Delaware’s Republican nominee for the Senate is turning out to be treasure trove of anti-gay nonsense and idiocy. TS at Instaputz has helpfully compiled a bunch of Christine O’Donnell’s anti-gay quotes over the years, so that we can see how little she’s evolved over time. For instance, here’s what she had to say about the gay pride parade in New York City in 2000:
O’DONNELL: But let me tell you something! They – homosexuals’ special rights groups can get away with so much more than nobody else can!
COLMES: Well, what are they getting away with here, Christine? Tell me what you’re seeing…
O’DONNELL: They’re getting away with nudity!
FAY: Oh, right.
O’DONNELL: They’re getting away with nudity! They’re getting away with lasciviousness! They’re getting away with perversion!
FAY: Oh, Christine…
O’DONNELL: They’re getting away with blasphemy!
OMG! They’re getting away with blasphemy! Which is completely legal in the United States, which has a secular government and Constitution! OMG!
On the Ryan White Care Act in 1995, in her work for Concerned Women for America:
The Ryan White Care Act provides money for community-based counseling centers. While that may sound noble and compassionate, we know from experience that “AIDS education” becomes a platform for the homosexual community to recruit adolescents and lure teens into a self-destructive sexual lifestyle.
Helping AIDS patients might “sound noble and compassionate,” but really, when you look at it from Jesus’s perspective, screw them!
I’m sort of glad the Republicans are nominating all these Christian tea-hadists, actually. Often the most extreme statements of the extremist Christian right go unnoticed by much of the population, but now? Haha, they’re national candidates! We get to show everybody what headcases they really are.
Did you notice how she brought up the only three “persecution” stories the Religious Right know about?
1. The time the kids in Massachusetts read a children’s book that acknowledged the reality that there are different kinds of families. Wendy Wright would prefer to lie to her children, apparently.
2. The time the photographer in New Mexico was forced to abide the same rules as everyone else in the operation of her business, and didn’t get an exception for being a bigot.
3. All of the millions of straight people who were maimed by robots and asteroids and three story homosexuals when Prop 8 passed. Oh, the tragedy.
Wait, they have one more story of pain and suffering: The time the public pavilion in New Jersey didn’t get to discriminate simply on the basis of the fact that it was owned by a church. How’d you forget that one, Wendy?
Another flagrant and inexcusable exercise of ‘raw judicial power’ threatens to enflame and prolong the culture war ignited by the courts in the 1973 case of Roe v. Wade…
We are not surprised. Judge Walker has made this a circus trial, and has repeatedly shown his personal bias. I think everyone who watched this case closely expected him to rule in this way.
The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) today decried the decision of U.S. Circuit Court Judge Vaughn Walker to invalidate California’s Proposition 8, an amendment which defines marriage as the union of one man and one woman:
“Big surprise! We expected nothing different from Judge Vaughn Walker, after the biased way he conducted this trial,” said Brian Brown, President of NOM. “With a stroke of his pen, Judge Walker has overruled the votes and values of 7 million Californians who voted for marriage as one man and one woman. This ruling, if allowed to stand, threatens not only Prop 8 in California but the laws in 45 other states that define marriage as one man and one woman.”
“Never in the history of America has a federal judge ruled that there is a federal constitutional right to same sex marriage. The reason for this is simple – there isn’t!” added Brown.
“The ‘trial’ in San Francisco in the Perry v. Schwarzenegger case is a unique, and disturbing, episode in American jurisprudence. Here we have an openly gay (according to the San Francisco Chronicle) federal judge substituting his views for those of the American people and of our Founding Fathers who I promise you would be shocked by courts that imagine they have the right to put gay marriage in our Constitution. We call on the Supreme Court and Congress to protect the people’s right to vote for marriage,” stated Maggie Gallagher, Chairman of the Board of NOM.
“Gay marriage groups like the Human Rights Campaign, Freedom to Marry, and Equality California will, no doubt, be congratulating themselves over this “victory” today in San Francisco. However, even they know that Judge Walker’s decision is only temporary. For the past 20 years, gay marriage groups have fought to avoid cases filed in federal court for one good reason – they will eventually lose. But these groups do not have control of the Schwarzenegger v. Perry case, which is being litigated by two egomaniacal lawyers (Ted Olson and David Boies). So while they congratulate themselves over their victory before their home-town judge today, let’s not lose sight of the fact that this case is headed for the U.S. Supreme Court, where the right of states to define marriage as being between one man and one woman will be affirmed—and if the Supreme Court fails, Congress has the final say. The rights of millions of voters in states from Wisconsin to Florida, from Maine to California, are at stake in this ruling; NOM is confident that the Supreme Court will affirm the basic civil rights of millions of American voters to define marriage as one man and one woman,” noted Gallagher.
Ooooooh, Liberty Counsel, slinging it at the Alliance Defense Fund. This is awesome:
Although Liberty Counsel has defended the marriage laws in California since the battle began in 2004, the Alliance Defense Fund, representing the Prop 8 initiative, opposed Liberty Counsel’s attempt to intervene on behalf of Campaign for California Families. The California Attorney General did not oppose Liberty Counsel’s intervention, but ADF did. Liberty Counsel sought to provide additional defense to Prop 8 because of concern that the case was not being adequately defended. After ADF actively opposed Liberty Counsel, ADF presented only two witnesses at trial, following the 15 witnesses presented by those who challenged the amendment. Even Judge Walker commented that he was concerned by the lack of evidence presented by ADF on behalf of Prop 8. Liberty Counsel will file an amicus brief at the court of appeals in defense of Prop 8.
The California Supreme Court previously stated, “The right of initiative is precious to the people and is one which the courts are zealous to preserve to the fullest tenable measure of spirit as well as letter.” Moreover, the U.S. Constitution cannot be stretched to include a right to same-sex marriage.
“Judge Walker’s decision goes far beyond homosexual ‘marriage’ to strike at the heart of our representative democracy. Judge Walker has declared, in effect, that his opinion is supreme and ‘We the People’ are no longer free to govern ourselves. The ruling should be appealed and overturned immediately.
“Marriage is not a political toy. It is too important to treat as a means for already powerful people to gain preferred status or acceptance. Marriage between one man and one woman undergirds a stable society and cannot be replaced by any other living arrangement.
“Citizens of California voted to uphold marriage because they understood the sacred nature of marriage and that homosexual activists use same-sex ‘marriage’ as a political juggernaut to indoctrinate young children in schools to reject their parent’s values and to harass, sue and punish people who disagree.
“CWA stands in prayer for our nation as we continue to defend marriage as the holy union God created between one man and one woman.”
CWA of California State Director Phyllis Nemeth said:
“Today Judge Vaughn Walker has chosen to side with political activism over the will of the people. His ruling is slap in the face to the more than seven million Californians who voted to uphold the definition of marriage as it has been understood for millennia.
“While Judge Walker’s decision is disappointing it is not the end of this battle. Far from it. The broad coalition of support for Proposition 8 remains strong, and we will support the appeal by ProtectMarriage.com, the official proponent of Proposition 8.
“We are confident that Judge Walker’s decision will ultimately be reversed. No combination of judicial gymnastics can negate the basic truth that marriage unites the complementary physical and emotional characteristics of a man and a woman to create a oneness that forms the basis for the family unit allowing a child to be raised by his or her father and mother. Any other combination is a counterfeit that fails to provide the best environment for healthy child rearing and a secure foundation for the family. It is this foundation upon which society is – and must be – built for a healthy and sustained existence.”
“This is a tyrannical, abusive and utterly unconstitutional display of judicial arrogance. Judge Walker has turned ‘We the People’ into ‘I the Judge.’
“It’s inexcusable for him to deprive the citizens of California of their right to govern themselves, and cavalierly trash the will of over seven million voters. This case never should even have entered his courtroom. The federal constitution nowhere establishes marriage policy, which means under the 10th Amendment that issue is reserved for the states.
“It’s also extremely problematic that Judge Walker is a practicing homosexual himself. He should have recused himself from this case, because his judgment is clearly compromised by his own sexual proclivity. The fundamental issue here is whether homosexual conduct, with all its physical and psychological risks, should be promoted and endorsed by society. That’s why the people and elected officials accountable to the people should be setting marriage policy, not a black-robed tyrant whose own lifestyle choices make it impossible to believe he could be impartial.
“His situation is no different than a judge who owns a porn studio being asked to rule on an anti-pornography statute. He’d have to recuse himself on conflict of interest grounds, and Judge Walker should have done that.
“The Constitution says judges hold office ‘during good Behavior.’ Well, this ruling is bad behavior – in fact, it’s very, very bad behavior – and we call on all members of the House of Representatives who respect the Constitution to launch impeachment proceedings against this judge.”
Oh, the tears!
Those tears are useful, though, because, as Zandar reminded us on Twitter, those tears actually “sustain the same sex cake figurine manufacturers.” Thanks for helping, wingnuts!
UPDATE: It wouldn’t be complete if we didn’t include Dan Blatt of GayPatriot among the gay-hating wingnuts. He is just not happy about this, because he doesn’t think gays have earned it yet! (Or something. You never really can tell what the hell he’s on about:
While I’m happy for the couples who can now have the state recognize their unions as marriages, I fear that this decision will further divide the nation on gay marriage and embolden social conservatives.
(…)
I find some things I like and some I dislike. First, the dislike, the judge has a very hostile attitude toward the Proponents of Prop 8, adopting a condescending tone when addressing their points.
Why wasn’t the judge nice to bigots?! Those are the people whose favor Dan needs in order to feel truly affirmed as a major league gay!
Whoah, this guy is given more to popular jargon that to constitutional interpretation: ”the evidence shows that Proposition 8 harms the state’s interest in equality, because it mandates that men and women be treated differently based on antiquated and discredited notions of gender.” Antiquated and discredited notions of gender? Discredited by whom? Sociologists writing in the 1970s, inventing a social construct out of thin air?
Dude. Dan. Why don’t you just enroll yourself in a program at JONAH? Because you’d be a tad more credible if you were pretending to be “ex-gay.” Right now, it’s just sad.
I’ll update with more wingnut tears later. Now I’m going to celebrate.
It’s important to understand, when dealing with people like this, that they are simply making it up as they go along. Although all of the evidence and all of the study have shown that marriage equality is GOOD for a state’seconomy, fundamentalist Christians like Tamara Scott of CWA are impervious to facts:
Said Scott: “This is not simply a party issue. It’s a Biblical issue. Now I expect somebody like SNL will come along and make fun. We’ll see the Church Lady revived. That’s okay. I’d rather have man mad at me than be a stench in the nostrils of the God almighty.”
She added: “It costs you, the taxpayer, as high as $280 billion a year for fragmented families, that’s according to the Family Research Council, May 14, 2009. That’s three trillion a decade…If we would correct the breakdown of the family by one percent, we could save the taxpayer $3 billion a year. To sit back and do nothing — we become part of the problem. We all need to help out here. It’s too big for any of us. There’s plenty of evil to go around.”
I think it’s safe to say that, if there is a God, Tamara Scott is definitely in His Nosehole.
Five minutes and seven seconds of bigotry, wherein she spends a lot of time protesting far too loudly about how she’s NOT filled with hate, in this video. Also, she lies a lot:
The other day, President Obama said the following on The News: “”I don’t sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar, we talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick.” It was a candid comment, but it wasn’t vulgar by any stretch of the imagination. Most adult human beings have used that word at some point in the last year, and those who say they haven’t are lying.
But Concerned Women for America are not “most adult human beings.” They are, in fact, getting a bad case of the vapors and possibly in danger of dying from consumption because the President of the United States said “ass.” In fact, one of the Concerned Women, a man named Ken Ervin (presumably the most concerned lady of them all), decided this was a big enough deal that he was going to write a column about it!
Last year, the only butts the president was looking to kick were the unhealthy cigarettes he was chain smoking. But on Monday, his rhetoric changed … and coarsened.
Ellipses are for dramatic effect.
At the same time you’re cheapening the office of President, you’re also using words we’re trying to teach our kids not to use. “But Mom, why can’t I swear? The president does it!”
Ken’s kids call him “Mom”? The gender bending at CWA is more widespread than I knew.
How does your swearing lend “hope” to the nation? What kind of “change” does it bring? I’ll tell you what kind. My young son can now feel completely vindicated in using coarse language and acting like a bully. Why? Because, sir, you did it.
By this logic, Ken’s son should also feel validated in doing the following:
4. Authorizing his underlings to torture prisoners, undermining the moral authority of the United States at home and abroad.
5. Undermining the civil liberties of all Americans to an unprecedented level.
6. Trading Sammy Sosa.
7. Clearing a whole lotta brush.
So, based on those things and the fact that Concerned Strumpet Ken Ervin is raising his young son to emulate presidents, we can safely assume that he’s raising a stupid monster.
Not only did you swear, but you did it in such a manner that the threat behind it wasn’t even veiled.
Scaaaaaary. Wait, what threat? He said he consults experts so that he knows what he’s talking about so he knows whose ass to kick and where to assign responsibility. Big whoop.
Mr. President, perhaps while you’re trying to kick cigarette butts, you should also work on kicking your own crass.
Or maybe Ken Ervin needs to grow up, grow a pair, and stop interjecting while the grown-ups are trying to talk?
One of the constant (fake) retorts given by “thoughtful” anti-gay conservatives about gay parenting is that there haven’t been enough long-term studies on gay parenting for us to know how kids do when raised by gay parents, and until then, we have to assume that all children raised in gay and lesbian families grow up to be addicted to marijuana, gangsta rap, and gay sex. Or something.
Well, a new study just came out in the journal Pediatrics, which followed 78 children raised by lesbian couples for 25 years, and here’s what they found:
The largest study of its kind to date finds that the adolescent children of lesbian mothers rate above their peers in areas like academic competence, social behavior, and psychological adjustment.
Uh oh. They do better.
“The NLLFS has been studying the same group of lesbian families since 1986; it is the only study to have followed the daughters and sons of lesbians from conception to adulthood,” said the news release. “The results released today are based on data gathered when the adolescents were 17 years old. The report also found no differences in the psychological adjustment of NLLFS adolescents who had been conceived by known and unknown donors, nor between those who reported homophobic stigmatization and those who did not.
“Although there are over 40 studies on young children with same-sex parents, data on adolescents reared by same-sex parents are very limited. The current NLLFS report shows that despite homophobic stigmatization, the adolescent daughters and sons of lesbians demonstrate more competencies and fewer behavioral problems than age-matched peers. These findings support the position statements of all major professional associations concerning the well-being of children growing up in lesbian and gay families.”
Now, this isn’t actually an argument that gays are uniquely qualified to raise children, moreso than straight people. Findings that show that our kids do better than their peers are a reflection of the fact that gays and lesbians don’t tend to “accidentally” have children. An interesting course of inquiry would be to follow the lives of children of gay and lesbian families and compare them to a group of children with straight parents who wanted them, planned for them, and had the resources required to raise children. My hypothesis is that the results would be damn near indistinguishable from each other.
The Religious Right can whine all they want (and Concerned Women for America already is) that “common sense” shows that all children need a mother and a father, and if you want to remain willfully uneducated on the subject, you’re free to believe that. But if you look at the mountain of data, the emerging scientific truth is that kids do better with two parents, of any gender combination, who have the time, desire, love, and resources to give those kids the best shot they can in life.
And really, that makes a lot more “common sense” than anything CWA has to say on the subject.
One night Townsend called Young, having recently realized what Young already knew. In the middle of a conversation about schoolwork, she said tenderly, “Every sunflower needs rain to grow. Would you be my rain?”
Young, who had long since given up on Townsend understanding the significance of her appearances at the gym, was confused. She thought, “This has nothing to do with the case” they had been discussing.
That was 12 years ago. They have tattoos on their wrists now: Townsend’s says “Sunflower” and Young’s says “Rain.”
On Tuesday they will have wedding bands as well. Townsend and Young, the first gay couple to apply for a marriage license after the District of Columbia legalized same-sex unions, also will be among the first to be married.
Garner and Holmes have been in an on-again-off-again relationship for more than 14 years. When asked why they took so long to realize they were right for each other, Garner and Holmes joked that their relationship is kind of like the movie, It’ Complicated. Along with two other African-American couples at the Human Rights Campaign’ Equality Center, the mothers of four and grandmothers of seven will finally jump the broom, a full 13 years after Garner first proposed to Holmes.
Holmes and Garner, both clergy in the LGBT-friendly Metropolitan Community Church, have been a family for a long time. But today, Garner says, represents “a public and legal recognition that our love can survive anything. We will spend the rest of our lives together in joy, no matter what might come.”
And then there was Rocky Galloway and Reggie Stanley, fathers of twin girls:
“There’ this whole controversy about African Americans; there are no gay African-American couples or what have you,” says Reggie Stanley, who will be marrying his partner, Rocky Galloway, at the ceremony tomorrow. Stanley said he and Galloway wanted to participate in the public ceremony because “we felt an obligation to make it clear that yes, we exist; we’re like anybody else; we’re healthy; we’re strong; we’re a family.”
Yes, they are. Congratulations to all the couples.
If you missed the live stream of the weddings, the Human Rights Campaign will have video up shortly, they say.
Adam Serwer’s piece in The Root (second link above) focuses on the fact that all three are African-American couples. The Religious Right, which is mostly made up of uptight white people, likes to use race as a wedge issue, which is insulting to the many people of color who also happen to be LGBT, as it reinforces the stereotypes Reggie Stanley mentioned, that being gay is a “white thing.” Just yesterday Jeremy Hooper highlighted a typically disgusting missive from the Concerned Women for America which explicitly played the race card:
“This is an issue that reaches across the usual divisions by party or race or income class. In California, 70 percent of African-American voters ‚Äî of whom virtually all voted for Barack Obama for president ‚Äî voted for Proposition 8 to protect marriage. Marriage and family are foundational underpinnings of our society, and voters in 31 different states have treated them that way. It is not for legislatures or courts to decide whether or not these fundamental institutions will be redefined. The people of D.C. have yet to speak, and we will ensure they get that opportunity.”
Right. Like CWA’s mission in life is to protect black voters. Here’s what Jeremy had to say about it:
In our years of covering them, we have never seen one — NOT ONE! — African-American on CWA’s staff. Yet they want to tell the D.C. Black population how they should feel, suggesting that supposedly homo-hostile sentiment can monolithically transport itself from coast to coast? They who oppose Barack Obama with every fiber in their socially conservative beings want to go even further and exploit African-American support for the Democratic president? As we said: Gross!
Of course they don’t have black people on staff, Jeremy! Most Christian Right organizations are direct descendants of the days of white supremacism. You see it throughout their movement, actually, when they pen pieces which suggest that, essentially, if African-American voters knew what was good for them, they would vote Republican.
As I always say, well, they don’t vote Republican very much, and maybe (just maybe!!!) they don’t vote Republican for a damn good reason.
Anyway, in this case, polls show that, in the majority African-American Washington DC, marriage equality has majority support, so once they wrap their heads around that, CWA will probably stop race-baiting on the issue.
They only mention black people when it serves their purposes, after all.
Which “concerned man” from Concerned Women for America has such a small, shall we say, sense of his own masculinity, that he thought this would be a good bumper sticker to sell at CPAC?
How sad! If you ever see one of those on a truck (with oversized tires, natch), please don’t get angry. Pity the poor, scared little child that lives inside the body of the man driving the, um, penile substitute. If you’re a spiritual person, say a little prayer for him. He needs all the help he can get, the poor dear.
UPDATE: This isn’t directly related, but right after I posted this, I came across this video of Ewan McGregor on Good Morning America talking about kissing Jim Carrey, on film and off. Instead of letting the situation devolve into childish humor, Ewan sort of made the giggling stagehands and Stephanopoulos look stupid, by, as David Mixner said, giving the moment dignity.
So, as you watch this video, I think you’ll see that my point speaks for itself. Which strikes you as more of a secure man? The pithy scared Matt Barber-esque morons who are so scared of gay people that they would manufacture the above bumper sticker? Or the guy below, who essentially looks around and says, “Yeah, I kissed a man. I’m really not sure why this is an issue for you.”
For a time after its founder D. James Kennedy recently passed away, there was hope that Fort Lauderdale-based Coral Ridge Ministries would go in a new direction.
For decades, the church had been a rabidly anti-gay organization that had employed attack dogs, such as the notorious Janet Folger. The church spearheaded the 1998 “Truth in Love” ex-gay campaign. (It ended badly after two of the campaign’s stars were caught having gay relations) But since Kennedy’s departure, Coral Ridge had been relatively quiet on divisive social issues.
Unfortunately, it seems their new pastor, Rev. Tullian Tchividjian, wants to reignite the culture wars. His General in this fight is Robert Knight, a veteran in these battles. Knight had recently been laid off from the Media Research Center’s Culture and Media Institute. He had also worked for Concerned Women for America and the Family Research Council.
Already one can see Knight’s deleterious influence on Coral Ridge. The website’s homepage is packed with shameless lies about hate crime legislation and it also promotes theocracy in America. (This brings us back to Kennedy’s dishonest days when the pastor even flirted with Reconstructionsism – a brand of Christian fanaticism that calls for homosexuals to be stoned to death.)
Knight is best known for his paranoid – if not delusional – rantings about the gay movement’s secret desire to stamp out the free speech of radical Christians. He is one of the right’s most nefarious propagandists and is severely truth challenged. Knight is also known for his sexual immaturity and penchant to make crude anti-gay wisecracks. At one event I attended, he joked about chubby lesbians in beer halls. Knight is also obsessed with gay sex and is closest in tone to Peter Labarbera. The two men worked together in the late 90′s at the Family Research Council and were like bosom buddies.
It seems that preaching the Bible was not enough to sustain the congregation – so Coral Ridge has returned to anti-gay bile. On the sun-drenched shores of Fort Lauderdale, Coral Ridge Ministries is still in the spiritual darkness.
As noted by TWO, Richard Cizik, Washington lobbyist for the National Association of Evangelicals, resigned his post last week because of controversy over his nationally broadcast support of gay civil unions. The NAE and right-wing political organizations are applauding his departure with words both questionable and unkind.
During a Dec. 2 interview on National Public Radio’s “Fresh Air,” Cizik told host Terry Gross that he voted for Barack Obama in the Virginia primary and said Christians should not fear supporting pro-choice and pro-LGBT candidates. Cizik also said that his views on marriage were “shifting” and that he supports civil union.
The comments made by the lobbyist — formally known as NAE’s vice president for governmental affairs — caused a huge stir in evangelical Christian circles and the controversy led him to resign his job. In a statement to the organization’s board members, the association’s acting president Leith Anderson explained his departure, saying Cizik’s radio remarks caused “a loss of trust in his credibility as a spokesperson among leaders and constituencies.”
It turns out that Cizik’s views are evolving even more. For years, he has been one of the rare evangelicals banging the drum for addressing climate change. The DC-based Institute on Religion & Democracy’s Mark Tooley told OneNewsNow that “Cizik has been very outspoken and in some ways ‘off the reservation’ for the last five or six years in terms of his global warming activism, which the board of NAE had initially somewhat disavowed — but that had not discouraged him.”
Cizik’s civil-union support was an apparent step too far from the reservation. “The National Association of Evangelicals has official positions strongly supporting traditional marriage and opposing same-sex marriage, and certainly by implication same-sex civil unions,” Tooley said. “So it seemed to be a very clear case where Cizik was ignoring the very obvious and official positions of his own organization, for which he is supposed to be the chief spokesman and lobbyist in Washington.”
Evangelical support for Cizik’s resignation is voluminous, the criticisms harsh.
Ingrid Schlueter, co-host of evangelizing radio show Crosstalk America said, “Those who are at war with God, the author of life, should be publicly confronted by evangelical Christians. Instead, they are aided and abetted in their evil by craven leaders like Cizik.”
Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council is expectedly meanspirited: “This is the risk of walking through the green door of environmentalism and global warming – you risk being blinded by the green light and losing your sense of direction. How else can you explain enthusiastic support for what will probably be the nation’s most pro-abortion, anti-family president in our nation’s 232 year history?”
Janice Shaw Crouse, director and senior fellow of Concerned Women for America’ Beverly LaHaye Institute, takes a broad swipe: “I think, perhaps, my dear friend Rich has been inside the Beltway for too long and has swallowed too much of the NPR and Vogue magazine Kool-Aid.”
I suppose the nasty talk has to be over-the-top. After all, Cizik has the ear of millions of Americans. People listen to him. You can see it in the responses on the FRC blog, where faithful Christians responding to Perkins’ statement wonder why caring about the environment or supporting Barack Obama contradicts their beliefs. Time magazine even named Cizik one of the world’s 100 most influential people this year. That’s a lot of clout to for the evangelicals to overcome.
Consider the response of NAE supporters of Cizik — and there are many of them. According to US News and World Report, “a coalition of roughly 60 evangelical leaders (mostly of the non-Christian right variety) has written to … Leith Anderson pushing for a successor [who, like Cizik, is] not beholden to the Christian right… [one] who embraces more progressive causes like combating global warming.” Read the full letter here.
David Gushee, a college professor and progressive evangelical activist who helped write the letter to Anderson, said this in an interview with USNWR:
I think Leith and the executive committee are going to take their time and let the furor over this die down. I personally think they need to find somebody who can promote all seven of the policy commitments in the NAE’s Health of Our Nation statement. There’s one on sanctity of life and one on climate change and one on poverty. There are always pressures from the right that the two fundamental issues of our time should be abortion and homosexuality. I think there will be pressure to hire somebody to make those the top priority.
I can tell you from some feedback that if the NAE makes the mistake of rolling back to the classic Christian right agenda, they would lose support of a lot of people who are currently happy to be working with them.
Yes, this comes from within the NAE.
The good news for Cizik, if he is sincere in his evolution, is that his message is being heard across the nation. It’s evident in the growing support for legal recognition of same-gender couples and for humane and just treatment of LGBT citizens. It is reflected in the fact that an increasing number of people are realizing that “gay” isn’t something that needs to be prayed away. Even the vote that passed California’s obnoxious and un-American Proposition 8 was a close one. Cizik is but one of many Americans who are slowly but surely understanding that being a Christian does not require denying compassion and equality to LGBT people.
Let’s hope this good man is snapped up by a progressive evangelical organization so that his vast influence — and his personal evolution — can continue. And let’s hope those questioning evangelicals continue searching their hearts and minds.
