Open to interpretation

James Dobson is criticizing Barack Obama's interpretation of scripture as it relates to how it guides Obama's politics. (Can I remind everyone that Dobson is a psychologist who has not been theologically trained?)

Obama raised a great question. Even if we got rid of every non-Christian in this country so that all that remained were Christians, whose Christianity would govern our country? Dobson's or Al Sharpton's? I would take it further to add Catholics or Protestants? Conservatives? Liberals? Fundamentalists? To govern this country strictly on Christian principles violates all kinds of religious liberties.

Obama also points out that Jesus' Sermon on the Mount is "a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application." And I have to wonder what would happen if our Defense Department didn't survive. What would happen? We may open ourselves up to attack. We may put our freedom on the line. But I think, more than that, people are concerned with losing our status in the world. When it comes to our status, I'm kinda thinkin' it dropped to the bottom of a body of water mafia-style last year.

"I think he's deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own world view, his own confused theology," Dobson said. Well, that may be. But don't we all? Doesn't he?

The bottom line is, and Obama pointed this out, none of us are really reading our Bibles.

But it's open to intepretation.