Barack Obama yesterday created one of the earliest controversies of his upcoming administration by inviting pastor Rick Warren, author of the popular book, The Purpose-Driven Life, to deliver the invocation at his inaugural. Warren is the founder of Lake Forest, California's Saddleback Church at which Obama and McCain held a candidate forum in August. CNN reports that the selection of Warren has particularly incensed gay rights supporters. Warren backed California's Proposition 8 banning same-sex marriage.
An Obama spokesperson defended the choice of Warren as an attempt to make the inauguration inclusive, even though Obama disagrees with Warren's views on gay rights. The Boston Globe says that "Warren has been a forceful advocate for reordering evangelical priorities.... [H]is public priority has been combating AIDS in Africa, and he has criticized the politicization of evangelical Protestantism." Dan Gilgoff of U.S. News says that this "is an early taste of the Democrats' post-election effort to reach evangelical Americans."
The benediction at the inauguration will be delivered by the 87-years old civil rights leader, Rev. Joseph E. Lowery, co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Yesterday's Atlanta Journal Constitution says that Yale poet Elizabeth Alexander will read a poem before Lowery's closing prayer. The Washington Post yesterday published the full schedule of the inauguration ceremony.
UPDATE: Here is an excerpt from a controversial Beliefnet interview with Pastor Rick Warren on the issue of gay marriage. Many opponents of Warren's participating in the inauguration point to language in this interview as being particularly insulting to gays and lesbians.
UPDATE2: AP reported on Sunday that Pastor Rick Warren defended the invitation extended to him to deliver the invocation at the Inaugural. In a speech to the Muslim Public Affairs Council annual convention in Long Beach (CA), Warren said that he loves people of other religions, of both political parties and he also loves "gays and straights."
