Wonder what all the fuss is about? The links here will lead you where you need to go to know more, but here's Kyle at People for the American Way's RightWingWatch with a quick reminder of who we're dealing with here:
[I]n 2004 Warren declared that marriage, reproductive choice, and stem cell research were "non-negotiable" issues for Christian voters and has admitted that the main difference between himself and James Dobson is a matter of tone. He criticized Obama's answers at the Faith Forum he hosted before the election and vowed to continue to pressure him to change his views on the issue of reproductive choice. He came out strongly in support of Prop 8, saying "there is no need to change the universal, historical defintion of marriage to appease 2 percent of our population ... This is not a political issue -- it is a moral issue that God has spoken clearly about." He's declared that those who do not believe in God should not be allowed to hold public office.
As John McCain once put the point in front of that awful pea green backdrop and in that creepy crawly voice of his: "That's not change we can believe in."
As someone pointed out on a message board I frequent... "Is there any prominent churchman who would have been acceptable on the gay right's issue and yet not far too controversial in other respects?"
ReplyDeleteOh, us pesky gays! So sensitive! Always whomping up controversy over nothing!
ReplyDeleteLook, Anonymous, Warren doesn't believe in evolution! Warren thinks forcing women into lethal back alley abortions is non-negotiable for any right thinking Christian! Warren thinks gay marriage is equivalent to child rape! Warren literally lied in public on multiple occasions to get his way on Prop 8! Warren has called for the assassination of the current Iranian President!
You're telling me there isn't a prominent churchman (your word -- guess what, there are also women who are pastors, but let's not even go there, I guess) who is less controversial "in other respects"? Even a grumpy crusty life-long atheist like me doesn't think that things are remotely that bad.
I daresay Obama's choice of a pastor who didn't hold such lunatic views would be regarded as "controversial" to the wingnuts across the Socially Conservative to Fundamentalist to Christianist Militarist Theocrat axis of America to whom Obama imagines he is "building a bridge" here... talk about a bridge to nowhere!
This isn't something I follow at all, but I clicked on the Interfaith Alliance and all these folks are on their board and appear to be plenty prominent, and I'm sure there are dozens of comparable figures (I understand Jim Wallace is a name getting bandied about, hell he probably could have chosen former President Carter). I doubt I would be thrilled with any of these folks in every respect, but this isn't perfectionism or political correctness or oversensitivity.
The Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy
Rabbi Jack Moline
The Rev. Dr. Galen Guengerich
The Rev. Dr. David Currie
The Rev. Olivia Holmes
The Rev. T. Kenjitsu Nakagaki
The Rev. Dr. Staccato Powell
The Rev. Dr. Dan Rosemergy
One can also check out the blogroll of Talk 2 Action for a bazillion comments.
> "Is there any prominent churchman who would have been
ReplyDelete> acceptable on the gay rights issue and yet not far
> too controversial in other respects?"
Heck, what about Rev. Mel White?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_White
Deeply intimate with the evangelical movement, ghost-wrote
for Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, et al.
Struggled with his homosexuality, finally came out, and
has managed to reconcile (at least in his own mind) being
gay with being Christian.
Author of _Stranger at the Gate: To Be Gay and Christian
in America_ and _Religion Gone Bad: The Hidden Dangers of
the Christian Right_.