One might have thought that Barack Obama’s plan to expand George W. Bush’s Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives would be music to the ears of Family Research Council Action, the main inside-the-beltway Christian Right advocacy outfit. Carving out a big role for religion in the public square is a major priority for the organization and the movement, right up there with battling abortion rights and gay rights.
But FRC Action is throwing cold water on Obama’s expanded vision for faith-based initiatives in an e-briefing:
… [Obama] said that church and religious organizations should play a bigger role in meeting our country’s social needs. He would even support the right of federally-funded programs “to hire and fire based on faith.” Of course, this statement stands in stark contrast to his policy position on ENDA (the Employment Non-Discrimination Act), which would trample on the religious and moral convictions of employers, including non-profits and certain church ministries. Nevertheless, Obama’s camp insists that their candidate will “elevate” the program to the “moral center” of his administration. It sounds appealing, but what exactly would a faith-based initiative under Obama look like? His latest statements on the California marriage amendment over the weekend provide a frightening glimpse. In a less-than-public letter to a Sunday breakfast of the LGBT Democratic Club in San Francisco, he scorned man-woman marriage, saying , “…I oppose the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution [to protect marriage], and similar efforts to amend the U.S. Constitution or those of any other states.” While telling the world he will up hold the faith-based initiative as the cornerstone of his administration, Obama says that a cornerstone of society – heterosexual marriage — is “divisive and discriminatory.” Doesn’t this mean that faith-based organizations that support marriage will be disqualified from federal funding under an Obama presidency? It would be next to impossible for ministries that promote traditional marriage to participate in a Healthy Marriage project funded through an Obama faith-based initiative. There is no doubt that Sen. Obama is polished on the issue of faith, but it’s his record–not his rhetoric–that speaks louder.
God-o-Meter is interested to learn what portion of the money from President Bush’s office of faith-based initiatives is currently going to programs focused on promoting one- man, one-woman marriage and will try to find out. In the meantime, the Family Research Council Action briefing goes on to beg John McCain to raise his voice in opposition to gay marriage:
Gaps like this leave Senator McCain with a huge opening: as with his letter last week supporting the marriage amendment in California, McCain can send message after message that his definition of faith is traditional and strong, not the High Church of Secular Liberalism that believes in a “faith-based” way to destroy marriage and family.
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posted July 2, 2008 at 12:08 pm
More mendacious and distorting rhetoric from the Family Research Council. Obama has made a good-faith effort to build on the Faith Based initiatives and the FRC, never missing a chance to show it’s partisanship, can only find problems with it. If they were truly interested in advancing the cause for Christianity, they would welcome this effort by the Obama campaign.
posted July 2, 2008 at 12:55 pm
McCain, Obama and George Bush have similar positions on gay marriage – they oppose it. We can nuance the rhetoric anyway we want, but that’s the fact – research it.
Abortion rate was LOWER during the Clinton admnistration than in the past 7 years of George Bush whom I supported partly because he’s pro-ife. Evangelical leaders and Christian advocacy groups make a dangerous assumption that a Republican candidate is better for people of faith. They’re going to lose us for good if they do not realize that most of their flock prefer Obama to McCain. As was the case with Burress who was first against McCain. After recently meeting with McCain, Burress is now supporting the presumptive GOP nominee and speaking against Obama.
HAS BURRESS MET WITH OBAMA? The answer is an emphatic NO. By being against Obama without meeting with him, he continues to show the same terrible judgment he showed when he criticized McCain without first meeting with him.
posted July 2, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Once more, the Zealots are taking the words of Obama and twisting them to mean the opposite of what was said. Obama supports the constitutional right for California to protect marriage. He opposes the Courts right to invalidate the amendments passed by the people. He has publicly express his rejection of “gay marriage” and the efforts of FRC is a swift boat type PAC and should be ignored and scoffed.
posted July 4, 2008 at 1:23 pm
Your headline connecting the “Family” “Research” council and pooh pooh was prescient and very revealing, Dan.
Pooh pooh accurately sums up the “research” they ‘do’.
Since when is bearing false witness no longer a sin? And how come groups like the FRC, FotF, etc. can get away with it so often and so much?
posted July 6, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Perkins is mendacious to say the least…
Perkins says “he [Obama] scorned man-woman marriage”
Yet Obama does no such thing. He said, “I oppose the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution [to protect marriage], and similar efforts to amend the U.S. Constitution or those of any other states.”
How is that ‘scorning” man-woman marriage? Hetterosexual men and women are still getting married in Massachusetts, California, Canada, Belgium, Spain, the Netherlands, South Africa, etc. now that gays are likewise allowed to marry. No divisive legislation was needed in any of those places to enshrine discrimination into the Constitution.
No one ever says what traditional marriage needs to be “protected” from. Why that?
And Dan, you say, “God-o-Meter is interested to learn what portion of the money from President Bush’s office of faith-based initiatives is currently going to programs focused on promoting one- man, one-woman marriage”.
Two questions arise…
Why do heterosexuals (who already can get married) need the institution “promoted”? (And at gay tax-payers’ expense, no less?)
And why should the faith-based initiatives only “promote” opposite-sex marriages when clearly there are many faiths that perform same-sex marriages? Why the favouritism? Seems heterosexism is alive and kicking here on God-o-Rama. Sad.
posted July 9, 2008 at 11:21 am
No comment Dan? I’m saddened but not surprised.