Obama Agrees with Majority (and Bush!) on Salvation

Bob Ellis frets over Senator Obama's statement that "Jesus is the only way for me. I'm not in a position to judge other people." The Democratic nominee was apparently responding to a question from Franklin Graham about paths to salvation.

Obama "doesn't even understand the most basic and foundational tenet of Christianity," Bob fumes, and thus won't appeal to too many "serious" Christians. "Serious," of course, is Bob's code for folks who agree with him that "God doesn't provide an "Oh but I'm not a Christian" excuse to get out of Hell."

Uh oh—looks like not even President George W. Bush is a "serious" Christian:

Obama's theological beliefs are clearly more liberal than those on the Christian right. But it's the beliefs of the latter that are fast becoming a minority. A new Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life survey of 35,000 Americans reports that 70% agree with the statement "Many religions can lead to eternal life," including 57% of Evangelicals. No less a figure than George W. Bush responded "no" when asked in 1999 if he believed heaven is open only to Christians. Those evolving, more relatively open-minded attitudes are one reason Dobson's organization has steadily lost members and revenue over the past five years [Amy Sullivan, "Is Dobson's Obama Hit Backfiring?" Time, 2008.06.26].

Looks like Bob and Dob are the ones being left behind in a hapless minority as true believers realize there's more to life and politics than wedge issues.