Okay, rope-a-dope. I get it.
Oh by the way: yes. I know his perspective quite well. I know all about it, from the inside. So you can drop that bullshit too if you please. Sometimes a position is just fucking wrong, Lib, and no amount of holding hands and singing songs will ever make it right.
Liberal, be patient with me here (I stopped posting in this thread because no one is listening to the other person at this point and no one seems to have any suggestions for anybody who’d have been better than Warren to deliver the unnecessary invocation (even though the question was asked), but I digress):
So, here, are you saying stop getting up in arms, quit whining and quietly let us continue to oppress you, or we’ll really give you a reason to get up in arms, whine and loudly shout oppression over!
I guess I’m just asking because I’m just not seeing how validating someone (anyone) with views like Warren’s,* that come from their religious beliefs, is going to change them over to a more accepting point of view.
- And who tried to backpedal the way he did the other night on Youtube.
I don’t believe in this ‘post partisan’ nonsense that Obama supporters keep on peddling. Maybe Obama should reach out to every Holocaust denier or every KKK head. Then he can win them over with his mystical powers. Bigotry has only ever been won by shaming bigots. By inviting Rick Warren over and having him do the invocation, he is providing cover to Rick Warren’s bigotry. *Why should anyone be ashamed of being bigoted against gays? Even Rick Warren got invited to do Obama’s invocation. * See how that works?
Me? No. I’m saying that your oppression is more likely to end sooner if you take the high road and reach out to some of those among your perceived enemies who are influential enough to bring about the kind of change you seek in a much more timely fashion than you could by continuing to treat them as enemies. I’m saying that it is possible that Rick Warren is approachable and reasonable, despite what some people might say. I’m saying that Obama is doing things the right way for a person whose goal is as I advocate. I said all those things in what you quoted. I think you may be on to something when you say that “no one is listening to the other person”. Look at it this way. What more harm could it do to say, “Okay, Rick, let’s talk about this thing.” The worst he can do is say no. But if he says okay, then you’ve made progress. And isn’t progress what progressives seek?
Count your blessings.
The harm in the gesture, Lib is that he is providing cover to the bigotry in the foolish hope that Rick Warren will eventually become a champion of gay rights which everyone knows will not happen. Rick Warren didn’t use reason in coming up with his position on gays - I don’t see him using reason to get out of it.
That would be true if he did not counter Warren’s bigotry by saying that he believes gay and lesbian Americans specifically should have rights equal to all other Americans — the first US president in my memory to do so. When a person has the moral high ground, his being gracious establishes the fact that his moral ground is indeed higher than that of the person who is the recipient of said grace.
With all due respect, I think that’s pretty much how a four-year-old sees things. Jesus ate dinner openly with whores and tax collectors not to show tolerance of their moral choices, but to show them the fruits of His own better choices. I think Obama understands that sort of ethical model.
Who said anything about reason? It isn’t about reason; it’s about grace. Christians recognize a phenomenon called “conviction”. To change, Warren need only be convicted by the grace Obama has shown.
And that’s straining to see things as a learned theologian would see it.
I’d like to see something somewhere halfway in between that and a four-year-olds point of view – a selection that accomplishes the same thing you wish will happen – in deed and in word.
Someone Obama could have selected to give the invocation who has lead a spiritual life preaching less hate and condemnation and that selection itself a demonstration by Obama’s action that his selection denotes a tent of inclusion is that is the largest possible.
He did that with his benedictory selection.
Because he’s an evil bigot who follows an evil, bigoted religion. Not that it matters much; there is NO valid justification for his attitude.
No, it’s the nature of objective reality. Warren is a threat to gays; gays are not a threat to Warren.
So… Rick Warren. Better or worse than Billy Graham? (1989 Invocation)
William Cannon apparently did Carter’s.
Joel Osteen. Hands down. Jesus as Amway.
Interesting fact: the preacher who did both Reagan’s and Bush I’s inaugural invocations, Rev. Peter Gomes, is gay. He came out in 1991.
Well, then, where do poor gays fall on the spectrum? In other words, relax. Take comfort in Miller’s words. This is simply a gesture.
Hm. But was he hiding it or just liberal?
Seems like a heck of a preacher from the wiki.
I’m kind of not sure about why Warren is in the position he is in. Clearly, he’s got something, if he got this gig after he screwed Obama in the semidebate. So… what is it?
If we can figure out the why, then we can figure out what it means.
For any who are interested, Barack Obama has a brief survey on his campaign website, where they ask some general questions about your level of involvement in the campaign, if you’d be willing to volunteer during his administration, and what issues are most important to you.
So go put in your 2¢ and become part of the solution. Let’s fix this fucking country together, dammit!
You are a threat to humanity. Your desire to exterminate the faithful is mitigated only by your powerless ineptitude. Luckily for us all, you are an impotent hack, for whom sloth is a natural inclination. You are a toothless Chihuahua. A blind sniper. An opinionated skank.
And you are a raving loony.