Related:
Some black pastors telling congregations not to vote
Washington - Obama’s
election-season “evolution” on gay marriage just before hauling in about $15
million from Hollywood has black clergy calling for their congregations to stay
home on election day.
This
is troubling news for Obama, who received 95 percent of the black vote in 2008.
However,
some pastors of large churches are being asked by members of their
congregations “how a true Christian could back same-sex marriage, as President Barack Obama
did in May,” this according to an Associated Press
report published Sunday.
Black
clergy in many churches who do not support Mitt Romney but also do not support
gay marriage are telling their congregation to sit the election out.
Obama
is counting on a majority block vote from African Americans to push him over
the top in November.
While
the AP piece said it isn’t clear how widespread
discontent for Obama’s endorsement for gay marriage is among black Christians and
in black churches, in a tight election during a stalled economy and with his
foreign policy under scrutiny, African American parishioners are a crucial
element to Obama’s reelection hopes.
Weeks before Obama's gay marriage announcement,
Baltimore-based Rev.
Jamal-Harrison Bryant formed
the Empowerment Network, a national coalition of about 30 denominations working
to register congregants.
However, in an apparent rebuke of Obama’s gay marriage
endorsement last month, Bryant told The Washington Informer, an
African-American newsweekly, "This is the first time in black church
history that I'm aware of that black pastors have encouraged their parishioners
not to vote."
Bryant said that the president's endorsement of gay marriage
is "at the heart" of the problem. Bryant, like many black pastors,
reportedly does not support gay marriage.
In Texas, Rev. George Nelson Jr., senior pastor of Grace Fellowship
Baptist Church in Brenham and other African-American pastors shared their views
in a conference call the day after Obama's endorsement of gay marriage.
Reportedly, the ministers agreed on their opposition and planned to oppose gay
marriage. Obama's public support of gay marriage caused a "storm" in
the African-American community, said Nelson. Source
