Don't call it a flip-flop, apparently the MSM got this one wrong. I also erred, reporting in this post, that unlike Pastor Rick Warren, the Rev. Joe Lowry, who will give the benediction at Barack Obama's swearing in, is a supporter of gay marriage. Well color me corrected. On MSNBC's "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue," Rev. Lowry went to great pains to disabuse David Shuster of the notion that he supports gay marriage. "I'm for civil unions," said Lowry, but he said his religious convictions would cause him to eschew the "marriage" thing. Watch:
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So, was Lowry's supposed support for gay marriage a case of wishful thinking (or editorial bookmarking) on the part of liberals and members of the media, an urban legend that got out of hand, or did Lowry commit a "flip flop," as some gay marriage supporters claim? Or does it even matter at this point? (An interesting sidebar: Lowry's selection hasn't gotten nearly enough ink, particularly since he's also the guy who condemned the Iraq war at Coretta Scott King's funeral, with George W. Bush sitting on the dais...)
Lowry's supposed support for gay marriage apparently rests on a speech he gave to fellow Methodists some years ago, and the following statement he made in 2004 to ABC News:
When you talk about the law discriminating, the law granting a privilege here, and a right here and denying it there, that's a civil rights issue. And I can't take that away from anybody.
That statement is interesting, in that nowhere in it, does Lowry state that he favors gay marriage. I think perhaps the media, in this case USA Today's Faith and Reason blog, and ABC, were looking for ideological bookends where none existed. I fault myself for not being more skeptical. As someone who grew up Methodist myself, and knowing the religion to posess the mildest of manners, and a long tradition of tolerance, I can tell you that despite that, Methodists read Leviticus in exactly the same manner as other Christians...
By the way, did Rachel Maddow jump the shark tonight with her big build-up to a supposed "gotcha" on Rick Warren over this 20-minute self-defense video on the Saddleback Church website? Maddow portrayed the extemporaneous video as damning, in the Jeremiah Wright at the National Press Club sense, but the clips she played were, charitably, run of the mill. No bombshells. Nothing incendiary. And if the clips she played represented the "worst" of Warren's "screed," as Maddow called it, then it's a sleepy screed indeed. I'm starting to remember why I didn't enjoy Rachel's radio show when it was on down here. Sometimes, activist journalism can be interesting. Other times, not so much.
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Labels: Christian right, christians, evangelicals, gay marriage, gays, inauguration, Methodists, President Barack Obama, religion, Rev. Joseph Lowry, Rick Warren, the base |
