Thoughts on Rick Warren
So, I’ve been trying to let this brouhaha over Rick Warren giving the invocation at BAM’s inauguration simmer for a little bit. You know, that’s the deal where because Rick Warren is against gay marriage (just like Barack Obama) a lot of BAM followers don’t think he should be allowed to speaking for two minutes.
It stems mainly from Warren’s opposition to Proposition 8 where a majority of Californians voted against it, and the open minded and tolerant progressives who supported it protested the decision by setting the Book of Mormon on fire and beating up old women at protests.
The issue itself, I’ll be honest, I’m indifferent to. I think the catalyst is the word “marriage,” which has always been a religious sacrament. Long before there was a church or state for us to argue aboot, marriage was a religious sacrament. Take away the word “marriage” and substitute it for “civil union” or what have you, I think there’s less of an issue…but maybe that’s just me.
There are two things aboot Warren-gate:
1. BAM said all throughout the campaign that he was going to be “post-partisan” and both those of us on the right and the left thought he was lying. We all thought he was going to turn far-left after the election. When you look at most of his cabinet and the fact that he would upset his open minded and tolerant base by inviting Rick Warren to speak in the first place, turns out he was telling the truth the whole time.
2. I found this quote from Warren to be quite tasty: “I don’t know any church in America that’s done more to help the gay community, particularly with AIDS, than Saddleback. But the hate speech against me is incendiary.”
Mary Katherine Ham expanded on this:
I can’t think of another evangelical leader who would have the gumption to call attacks upon him “incendiary hate speech.” White evangelicals are by definition incapable of being oppressed, according to the liberal definition. They are the haters; hatred is justified. They are not inclusive; exclusion is justified. Warren challenges that idea. After years of acquaintance with his liberal critics, Warren is not afraid to shame them with their own language. It will be interesting to see if other social conservatives take his lead in the future.
This is something that has always driven me insane, because while these open minded and tolerant progressives like to claim to be open minded and tolerant, anytime you disagree with them, their “argument” is:
You’re racist
You’re sexist
You’re a bigot.
You’re on someone’s payroll and/or have been bought off.
You’re too stupid to know any better.
If those are you default arguments. I just don’t have the time to listen to you.
UPDATE: My colleague Tabitha has some thoughts on the matter as well.
UPDATE DEUX: Awww yeah, that’s the stuff…
great thoughts man.