Conservative evangelical and Catholic leaders who went out on a political limb by aligning themselves with the Obama administration are expressing feelings ranging from disappointment to optimism in their reaction to the president’s decisions so far on culture war issues.<\/p>\n
Although most of President Barack Obama’s moves on abortion and stem cell research have been expected, some right-leaning Christian leaders who took a risk sitting down at the table with a Democratic president feel that several major decisions fall short of the common ground Obama had promised on divisive social issues.<\/p>\n
Obama’s reversal this week of Bush-era restrictions on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research is the latest example.<\/p>\n
“Thus far, I have been disappointed to see little give. There’s been a lot of take,” said the Rev. Frank Page, a former president of the Southern Baptist Convention who serves on a month-old advisory board to Obama’s White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. “I’ve seen little give in the area of relating to the evangelical community as far as life issues.”<\/p>\n
Others point out that Obama is, after all, a Democrat and supporter of keeping abortion legal \u2014 and he has promised to proceed with caution on stem cells.<\/p>\n
Obama “is not doing anything he hasn’t said he was going to do during the campaign,” said the Rev. Joel Hunter, an evangelical megachurch pastor from Orlando, Fla., and another advisory board member. “So I am not enthusiastic, but I’m not disappointed, because we knew what to expect. I’m encouraged he is not totally flipping to the other side. We’ve got to be patient here.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
There’s more context and background in the AP story<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Somehow, this doesn’t surprise me. And I expect that the list of those who are less-than-thrilled with the new president will grow. From the AP: Conservative evangelical and Catholic leaders who went out on a political limb by aligning themselves with the Obama administration are expressing feelings ranging from disappointment to optimism in their reaction…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":365,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-and-politicians"],"yoast_head":"\n
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