According to the American Spectator, Focus on the Family founder James Dobson is set to endorse Mike Huckabee for president. The Spectator article says it will happen in Iowa and is sure to help offset Sen. McCain’s endorsement from Sen. Brownback as well as the Giuliani endorsement from Pat Robertson. Expect to see more endorsements from social conservatives as this unfolds.
Month: November 2007
Pat Robertson endorses Giuliani
Christian Broadcasting Network leader Pat Robertson has decided to endorse Rudy Giuliani for president, the Washington Post is reporting.
Rationale?
“I thought it was important for me to make it clear that Rudy Giuliani is more than acceptable to people of faith,” said Robertson. “Given the fractured nature of the process, I thought it was time to solidify around one candidate.”
So it’s official the Christian right is fractured. See the Post article for more, including video.
Christian Post reports on youth attitudes toward homosexuality
Lillian Kwon integrates several lines of reporting to craft an article about trends among youth and attitudes toward homosexuality.
She first notes the Exodus International Allies Too campaign and then quotes Jared Barber from the same article by older brother Matt Barber that I cited in a recent post. Finally, she mentions the research from the Barna group which suggests that youth believe opposition to homosexuality may be out of balance.
Speaking of this tension, Peter LaBarbera posted on his website some of the discussion on the topic from this blog.
Cameron takes his show across the pond
Paul Cameron went to Britain last month to tell about his new research studies of newspaper clippings. The title for this talk was a cheery one: “Homosexuals Account for 29 Percent of Rape and Murder of Kids.” All of that based on reading the paper. Recently, I addressed the problems with his methodology regarding another similar “study” he posted on his new online “journal” (read: website).
Anyway, Peter Ould has an interesting post about the group he spoke to — the Christian Council of Britain. He takes a romp through a history of ideas regarding race and apartheid that are worth considering.
Youth movement: Quit bashing homosexuality
Although this article in the Ventura County Star doesn’t predict a new Jesus Movement, the conditions described seem to be a good foundation for such a prediction. And the information relating to homosexuality should be read by every evangelical leader.
Last night at GCC, I gave a talk to a group called God and the Gay Neighbor. This article dovetails very nicely with that talk and with what I heard from the students. A couple of students asked questions about how to counter activism but mostly, the interest was in how to love.
And then there is there is this column by Matt Barber which includes an excerpt from a paper by his little brother Jared Barber, age 19. This illustrates nicely the type of sentiment described in the polling by the Barna group, noted in the Ventura newspaper piece above.
Jared Barber wrote:
Another problem arises here, though; and it is this: Christians, as a whole, focus too much on the homosexual issue alone. They attack it solely, denounce it, and live whichever way they please. Adultery, fornication, racism, pride, jealousy, selfish ambition, drunkenness; all of these immoral acts take to the background in view of homosexuality, and so we as Christians are set up as anti-gay instead of anti-immorality. We need to end our own hypocrisy, all of us, I as much as any, so that we can more blamelessly broach this subject and others.
And foremost, we must remember that Christ preached one thing above all else: Love. We must love others, with, as [C.S.] Lewis said, “…a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner — no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment.”