Conger

‘Disappearing bishop’ to return: CEN 1.20.09 January 20, 2009

First published in The Church of England Newspaper’s Religious Intelligence section.

Barack Obama’s disappearing bishop will reappear on Jan 20, the Presidential Inaugural Committee said in a statement issued Monday, and an edited version of Bishop Gene Robinson’s invocation given at the start of the inaugural festivities on Sunday will be played on “jumbotron” viewers for crowds gathering for the inauguration.

Amidst considerable partisan hoopla the New Hampshire bishop was chosen to give an invocation at the start of the “We are One” concert at the Lincoln Memorial—the opening event for the president’s inauguration which would be broadcast live across the United States on the cable television channel HBO.

However, the live broadcast of the concert did not begin until after Bishop Robinson’s prayer was concluded, while many of those in attendance could not hear the bishop as the public address system was not working properly. In an interview with National Public Radio on Jan 19, Bishop Robinson said he did not know why his invocation was scheduled for 2:25 pm Eastern Time while the concert broadcast was scheduled to commence at 2:30 pm.

Conservative political and religious pundits enjoyed a rare moment of schadenfreude at the New Hampshire bishop’s expense. “God still has a sense of humor,” one pundit noted, while a magazine editor likening the sound and screen blackout of the publicity minded bishop to the lightning strike on York Minster after Bishop David Jenkins’ consecration.

Gay activists were incensed by the slight, however, with bloggers positing a host of reasons for the bishop’s disappearance from the airwaves. However the leader of the Episcopal Church’s gay lobby group, Integrity, the Rev. Susan Russell put a brave face on the farce. “Any disappointment that Bishop Robinson’s powerful opening prayer was not part of the HBO broadcast pales in comparison to the power of his iconic presence at the Lincoln Memorial on this historic occasion,” she said.

Technical glitches were blamed for the sound black out at the Lincoln Memorial, while a schedule mishap was blamed for Bishop Robinson’s absence from the broadcast. On Monday, the Presidential Inaugural Committee took responsibility for the “omission”.

“We regret the error in executing this plan ¬ but are gratified that hundreds of thousands of people who gathered on the mall heard his eloquent prayer for our nation that was a fitting start to our event,” Josh Earnest, a spokesman for the inaugural committee, was quoted as saying.

HBO said that it hopes to include the disappearing bishop in future re-broadcasts of the concert. However, the version available for instant viewing on HBO.com does not carry the invocation.

Inauguration concert cuts Bishop’s comments: CEN 1.19.09 January 19, 2009

First published in the Church of England Newspaper’s Religious Intelligence section.

The Bishop of New Hampshire disappeared from America’s television screens on Sunday as the live broadcast of President-elect Barack Obama’s inaugural festivities omitted the opening prayers of Bishop Gene Robinson.

A long time supporter and active campaigner for President-elect Obama Bishop Robinson had been invited by the Presidential Inaugural Committee to give a prayer at the inaugural concert. The invitation came after activists protested Obama’s selection of Rick Warren to give the invocation at the president’s swearing in ceremony.

The slight of Bishop Robinson—whether accidental or deliberate—will likely enrage those on the left unhappy with the Obama team’s move to the political center. Gay activists had charged the Obama campaign with treachery for having solicited their support during the election, but dumping them once victory was in hand. The selection of Rick Warren was especially galling as the California Baptist had been a vocal supporter of Proposition 8—the state initiative that overturned the California Supreme Court’s legalization of gay marriage.

HBO, a cable network owned by Time-Warner Communications, had been given exclusive broadcast rights to the “We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial”, the Opening Celebration for the 56th Presidential Inaugural held at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

HBO said it would be broadcasting the “event that evening on an open signal, working with all of its distributors to allow Americans across the country” with cable television the opportunity “to join in the Opening Celebration for free.”

The cable network’s press statement said the “Opening Celebration will be a declaration of common purpose and new beginnings. The Sunday afternoon performance will be grounded in history and brought to life with entertainment that relates to the themes that shaped Barack Obama’s campaign and which will be the hallmarks of his administration.”

Calls to HBO’s media office asking why the New Hampshire cleric’s invocation was omitted from the broadcast were not returned as of our going to press. However, complaints from gay activists to HBO over the disappearance of Bishop Robinson were answered with an email saying a technical “glitch” was at fault.

HBO’s glitch was not the only failure that afternoon, as at least one of the large speaker towers at the Lincoln Memorial was turned off for Bishop Robinson’s prayer, prompting chants of “we can’t hear you” from the crowd.

Concert goers reported that while Bishop Robinson could be seen on the “Jumbotron” viewer, he could not be heard by the crowd—estimated at 750,000 by organizers. One person present told CEN that the HBO logo did not appear on the jumbotron until after Bishop Robinson’s prayer was concluded—apparently indicating the prayer as a pre-concert event.

Those close to the front of the podium, including a reporter for Christianity Today, reported the sound system was working around the stage—and privately recorded videos of the invocation were taken, showing that Bishop Robinson did indeed appear that day.

The text of the prayer released by the Bishop’s office reads:

“O God of our many understandings, we pray that you will bless us with tears – tears for a world in which over a billion people exist on less than a dollar a day, where young women in many lands are beaten and raped for wanting an education, and thousands die daily from malnutrition, malaria, and AIDS.

Bless this nation with anger – anger at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people.

Bless us with discomfort at the easy, simplistic answers we’ve preferred to hear from our politicians, instead of the truth about ourselves and our world, which we need to face if we are going to rise to the challenges of the future.

Bless us with patience and the knowledge that none of what ails us will be fixed anytime soon, and the understanding that our new president is a human being, not a messiah.

Bless us with humility, open to understanding that our own needs as a nation must always be balanced with those of the world.

Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance, replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences.

Bless us with compassion and generosity, remembering that every religion’s God judges us by the way we care for the most vulnerable.

And God, we give you thanks for your child, Barack, as he assumes the office of President of the United States.

Give him wisdom beyond his years, inspire him with President Lincoln’s reconciling leadership style, President Kennedy’s ability to enlist our best efforts, and Dr. King’s dream of a nation for all people.

Give him a quiet heart, for our ship of state needs a steady, calm captain.

Give him stirring words; We will need to be inspired and motivated to make the personal and common sacrifices necessary to facing the challenges ahead.

Make him color-blind, reminding him of his own words that under his leadership, there will be neither red nor blue states, but the United States.

Help him remember his own oppression as a minority, drawing on that experience of discrimination, that he might seek to change the lives of those who are still its victims.

Give him strength to find family time and privacy, and help him remember that even though he is president, a father only gets one shot at his daughters’ childhoods.

And please, God, keep him safe. We know we ask too much of our presidents, and we’re asking far too much of this one. We implore you, O good and great God, to keep him safe. Hold him in the palm of your hand, that he might do the work we have called him to do, that he might find joy in this impossible calling, and that in the end, he might lead us as a nation to a place of integrity, prosperity, and peace.

Amen

Obama invites Gene Robinson to pray at Inaugural Celebration: CEN 1.16.09 p 5. January 16, 2009

Barack Obama has moved to blunt criticism from gay activists that he had abandoned their cause once he secured his election as President by inviting the ‘gay’ Bishop of New Hampshire to give an invocation at the start of a musical concert at the Lincoln Memorial on Jan 18.

On Jan 12 the Presidential Inaugural Committee announced that the Rt. Rev. Gene Robinson would give an invocation at the start of “We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial.”

The selection of Bishop Robinson to offer a prayer at one of the outlying events of the inauguration follows the Jan 10 announcement by the Obama team that the leader of the Disciples of Christ, a liberal-leaning denomination with approximately 690,000 members in the United States and Canada, the Rev. Sharon Watkins, had been chosen to preach at the National Prayer Service on Jan 21 at the Washington National Cathedral.

President-elect Obama had come under harsh criticism from gay activists for selecting the Rev Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inauguration ceremony on Jan 20. When the Warren announcement was made last month, Bishop Robinson told the New York Times the news had come as a slap in the face, adding that the God [Mr. Warren is] praying to is not the God that I know.”

In an email posted to an Episcopal Church related blog called The Lead, Bishop Robinson said it would be “an enormous honor to offer prayers for the country and the new president.” Bishop Robinson will offer a brief prayer at the start of a televised two-hour concert featuring performances by hip-hop, R&B, rock, pop and country music starts including Bono, Garth Brooks, Beyonce, Mary J. Blige, Stevie Wonder, Sheryl Crow, Renee Fleming, John Mellencamp, Shakira, Bruce Springsteen, and James Taylor and dramatic readings by actors Jamie Foxx, Queen Latifah and Denzel Washington.

“I am humbled and overjoyed at this invitation, and it will be my great honor to be there representing the Episcopal Church, the people of New Hampshire, and all of us in the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community,” Bishop Robinson said.

A vocal supporter of Senator Obama during the election campaign, on Sept 4 the New Hampshire bishop released a letter calling for Lesbian Gay Bi-Sexual and Transgender voters “put our differences and disappointments aside, and get behind [Barack Obama as] the one candidate who has our interests at heart.”

In an interview with the Boston Globe last year, Bishop Robinson acknowledged his close identification with the “gay movement” in the United States. “As much as I wanted to be known as the good bishop, and not the gay bishop, there’s no escaping,” he said, adding that he would “love just to be a simple country bishop, but that just doesn’t seem to be in the cards.”

Reactions to the Robinson’s invitation by President Obama in the US press have focused more on the President-elect’s skills at populating the pulpits at the various inaugural events with a conservative white Baptist minister, an African American minister active in the Civil Rights movement, a woman minister from a liberal denomination, and the gay bishop of New Hampshire. While rewarding church leaders from his political base with peripheral spots at the inauguration, political analysts view Obama’s choice of the influential conservative Rick Warren to take center stage as a pragmatic move towards America’s political and cultural center.

However, Catholic League president Bill Donohue said the selection of Bishop Robinson was offensive to traditionalist Roman Catholic voters.

“President-elect Barack Obama says he wants to unite Americans, and yet he chooses the most polarizing person in the Episcopal Church, Bishop Gene Robinson, to offer a prayer at one of his inaugural events,” Mr. Donohue said calling the New Hampshire bishop “an embarrassment to rank-and-file Episcopalians” and an anti-Catholic bigot.

The two-hour concert will feature performances by a cross-section of hip-hop, R&B, rock, pop and country music starts including Bono, Garth Brooks, Beyonce, Mary J. Blige, Stevie Wonder, Sheryl Crow, Renee Fleming, John Mellencamp, Shakira, Bruce Springsteen, and James Taylor and dramatic readings by actors Jamie Foxx, Queen Latifah and Denzel Washington.

Gene Robinson breaks ranks and backs Barack Obama for president: CEN 9.12.08 p 6. September 13, 2008

The Bishop of New Hampshire has broken with tradition and endorsed a candidate for political office. In a letter published on “LGBT for Obama,” a website that states it serves as the “lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community’s online campaign to educate voters on John McCain’s anti-gay policies” Bishop Gene Robinson called on all LGBT voters to “put our differences and disappointments aside, and get behind the one candidate who has our interests at heart.”

On Sept 4 Bishop Robinson wrote LGBT voters were “faced with the most stark choice in recent memory, with ramifications for our community like no other. If nothing else convinces you to vote for Barack Obama, surely the likelihood of the next president appointing one, two, or possibly even three Supreme Court justices should do it.”

While endorsing specific issues and or programmes is not uncommon, lending the support of the episcopal office to a single candidate is uncommon. It also skirts US tax laws, as clergy or church endorsements are prohibited by a 1954 amendment to the Internal Revenue Code. Nonprofit, tax-exempt entities may not “participate in, or intervene in . . . any political campaign on behalf of any candidate for public office.”

Past challenges to the law have so far failed, with the Courts holding that while clergy are free to speak out on religious, moral and political issues they cannot use tax-exempt resources to support or oppose candidates for public office, which includes statements from the pulpit by church officials and other indications of campaign intervention.

In May of 2000, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia unanimously held that the IRS properly revoked the tax exemption of the Church at Pierce Creek, a congregation near Binghamton, N.Y., that bought newspaper ads in 1992 opposing presidential candidate Bill Clinton.

Bishop Robinson said that the election of John McCain would lead to the packing of the US Supreme Court with justices that would rule against the recognition of gay marriages. “With Barack Obama, we have someone who is utterly sympathetic to our full and equal rights as citizens.”

He added that while Senator Obama “won’t say he’s for equal marriage rights” Bishop Robinson knew from his “own private conversations with him that he is totally in our court. I believe him, and I trust him, not to throw us under the bus when the election is over.”