Family Research Council

Family Research Council president hasn’t tried hard to downplay the apocalyptic rhetoric surrounding the presidential election in November coming from the Right, as he has called President Obama “the worst president this country has ever had” and warned that his administration “will destroy this country” if “given another four years” in office. On Tuesday’s edition of Truth that Transforms, Perkins warned that the upcoming election “doesn’t so much define our future but I would have to say determines whether or not we have a future as a country.” He claimed that the Obama administration “is moving this nation not slowly but rapidly down the path of moral and fiscal bankruptcy” and urged conservatives to only vote for candidates who “share our biblical worldview”:

Perkins: This is an election that I think doesn’t so much define our future but I would have to say determines whether or not we have a future as a country. We are faced with so many significant fiscal issues that are intertwined with the moral and social foundations of this country. I’ll be very blunt. I respect the office of the President and I do believe we are to pray for those in authority, and I do, but we have an administration that is moving this nation not slowly but rapidly down the path of moral and fiscal bankruptcy. This election is going to have significant consequences on our generation and for future generations. We need to be electing candidates to every level of office, state office, local office, federal office, that share our biblical worldview and we need to have Christians presenting themselves as candidates as well, to get into this process, to stand for truth, to stand for justice and that which is right.

As Kyle and Brian have reported, the Family Research Council is teaming up with "apostle" Cindy Jacobs' Generals International in a major push to influence the 2012 elections. In Washington, DC, last night, the FRC, Jacobs and other “apostles” affiliated with the New Apostolic Reformation launched “Fast Forward,” a year-long “prayer and action” campaign designed to influence the GOP caucuses and primaries as well as the November presidential election.  The launch event, “A Gathering of Eagles,” was held at a Baptist church in northwest Washington. It featured plenty of prophecy and lots of rhetoric about the 2012 elections as war – a spiritual battleground against demons, marriage equality, and the Obama administration.  

We are sorting through video and will be posting highlights and analysis over the next couple of days, but the entire three-plus hours should be required viewing for any reporter or pundit who has downplayed the goals or influence of Christian dominionists in American politics.  Jacobs said the Lord had told her that 2012 is the “do or die” year for bringing America back to a “biblical worldview.”  She “decreed” that separation of church and state would be pulled down.  Jacobs was joined by the Family Research Council’s Pierre Bynum, who spoke wistfully about a time in America when you couldn’t hold public office without believing in Jesus Christ, heaven, and hell.   

It featured Jacobs and others demanding that angels deliver Bishop Harry Jackson the half-million dollars he said he needs to defeat marriage equality in Maryland.  But the evening was dominated by Dutch Sheets, another NAR apostle, whose presentation focused on the need for Christians to get away from a sheep-like focus on pastoral care, and start becoming an army of warriors prepared to take their rightful dominion and rule the earthly part of God’s kingdom.

Just a taste – more to come.

The Family Research Council today announced a Family Policy Lecture with author and radio show host Michael Brown next month where he will address the “the homosexual agenda” and “a clear and Christian response,” because “if we don’t do what is right today, we will have to apologize to our children and grandchildren tomorrow.” “Forty years ago, most Americans said they didn't know anyone who was homosexual and claimed to know little or nothing about homosexuality,” the FRC said in a statement, “Today, there’s hardly a sitcom without a prominent gay character and even school children are learning the meaning of ‘Gender: Queer.’

Brown’s hostility to gays and lesbians will surely be welcomed by the aggressively anti-gay group, as he previously claimed that “gay activism” was to blame for the brutal murder of the openly gay California teenager Lawrence King and “hypersensitive” gays intend to throw Christians “in jail.” Hopefully, FRC will show the trailer to his book, A Queer Thing Happened to America, where a young boy enters the nightmarish world of having same-sex parents:

The FRC urges attendees to leave “retreat mode” and “stand up and be counted”:

At a time when it is more important than ever for Christians to stand up and be counted, many of us seem to be in retreat mode. We do not want to sound offensive or be considered "irrelevant." But retreat spells defeat, and when we willingly shut ourselves out of public debate, we reward intimidation.

The public debate about marriage and the homosexual agenda continues. But if we don't do what is right today, we will have to apologize to our children and grandchildren tomorrow.

Join us at noon on Thursday, January 5th as author, professor, and radio host, Dr. Michael Brown explains the homosexual agenda and motivates to a clear and Christian response.

Forty years ago, most Americans said they didn't know anyone who was homosexual and claimed to know little or nothing about homosexuality. Today, there's hardly a sitcom without a prominent gay character and even school children are learning the meaning of "Gender: Queer."

Dr. Brown's recent book, A Queer Thing Happened to America, chronicles the amazing transformation of America over the last 40 years and addresses the question, "Is there really a gay agenda, or is it a fiction of the Religious Right?"

Today, Newt Gingrich sent a letter to Iowa Religious Right leader Bob Vander Plaats detailing his commitment to fight gay rights and reproductive rights, and also taking a vow to stay faithful to his wife Callista, his third wife and former mistress. After vowing to fight against gay and lesbian couples’ right to marry, Gingrich said he would “pledge to uphold the institution of marriage through personal fidelity to my spouse and respect for the marital bonds of others.” Vander Plaats has previously floated supporting Gingrich, who leads in the Iowa polls, and publicly announced that his organization has narrowed its choices to Gingrich, Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum.

But Gingrich’s problems winning over Religious Right activists despite his best efforts were exhibited in an interview Family Research Council president Tony Perkins gave on Friday with radio talk show host Janet Mefferd. Perkins told Mefferd that Religious Right voters may be viewed as hypocritical if they pick Gingrich over right-wing candidates who, unlike Gingrich, also have both “their personal lives and their professional lives in order” like Bachmann, Santorum and Perry in the Republican primary. However, Perkins said it would not at all problematic for Christian conservative voters to back Gingrich over President Obama if he is the party’s nominee.

Listen:

Mefferd: My question is, Tony do you buy this idea that if Newt Gingrich does end up being the nominee and Christian conservatives end up getting behind him because they want to vote out Barack Obama, which we all do, that that somehow will ruin the reputation of Christians? Are you buying that connection?

Perkins: No, I think the question that does have some legitimacy is in—right now, where it stands, you’re still four weeks away from the vote in Iowa, and there are still solid conservative candidates in this race. You have Michele Bachmann, a strong Christian woman who I know very well and is completely in line with us, Rick Santorum, another close friend again who is perfectly in line with us, as well as Rick Perry, who is in line with us on all the issues. So I think for Christian conservatives to come out now and say, ‘alright well we’re going to support Newt Gingrich,’ when you still have people that have their personal lives and their professional lives in order, I do think that then rings kind of like, ‘well we just want to be with a political winner,’ so I think that charge would stick now.

That was fast.

Just moments after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the United Nations in a historic address that the United States that the United States is committed to protecting LGBT people overseas from persecution and discrimination, and will use foreign aid as an instrument to defend their rights, Liberty Counsel’s Matt Barber attacked Clinton and President Obama for having an “obsession with the radical homosexual activist agenda.” Clinton called out abuses such as violence against the LGBT community, including “corrective rape,” along with the criminalization and demonization of homosexuals.

But that was too much for Barber, who earlier this year joined Liberty Counsel chairman Mat Staver in blasting the Obama administration for withholding aid to Malawi because the country outlaws homosexuality. Barber told the American Family Association’s OneNewsNow that the Obama administration is “trying to force nations to adopt America’s immoral positions on issues of sexuality” while supposedly ignoring “real human rights abuses”:

The announced policy, according to Matt Barber of Liberty Counsel Action, "displays the arrogance of the Obama administration."

It is "frankly offensive," says the attorney, that President Obama "feels compelled to export American culture's decline in morality, and export that immorality to other nations that are trying to adhere to traditional principles relative to human sexuality."

Barber also notes that the administration is apparently ignoring the fact that foreign nations -- like the United States -- are sovereign countries. He adds that the U.S. is "using essentially blackmail and the purse strings" of the nation to force countries to change their moral principles.

"What about nations where Christians are driven out of the nation or executed?" he asks. "And this Obama administration, instead of focusing on real human rights abuses, is trying to force nations to adopt America's immoral positions on issues of sexuality."

Barber believes there is an "obsession with the radical homosexual activist agenda that seems to drive this Obama administration."

UPDATE: Family Research Council senior fellow Peter Sprigg also denounced the new policy to defend LGBT rights abroad, lashing out at the administration for “imposing an alien ideology on other countries”:

"It is startling that President Obama is prepared to throw the full weight and reputation of the United States behind the promotion overseas of the radical ideology of the sexual revolution. If he did the same on other issues, his own liberal allies would undoubtedly accuse him of cultural imperialism. Threats to withhold foreign aid from poor countries unless they conform their laws to the views of Western radicals are unconscionable.

"The United Nations, like the United States, remains sharply divided on the issue of whether special rights should be granted on the basis of sexual conduct, sexual orientation or gender identity. No treaty or widely accepted international agreement has established homosexual conduct as a human right, yet the Obama administration's actions seem guided by this fiction.

"President Obama should increase efforts to defend human rights that are widely recognized, such as religious liberty, rather than appeasing his domestic allies by imposing an alien ideology on other countries."

While speaking with Family Research Council president Tony Perkins on yesterday’s edition of Today’s Issues, Rick Santorum argued that single mothers were the “political base” of the Democratic Party, and that Republicans should work to lessen single motherhood in order to score political points against their Democratic rivals. The Democratic Party, Santorum said, relies on “single mothers who run a household” and have a “desire for government” as their voter base, and concluded that building “two parent families” is necessary “to reduce the Democratic advantage.”

Look at the political base of the Democratic Party: it is single mothers who run a household. Why? Because it’s so tough economically that they look to the government for help and therefore they’re going to vote. So if you want to reduce the Democratic advantage, what you want to do is build two parent families, you eliminate that desire for government.