So What If Rick Warren Gives The Invocation?

So what? Who cares?

So what if lesbians and gays worked their asses off to get Obama elected? So what if they saw their rights snatched away in Cali? Is it only the oppressed who have a right to claim themselves victims? And so what if the Obama administration asks Rick Warren to give the invocation. That just proves how tolerant they are. You don't see the NAACP asking David Duke to speak. This just goes to show how inclusive the Obama administration is.

My friends, it was the spirit of comradely love that led Brother Obama to invite Brother Warren to speak for how can we claim ourselves tolerant if we do not reach out to the intolerant? Didn't Emily Pankhurst and the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King break bread with their oppressors, didn't they bow down and dutifully ask their masters if they could possibly be allowed their rights, if it wasn't too much trouble? Wasn't it that same spirit of comradely love that led the Texas Legislature to commend Albert DeSalvo for his unorthodox methods of population control*? Wasn't it that same spirit of shared endevour that led George W Bush to invite Senator John McCain into his Cabinet? If we do not reach out to our enemies, if we do not thank them for the gift of the knife they stuck in our backs, can we really call ourselves tolerant at all?

My friends, Brother Warren's invocation shall be in the name of Jesus and would not Jesus applaud this gesture of inclusivity? Did Jesus not exhort his followers to render all things unto Caesar? Did he not remonstrate politily with the money-changers of the temple but only quietly and when it was convienient to them? It is in that same spirit of inclusion that Brother Warren will offer an invocation calling only on the name of Jesus. The followers of Allah, Buddha, Vishnu, Satan and O'Hare shall be included in their exclusion and is that not the most inclusive state of all? Isn't it more noble to be ranked among society's rejected than among it's approved? That is the message of Brother Warren. His love of his gay brothers and sisters ranks so highly that he accords them such exhalted company!

My friends, may we all wish to show Brother Warren such high regard! May we all yearn for the day when he too shall be rejected, his achievments taken for granted and his humanity ignored. May he live to see a day when he too is placed among the most noble outcasts of society, when he shall break bread with Stormfront and offer the Klan his invocation. May he stand shoulder to shoulder with the holy warriors of NAMBLA for his own right to be rejected, mocked and excluded.

Amen.



* - This is really true

However, as always, context is everything. The bill was introduced to the Texas Lege by Tom Moore, a liberal who wanted to make a point about how little scrutiny his collegues often gave to a bill before voting. The bill commended DeSalvo as "officially recognized by the state of Massachusetts for his noted activities and unconventional techniques involving population control and applied psychology".

Keep it in the churches.

People of faith will always have a role in politics. What I'd like to see rather less of is the use of religion as a justification for policy.

The whole idea of having an "invocation" at the inaugural is wrong.

God would approve of inviting him to watch--but would be against allowing him to run the proceedings. Look how Jesus treated the money changers in the temple. Relgion was sacred. It should not be profaned by Rick Warren. Of course Warren would say the same thing about gays and possibly women when it came to official church events.

Thus, there is a lot to be said for leaving religion out of this secular event.