Americans, he said, need to "come together" even when they disagree on social issues. Obama gave a wonderfully Russellian defense of Warren on Thursday at a press conference. Obama reminds me a little bit of Richard Russell Jr., the longtime Senator from Georgia who as historian Robert Caro has noted cultivated a reputation as a thoughtful, tolerant politician even as he defended inequality and segregation for decades. ![]() He did throughout his campaign, one that featured appearances by Donnie McClurkin, a Christian entertainer who preaches that homosexuals can become heterosexuals. He is far too careful and measured a man to say anything about body parts fitting together or marriage being reserved for the nonpedophilic, but all the same, he opposes equality for gay people when it comes to the basic recognition of their relationships. ![]() Obama has proved himself repeatedly to be a very tolerant, very rational-sounding sort of bigot. Gays and lesbians are angry that Barack Obama has honored Warren, but they shouldn't be surprised. Rick Warren may occasionally sound more open-minded than Jerry Falwell, another plump Evangelical who once played a prominent role in U.S. I wish the reporter had asked the next logical follow-up: If gays are like child-sex offenders, shouldn't we incarcerate them? More recently, Warren told Beliefnet that he thinks allowing a gay couple to marry is similar to allowing "a brother and sister to be together and call that marriage." He then helpfully added that he's also "opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that a marriage." The reporter, who may have been a little surprised, asked, "Do you think those are equivalent to gays getting married?" "Oh, I do," Warren immediately answered. (He didn't explain how, but I suspect he thinks praying really hard would do it, as if most of us who grew up gay and evangelical hadn't tried that every night as teenagers.) Homosexuality, Pastor Warren explained in the virtually content-free language of the dogmatist, is "not the natural way." And then he went right for the ick factor, the way middle-school boys do: "Certain body parts are meant to fit together." And when they go to hell, they won't be quite as far down in Satan's pit as other evildoers.īut Warren did have a message of hope for gays: they can magically become heterosexuals. homosexuality is not the worst sin." So gays get to eat sometimes even with Rick Warren! Then they get to die of AIDS possibly under the care of Rick Warren's congregants. His proof? He has dined with gays he has a church "full of people who are caring for gays who are dying of AIDS" he believes that "in the hierarchy of evil. Warren is known as an evangelical focused on fighting poverty and disease, including AIDS in Africa, but he also advocated California Proposition 8, the gay marriage ban passed by voters last month.Follow three years ago, a reporter at Fortune asked Rick Warren, the successful pastor whom the President-elect has asked to pray at his Inauguration, about homosexuality. that we are diverse and noisy and opinionated,” he said. That’s part of the magic of this country. And that’s how it should be, because that’s what America is about. ![]() “During the course of the entire inaugural festivities, there are going to be a wide range of viewpoints that are presented. ![]() The president-elect said on Thursday he held views “absolutely contrary” to Warren on gay rights and abortion and described himself as “a fierce advocate for equality for gay and lesbian Americans.” A gay rights advocate called the pick appalling. Obama chose Rick Warren, the evangelical pastor of the Southern California megachurch Saddleback, to give the invocation when he takes office in January. Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren participates in a panel discussion during the Clinton Global Initiative in New York in this Septemfile photo.
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