President Barack Obama
4 notable remarks from President Obama’s Easter Prayer Breakfast
By Adelle M. Banks — April 7, 2015
WASHINGTON (RNS) "Easter is our affirmation that there are better days," the president said.
Obama meets with top Mormon leaders
By Thomas Burr — April 3, 2015
SALT LAKE CITY — Mormon President Thomas S. Monson, 87, skipped the meeting with Obama to preserve his strength for the church's massive General Conference.
Obama to host Pope Francis at White House in September
By David Gibson — March 26, 2015
(RNS) Pope Francis will become the third pope to visit 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue when he meets with the president and first lady during his U.S. tour in September.
Southern Baptists urge Obama to defend ‘the least of these’ against ISIS
By Adelle M. Banks — March 2, 2015
(RNS) “The world will applaud your courage and compassion as you defend those that Scripture calls 'the least of these,'" they wrote.
Theological purity tests will ruin presidents and the presidency (ANALYSIS)
By Jacob Lupfer — February 24, 2015
WASHINGTON (RNS) The trouble with making presidents’ religiosity just another weapon in our ongoing ideological war is that we may have ruined religion for presidents themselves.
Is President Obama a Christian? It depends what you mean by ‘Christian’ (COMMENTARY)
By Justin Taylor — February 23, 2015
(RNS) When it comes to the question of who is and who is not a Christian, the governor should have remembered that clarity is often served by asking the questioner why the question is being asked.
Onward, Christian Soldiers: The complicated legacy of the Crusades (COMMENTARY)
By A. James Rudin — February 19, 2015
(RNS) The term "Crusades" is not some sort of benign, even quaint, historical reference.
Obama’s God talk ‘doesn’t stand a chance’ in a polarized America
By Cathy Lynn Grossman — February 16, 2015
WASHINGTON (RNS) No president can make religious rhetoric work without getting buffeted by critics from all directions, experts say.
The echoes of Abraham Lincoln in President Obama’s Prayer Breakfast speech (COMMENTARY)
By John Fea — February 11, 2015
MECHANICSBURG, Pa. (RNS) No president has made such an appeal to humility and mystery since Abraham Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address.
Why Christians can’t ignore the mote in their eye (COMMENTARY)
By Tom Ehrich — February 10, 2015
(RNS) When we deny any culpability, we merely perpetuate ignorance and hubris in our own ranks and make ourselves seem dishonest and dangerous in the eyes of the world.
Obama condemns ‘distorted’ faith at National Prayer Breakfast
By Adelle M. Banks — February 5, 2015
WASHINGTON (RNS) “As people of faith we are summoned to push back against those who try to distort our religion -- any religion -- for their own nihilistic ends,” Obama said.
UPDATE: China tells U.S. it’s against Obama meeting with Dalai Lama
By Reuters — February 1, 2015
The White House said Obama would deliver remarks at the Feb. 5 event about the importance of upholding religious freedom, and that the organizers had also invited the Dalai Lama.
In parting shot, Obama prods India on religious freedom
By Frank Jack Daniel — January 27, 2015
NEW DELHI (RNS) Obama's speech was widely interpreted as a message to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist party, whose rise to power emboldened activists to declare India a nation of Hindus.
Catholic leaders to House abortion foes: Immigration reform is also ‘pro-life’
By David Gibson — January 21, 2015
(RNS) The statement cites Pope Francis’ views that immigration woes and economic inequality are threats to life along with abortion, and it appears to be another example of the so-called Francis effect that is recasting the nation’s culture war by shifting the debates onto a broader terrain.
How Pope Francis’ diplomacy may change everything, not just US-Cuba relations
By David Gibson — December 18, 2014
(RNS) “Pope Francis did what popes are supposed to do: Build bridges and promote peace,” Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski said after Wednesday’s announcement about the U.S.-Cuba rapprochement.
