December 22, 2008

Rick Warren Flap: Defining Divinity Down

I can’t believe I’m back commenting on the gay movement and their obnoxious culture wars. I had other windmills at which to tilt this week – but every time I think I’m out, they pull me back in!

This time it’s the mega-stink being raised over mega-pol Barack Obama’s invitation for Rick Warren, mega-church pastor – not to mention mega-hit author, mega-relief advocate for AIDS and poverty and mega-debate moderator – to give the invocation at the mega-Inaugural.

Take this nugget from the gay advocacy group Human Rights Campaign (please): “It is difficult to comprehend how our president-elect, who has been so spot on in nearly every political move and gesture, could fail to grasp the symbolism of inviting an anti-gay theologian to deliver his inaugural invocation.”

Pipes in People for the American Way: “(T)he sad truth is that this decision further elevates someone who has in recent weeks actively promoted legalized discrimination and denigrated the lives and relationships of millions of Americans.”

And the two cents worth (thanks to inflation) of Chuck Currie, minister at Portland, Oregon’s Parkrose Community United Church of Christ: “(Warren’s) position on social issues like gay rights, stem cell research and women's rights are all out of the mainstream . . .”

Earth to space cadets: Buy a clue. More than 23,000 people attend Warren’s church each and every week. Both major presidential candidates agreed to participate in a forum he moderated, and 3 million viewers watched it on Fox News alone on a Saturday night in the middle of the summer. Around 30,000 congregations and organizations have participated in 40-day Purpose Driven Life programs based on Warren’s book. And Americans have gobbled up some 30 million copies of that tome, making it one of the bestsellers of all time. 

Yo, if that ain’t mainstream, tell me what is. Surely not the gay movement, which is 0-for-everywhere on votes banning same-sex marriage – almost always by huge margins.

Nevertheless, I did a search of “Obama defends Warren” the other day. And found stories with those terms on the Associated Press wire and National Public Radio as well as in USA Today, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Sun-Times, the San Jose Mercury News and the Miami Herald. Somehow it missed the Weekly Reader.

It says a heck of a lot about our country – and none of it good – when a politician has to defend any association with a pastor holding legitimate, traditional and yes, mainstream views of the Bible.

The late, respected sociologist and Democratic Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan once maintained in a famous article that America was “defining deviancy down” through its increasing acceptance of “alternative family structures” (i.e., single parenthood) and “unprecedented levels of violent crime.” It’s not exactly a stretch to extend the concept to homosexuality and what radio host Laura Ingraham has labeled the “pornification” of America.

And now, America is defining divinity down – not just our definition of God, but our view of those who represent him.

It’s nothing new, of course. Loving Christ in the First Century could mean becoming lion chow, and it’s still hazardous duty in much of the globe. Darrow v. Bryan inspired the over-the-top inventions of Inherit the Wind. It’s been nearly two generations now since God was tossed out of the schools.

Yet never have elements outside the church so boldly attempted to dictate the boundaries of acceptable – read “politically correct” – preaching, doctrine and practice here in the good ol’ US of A. Fundamentalist pastors and leaders? “Ayatollahs of intolerance” (said a guy on our side). No proselytizing to Jews and Catholics. Stop “defaming” Islam. Cut out that praying in Jesus’s name. And preaching against homosexuality and even ordination of gays? That’s homophobia and hate speech! (By the way, the term “homophobia” is the true hate speech, implying that holding to principled, traditional Bible-based positions equates to mental illness.)

All to the point where even gentle, loving, tolerant, PC AIDS relief champion Warren has been transformed to Louis Farrakhan in a Hawaiian shirt.

But methinks that this time – fresh from their militant demonstrations, boycotts, violence, vandalism and public show trials of Prop 8 appointments – the gay movement doth protest too much. And Sleek Barry doth defend altogether too defensively a beloved pastor 25 million Americans have invited into their daily lives.

Mr. President-elect, some free advice: Remember how quickly “don’t ask, don’t tell” slid Slick Willie off his pedestal. You just could be defining your presidency down.