his preacher of division, bigotry, and — honestly — half truths without a word of objection from [the] senator until the media brought it up, and now he doesn’t want any part of the guy.”<\/p>\n

This was a prayer<\/i>. Cheap shots at a presidential candidate are now kosher in an official prayer from a priest? Who did this clown study under in seminary, Karl Rove?
\n
\nI can only hope some Catholic parishioner who takes his or her faith seriously takes a moment to send Lisante this astute item<\/a> from the Rev. Chuck Currie.<\/p>\n

A Newsweek reporter called yesterday. She wanted to know about prayers that I’ve offered for Senator Obama. What I told her was that prayers should never be partisan. That when I pray for Senator Obama I don’t ever lay claim that God wants one candidate or another to serve in office and that I often pray for all those running for office. I pray that we all listen for the still speaking God and allow the Holy Spirit to guide us as we try and follow the teachings of Jesus. <\/p>\n

That is not to say that I don’t have a favorite in this race. Clearly, I support Senator Obama because of his values, judgment and experience.<\/p>\n

However, we shouldn’t ever misuse religion for partisan political gain — a line Father Michael Pfleger crossed this weekend (Senator Obama denounced those remarks, rightly)….<\/p>\n

But if a seminary is ever looking for a Class A example of how not to pray the video above from Republican<\/strike> Roman Catholic priest Jim Lisante provides it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Note to Lisante: that collar is supposed to mean something — something that has nothing to do with the Republican Party and cheap campaign slurs. It’s time to reevaluate those spiritual priorities….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was going through Ben Smith’s blog and noticed this headline: “GOP priest attacks Obama in invocation.” This struck me as problematic for a couple of reasons. First, there shouldn’t be any such thing as a “GOP priest,” just as there shouldn’t be a “Dem priest.” Priests are not supposed to serve one party or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15708\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}