It was simply time to cut his ties to the Trinity United Church of Christ. (AP):

Barack Obama has resigned his 20 year membership in the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago in the aftermath of inflammatory remarks by his longtime pastor the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and more recent fiery remarks at the church by another minister.

Obama campaign communications director Robert Gibbs said Obama had submitted a letter of resignation to the church and would discuss his decision in a session with reporters later Saturday.

It happened "over the last few days," Gibbs said. Messages left for a church spokeswoman in Chicago were not immediately returned Saturday afternoon.

...On Thursday, Obama was again forced to reject another man of the cloth, this time Pfleger, who made racially charged comments mocking Clinton in a guest sermon at Trinity United Church of Christ, Obama's church.

Obama made it clear he wasn't happy with the comments — in which Pfleger pretended he was Clinton crying over "a black man stealing my show" — and said he was "deeply disappointed in Father Pfleger's divisive, backward-looking rhetoric, which doesn't reflect the country I see or the desire of people across America to come together in common cause."

It's an abject lesson that mixing church and politics can inevitably get any pol in an endless amount of trouble. From McCain sidling up to Hagee/Parsley or Obama and the latest remarks by Father Michael Pfleger, it's a crap shoot to inject your faith into "your game" of political ambition.

In Obama's case, and for the Democratic party generally, the courting of the faith based vote has been purposeful -- to make inroads into these communities and voters. Wearing faith on one's sleeve was thought to be the best way to counter the belief that the Democratic party is a bunch of heathens, atheists, paganists, Satanists, you name it - all trying to persecute "Christians."

However, pastors aren't beholden to any focus group or poll; they don't have to guard what they say -- it's inevitable that blowback, explanations and apologies can't outweigh the endless MSM bleating about all of it.

Quite frankly, with the economy crumbling, an endless military action, and corruption at the highest levels of government, focusing on religious clerics and their misguided, inflammatory remarks is a waste of air time.