"God Damn America" - A July 4th Dedication to the Honorable Reverend Jeremiah Wright
Reverend Wright is a father, a pastor, and a community leader. His brevity may get him into trouble at times, but he broadly stands for what is right and just, unlike the 199th United States Congress.
Reverend Jeremiah Wright was a man who can best be summarized as a Christian who did not place a premium on restrained speech. While he has great work as a minister, he is unfortunately better remembered for a few gratuitous words from a longer sermon. The soundbite that the mainstream media and America’s political class latched onto was, of course, the climactic chorus of one of his trademark firebrand sermons, “God Damn America”. In the aftermath of the patriotic fervor of post - 9/11 America, even as opinions of the Bush Administration were sour, criticizing the militarism of the United States was politically dangerous. To have been a politician associated with a prominent person who uttered such words would have been a nightmare situation - especially if that person were your family’s longtime pastor.
With that in mind, Barack Obama had no choice but to denounce the words of Reverend Wright - at least if he wanted to win the 2008 election. While I do not think President Obama was dishonest when he said he disagreed with the reverend’s choice of words, I doubt that he did not understand the point Rev. Wright was trying to make. America is a nation that despite all of its praise of revolution, democracy, and freedom, has utterly failed to live up to these ideals in the past and present. While we have progressed since July 4, 1776, it is undeniable that much work is still needed to live up to these ideals. The current administration, as its slogan states, believes that America was great and must return to that era. At the interpersonal level, nostalgia and a desire to the return to the past are perfectly normal in small doses. At the level of politics, it is collective delusion. Aside from the fact that we do not have the ability to go back in time, why would we desire to return to the America of the past?
Beneath this paragraph, I have included the full sermon, not just the deleted sound bites. Reverend Wright rips apart the nostalgic view of the America yesterday. I highly encourage all of those who were not the most politically conscious elementary schoolers to listen to the full sermon. Spoiler alert - he will not exactly give off the vibes of an Iranian Mullah. In fact, I would say that this was the sermon of a man who cared about his country, who wanted the aggregate human legacy imperialism, slavery, and exploitation to be stamped out for good - not just in the United States, but everywhere. Injustice anywhere is, of course, a threat to justice everywhere.
Reverend Wright was by no means a perfect human being. In fact, he has said some things which were reprehensible and condemnation worthy. I do not write a defense of everything he has said or done. But I ask you dear reader, living in the present day and after viewing this clip, was saying “God Damn America” indeed such a reprehensible statement to make?
When the dust has settled and the historians of tomorrow study the Early 21st Century, I often wonder what they will focus on. I know for a fact that when they create US History 101 undergraduate courses, they will not be paying attention to every single political scandal, be it real or manufactured. In the event that knowledge of the Reverend Wright scandal gets lost to the passage of time, I wanted to offer him some historical revisionism - not for everything he has said or done - but to rebuff his critics’ dog-pilings during the 2008 Presidential Campaign. Even if its just a small Substack article, its out there in the cloud somewhere. Thank you, Reverend Wright, for championing the liberation of all peoples of the Earth.
If you are going to celebrate the Fourth of July in light of all of the horrific things the United States is doing both foreign and domestic, do not celebrate it on behalf of Congress or the President. Do it on behalf of Americans who spoke truth to power and stood up for what was right even when it was unpopular - people like Harriet Tubman, John Brown, the countless numbers of people who supported, marched, and led the Civil Rights Movement, and yes - Obama’s former pastor best known for saying “God Damn America” too. In their day, they often received harsh criticism or violent reprisal for their actions, but the world today remembers them as the heroes of the nation more than any Congressman ever was. Their legacy is a testament to what America could be in the future, and how far we have come as well as how far we must march on. Tragically, we move further away from our true national heroes as our nation builds concentration camps in the Everglades, deports “criminal illegal” preschoolers with cancer, engages in militarism on behalf of Israel, and slips deeper into the dark recesses of our history and human nature.
Lets hope we change course as a nation soon, because the America of right now is something that has more than earned her eternal damnation by the Almighty. I would rather not turn into a pillar of salt if I can avoid it.