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Well, I read his "Purpose Driven Life" and to be sure, I thought it was somewhere on the border between pablum and rubbish.

Literary criticism to the side, I hope that giving Warren a part in the festivities can be seen as a sign that Obama seriously wants to work at bringing an end to polarizing politics. Letting everyone give their input and then searching for compromise is by far the most effective way (IMO) to unite people. I wish him luck in that effort.

Should he? Who knows.

But think about this: Obama ran a campaign based on inclusion and including people who often feel left out of society. So now he has chosen someone who argues forcefully for the exclusion of a large group of people from a particular form of civic life. That might be seen as inconsistent.

But Mark, Obama's campaign was also about crossing partisan boundaries to work with people of all political stripes, including those who think highly of Rick Warren. In that sense it's quite consistent.

Having said that, I don't like it. But I wouldn't like it no matter whom he chose. I think religion and politics should be kept separate, even (especially?) at a presidential inauguration.

"I think religion and politics should be kept separate, even (especially?) at a presidential inauguration." A. Brod

But Andrew, this statement contradicts the entire Tenakh. God demanded that the religion He gave to the Israelites be the ONLY one, and regulate ALL areas of life - especially and including he political sphere - kings et al.

I know, you're going to say that that was THEN - in a theocracy. We live in a pluralistic democracy where everyone and no one should express their religious ideas and preferneces publically, particularly at a state function.

What this does is effectively exclude God from the very area of a nation's life that MOST needs His divine Law and Word to guide it. You libs are always crying "inclusiveness!" - so you think the Almighty should be excluded? We're not just talking aboout a god-idea, but the true and living God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

I think not. In rejecting God and His inanate authority over ALL of life, we are simply setting ourselves up for all the curses mentioned in Deuteronomy. You should know that. But I guess liberalism trumps the Law.

I'm fine with Warren praying. I even admire (can't believe I'm saying this) for having the guts to stand up to the vicious far left harpies who want to eliminate Biblical religion (including orthodox Jewish elements) from any voice or presence in the socio-political sphere; so they can advance their agenda of free and perverted sex, baby murder and government domination. They are mad because they do not totally pull Barry's strings, i spite of htier role in convincing the American public to pull the Trojan Horse within the walls.

So, Anonymous; you believe God's law should be obeyed by governments...what about individuals? When's the last time you sacrificed a sheep? Or urged your representatives to enact a law mandating that anyone who works on Saturday be stoned to death? You need to read more history of the way theocracies work. For one thing, what makes you sure that any theocracy that did get established would agree with everything in your theology rather than considering you a heretic to be sent off to the re-education camps, or burned at the stake? Should the govt. outlaw every religion but yours? What if it outlawed yours instead? Read about the Spanish Inquisition, then come tell us about the glories of theocracy.

Kuranes,

Like most people today you do not understand the biblical concept of theocracy. According to scripture every nation is already a theocracy - either in rebellion or in submission; and there are degrees. Nation states, like the USSR, which totally and officially reject God and his Law/Word end up in chaos, oppression and defeat – or come under historical divine judgment – NAZI Germany.

And America was founded as a theocracy, with MANY MANY allusions to it in her official documents and private commentary. We still adhere to the moral Law in many of our laws and policies. Try killing someone and see that happens; or stealing. To the extent that we have attempted to ameliorate or dispense with God’s moral Law we have known only breakdown and ruin. The institution of no-fault divorce and the legitimizing of Sodomy are two examples. Our marriage and family structures are crumbling around us nad inflictin g great pain on multitudes.

Theocracy does not imply GOVERNMENTAL imposition of any particular religious organization. Our national founding documents were careful NOT to be too specific. The idea is that the PEOPLE voluntarily uphold the Scriptures and God’s Law. You are uneducated if you think that NT Christianity calls anyone today to keep the OT ceremonial laws. They were fulfilled in Christ’s atonement. What we do insist upon is that ONLY by upholding biblical morality in the light of, and method of the Gospel and “way” of Jesus can any society expect long term success and happiness.

Broadly, a theocracy is a nation that publicly, legislatively and judicially uses God’s moral Law ( and applicable case laws) as the touchstone of all its law and policy. Strictly speaking, from the NT view of the now reign of Jesus Christ from heaven, it means to acknowledge the authority of Messiah over all human life – i.e. obedience to Christ’s moral standards of the Law, AND the specifics of the Decalogue – NOT those rules and policies that appertained strictly and limitedly to OT Israelite society.

Oh – the Inquisition was a product of Romanist error and papist darkness. It does NOT qualify for true biblical theocracy. True and successful theocratic examples are as scarce as hen’s teeth. Sin and spiritual ignorance are always the spoilers – NOT the Law and Not God. But not to attempt to truly and justly seek to advance the Kingdom on earth is to cave to ruin and death.

A modern theocracy is a society that seeks to uphold the Law in the grace of the Gospel, but nevertheless to uphold. This WOULD imply, I admit, that Christians be in the ascendancy (but not exclusively) and seek to exalt Messiah in every way; because He is worthy. There is no other Law, no other Tenakh and NT, no other Mediator between God and man. “Thou shalt have no other gods . . .” I realize this is a royal burr under a humanist’s saddle. But “there is a way that seems right to a man, but leads to the ways of death.” Proverbs. Jesus: “I am the way, the truth, and the Life.”

America is already a nation is great peril – if we continue down the road of rebellion and lawlessness, we can expect FURTHER deterioration and collapse – despite “all Obama’s horses and all Obama’s men.” Haven’t we had enough? At least now we have an administration and congress that can truly “fill up our cup of iniquity,” so that we can see EXACTLY where anti-god rebellion lead. We seem to be determined to learn the HARD way. I won’t be around too much longer, but I hate it for my children and grand children. But Romans 8:28!!! And – “the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.” The Messianic kingdom will eventually triumph, regardless of our brief historical r

So, Nikos, if the nation must obey the 10 commandments or God in his infinite love and mercy shall smite it with the usual plagues and disasters, what of the one you mention: "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me"? Exactly how would you propose this law be enforced in a properly theocratic (meaning, of course, Christian theocratic, not, say, Muslim or Pagan theocratic) state? Smash all the Hindu idols? Outlaw Buddhism, Islam, any religion that doesn't worship the Trinity? Forbid non-Christians to hold political office, as some states did back in the good old days of theocracy? You think sodomy is a violation of God's moral laws, which we are to follow, not his merely ceremonial laws, which are abrogated (though I challenge you to name a single NT verse that abrogates Saturday as the Sabbath). Does that mean you favor stoning homosexuals as God's moral law commands? If not, why not? Likewise slavery; should we reintroduce that institution, which the Bible nowhere condemns? How about polygamy? Nowhere does the NT command anyone but bishops to be a man of one wife.
As for family values, Jesus himself held them in little esteem and hardly practiced any of them. He never married or had children; he commanded his disciples to leave their livelihoods and follow him, abandoning their wives and children; when his own family tried to make him marry and settle down to God's favored nuclear- family lifestyle, what did he say? "My goodness, what have I been thinking, running around the countryside with all these men, not to mention Mary, Salome, and all the other women who are not at home where they belong, cooking the oatcakes and watching the children; I'll come home at once and start a family, because that is the only lifestyle God favors, and is the Backbone of Society"? No, Jesus, your God, didn't say or ever do that. What did he say, class? He pointed to the people around him, none of whom were his blood relations, and said, "he who does the will of God is my mother and brother and sister." Hardly a ringing endorsement of Tradidional Family Values.
I invite everyone to examine the actual history of theocracies, and see if you would be happy in one. Anyone out there want Nikos and his friends to tell you how to think and behave? Because that's who would be doing it. God would not thunder fresh commands from Heaven every morning in Nikos' version of the New Jerusalem, any more than He did for Calvin's Geneva or Spain during the Inquisition (and here's another thought for you, Nikos, if you haven't used up your quota for the day: how can you be sure that a theocracy would not judge you to be among the heretics, and send you off to the reeducation labor camps? Just because you want a theocracy doesn't mean it will automatically agree with you. I already know it doesn't agree with me, so no thanks. If Jesus is already ruling, he doesn't need my help to do it.