How Rev. Wright Brought Me to God

I am listening to Jeremiah Wright at the National Press Club and I weep for 7 decades of lost understanding.  And, although my title may be misleading, as this atheist has not had a moment of conversion, I am so compelled by his speech that I feel bereft at his words.

I grew up in the pale, intimidating, bleached religions of European colonialism.  I was early bathed in Catholicism, the faith my mother said, "Always makes me feel warm".  When I protested, at the age of 9, my father intervened and led me to the cold, Episcopal church of his New England fore bearers.

I grew up in an oppressive, leader driven, controlling religious tradition that is aptly mirrored in the exercise of power by this government.  It is signified by a small group of power elites that feel that they are the only ones who understand either the issues, or the range of solutions, that may be brought to any problem.  A tradition that is classically top down, and therefore, oppressive.  I rebelled.

I do not know why I rebelled, since I did so at the early age of 12 years.  I do know that I was offended by what I often saw as a tradition that demanded conformity, set the margins for what a given church would tolerate, and reacted in horror at what I thought of as rational questions.

I don't believe in a God.  I know that that lack of belief is driven in major part by the narrow, self-satisfied, force of small minds, fearful of questions, fearful of challenge, demanding of compliance of their interpretation of a history imposed by upon us by Constantine and divorced from the modern world.  My entire experience of the Christian God has been mind numbingly formed by the cold, hierarchical, masculine model of control.

But, I just fell in love with Rev. Wright.  This is a brilliant mind.  Full of humor, extraordinarily well educated, facile with the language, not limited to traditional, i.e., European, views of the role of religion in modern life.  

Had I been raised in the TUCC tradition, a Black Church experience exemplified by Jeremiah Wright, I might well have been a Christian.

If this represents "elitism", if this represents the experience of Barack Obama, then he should never "disavow" this brilliant man who led him to his religion.

The questions Wright raises, the history he uncovers, the religion he represents will only be offensive to the narrow, cold, practitioners of European Colonial theology.  Had I heard him 60 years ago, I might well have a different relationship with the spiritual.  For, buried in his message is a road to freedom for all of us.