Was Obama a Teenage Muslim?

No, Barack Obama is not a Muslim nor was he one during his teenage years. The Obama campaign is claiming that Republicans are using Obama's ties to Islam as a smear. Here are the facts.

Barack Obama was born a Muslim because his father was a Muslim. His mother was an anthropologist and although his grandparents were Christians his mother was more of a secular humanists. Barack's father took off pretty quick and since he had never divorced his first wife in Kenya it is hard to say if their marriage was valid anyway.

Obama's mother then married an Indonesian man who was also a Muslim. When Barack was six years-old he moved to Indonesia and lived there for four years. In Indonesia Barack attended a Catholic school but was enrolled by his mother as a a Muslim. Consequently he did pray with the other Muslim children and received weekly instruction on the Koran. In the third grade Obama was enrolled in a public school again identified as a Muslim, but he never attended a "madrassa" or any radical Muslim school as some have claimed.

Still, the Obama campaign is being untruthful when they claim that he was "never" a Muslim or that he has never prayed in a mosque. He was the son of one Muslim man and the stepson of another. As a child he occasionally attended a mosque and had some training in Islam. When the Obama campaign wants to be scrupulously accurate they say he has never been "a practicing Muslim". They know that admitting to having any Muslim background could cost the Senator votes.

It is true that some Americans would not vote for a Muslim just as some might have not voted for Mitt Romney because he is a Mormon. It is also true that Barack Obama became a practicing Christian in the 1990's when he joined the Trinity United Church in Chicago.

Considering the type of sermons delivered by the Reverend Wright in that church I think the country might be better off with a Muslim.