The Cult of the Messiah, Barack Obama, Our Lord

No he has never walked on water or sated the hunger of 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and a couple of fish, but Barack Obama continues to attract Jesus comparisons from many of his followers since announcing his candidacy for the presidency.

He has been introduced several times as a savior of the Democrat Party. An artist created a sculpture depicting Obama as the messiah with a crowned halo that was actually displayed with much controversy at the Chicago Institute of Art during the Easter holiday in 2006.

For several months now I have shrugged off the Messiah, Barack Obama stuff claiming it to be a small minority of liberal whack jobs operating from a strong emotional base that ignores reason. Reason, of course, would point out that Obama’s policies are about the same as any other liberal democrat and his experience is minimal. However, in many instances the phenomenon has become practically cult like, as one blogger who tracks these events on the blog “Is Barrack Obama the Messiah?” writes:

... And when [OBAMA] was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; and behold, a voice from heaven said, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased."

There is no reference as to where the above statement came from or if it is the personal work of the blogger, but what is clear is this is not just some random act of Obama worship from a small group on the left. In fact this seems to be a new hysteria that has over taken the left as a whole.

To those who worship at his feet this is not out of the ordinary. To them he is the man of all things great. If you type in the key words Obama messiah at Google you’ll get about 1.5 million results. That is a disturbing number within itself, but the real concern comes from the way people describe their emotional reactions to this former unknown politician from Chicago.

San Francisco Chronicle Columnist Mark Muford explains to us that Obama is a higher being than the rest of us in his column “Is Obama an Enlightened Being?”

Barack Obama isn’t really one of us. Not in the normal way, anyway … it’s not merely his youthful vigor, or handsomeness, or even inspiring rhetoric … It is something more … a sort of powerful luminosity, a unique high-vibration integrity.

Dismiss it if you like, but I’ve heard from far too many enormously smart, wise, spiritually attuned people who’ve been intuitively blown away by Obama’s presence—not speeches, not policies, but sheer presence…

Many spiritually-advanced people I know identify Obama as a Lightworker, that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who casually help usher in a new way of being on the planet…. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a very high order, and they speak not just to reason or emotion, but to the soul.

Chris Matthews, a talking head from MSNBC whom one may make the argument has some professional objectivity left, listened to an Obama speech and claimed it was the “New Testament”

“I’ve been following politics since I was about five,” he said. “I’ve never seen anything like this. This is bigger than Kennedy. Obama comes along, and he seems to have the answers. This is the New Testament. This is surprising.”

Others want to give Obama his own chapter in the good book!

“What Barack Obama has accomplished is the single most extraordinary event that has occurred in the 232 years of the nation’s political history. The event itself is so extraordinary that another chapter could be added to the Bible to chronicle its significance,” declared Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. of Chicago.

Those are some strong statements made about a man with no real substantial accomplishments in his political career, but what is really agitating and frightful is how little interest Obama followers and the media have in the actual track record of the political savior with the cry for “change.”

It is also disgustingly amazing and frightening to watch Barack Obama get cheers and applause from a crowd during a rally in Dallas, Texas during the primary race for blowing his nose and then declare, “I am confident we can create a kingdom right here on Earth,” or when women faint in the mere presence of his existence. (Which interestingly enough has not happened again since the news of “swoon-mania” broke.)

Is it possible people have lost their sense of God to such a degree they are worshiping a presidential candidate?

One needs to look no deeper into the question than the supporters themselves.

In a letter to the editor of the Charleston Journal Gazette Time Courier, in Illinois Steve Davis writes:

What if God decided to incarnate as men preaching “hope and change.” And what if we didn’t recognize them, because we are so dull, and let them slip away, not availing ourselves of the opportunity to be led by God!

“I believe in Barack Obama,” yells one supporter at a rally. “It’s almost like a revival for a lot of people’s souls,” extolled another.

As the crowds gather to worship their messiah, he declares himself the Democrat candidate, and then capitalizes on the dumb masses with the same type of rhetoric he used to capture them in the first place.

"The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people. Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on Earth. This was the moment - this was the time - when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves, and our highest ideals."

All this delivered to a hyped applauding cheering crowd with so much emotion it nearly drowned the candidate out with noise.

This has been the strategy of the Obama campaign. Instead of focusing on policies and accomplishments, which are extremely limited, they have played on emotions of their supporters.

As this story, “Obama Basic Training” by John Hill of the Sacramento Bee, points out Obama volunteers were told to share conversion stories about how they came to support Obama and not his policy views. If asked about policy issues refer people to the Obama website.

This is what makes this more like a cult than a political campaign. Obama strategist sound more like evangelical Christians exclaiming how they came to Obama in the same way born-again Christians tell about how they came to Jesus.

Even Obama’s campaign logo has more of an iconography cult feeling to it for a political campaign. Most of the time the usual political poster is simple. It either has the candidate’s name in patriotic colors, as well as some nice adjectives attributing abilities and experience to his leadership like this John McCain poster to the left.

Other times it is a picture or photograph of a candidate, usually in color, looking either firm or friendly. To the left is a good example of that from Hillary Clinton’s camp.




Obama’s political material takes on a whole other world. The Obama Online store, which is an official part of the Obama campaign, hired propagandist artist Shepard Fairey to create Obama’s presidential campaign poster. This poster transcends the usual flag waiving national pride and instead portrays a new symbolic metaphor to go along with the candidate. Here is a look: As you see, Obama is no longer an ordinary mortal. He has now been elevated to a symbolic cult like figure, where his name is unnecessary. His goals unmentioned and his qualifications are irrelevant, which is convenient since he hardly has any. Instead, all that's left is his almost superhuman visage combined with one magical word: "change" or "hope." The political poster is no longer advertisement, but instead iconography.

The one-word message offers a simple-minded promise of utopian existence, much like the graphic style of the old totalitarian Soviet Union propaganda. It brings back the idealized portraits and personality cult of the “Beloved Leader” of Stalin and Lenin. The leader is illuminated by a “holy” light, looking off to the horizon at a truth that is not available to his mere mortal followers, who must look up to his image.

As is the case with other cults throughout history, perhaps the best metaphor for Obama and his followers is “mirage.” He shines and shows upon the horizon like water in a hot desert, but as the thirsty followers approaches closer they realize, usually to late, there is no water at all, but rather nothing, or sometimes something far worse.

Millions of the Messiah, Obama’s cult followers are thrilled the “mirage of change” is spreading across the nation this election year. They are so overwhelmed with the idea of change they aren’t even concerned what the change may be. But let us do what no politician ever wants us to do – stop and think for a moment.

In order for anyone to be successful with a mandate for change without a specific outline of what that change may be is to find a way to turn off people’s thinking and turn on their emotions.

This is precisely how Jim Jones led hundreds of people to their deaths at Jonestown, Lenin and Stalin created a regime of mass murder in Russia, Hitler rose to power in Germany and Mao in China.

The unification of people behind the “mirage of change” essentially means asking for a blank check in exchange for feel good rhetoric. That deal has been made several times in many different places throughout the history of the world – and millions of people have lived to regret it.

Obama says he wants to “heal America and repair the world.” I wonder if he plans to rest on the seventh day.

The way this campaign has been going one should not be surprised if a light shines through the windows of the Democratic National Convention followed by a big voice from the sky saying,

"Be not afraid; for I bring upon to you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all the people: for there was born to you in the city of Chicago a Savior, the great messiah, who is Barack the Democrat."

The fact there are so many people ready to be swept along by such rhetoric is a huge danger, for it means the fate of this great nation is at risk from any skilled propagandist who comes along and can reach a cult like following.