That Moment the President Moved from Hope to Grace

What a tremendous eulogy President Obama delivered today for the Reverend Clementa Pinckney. He started out talking about hope, but then he quickly moved to grace.

“The killer could not see the grace” in Reverend Pinckney, Obama said.

He could not see the grace around him in that church, in those people he would kill. He was blind to it. And he did not know that God would make use of the tragedy for the good.

Obama said he’s been thinking a lot about grace lately. And he went on to describe the grace of God.

“We don’t earn grace. We’re all sinners. We don’t deserve it. But God gives it to us anyway. And we choose how to receive it. It’s our decision, how to honor it.”

In his moving discourse on grace, the president did not shy away from the harsh realities of race. As he put it,  let us not “slip into a comfortable silence,” about the hard realities of race relations in this country. But we don’t need more talk about race, he said. Instead, we need to live into the reality of grace. An “open heart.” That’s what’s called upon now…what writer Marilynne Robinson called the “reservoir of goodness.”

“If we can find that grace, anything is possible. If we can tap that grace, everything can change.”

Whatever one thinks of President Obama’s policies and presidential leadership, it’s a remarkable thing to hear our president speak so powerfully about grace. And then, to sing about it. 

“Amazing grace.”

Surely this week (the SCOTUS upholding of Obamacare), this day (the SCOTUS ruling legalizing gay marriage across the nation), and this half-hour (Obama’s moving eulogy for Reverend Pickney and the Charleston Nine), will go down as the highest moment of Obama’s presidency.

Perhaps it also marked the moment Obama shifted from hope, to grace. And that’s a good thing. Hope is great. But grace may be even more powerful.