The defilement of slain gay activist David Kato’s funeral by a “preacher” and local villagers who refused to bury his body shows the capacity of Ugandan society to commit extreme violence against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. Thanks to the hateful messages spewed by American evangelical missionaries and the sermons preached by local religious zealots, the public has been whipped into a fanatical anti-gay frenzy. Sexual minorities have been so demonized that their lives are now seen as worthless.
When people are dehumanized to this extent, it is not difficult to imagine the possibility of large-scale atrocities. If anyone doubts this, they should read Daniel Jonah Goldhagen’s book, “Worse Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the Ongoing Assault Against Humanity. The author makes a persuasive case that when a group is singled out, labeled inferior and deemed a threat to society, the public is primed to carry out violent acts that are otherwise unthinkable.
Given the level of vitriol in Uganda, no one was surprised when Kato was bludgeoned to death with a hammer in his home last week – least of all this brave gay activist himself who warned that “people were following him” and that “he feared for his life.” As the saying goes, one is not paranoid if the threat is real.
The treatment of this hero at his own funeral shows the moral depravity of what many people try to pass off as religion. According to various news reports, a graveside preacher exploited the somber affair to use it as an opportunity for condemnation.
“The world has gone crazy,” the pastor railed through a microphone. “People are turning away from the scriptures. They should turn back, they should abandon what they are doing. You cannot start admiring a fellow man.”
Gay activists (about 100 had arrived on a bus) seized the microphone and an unidentified woman defiantly shouted, “Who are you to judge others? We have not come to fight. You are not the judge of us.”
News reports say that villagers defended the preacher and a “scuffle” ensued. The local mob then refused to bury the body and it was left to gay activists to dispose of their friend’s remains.
The lack of empathy, human compassion, and respect for Kato’s body is astonishing. Only a spiritual cesspool with “religious” teachings ranging from vacuous-to-vaudeville-to-violent could produce such monsters. Is this really what religion has been reduced to in Uganda?
Ironically, the one figure that emerges as Christ-like is Kato.
“David lived his life for his friends, even defending those he hardly knew,” writes a Ugandan lesbian activist Val Kalende. “David was always concerned for the safety of others. Many times, he put himself out of the way for the sake of others. He fed, dressed, comforted, and housed many members of the community who were homeless.”
Kalende rightfully places the blame squarely at the feet of militants – both American and Ugandan — who are currently promoting The Anti-Homosexuality Bill. Indeed, most of the trouble in Uganda began when American evangelicals like Rick Warren, Lou Engle, and the secretive organization The Family began coming to Uganda to export their culture war.
The situation intensified in 2009 when two “ex-gay” activists joined holocaust revisionist Scott Lively at a conference in Kampala to discuss the evils of homosexuality. Two weeks after the conference, Lively bragged that he had delivered a “nuclear bomb against the gay agenda in Uganda.” This was followed by the introduction of the harsh Anti-Homosexuality Bill and Uganda’s Rolling Stone tabloid (no relation to the American magazine) publishing Kato’s picture alongside other gay activists with the call to hang them.
Interestingly, we have no compunction about expressing our outrage when Muslims mask nefarious intentions behind the front of Islamic charities. Yet, we rarely reserve the same righteous indignation when Americans hide murderous designs behind the veil of evangelical charities.
When Christian extremists plan trips to developing countries, the State Department ought to begin asking what their “mission” is and what they are trying to “revive” during their revivals. If the answer is religious agitation and stigmatizing minorities, their passports ought to be revoked for the sake of national security.
President Barack Obama made a powerful gesture by recognizing Kato’s contributions to humanity.
“In Uganda, David showed tremendous courage in speaking out against hate,” Obama said. He was a powerful advocate for fairness and freedom.”
The next step should be that key members of Congress threaten to cut off funds to Uganda if the Anti-Homosexuality Bill passes. The perfect name for this action would be, “The David Kato Human Rights Bill”.
As Truth Wins Out’s Mike Airhart pointed out earlier today, the Anti-Homosexuality Bill in Uganda is likely to be considered after February 18th. Thus, we begin the arduous process of stopping this homicidal bill and documenting the criminal actions of those behind it — both in Uganda and America. We are doing so to ensure that the perpetrators of this eliminationist campaign are prosecuted for crimes against humanity.
Truth Wins Out will begin our documentation by looking at the secretive fundamentalist group, The Family, which hosts the annual National Prayer Breakfast and is led by Doug Coe. This furtive organization is knee-deep in the Anti-Homosexuality Bill. Indeed, it was introduced in Uganda’s parliament by a key member of the organization, David Bahati.
Much of the information below was compiled from Jeff Sharlet’s book, “C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat to American Democracy”. It is not a complete list of the membership, but a snapshot — so people can get a glimpse of the immense power The Family represents and what they stand for.
Basic Background Information
Abraham (Abram) Vereide founded The Family. He had a vision referred to as “The Idea”, which was the notion that he should minister to the elite. He believed that Jesus favored the wealthy and anointed political leaders. This is the core of The Family’s message.
The first National Prayer Breakfast took place in 1953.
The Family’s original name was the International Christian Leadership (ICL)
The organization focuses on cultivating “key men” in countries throughout the world
The Family believes in “soul surgery”, cutting into the self and exposing one’s desires in front of a small groups of social equals.
A Family’s goal is to create,“Two hundred national and international world leaders bound together relationally by a mutual love for God and the family.”
Family Quotes
“The more invisible you can make your organization, the more influence you will have,” (Doug Coe, the leader of The Family)
“You say, hey, you know Jesus said, ‘You got to put him before mother-father-brother-sister’? Hitler, Lenin, Mao, that’s what they taught the kids. Mao even had the kids killing their own mother and father. But it wasn’t murder. It was for building the new nation. The new kingdom.” (Doug Coe)
“We elect our leaders, Jesus elects his.” (Doug Coe)
“[The Family is] A veritable underground of Christ’s men all through government.” (Chuck Colson, Prison Fellowship)
“I’m guilty of two things. I’m a Jesus guy and I have a heart for Africa.” (Sen. James Inhofe, R-OK)
Parliament was currently preoccupied with the upcoming Christmas break and then the elections. About the AHB, he [Ugandan Official] said, “So I suppose I can say it will come up after elections which is the 18th of February.”
The government of Uganda be forewarned. Passing this bill will be detrimental to your nation and turn it into a failed pariah state. The wheels will be set in motion to have right wing American puppet and “Kill the Gays” bill sponsor David Bahati prosecuted for crimes against humanity and he will likely spend his final days locked in a cage, wearing prison stripes and enjoying bread and water. The Family will have had ts last peaceful National Prayer Breakfast. The event will become toxic and likely cease to exist.
Is persecuting LGBT people really that important to The Family and leaders in Uganda?
We will not allow these fanatical thugs to wantonly kidnap, beat, falsely imprison and murder LGBT people without a fight like they have never seen. I hope Doug Coe and his Ugandan puppets fully understand the implications of what they are doing. This will not end well for them.
Note: Box Turtle Bulletin has an excellent time line documenting the horror in Uganda.
The American fundamentalist group, The Family, has to make an important strategic choice. It can have its influential National Prayer Breakfast each February in Washington, or it can have its Anti-Homosexuality Bill become law in Uganda. It likely cannot have both.
It would be naïve for this secretive and powerful organization to believe that it can turn Uganda into a concentration camp for gay and lesbian people without transforming its signature affair into a symbol of such oppression. It would be madness for The Family to think it can sell the loving Higher Path Jesus at their breakfast, while unleashing its anti-gay Psychopath Jesus in Kampala.
If The Family does not kill the Anti-Homosexuality Bill before it becomes law, the cruel piece of legislation will end up killing The Family, by stripping it of its moral authority and tying its members to genocide. What respectable politician would want to attend an event marred by protests and hosted by human rights abusers?
Last year, a prominent member of The Family, David Bahati, wrote and introduced The Anti-Homosexuality Bill in Uganda’s Parliament. In Jeff Sharlet’s latest book, “C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat to American Democracy”, the bill’s author said he believes that homosexuality is worse than murder and calls it “a threat to our existence”.
Aside from persecuting LGBT people and snuffing out their right to exist, the bill punishes anyone who offers support or friendship. Some of its provisions:
Three years in prison for failure to report a gay person to authorities within 24-hours of disclosure
Seven years in prison for “promotion”, which includes activism or simply acknowledging that homosexuality exists
Life imprisonment for one homosexual act
The death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality” (which includes sex while HIV-positive, sex with a disabled person, or sex more than once, marking the person as a “serial offender”)
The Anti-Homosexuality Bill was put on the backburner last year after the National Prayer Breakfast was protested. The efforts to shine a light on The Family’s activities led to President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton condemning the bill at the event.
Unfortunately, Bahati has revived the bill, claiming it will pass and “close the door to homosex”. Last week, he made a trip to The United States to furtively rally support for his efforts. The Ugandan legislator says that he has strong support in America, but his prominent evangelical friends are afraid to publicly back him because they fear reprisals.
Indeed, Bahati believes he is vindicating his American friends who have lost the culture war against LGBT equality. The grand plan is for Uganda to be used as a proxy in a global war against homosexuality. Once the bill passes in Uganda, the hope is to spread copycat bills throughout Africa. These conservative African nations can then be used as vivid examples to Western countries of how to re-stigmatize homosexuality. Of course, the larger utopian fantasy is to use homosexuality as a wedge issue to establish theocracies across the planet.
We should take this effort very seriously and make it clear to The Family that there will be consequences for such bloodlust. A few of the options include:
Working to have Congress cut off all foreign aid to Uganda
Large demonstrations at The National Prayer Breakfast
Denying Ugandan officials visas to America
Denying prominent members of The Family visas to Uganda
Stripping David Bahati of his degrees at the University of Cardiff and the University of Pennsylvania
Exploring efforts to prosecute Bahati, and others affiliated with this bill, for crimes against humanity.
A media campaign exposing The Family
Bahati justifies his planned purge by disguising it as a morality campaign to protect Ugandan children from predatory Western gay men. However, he has put forth no credible evidence to back his bizarre assertions, and all available information points to an eliminationist witch-hunt against innocent people.
Bahati also rationalizes his cruelty by saying that Ugandans support his bill. Of course, the bill’s popularity and the demonization of LGBT people are only maintained through artificial means. To tar homosexuals as despised villains, Bahati and his goons have to create a repressive culture where free speech is stifled, LGBT people can’t come out, pro-gay allies are punished for “promoting” homosexuality, the media is cowed, and a robust smear campaign is relentlessly waged with no opposition.
Incredibly, Bahati plays the imperialist card, arguing Americans should stay out of his nation’s business, even as he hypocritically does the bidding for American evangelicals that made his career.
In the name of God, these thugs and theocrats are playing God with the lives of LGBT people across the globe. The only Family these tyrants remind me of is The Sopranos – except they are more sadistic. It is time civilized people stand up to such Bible-based barbarism before it is too late. A good place to start is at The National Prayer Breakfast.
The September 2010 issue of Harper’s features a chapter-length excerpt from Jeff Sharlet’s upcoming book, C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat to American Democracy. A subscription or newsstand purchase required to read the full article, which is a must-read; what follows is an overview. C Street will be released on September 27.
For more than a year, Sharlet has warned of a secretive Christian fundamentalist group known as “The Family” or “The Fellowship,” which includes several U.S. and African lawmakers and Washington policymakers. Sharlet’s 2009 bestseller The Familydetailed the Family’s 70-year history, its membership’s undemocratic Christianist values, and their cozy relationships with key Washington insiders including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Expanding upon his earlier work, C Street now explores the motives and tactics employed by The Fellowship to turn the nation of Uganda into a test case and beachhead for authoritarian fundamentalist rule that — they hope — can be replicated across Africa and returned to the United States through influential African Anglican and evangelical megachurches.
Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill (or AHB) — still under consideration by Ugandan officials who are Fellowship leaders — calls for up to three years in prison for failure of family member, pastor, doctor, or other peer to report a homosexual; seven years for “promotion” of tolerance; life imprisonment for a single homosexual act; and for same-gender sex while HIV positive, same-gender sex with a disabled person, or, if you’re a recidivist, gay sex with anyone — marking the criminal as a “serial offender” — death.
The bill was launched after Exodus International board member Don Schmierer, U.S. ex-gay activist Scott Lively, and former PFOX president Richard Cohen’s protégé Caleb Lee Brundidge keynoted a March 2009 conference which collectively declared gay people to be pedophiles responsible for some of history’s great holocausts. The speakers agreed that Uganda (which already subjected LGBT people to life imprisonment) was too permissive and that tougher action was needed. Lively, in particular, was enthusiastic about the opportunity to force Ugandans into ex-gay brainwashing programs as the only alternative to execution.
The conference and the ensuing actions by Ugandan Fellowship leaders reflected a shift in tactics. Previously, African evangelicals collected millions of dollars from the U.S. State Department in supposed HIV/AIDS-prevention funds and then spent that taxpayer money on efforts to cut off Ugandans’ access to condoms, promote abstinence outside of marriage, and exclude sexual and religious minorities from Christian-run outreach programs.
Now, through the AHB, these political and religious leaders would use ongoing U.S. aid to openly foment ethnic cleansing. The United States would cooperate. Why? Because America has long needed Uganda as a base from which to secure American industrial interests, fight terror groups across the African continent, stabilize the oil- and mineral-rich territories of central Africa, and win African popular support through food, ecomomic, and cultural aid.
U.S. evangelicals have understood and exploited the importance of U.S.-Uganda ties for decades. As Sharlet notes:
The Family has poured millions into “leadership development” there, more than it has invested in any other foreign country, and billions in U.S. foreign aid have flowed into Ugandan coffers since a Family leader turned on the tap twenty-four years ago for President Yoweri Museveni, a dictator hailed by the West for his democratic rhetoric and by Christian conservatives for the evangelical zeal of his regime. …
Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, former attorney general John Ashcroft—both longtime Family men and outspoken antigay activists—and Pastor Rick Warren, are a frequent attraction at the Ugandan Fellowship’s weekly meetings. “He said homosexuality is a sin and that we should fight it,” Bahati recalled of Warren’s visits.
Inhofe and Warren, like most American fundamentalists, came out in muted opposition to Uganda’s gay death penalty, but they didn’t dispute the motive behind it: the eradication of homosexuality.
They may disagree on the means, favoring a “cure” rather than killing, but not the ends.
Decades of cultural and religious exchange have corrupted Uganda’s Christian churches, turning them into outposts of American fundamentalism.
Ugandan evangelicals sing American songs and listen to sermons about American problems, often from American preachers. Ugandan politicians attend prayer breakfasts in America and cut deals with evangelical American businessmen. American evangelicals, in turn, hold up Ugandan congregations as role models for their own, and point to Ugandan AIDS policy—from which American evangelicals nearly stripped condom distribution altogether—as proof that public health problems can be solved by moral remedies. It is a classic fundamentalist maneuver: move a fight you can’t win in the center to the margins, then broadcast the results back home.
The Fellowship may have overplayed its genocidal intentions — because of overwhelming international protest, the Anti-Homosexuality Bill is on hold. Some influential Ugandan leaders oppose the bill — but for the wrong reasons.
The closet, former ethics minister Miria Matembe believed, was a fine African tradition. That made her a liberal; she didn’t want to kill gays.
Her real problem with the bill, she said, “is it makes us all potential criminals.” She’d have twenty-four hours to report me or face a prison sentence of up to three years.
This, she thought, was unfair. To her.
“The Prayer Breakfast continues, but I no longer go to it. They were corrupted. It is the Americans! Confused as usual, exploiting.”
Sanctified brutality is difficult for ex-gay activists in the United States to perpetrate. But the African continent’s counterparts to Exodus International roam free: Corrective rape remains common. After a conservative Christian pastor and congregation correctively raped Victor Juliet Mukasa to make this transgender man “female,” the police blamed Mukasa. He and friend Yvonne Oyoo successfully defended themselves against police violation of due process — so Ugandan fundamentalists sought to change Uganda’s laws so that there would be no due process. They invited Scott Lively to numerous conferences, and drafted the AHB with the colonial concerns of their U.S. fundamentalist allies in mind. The language of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill declared itself a model not just for Ugandans, but also for other nations.
Sharlet explores certain disagreements within Uganda’s antigay movement.
One camp within the antigay movement, led by Pentecostal Pastor Michael Kyazze, argues that Ugandans must admit that homosexuality is an internal Ugandan problem. Martin Ssempa, Kyazze’s friend, had a different perspective, that U.S. and Europe are under the control of the homosexual. Ssempa had received $90K in U.S. PEPFAR aid and was guest of honor at Saddleback Church in 2005 and 2006.
According to Kyazze, homosexual predators recruit Ugandans through the use of iPods, laptops, cell phones — and UNICEF. His supposed proof: a 2002 UNICEF pamphlet, “the Teenagers Toolkit,” which referred to homosexuality as natural. Kyazze says the AHB is too lenient because it protects victims of same-sex rape from media exposure. But his objections may rest more upon religious favoritism than stereotypes about rape: While Kyazze is a pentecostal, his rivals MP David Bahati and ethics minister James Buturo are Anglican.
Ssempa has initiated antigay pogroms more than once. And before Ssempa, Ugandan dictator Idi Amin murdered hundreds of thousands of his countrymen in the 1970s.
In the 1980s, a war between dictator Milton Obote and [current president Yoweri] Museveni’s bush army killed hundreds of thousands more. Museveni, once in power, was different. He disposed of his enemies through “accidents” and frame-ups, not massacres. He wasn’t a kleptocrat, but he surrounded himself with thieves—on the theory, apparently, that rich men are peaceful men. Still, he is a dictator, and dictators need enemies. For years, the enemy was a vicious rebel group called the Lord’s Resistance Army, but the LRA has been reduced to a few hundred child fi ghters. Enter the homosexual: singular, an archetype—a bogeyman.
The nation, it seems, has not yet purged itself of barbaric tendencies.
David Bahati’s training in U.S.-style theocracy, political campaigning, and ethnic cleansing began in 2004 at The Leadership Institute in Arlington, Va., where he was invited to the Family’s headquarters and coached to seek out the Ugandan branch of The Fellowship when he returned to Uganda.
To him, homosexuality is only a symptom of what he learned from the Family to be a greater plague: government by people, not by God. The burden is on you, David, his American friends told him. Inhofe’s staff had sent word, he said, and there were others— about half a dozen American leaders who supported his cause. …
There was still hope for Africa. God would use the weak to teach the strong, a Bahati to send a message to America.
Like its siblings among the Christian Right, the Family coaches its members to be spiritual egotists on a messianic mission to impose their will upon ex-democracies, using selective words from the Bible.
Five words, actually, Isaiah 6:8, illuminated for Bahati by Jesus: “Here am I; send me.”
Smartly divorced, that is, from what follows, just two verses later:
Then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, / Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, / And the houses without man, / And the land be utterly desolate, / And the lord have removed men far away, / And there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land.
Sharlet quotes Bahati and a pastor ally saying that Fellowship groups in the governments of countries across the continent — Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Zambia, Congo — have requested copies of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill.
In February, a brave gay Ugandan man living in exile appeared at the National Press Club in Washington with a paper bag over his head to denounce Uganda’s draconian Anti-Homosexuality Bill. He wore the mask to conceal his identity because he feared for his life.
Today, Kushaba Moses Mworeko took off his mask to urge the African Anglican Bishops at the All African Bishops Conference in Entebbe to speak out against Uganda’s “Kill the Gays Bill” and other forms of anti-gay discrimination on the continent.
“It is time for Christian leaders in Africa to start promoting peace and stop persecuting LGBT people,” said Kushaba Moses Mworeko, who recently escaped to the United States. “I call on the Anglican Church to speak out forcefully against the Anti-Homosexuality Bill and to support decriminalizing gay relationships across the continent. As the church grows in Africa it must choose to be a force for good and not intolerance.”
Speakers claimed that the continent would have 673 million Christians by 2025 and lead Christendom in the 21st century. Egyptian Bishop Mouneer Anis spoke of the significance of this meeting when he told bishops from more than 400 dioceses, “There is no doubt that history is going to record what happens at this conference for future generations. This is no ordinary conference because it’s happening in an extraordinary context.”
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, (pictured) spoke at the event, but has yet to effectively use his bully pulpit to shape a more accepting environment towards LGBT people in Africa.
“The All African Bishops Conference offers Rowan Williams a unique opportunity to show leadership and moral clarity by denouncing Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Bill,” said Mworeko. “I urge the Archbishop of Canterbury to display a backbone and set a positive tone for the Anglican Church in Africa. His silence will be seen as a green light for the witch hunts against the LGBT community to continue.”
In a new Youtube video, Mworeko sent a message of perseverance and hope to his LGBT brothers and sisters still living in Uganda.
“We shall continue fighting for our rights and the time to fight is now,” said Mworeko. “This is about liberty, this is about equality, this is about justice. We are here to reclaim our freedom.”
“If Moses has the courage to put his life at risk by speaking out against intolerance and injustice, the least Rowan Williams can do is acknowledge the inhumanity of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill while he is at this conference,” said Truth Wins Out’s Executive Director Wayne Besen. “His noticeable indifference to the suffering of LGBT people in Africa and worldwide is a great stain on his shrinking legacy. Only by finding his voice on LGBT issues can Williams reverse the damage that has occurred on his watch.”
Truth Wins Out is a non-profit organization that fights anti-gay religious extremism. TWO’s goal is to create a world where lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people can live openly, honestly and true to themselves.
The latest lying Lothario is Rep. Mark Souder (R-Ind.) who announced that he would resign from Congress because he had an affair with a woman on his staff. Rep. Souder had received a zero on every single Human Rights Campaign scorecard since entering Congress in 1995. He has consistently voted against employment protections, hate crime laws, increases in HIV/AIDS funding and providing equality to same-sex couples.
Clearly, the state of the GOP Family Values fraud is such, that Republican leaders were probably relieved that Souder’ sinful shenanigans were with a woman – not an undercover cop in a bathroom stall (Sen. Larry Craig) or with male congressional pages (Rep. Mark Foley).
Like most sexual scandals, there was an element of tragic comedy. In November 2009, Souder’ mistress, Tracy Jackson, interviewed Souder for a video on abstinence.
“You’ve been a longtime advocate for abstinence education and in 2006 you had your staff conduct a report entitled ‘Abstinence and its Critics’ which discredits many claims purveyed by those who oppose abstinence education,” Jackson said as she introduced Souder.
Technically, there was no hypocrisy in this instance, because Souder believes in abstinence before marriage — and he was clearly married at the time he and Jackson put in a little overtime protecting the morals of taxpayers.
However, there was quite a bit of duplicity in Souder’ rabid and reactionary opposition to LGBT equality. For example, he opposed the Domestic Partnership Benefits and Obligations Act, which would give federal employees in gay relationships access to health benefits. In voting against the bill Souder told the Federal Times, ”I am against taxpayer funding for these benefits because it is totally inconsistent with the belief that marriage should be one man and one woman.”
Social conservatives would do themselves a huge favor if they edited their marriage creed to, “one man, one woman and one mistress.” Although, it is doubtful even this amendment would sate their voracious sexual appetites. One just has to consider the outrageous behavior of Gov. Mark “Appalachian Trail” Sanford (R-S.C.) and Sen. John “I slept with my best friend’ wife” Ensign (R-NV) to realize that conservative politicians are as addicted to extramarital porking as they are in procuring big government pork.
The most predictable part of the salacious Souder scandal is his attempt to blame unnamed political opponents for exploiting his tryst.
“I sinned against God, my wife and my family by having a mutual relationship with a part-time member of my staff,” Souder said. “In the poisonous environment of Washington, D.C., any personal failing is seized upon and twisted for political gain. I am resigning rather than put my family through a painful drawn out process.”
Souder is clearly confused. The only thing that was likely “twisted” was the bed sheet used during his extramarital affair. The congressman seems blithely unaware that it was opportunistic puritanical phonies — such as he — that are responsible for creating the toxic environment in Washington that he now ironically bemoans.
It was right wing ideologues looking to mine conservative churches for votes and money that made “protecting” the family a matter of United States policy. They launched a destructive culture war and divisive debate, even as they behaved like whores who fornicate. Yet, the money-grubbing morality machine soldiers on — blaming everyone and everything but the shallowness and emptiness of their wanton worldview.
A perfect example of deflecting blame came from The Liberty Counsel’ Matt Staver who suggested outside forces were out to get anti-gay researcher George Rekers, who got nabbed with a male hustler he met on Rentboy.com.
“I think that it’s the classic [tactic], ‘If you can’t destroy the message, you destroy the messenger,’ … and I think this is a personal attack (on Rekers) designed to cast aspersions on his character and reputation,” Staver said.
Is Staver suggesting that a gay organization or mischievous LGBT activist sent Rekers to RentBoy.com? Furthermore, isn’t the alleged rectitude and righteousness of these holier-than-thou messengers a key part of the moralistic message?
Miami Herald columnist Daniel Shoer Roth said it best this week when he wrote, “When these cases come to light, it is a victory for the public, because you open your eyes to the veiled nature of these two-faced individuals. And, hopefully, you will better appreciate those who are honest with themselves and others.”
Right wing activists and politicians have no one to blame for their troubles but themselves. People would not care one bit about their tawdry affairs if they had not made “family values” a central part of the affairs of state.
For more than 50 years, the National Prayer Breakfast has served as a prime networking event in Washington, bringing together the president, members of Congress, foreign diplomats and thousands of religious, business and military leaders for scrambled eggs and supplication.
Usually, the annual event passes with little notice. But this year, an ethics group in Washington has asked President Obama and Congressional leaders to stay away from the breakfast, on Thursday. Religious and gay rights groups have organized competing prayer events in 17 cities, and protesters are picketing in Washington and Boston.
The objections are focused on the sponsor of the breakfast, a secretive evangelical Christian network called The Fellowship, also known as The Family, and accusations that it has ties to legislation in Uganda that calls for the imprisonment and execution of homosexuals.
The Family has always stayed intentionally in the background, according to those who have written about it. In the last year, however, it was identified as the sponsor of a residence on Capitol Hill that has served as a dormitory and meeting place for a cluster of politicians who ran into ethics problems, including Senator John Ensign, Republican of Nevada, and Gov. Mark Sanford, Republican of South Carolina, both of whom have admitted to adultery.
More recently, it became public that the Family also has close ties to the Ugandan politician who has sponsored the proposed anti-gay legislation.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a government watchdog group, sent a letter this week to the president and Congressional leaders urging them to skip the prayer breakfast. They have also called on C-Span not to televise it this year.
Melanie Sloan, executive director of the ethics group, said: “It is a combination of the intolerance of the organization’ views, and the secrecy surrounding the organization. It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be allowed to hold their breakfast; of course they should. The question is, Should American officials be lending legitimacy to it, giving their imprimatur by showing up.”
The Family has no identifiable Internet site, no office number and no official spokesman. J. Robert Hunter, a member who has spoken publicly about the group, said that it was unfair to blame the Family for the anti-gay legislation introduced by David Bahati. Mr. Hunter said that about 30 Family members, all Americans, active in Africa recently conveyed their dismay about the legislation to Ugandan politicians, including Mr. Bahati.
Mr. Hunter said the recent controversies had prompted a debate within the group about its lack of transparency. “I and quite a few others are saying we should be much more open,” he said.
Jeff Sharlet, author of “The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power” (Harper Perennial, 2009) said in a telephone interview, “Here’ an organization that, in the past, has not acknowledged its own existence.”
“It’ not a sinister plot. This is their theological stance,” said Mr. Sharlet, who infiltrated the group to do research for his book. “Their leader, Doug Coe, says that the more invisible you can make your organization, the more influence it will have.”
A White House official said that Mr. Obama, like each president since Dwight D. Eisenhower, planned to attend the breakfast. Michelle Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and other cabinet members will also attend. The president will deliver remarks about “the importance of an openness to compromise,” the official said.
The official also said that the president and the State Department had spoken out strongly against the legislation in Uganda.
The breakfast, which usually features a prominent keynote speaker (past ones have included Bono, Mother Teresa and former Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain), is only the most visible in several days of gatherings where the Family’ networking takes place in smaller groups. There are separate meetings for African politicians, military leaders, business people and media professionals, to name a few.
Many states also have prayer breakfasts this week, which may appear to be government-sponsored but are also mostly affiliated with the Family.
Liberal members of the clergy and gay rights leaders organized the alternative events in haste this year, calling theirs the American Prayer Hour. The will convene at places like Calvary Baptist Church in Washington; Glendale City Seventh-day Adventist Church in California; the bishop’ chapel of the Episcopal Diocese of Western New York, in Rochester; and Covenant Community Church in Center Point, Ala.
Wayne Besen, executive director of Truth Wins Out, a gay rights group, said he initiated the prayer-hour idea because many religious Americans who attend the breakfasts have no idea about the connection to the Family and the anti-gay legislation.
“They have symbolically taken the mantle of religion,” Mr. Besen said, “and I think it’ time to take it back. And the American Prayer Hour is a step in that direction.”
(Moses, pictured left, is a gay Ugandan seeking asylum in the U.S. who had to hide his face at today’s press conference. He feared persecution and even violence if his identity were known.)
Religious Leaders Urge America’ Leaders to Speak Out Against Event’s Connection to Abhorrent Ugandan “Anti-Homosexuality Bill”
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Key religious leaders held a press conference this morning at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. to announce the formation of The American Prayer Hour, a multi-city event to be held in two days on February 4, 2010, with key events in Washington, D.C., Dallas, Chicago and Berkeley and to call on organizers of the National Prayer Breakfast, Members of Congress attending and the President to use the opportunity to send a clear, unified message against the horrendous Ugandan “Anti-Homosexuality Bill”.
The American Prayer Hour was announced as an alternative to the National Prayer Breakfast which is sponsored by The Family (aka The Fellowship), a group with disturbing ties to those spearheading Uganda’ oppressive “Anti-Homosexuality Bill.” The Bill proposed by Parliament Member, David Bahati, adds an array of criminal punishments for gay people‚Äîincluding the death penalty.
Harry Knox, Director of Religion and Faith for the Human Rights Campaign,(pictured left) opened the press conference and said, “Tax documents from The Family show millions of dollars have gone into programs run by David Bahati, Ugandan Parliament Member who wrote the anti-gay legislation for Uganda. With that kind of influence, we call on the head of The Family, Doug Coe, to publicly speak out against the proposed anti-gay bill in Uganda. Our nation’ public officials, religious leaders and civil and human rights champions must speak with one, clear voice that the proposed execution of a group of people for no other reason than because of their sexuality is immoral and will not be tolerated or condoned through silence. Members of Congress and other elected officials attending this event cannot turn a blind eye to the obligation they have to speak out against such inhumane proposals such as the legislation being proposed in Uganda.”
Metropolitan Community Church pastor, the Rev. Elder Darlene Garner, (pictured) said, “MCC is an international denomination at work in dozens of countries so we know firsthand that hatred of gay people is not limited to Uganda. Sadly, conservative groups like The Family continue to spread lies and foment rejection of people based on perceived or real differences in sexual orientation and gender identity. In the name of protecting families, they tell parents to reject their sons and daughters. Implicitly they ask families to imprison their own people and inflict the death penalty on them, whether on the streets or in the jails.”
Moses, a gay Ugandan man seeking asylum in The United States said, “It breaks my heart that I have to leave my family and loved ones to seek asylum in this country simply because I am gay. Even as I speak, gay people a are being persecuted as a result of this proposed law against gay people. I can only imagine how bad it will be if the bill is actually passes.”
Bishop Gene Robinson, (pictured left) the first openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church said, “I spent time in Uganda to help set up HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment programs many years ago. Ugandans are a generous and hospitable people. But because of an unholy alliance between conservative religious groups in this country and anti-gay forces overseas Ugandans are turning on their own Ugandan sons and daughters who happen to be gay. This proposed law is a threat to LGBT people in Uganda and everywhere. Around 35% of Ugandans are Anglican and 45% are Catholic. Although many faith leaders have stood by silently, today we speak out on behalf of the marginalized. Faith leaders of all traditions should speak out for the most vulnerable in Uganda before it’ too late.”
Bishop Carlton Pearson, (left, with collar) interim senior pastor at Chicago’ Christ Universal Temple said, “As a straight ally, gay and transgender people come to me and say “thank you for speaking out.’ In Uganda, gay and transgender people cannot even say “thank you.’ They are being silenced by the threat of imprisonment and death. In the yawning silence, we must speak and we must pray. Both religious and political leaders must pray for gay people in Uganda and stop preying on them.”
Frank Schaeffer, (pictured left) son of pre-eminent conservative theologian, Francis Schaeffer said, “As a person who was raised in the heart of conservative Christianity, it took me years to realize that anti-gay beliefs are wrong and not inherent to Christianity. Today, fundamentalists are exporting anti-gay beliefs because fewer and fewer people here believe the lies. It’ time to stop using gay people as political pawns and understand that we are all children of God.”
Barry Lynn, Executive Director of Americans for Separation of Church (pictured below) said, “We are heartened to note that Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, and the State Department, under President Obama’ direction, have been actively working against the proposed anti-gay law in Uganda. These efforts have led Ugandan President Museveni and MP David Bahati to signal that they are considering changes to the legislation. But, now is not the time to ease up the pressure but to continue to push for full decriminalization of gay and transgender people. We ask that President Obama to take the lead on human rights for everyone, everywhere, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.”
Bruce Wilson of Talk To Action – a veteran watchdog of the Christian Right — has created a very short documentary called “Transforming Uganda.”
Please share the video with friends or colleagues, and spread the word that the Uganda antigay genocide legislation is not an isolated incident. In fact, the “transformational” movement is working underground in several cities in America.
ekly Column)
The situation intensified in 2009 when two “ex-gay” activists joined holocaust revisionist Scott Lively at a conference in Kampala to discuss the evils of homosexuality. Two weeks after the conference, Lively bragged that he had delivered a “nuclear bomb against the gay agenda in Uganda.” This was followed by the introduction of the harsh Anti-Homosexuality Bill and Uganda’s Rolling Stone tabloid (no relation to the American magazine) publishing Kato’s picture alongside other gay activists with the call to hang them.
(Weekly Column)
For more than a year, Sharlet has warned of a secretive Christian fundamentalist group known as “The Family” or “The Fellowship,” which includes several U.S. and African lawmakers and Washington policymakers. Sharlet’s 2009 bestseller 
Speakers claimed
We are fast approaching the point where it will only be news if an outspoken Christian conservative politician isn’t cheating on his or her spouse. The extramarital humping from the self-righteous Bible-thumping is becoming clich?© with the scandals happening almost by the day.
The American Prayer Hour was announced as an alternative to the National Prayer Breakfast which is sponsored by The Family (aka The Fellowship), a group with disturbing ties to those spearheading Uganda’ oppressive “Anti-Homosexuality Bill.” The Bill proposed by Parliament Member, David Bahati, adds an array of criminal punishments for gay people‚Äîincluding the death penalty.
other elected officials attending this event cannot turn a blind eye to the obligation they have to speak out against such inhumane proposals such as the legislation being proposed in Uganda.”
oses, a gay Ugandan man seeking asylum in The United States said, “It breaks my heart that I have to leave my family and loved ones to seek asylum in this country simply because I am gay. Even as I speak, gay people a are being persecuted as a result of this proposed law against gay people. I can only imagine how bad it will be if the bill is actually passes.”
wn Ugandan sons and daughters who happen to be gay. This proposed law is a threat to LGBT people in Uganda and everywhere. Around 35% of Ugandans are Anglican and 45% are Catholic. Although many faith leaders have stood by silently, today we speak out on behalf of the marginalized. Faith leaders of all traditions should speak out for the most vulnerable in Uganda before it’ too late.”
Frank Schaeffer, (pictured left) son of pre-eminent conservative theologian, Francis Schaeffer said, “As a person who was raised in the heart of conservative Christianity, it took me years to realize that anti-gay beliefs are wrong and not inherent to Christianity. Today, fundamentalists are exporting anti-gay beliefs because fewer and fewer people here believe the lies. It’ time to stop using gay people as political pawns and understand that we are all children of God.”
