After Rick Warren Flap, Gay Activists Cheer Obama's Invite of Gene Robinson
The gay-rights movement is expressing elation over President-elect Barack Obama's invitation to gay Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson to give the opening invocation of inauguration week after reacting angrily to Obama's selection of evangelical megachurch pastor Rick Warren to deliver the invocation on Inauguration Day.
The Robinson invitation shows that "ultimately, Barack Obama is a friend to the LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender] community," says Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay-rights group. "I believe his administration is going to inspire us and advance our agenda more often than not."
"At the same time," Solmonese continued, "both the Warren and Robinson decisions give us a clue about what the road ahead is going to be like. This is the beginning of a long journey."
The Human Rights Campaign and other gay-rights groups sent letters to Obama asking him to rescind the invitation to Warren—who disapproves of homosexuality and who opposes certain gay rights, including the right to marry—after his inauguration role was announced last month. "There was a sense of uproar around Rick Warren," says Darlene Nipper, deputy executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "People were confused, fearing that maybe the [president-elect] isn't the individual we thought he was."
The Robinson invitation, she said, "is an important step for knowing that this is someone who believes in the inclusivity of all Americans."
A source familiar with inauguration plans said that the Obama team had planned to give Robinson a public role at the inauguration even before the Warren flap, though Robinson's invitation was issued much more recently. "It's inaccurate to suggest that this was a reaction to the Rick Warren complaints or criticism," said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The first openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church, Robinson's 2003 election caused a rift in the church, provoking several dioceses and dozens of parishes to secede in protest. Though he'd been an early public supporter of Obama, Robinson called the inaugural invitation to Warren "a slap in the face."
"I'm all for Rick Warren being at the table," Robinson told the New York Times. "But we're not talking about a discussion; we're talking about putting someone up front and center at what will be the most watched inauguration in history, and asking his blessing on the nation. And the God that he's praying to is not the God that I know."
Robinson will give the invocation at this Sunday's official opening to the inaugural week activities, at Washington, D.C.'s Lincoln Memorial, while Warren will give the invocation at Obama's swearing-in on Tuesday. "It will be an enormous honor to offer prayers for the country and the new president, standing on the holy ground where the 'I have a dream speech' was delivered by Dr. King," Robinson wrote in an E-mail this morning to Episcopal Café, an Episcopal website. "It is also an indication of the new president's commitment to being the President of ALL the people. I am humbled and overjoyed at this invitation...."
Despite the fallout the Warren invitation engendered in the gay community, the Human Rights Campaign's Solmonese says the Obama transition team has been "very enthusiastic to the list of agenda items for the LGBT community."
That wish list includes executive orders for instituting nondiscrimination policies for federal employees on sexual orientation or gender identity grounds, for interpreting the Family and Medical Leave Act to include same-sex partners, and to enact a congressionally approved end to a ban on HIV-positive travelers from entering the U.S.
"Four years from now, will we believe that we have made more progress for advancing gay equality than at any other time in our history and than under any other president?" says Solmonese. "I think the answer is yes. That is what's paramount."
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Reader Comments
Knights of Columbus & "under God" in Pledge....
In the l950's era of Catholic Sen. McCarthy, when socialists were blacklisted out of the State Dept. & all sectors of the communications media, the Knights of Columbus successfully lobbied Congress to add "under God" to the Pledge. The motto "In God We Trust" was put on our money before that. Why did Christians do that? They did it to FORCE children to HEAR, SAY & READ the word "God" most of their lives. They were expected to believe there are no atheists & that everybody bows heads and prays. It was done to make children believe nonexistent god exists, so they'd give money as tithes to churches--as kids and when they go to work. "Catcher in the Rye" was banned because schoolboy Holden says he "must be an atheist." Believers didn't want kids to even SEE the word "atheist.' As more people graduate from college, they realize they were lied to about religion. That's why so many religious families send their kids to church schools. They don't want the kids to lose faith. But gradually, the population of the USA is becoming more secular. Eventually, successful lawsuits will remove religious contamination from the Pledge and money. The nation will once again be "indivisible."
Obama (homosexuality Article)
OK U.S.A.our pledge is one nation under god right?? ok so Obama being our president its sinfull. God says in the bible that...
Romans 6:1-2 Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? 2 Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it?
Romans 1:24 So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. 25 They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen. 26 That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. 27 And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved.
28 Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. 29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. 30 They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. 31 They refuse to understand, break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. 32 They know God’s justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.
Matt 19:4 “Haven’t you read the Scriptures?” Jesus replied. “They record that from the beginning ‘God made them male and female.’* 5 And he said, ‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.’* 6 Since they are no longer two but one, let no one split apart what God has joined together.”
AND ABORTION IS A WHOLE NOTHER SUBJECT!! its murder!!
To homosexuals
I will simply write out a few scriptures for those supporters of HOMOSEXUALITY who feel "We (believing Christians) now live under the new Covenant...thankfully--so the passages in Leviticus are not applicable for the Age of Grace--we're still sinners--just saved from our sins by Jesus' vicarious death on the cross."
I ask you to prayerfully look at
Romans 6:1-2 Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? 2 Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it?
Romans 1:24 So God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired. As a result, they did vile and degrading things with each other’s bodies. 25 They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen. 26 That is why God abandoned them to their shameful desires. Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other. 27 And the men, instead of having normal sexual relations with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men, and as a result of this sin, they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved.
28 Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. 29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. 30 They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. 31 They refuse to understand, break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. 32 They know God’s justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.
Matt 19:4 “Haven’t you read the Scriptures?” Jesus replied. “They record that from the beginning ‘God made them male and female.’* 5 And he said, ‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.’* 6 Since they are no longer two but one, let no one split apart what God has joined together.”
DONT JOIN THE GAY MOVEMENT TO WIN THE ARGUEMENT ON GAY RIGHTS. FOLLOW THE SCRIPTURES, PLEASE
GOD'S POWER IS STILL WORKING ON EARTH TO SET GAYS FREE FROM THE POWER OF HOMOSEXUAL LIFESTYLE
HUMAN RIGHTS CANNOT DELIVER FROM SIN. ONLY JESUS CAN, AND HE LOVES YOU.
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