There will be plenty of questions following Obama’s resignation from Trinity. Has the church somehow changed in the past few weeks from the Trinity he attended, apparently happily, for 20 years? Are ministers somehow making unacceptable statements from the pulpit that they did not make when Obama was going there earlier?
Also, what has changed since March 18, when Obama delivered his race speech in Philadelphia, when he asked the question:
Why not join another church?…if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way.
And then there is this description of Trinity, also from the speech on race:
Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety – the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity’s services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.
Has that balance somehow changed in recent weeks?