Customer Reviews

The Faith of Barack Obama

5 star:		(27)
4 star:		(45)
3 star:		(22)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

"The Faith of Barack Obama" disappoints those looking for a close-up view of his personal walk with Christ. While Stephen Mansfield is fair in describing Obama as a person of faith and makes it pretty clear which faith (Christianity), Mansfield also makes it obvious that this book was rushed to press without the author having had any personal interviews with Barack. He references a couple of Obama's speeches regarding faith and race, references an Easter Sunday excursion he took to Trinity (Obama's church for 20+ years) and gives credit to the campaign for being professional and helpful. Going to the Obama YouTube page provides an opportunity to see and hear over 1,000 videos of speeches and interviews that would flesh out Barack's faith for any interested individuals much better than this book was able to provide.

One highlight of the book comes in chapter five: four faces of faith. Mansfield compares John McCain's, Hillary Clinton's, and George W. Bush's faith to Obama's. While Obama's faith wasn't fleshed out in this chapter, it seemed safe to assume it would be fleshed out in a following chapter since the whole book was dedicated to this pursuit. Disappointingly, that chapter wasn't included in the book.

Stephen Mansfield has done well in this brief book about Barack Obama's life and faith. Presidential biography makes some of the most interesting reading, and the story of presidential candidate Barack Obama is among the most remarkable. I am grateful for the opportunity to read and review the book. It has helped me to better know who Obama is, and understand his significance.

Perhaps most interesting to me is that Obama, if elected, would be the first "Third Culture Kid" to become president. One of the aspects of Obama's life that Mansfield makes clear is that Obama is a "man without country" (xvi). He was too white for his black friends, and too black for the society of his white grandparents. He was born in Hawaii, and barely knew his father from Kenya. A significant portion of his childhood was spent in Indonesia where his step-father introduced him to folk-Islam. And his mother sent him to a Catholic school, though she herself taught Obama her "atheistic optimism" (14).

Technically, John McCain is also a TCK, born in the Panama Canal Zone, and moved from base to base much of his childhood, though in my opinion, as far as cultural diversity goes, that does not hold a candle to running barefoot in the streets of Jakarta.

As a TCK myself, I find Obama's biography fascinating. Raised in Colombia of American parents, I can identify with the feeling of being neither fish nor fowl. I can sympathize with his longing for belonging, and yet never quite fitting in. And even when apparently finding some birds of a feather, I know the feeling of resting lightly on the roost. Mansfield describes Obama's association with Jeremiah Wright's church and suggests that Obama was able to attend there for 20 years and "take the chicken and spit out the bones" (64). I can attest to the TCK's ability to pick and choose wherever he goes. In my past 15 years as an adult TCK, as I moved from assignment to assignment, I have participated in a dozen churches on four different continents. Of these churches, I only left two for doctrinal reasons. The others I stayed and got plugged in despite the flaws--and found the Lord still worked in me and made me useful in that season. But I have little assurance that Obama would have the foundation to pick and choose rightly. Being raised in an atheist and Muslim home, attending a Catholic school, I don't see where Obama would ever have received the biblical instruction required to have the discernment to pick and choose from Jeremiah Wright's sermons. All the same, I will give Obama the benefit of the doubt. I will grant that he may have able to receive some benefit from the good, bring his own contribution as well, and leave most of the bad to the side. If this is true, it stems not from any superior skill of Obama's, but from God's sovereign ability to use imperfect vessels to accomplish His purposes.

This brings me to the main thing that troubles me about Obama. Mansfield quotes from Obama's The Audacity of Hope, that "he was seeking a `vessel' for his values, a `community of shared traditions in which to ground my most deeply held beliefs'" (24, 52). This concerns me because it appears that Obama came not to faith and a church because he was drawn to Christ, but because he already had a "faith" of his own making and sought a sympathetic community not unlike a virus seeks a host to draw the basic requirements to pass on life. The Gospels record several people who wanted to be included among Jesus' followers, but on their own terms (Matt. 8:19-22; Luke 9:57-62). Jesus turned all of them away, because "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself" (Matt. 16:24; Luke 9:23). No one can come to Christ with his own agenda; Christ is Lord, He sets the agenda.

Furthermore, Mansfield quotes from Audacity that "rather than `renounce the world and its ways'" Obama "was pleased that his faith would not require `retreat from the world that I knew and loved'" (53). This raises red flags in my mind, for though Jesus' followers are "in the world" (John 17:11), we are not to be "of the world" (John 15:19). Likewise John in his first epistle writes "Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1 John 2:15). If Obama is pleased with his faith because it has not required him to forsake the world he knew and loved before his conversion, then I must express serious doubts that Obama has found biblical, saving faith.

If I could hazard a guess at where Obama is spiritually in his own mind, I would draw from the words he used to describe his own mother. In a caption to a photo on page 68, Mansfield records Obama as having written, "For all her secularism, my mother was in many ways the most spiritually awakened person I have ever known." Obviously Obama is not speaking with scriptural understanding here because no atheist is spiritually awakened in the biblical sense. Without Christ, we are dead in our trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1). I believe Obama intends to pay his mother a compliment in calling her "spiritually awakened." The way the world understands these words, being spiritually awakened merely means appreciating beauty in others different than one's self and acknowledging an immaterial dimension to reality. Ann Dunham raised her son well, and I suspect there is a great deal of her still in him. Though many are eager to say Obama is a Christian, and proud of it, it might be more accurate to say he is "spiritually awakened" as the world would understand it, and he has associated himself with Christianity in order to give his spirituality expression.

Unfortunately, Mansfield was not able to interview Obama personally, and since I have not read any of Obama's books myself, I will stop short of pronouncing Obama an infidel. But after reading The Faith of Barack Obama, the best I can say is that I hope this is not the final definitive word on Obama's faith. Obama is still a young man. I pray that the Lord will indeed save Barack Obama. Jesus is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him (Hebrews 7:25).

"Give us the tools and we will finish the job." Winston Churchill.

Stephen Mansfield has written a book that will give every voter the tools they need to make a much more informed decision about Barak Obama come November.

This book does not praise Senator Obama nor does it bash or criticize Senator Obama. Some people may see this as an evasive way to write a book. I see it as a responsible and courageous way to write a book.

This book is well researched and extremely well written. I have already used the information in the book to combat and correct emails I have received from friends and colleagues regarding Senator Obama.

I am by no means a supporter of Senator Obama and will not vote for him this November. However, I am not a believer in the politics of fear and am certainly not a believer in the politics of misinformation.

This book helped me to better understand Senator Obama's roots, his faith, and the path he has taken that may lead him to the White House.

Dr. Mansfield has hit a home run with this book, and I would encourage every voter to pick up a copy before the November election.

I will admit I picked up this book with trepidation. I understand from the author's website that he is not planning to vote for Obama and thought I was going to read a "very" biased book. Instead I found one that treated its subject extremely generously and fair.

Most importantly the author, through a biographical journey, helps the reader to understand Obama's faith walk, which like so many American's cannot be buttoned down; and has varied at times in his life for various reasons (i.e. parents dragging him, etc.), as well as the reasons for remaining a member of Jeremiah Wright's congregation for so long. For this reason alone, supporters and critics would be well served to read this.

My favorite section was Chapter 5 "Four Faces of Faith" where Mansfield does an excellent job taking the faith journeys of McCain, W.Bush, Hillary Clinton, and Obama to compare the different faces of Christianity among American's today. This chapter is not a "stand alone" though as the details of Obama's "face of faith" is best understood only by reading the previous chapters, and thus is relegated (and rightly so, in my humble opinion) to only a paragraph in Chapter 5.

I found only a minor disagreement with the author via the lens that he draws between Obama's and McCain's faith expressions. Using different lenses, Obama's looks like a negative (serving politics over religion), while McCain (serving country over, but inspired by religion) as a positive. Though I see the point he is making, I do not feel that Mansfield was convincing enough to make the point, as it appeared to me that both are the same, inspired by faith to serve a greater cause.

That being said, if you do not want to slog through a longer, more detailed bio of Obama, and want a very well researched focus on his spiritual journey, this book is an excellent vehicle in which to explore those points.

[This review was originally written for a UK-based magazine]

This is a short book at about 130 pages (although with a 45 pages of appendices including texts of speeches) but it provides an excellent introduction to Barack Obama and the place that his Christian faith holds in his life. It briefly describes his upbringing by an atheist mother and Muslim father, his conversion to Christianity and his relationship with his mentor, Jeremiah Wright. The book doesn't delve deeply into Obama's political history but discusses a few of his political views and how they fit with his faith. There is a particularly helpful chapter which looks at Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain and George W Bush and the way in which the faith of each of them works out in their lives.

The book was an easy read with some interesting anecdotes and no strong political axe to grind although I didn't feel that I got a very in-depth look at the character of Obama, he still felt somewhat distant. The book accurately portrayed the rising importance of Christian faith in American politics and showed the different ways in which the faith of the candidates can be demonstrated. It is a helpful resource for those interested in American politics and in the man who may well be the next President.

According to archbishop Desmond Tuto: "You must read this perceptive

and well written book". And so I did.

I am not sure we are much wiser after reading the book though.

On the afterlife Obama tells his daughter: "I wondered

if I should have told her the truth, that I wasnt sure what happens

when we die, anymore than I was sure where the soul resides or what existed

before the Big Bang."

Kind of the usual post modern christianity. Then what about Obamas

connection to the Trinity church and Jeremiah Wright

(And his sermons where America is damned for her rascism,

HIV is devised by the US government as a weapon against black,

and 9/11 is chickens coming home to roost).

Not much new in this book either I am afraid.

Trinity is just a "vessel" for values he already had, for "community

or shared traditions in which to ground most deeply held beliefs".

Questions do not magically disappear - Instead by joining the church,

Obama becomes a part of something, instead of just being a loner.

Then what about his childhood years?, when he ran around

in Indonesia wearing a sarong, the traditional indonesian skirt for men.

Was he a muslim back then?

According to the book, a child must have reached puperty before he can convert

to islam, and young Barack was years away from that. And therefore

he is not an apostate now.

Still the book seens somewhat rushed,

it is still less than crystal clear what it means

to be the child of "an atheist mother and a Muslim father,

to convert to Christianity and have a powerful relationship with

a colorful man like Jeremiah Wright".

If his grandfather is a somewhat "failed furniture dealer",

and his mother is a "sharpwitted, intellectual on foodstamps"

you can understand why you need faith to keep going.

But neither the grandfather, nor the mother really comes across

in this book. Their portraits are somewhat out of focus throughout the book.

One of the reasons this book doesnt really deliver.

-Simon

It was two days after the election when I saw the post on a Facebook site, screaming in all caps. "I AM CERTAIN NOW WE ARE IN THE MIDST OF THE TRIBULATION." It didn't mention Obama's historic election win, but it didn't have to. I knew the conservative writer; I was pretty confident I knew what was considered the advent of this "tribulation."

The next week my friend Cindy, who teaches at a Christian school, expressed dismay at the horrible comments made by her high schoolers after the election. One went so far as to say hopefully: "Maybe Obama will be assassinated." Horrified, she tried to teach kids who were likely only parroting what they heard at home the Scriptural principles of honor for your leaders and God's control over who ends up in leadership and the command to pray for our leaders.

My response to the election is fear of another four or eight years of venom spewed by fellow Christians, as in the Clinton years. I wish Cindy could give all the disrespectful so-called Christians a lesson in biblical grace and citizenship. You can disagree with a president, or any leader, and work to block policies he or she espouses if you don't agree, but there is no biblical wiggle room to be rude and to attack a politician personally. It was Paul who told us to honor our leaders, and that was during the reign of Nero, he of the human Christian torches.

So after listening to the hysteria of the fringe, I was interested to read the new book from Christian publisher Thomas Nelson called The Faith of Barack Obama. It's written by Stephen Mansfield, the same man who wrote The Faith of George W. Bush, so I expected it to be from an evangelical viewpoint and fair. I found it to be so. Mansfield walks through Obama's spiritual journey, including his unconventional childhood, explaining in Obama's own words his conversion experience. It covers his appearance at Rick Warren's Saddleback church and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright controversy. As Mansfield describes his own visit to Obama's church (after Wright has moved on), he does so from the stance of a white visitor, and he notes the differences we whites would notice.

An insightful section of the book, which was released in August and so before the fall elections, talks about the faith of the four key personalities in this election-- Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and George W. Bush--contrasting their styles and beliefs while showing how each represents a certain subset or generation of Christian Americans. I felt excited, just as I did while the election unfolded, to see how personal faith had once again become something of value in the political discussion, no matter what party one was a part of, and how it impacts one's decisions on policy and justice.

So what is the faith of Barack Obama? My conclusion, based on the book, is that he has a sincere faith in Jesus Christ, and yet he does not necessarily believe Jesus is the only way to a relationship with God. I have a problem with that, as I often discuss with one of my friends who feels the same. First, Jesus himself said, "I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6). He doesn't say "a way" and seems pretty clear there are not multiple ways. And even if you could discount that verse and others on a similar theme, here's my other problem with the "multiple ways to God" theory: If any sincere faith (or many sincere faiths) can bring people to God, it would be horribly cruel of God the Father to send Jesus to earth to be crucified to offer one subset of people another alternative. If I were Jesus, I would have had to say, "Let them use one of the other five or fifty or five thousand acceptable ways to God, and leave me out of this." That he didn't, and God didn't, to me indicates his death must be the only way.

But no matter what the beliefs of my new president-elect, I am called to pray for him and honor him. The Faith of Barack Obama will help me to do that as I understand more about what makes him the man he is. And I call on my Christian friends of all political persuasions to show the world, and President-elect Obama, that we have the Spirit of Christ within through our gracious words, our commitment to prayer for our President's good, and our willingness to work together to, as Micah puts it "do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God."

Thomas Nelson recently released The Faith of Barack Obama by Stephen Mansfield. Mansfield is perhaps best known for his 2004 book The Faith of George W. Bush; his other books have also tended to be biographies of conservative political figures, or focusing on themes amenable to conservative Christians.

With that background, it is somewhat surprising that he would choose the faith of the Democratic presidential nominee--who is no conservative--as his current book topic. But even that is not the most surprising aspect of the project.

In a heated election year, one would expect most biographies of presidential candidates to be at least slightly slanted, either to encourage the reader to vote for the individual or the opposite. Rarely is this blatant; unlike campaign biographers of the mid-1800s, campaign biographers today realize that subtlety is often more effective. A selective presentation of the evidence, favoring points that are either likely to resonate with or repel the intended audience, can often be done so subtly that the average reader does not even realize how the presentation of evidence or choice of wording impacts their reaction to the book.

The Faith of Barack Obama comes across as a genuine attempt to find the truth about his religious experience and beliefs and portray it fairly and accurately, largely in terms that Obama himself would likely find unobjectionable. (I do not mean to say that the purpose of the book was either strictly academic or entirely altruistic; Mansfield undoubtedly realized earlier this year that Obama will be the defining force in this election, and that more people--Republicans and Democrats alike--would purchase a book on Obama's faith than on John McCain's.)

For roughly twenty years, Obama attended Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, Illinois. The church was led until this year by Rev. Jeremiah Wright. This man, who shaped Obama's religious and political views so profoundly, has been caricatured in the public mind more than any other supporting actor in this year's political drama. The book paints a picture of a man with a surprising juxtaposition of orthodox and unorthodox doctrines; though he might say incendiary things about only believing the portions of the Bible that relate to his black liberation theology, Wright also presents an orthodox view of salvation.

His portrayal of Obama's personal faith sticks closely enough to Obama's own words that it has the ring of authenticity. Obama is a man who will say he believes "in the redemptive death and resurrection of Jesus Christ" and "that faith gives me a path to be cleansed of sin and have eternal life," but he will also that "I believe there are many paths to the same place and that is a belief that there is a higher power, a belief that we are connected as a people."

The book seems to drift somewhat in Chapter 5, "Four Faces of Faith." The chapter contains treatments of the faith of John McCain, Hillary Clinton, and George W. Bush. The section on Bush was adapted from The Faith of George W. Bush, while the sections on McCain and Clinton read like the synopses of the books Mansfield could have written had the election gone differently. There is an effort to tie the threads together at the end of the chapter with a comparison to Obama; this is a decent recovery from a chapter that seemed to be a surprising departure.

The conclusion, on the direction in which Obama's faith may be changing the attitude of the Democratic party toward Christians, is well-written.

Someone who picked up the book expecting most of its pages to discuss Obama's personal faith would probably be disappointed. But that is less a failing on Mansfield's part and more that Obama has not given us much source material to work with.

The book does not succeed in demonstrating that Obama's religion is a major force in shaping his politics--but in its defense, it doesn't particularly try. It does succeed in showing how Obama's faith and politics intersect, with his political views often the predominant force.

Stephen Mansfield has written yet another insightful book regarding the religious faith of some of those in the public eye. It gives the reader insight into Barack Obama's faith and his embrace of black theology. It is an easy read and one will find it difficult to put down. Whether or not you agree with Obama's faith or his political ideology it is a must read if you want to understand from whence he is coming.

Stephen Mansfield became prominent when he published "The Faith of George W. Bush" some 4-5 years ago, which became a big seller. Since then, Mansfield also published (among others) "The Faith of the American Soldier" and last summer, Mansfield published what now seems to be the next book in "The Faith of" franchise series, on Barack Obama. The book was completed before (but published after) the Democratic primary season was concluded.

"The Faith of Barack Obama" (187 pages) purports to examine Obama's long walk towards finding Chistianity, which Obama found in the mid-80s at the Trinity United Church of Christ. A big part of the book brings a retelling of Obama's upbringing, which has been brought in many other books. The main interest for me was to see how the author would explain Obama's ties to the Trinity United Church of Christ, as controversial that congregation was/is, due to the views of its (then) pastor Jeremy Wright. On that issue, the author brings some interestng new perspectives that Jeremy Wright is not necessarily the extremist that one could imagine him to be simply on the basis of the YouTube moments of his most inflamatory statements.

That said, I don't feel satisfied that this book brings great insight into Obama's true road to faith. The book falters badly when compared to the book the author wrote on George W. Bush. It simply feels like a quickly thrown-together rush job, which it clearly was. Too bad. The real book on Obama's road to faith remains to be written.