This needs to be read and spread

[fpb]

God knows I am no fan of Christopher Hitchens' utterances on Christianity and Christians. But what he says here - http://www.slate.com/id/2207554/ - is simply just and commonsensical. To have Rick Warren attend the swearing-in of the new President, only two years after he all but prostituted himself to one of the worst tyrants in the world (who is also one of America's worst enemies), is to reward immorality and hucksterism of an almost caricatural extreme.

Comments

[mentalguy.livejournal.com]

This is definitely an issue which deserves to be raised; I've forwarded the Slate article to a number of people I know.

At the risk of stating the obvious (or else revealing my cynicism), the president-elect's invitation to Mr. Warren strikes me as rather politically shrewd, precisely because of this kind of thing. Rick Warren is not just a man who has the ear of a large portion of the population that opposes Mr. Obama on certain key issues, but is also one who has demonstrated an extraordinary willingness to grovel before power. I expect that Obama plans to continue to flatter Warren as the Evangelicals' "man at the table", in hope of using Warren to lead them into compromise, or at least to confuse and undermine their opposition. Given the extraordinary political opportunity Warren presents in this regard (highlighted by the amount of political capital Obama has been willing to spend with his own supporters over this invitation), I doubt Warren will get un-invited unless the invitation were to become politically toxic for Evangelicals specifically.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I think it is. However, to judge by the reactions, I do not think the invitation was as shrewd a move as you see it. The interesting thing about the comments to Hitchens' piece is that they all totally neglected what Hitchens had to say and raged about Warren's view of gay marriage. The political gay movement (which is not at all the same thing as the totality of homosexuals) is already embittered at their recent defeat in California, and I think that Obama risks losing much of his left-wing bedrock without getting much by way of compensation. Contrary to left-wing belief, Evangelicals are not sheep who follow wherever their pastors lead them; to the contrary, it is the public that selects the pastor according to thair appreciation of his message. If Warren goes too far in bowing before Obama, he may well find that Obama is the only parishioner he's got left.

[mentalguy.livejournal.com]

Good point. There is also the issue that, even such as he is, Warren may not be willing to compromise as much as Obama hopes.

Shrewd may have been the wrong word; I think the invitation was certainly very deliberate and carefully calculated, but that does not mean Obama's basic assumptions are correct, both with respect to the amount of political capital he actually has to spend, and with respect to Evangelical pliancy.

[mentalguy.livejournal.com]

Incidentally, here is an article with actual audio of Warren.

[wade-scott.livejournal.com]

Yeah...I'm not a fan of Rick Warren. I don't wholeheartedly oppose him, due to the fact he's not much on my radar, but I'm quite wary of anybody who has built themselves up to religious mega-stardom. At that point, I question their motives.

However, I find the fervor over Warren's invocation by the LGBT community interesting when you consider who is giving the benediction: Rev. Dr. Joseph E. Lowery. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_E._Lowery. Lowery is also opposed to gay "marriage," but isn't creating as much of a stir on the same issue. Granted, he seems more moderate, plus he did march with the late Marting Luther King, Jr.

Something I find amusing.

[mentalguy.livejournal.com]

I don't see that there's anything surprising or ironic about it: the reason the LGBT movement doesn't object to Lowery's participation is because he doesn't oppose the aims of the movement in any substantial way. He's willing to put his name to statements like this, even.

As Lowery said in this interview:

I've never said I support gay marriage. I support gay rights, and I support civil unions. Like a whole lot of people, I have some difficulty with the term "gay marriage" because...deeply rooted in my heart and mind, marriage is associated with "man and woman." So I have a little cultural shock with that, but I certainly support civil unions, and that gay partners ought to have all the rights that any other citizens have in this country.