So I posted a totally non-political post on Facebook about how much I suck at meeting people in bars, referencing the fact that I had recently met someone I was interested in until I realized she was associated with a deeply homophobic church. After a bit of back and forth with a friend who said maybe I should have tried to re-educate her, I mentioned that a “progressive” state rep candidate attends the same church. No names named, because I wasn’t trying to make it a political conversation. I was trying to make fun of myself. And suddenly I have Elugardo supporters ripping into me, because they just ASSUME this was about their candidate. It wasn’t, but her people’s assumption that it was speaks volumes, and now I am going to talk about her.
I think it comes from a guilty conscience. Deep down, everyone realizes that Jeff Sanchez is pretty progressive. Going by his current Progressive Massachusetts scorecard, only about 16% of the House is any better than him. Elugardo’s campaign isn’t about progress. It’s about some people having a tantrum and breaking stuff, because fighting “The Establishment” is fun even when “The Establishment” consists of smart, dedicated progressives doing the best they can. Maybe, if you’re really lucky, you can move the legislature marginally to the left by throwing out Sanchez, but I doubt it. Throwing out progressive champions like Sanchez (and Liz Malia, Byron Rushing, Dan Cullinane, etc.) just so you can embrace every untested newbie who sweet talks you a little bit, does not promote a more progressive legislature. The message it sends is that progressives are unreliable, disloyal allies. That you can work for years to help them achieve their most important goals, and they’ll throw you in the trash as soon as you have one disagreement. It’s what Trump does to his allies, and it’s why he can’t hire anyone competent. The message it sends to the remaining legislators is to stick with conservatives, because they are the only people who understand loyalty.
And I think the progressives supporting Elugardo know this. They know they should have vetted her more, and that it really is a deeply immoral decision to replace a solid, if imperfect, progressive with someone who says all the right things but then is active in a church that is working to tear those things down, and has no record to demonstrate she is capable of standing up against all the pressure she would face from them as a legislator. They know. They can’t not know. But it’s just so much FUN to “fight the power”, even when that means tearing down your own cause. So that guilty conscience comes rushing out, a confession offered at the slightest hint that I might be talking about their candidate.
Note to eds: Contact me if you need proof to keep this up. I’d rather not publicly embarrass misguided but well-intentioned members of the general public if I don’t have to, but I do have the proof if you need it.
So he has about an 75-80% progressive rating. He’s no Jon Hecht or Mike Connolly and JP could do better than his lack of leadership on Safe Communities and other progressive priorities. I’ll also add that like Rushing, we see a pattern where progressive outsiders critical of DeLeo’s leadership are brought into his inner circle and suddenly their voting records start inching the Speaker’s way and away from where they started. The legislature could do so much better in a state as blue as this one and wealthy as this one. Changing chairman via primaries is one powerful way to do that proven to work (just ask Carl Sciortino and Mike Connolly).
Neither of your examples is comparable. Connolly had a long record as a solid progressive by the time he got elected, including time working in government. The voters rejected him when he first ran. In my view the got it right both times.
Sciortino didn’t have a record, but his opponent did. And it was best described as “aggressively terrible”, not “progressive but flawed.”
Are you objecting to 75-80% progressive rating? That sounds pretty good to me.
Voting in lockstep with the Speaker will get you a 78% on that scorecard. So if you’re happy with DeLeo’s record, then you’ll like Sanchez’s too. (link)
Well, I have argued before that I don’t see DeLeo as the progressive’s bogeyman that some do.
You are going to have to clarify. You say “it wasn’t” but the rest of the diary. as well as your desire to use that as jumping off point, suggests, “it was,” which is confusing. Are there two such “progressive politicians” who meet your description? You should not assume, also, that we know what ‘deeply homophobic church’ to which you refer nor should you expect us to take your word for it…
Oh there’s a lot more than one. But most don’t make it so obvious, which is why their supporters don’t have the same guilty conscience.
Lion of Judah. They worked hard to kill gay marriage. Here’s a Globe article about their pastor participating in a Family Research Council event at the time . http://archive.boston.com/news/specials/gay_marriage/articles/2006/10/15/group_to_rally_opposition_to_gay_marriage/. Plenty more out there. Here’s another Globe article recognizing that their role in the debate was prominent enough to be newsworthy. https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2014/05/16/10-years-of-gay-marriage-in-massachusetts.
A NYT article. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/17/us/gay-marriage-opponents-keep-low-profile-for-now.html
Here’s an article about them having another major anti-gay Family Research Council guy speak at their church. http://www.talk2action.org/story/2009/12/20/224021/61/Front_Page/Will_Lou_Engle_take_his_mega_antigay_TheCall_to_Uganda_
Here’s where their pastor blames 9/11 on the gays. https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/01/08/growing-hispanic-church-hosts-inaugural-prayer-service/m5GcCbW0gJjMeK6gKLu0jJ/story.html
Here’s a Facebook post where she references how hard this same congregation is working for her. https://www.facebook.com/CongregacionLeonDeJudaLionOfJudah/posts_to_page/
So either the congregation has a pretty serious disconnect in values with its pastor, she has a pretty strong values disconnect with her entire church, or she’s not a progressive,
If the last link is the candidate in question, then it is hard to dispute her agreement with the homophobic agenda of this aggressively homophobic church and congregation.
I frankly don’t quite understand the OP’s reluctance to simply name her and post these links in the thread-starter.
Elugardo is the one I can prove is linked to a homophobic church, and she’s the candidate in the last link. I’m not naming any of the others I know of because I can’t prove it. All I have is rumor. From sources I trust, but not their own admissions, backed by photos, as with Elugardo.
We are in agreement here. Something tells me this smear campaign wouldn’t be happening if she attended a white church.
You are misrepresenting my comment. For Elugardo, I have her own confession to be involved with Lion of Judah, which has a long and well-documented history of courting the spotlight for it’s homophobia, not rumor. For the other “progressives” with similarly questionable ties, I don’t have proof.
So do the Knights of Columbus, are we going to kick Joe Kennedy out of the Democratic Party too? Or assume he’s lying when he votes to support LGBT rights? This is guilt by association based on someone’s religion and ethnicity. So it is a smear one you admit to basing on rumor. That is classic eve of election trolling. I am surprised Tom is buying it, but he’s been cranky lately. I’m surprised based on your own BMG history that you are content to spread this nonsense.
I have the Kennedys confession to being part of the Knights of Columbus, another organization that has campaigned for homophobic legislation. Joe Kennedy got married in a Southern Baptist Church and associates with his father in law who has preached against gay marriage. Should we toss that family from the Democratic Party? Or is it ok because the Catholic Church is Irish and “mainstream” and not a branch of a black/ethnic denomination most voters have not heard of? Attacks on religion and ethnicity have no place in progressive primaries.
I’m sorry, James, but that’s WAY beyond acceptable.
I’ve cited my own very white Episcopal brethren and the Roman Catholic church. The offensive bigotry of the “CLF” has nothing whatsoever to do with race. This is yet another hate-group that wraps their own perverted version of “god” around their homophobia and than claims they are being “moral”.
You know better than this.
Sorry, “CLJ”, not “CLF”.
How is this any different from Jeff Sanchez’s church? If she is getting them to campaign for her, perhaps they reject their churches teaching on homosexuality as do the majority of American Catholics.
It is not “hard to dispute”, as I’ve demonstrated. It’s easy to disprove.
Here’s footage of Barack Obama thanking a homophobic pastor and headlining a fundraiser for a homophobic church charity. It did not make the first President to endorse gay marriage a homophobe. She is *allegedly* thanking her fellow parishioners and the pastor for coming to a campaign event.
An event for a candidate with a 100% rating and commitment on LGBT issues. At worst, she is getting homophobic church members to campaign for a pro-equality candidate. Something we cannot say about Jeff Sanchez, another member of a homophobic church, who abandons his own bills when the Speaker tells him too. A conditional ally is no true ally at all.
The local and international heads of Sanchez church have also spoken out against gay marriage repeatedly. Unlike Nika, he’s stabbed local LGBT youth activists in the back by flip flopping on the Healthy Youth Act.
Barack Obama did not call Mr. Warren’s church his “family”.
As I recall, Mr. Obama was in fact forced to leave his parish because it was too black for the American voters Mr. Obama needed support from.
Jeremiah Wright at one point in his early career preached against homosexuality, and Obama cited his faith as a reason he opposes gay marriage in 2008. The LGBT movement did not expel him, it knew he was better then McCain and lo and behold he evolved along with the rest of America. Nika has made a strong commitment to the LGBT community, I am friends with LGBT persons working on her campaigns and hosting her, nobody is disqualifying her over this eve of election smear campaign.
“Jeremiah Wright at one point in his early career preached against homosexuality”
James, do you have evidence to support this? I ask because it surprised me, and I did a bit of research. The only thing I found is this NPR Ombudsman piece that concludes that NPR falsely reported that Mr. Wright was anti-gay. The somewhat lengthy piece explains that the story in question (an All Things Considered piece) got the story wrong. From the piece (emphasis mine):
I invite you to re-examine your sources about Mr. Wright. It certainly looks to me as though you’ve perpetuated a false and ugly rumor.
Jeremiah Wright doesn’t really matter. The broader question is liberals always get attacked for not attending church or for attending the wrong church. JFKs speech to the Protestant Clergy and Obama’s speech on Wright demonstrate that presidents can separate their faith from their job.
I have zero doubts that Nika Elguardo-who marched in Boston Pride, who has gay supporters, and who stated on her website she will back a pro-equality agenda 100%. I do not see why we should suddenly hold her to a new standard we do not hold her incumbent challenger too. I could care less what god they kneel too. Jeff Sanchez’s kneels to DeLeo. Nika will not. Nika would get my vote if I lived in
You and Long2024 have insinuated she’s a homophobe based on one friendly post about her church. Has she ever said anything homophobic or supported homophobic policies in the past? Barring any evidence of this, this is just a cheap smear. Same as the attacks against Obama on a Wright and the attacks on JFK in 1960.
@ jconway: I hope you breathe more easily after the election.
I’ve neither said nor implied that “she’s a homophobe”. I’ve said that her continued embrace of her flagrantly homophobic church creates a conflict.
Perhaps if some voters cared a bit more about the God that they and their candidates kneeled to, we might not be teetering on the brink of reversing a long list of advances for women and gays. I suggest that whatever it is that causes men and women to talk about homosexuality as an “abomination” has nothing whatsoever to do with God, and everything to do with human insecurity, fear, and prejudice.
I agree that JFK and Barack Obama both were fully capable of separating their faith from their job, and did so. Neither JFK nor Barack Obama were members of an extremist cult comparable to CLJ.
I despise the way that the right-wing has pulled religion squarely into government. The GOP has explicitly aligned with the most viciously misogynist forces in the both Roman Catholic Church and also the right-wing Protestant tradition.
The right-wing fought gay marriage tough and nail, just as it has fought abortion rights and access to contraception tooth and nail. The CLJ has long been an outspoken and flagrant ally of that fight against gay marriage.
You cited JFK and Barack Obama. I suggest that your candidate needs to do the same. JFK was forced to do that in the 1960 campaign. Barack Obama had to do the same in the 2008 campaign.
So your claim that this is some new standard is rhetorical overreach — as is your claim that “Jeff Sanchez’s [God[ kneels to DeLeo.”
That’s WAY over the top my friend, way over.
She has.
That’s a JFK/Obama statement right there. Not only does she reject her churches teaching but she is making inroads to changing it. I know many evangelicals doing the same thing and we should embrace them as allies not cast aspersions on their character and commitment to our cause because of their religious beliefs. I am glad Charley sees it the same way, along with LGBT canvassers I met yesterday who were stumping for Nika and Ayanna and Dr. Santiago who is taking on Byron Rushing and identifies as an LGBT person. I have serious doubts any of them would do this if they did not feel she would do a better job than the Speakers today on gay rights. You want a more progressive legislature, you vote for challengers like Nika.
The “James Conway” that I’ve known for years here would have walked back this unfounded smear against Jeremiah Wright after seeing the evidence that it was false. Yesterday’s James Conway instead wrote “Jeremiah Wright doesn’t really matter.”
Mr. Wright may or may not matter — if he doesn’t matter, then perhaps Mr. Conway should not have injected him into this discussion.
What does matter, at least to me, is political speech that is shamelessly disconnected from fact and reality. We have more than enough of that already from the Trumpists and their echo chamber.
I’d like to see rather more of the old James Conway and rather less of the new.
You consistently ask for challengers to take on DeLeo and have devoted far more time to attacking this one based on a religious affiliation than advocating for any of them. Her statement above should be more than sufficient to address your concerns.
My source for Wrights homophobia has as much veracity as your source here. It’s a secondhand comment from a pastor I know who worked with him who said Trinity was not so welcoming to gays back when Obama first joined. Maybe it’s inaccurate, but it’s about as accurate as the insinuations on this thread. We have written evidence from the candidate herself to dispel your concerns. I would argue you and long2024 owe her an apology.
You’re now suggesting that third-hand hearsay “has as much veracity” as a sourced and documented NPR retraction? “Not so welcoming?”
My objections to CLJ are NOT they are “not so welcoming”. Did Jeremiah Wright spend a decade publicly advocating against the LGBTQ community? Did he intentionally align his parish with the most regressive most homophobic elements of Illinois?
A sidelong glance is different from a punch in the face.
I’d like to just stop this argument and take a breather for a week or two.
I can’t vote in the race. I don’t know the communities, I don’t know the other candidates. I hold no personal animosity towards your candidate.
What you see is my anger, frustration, and genuine fear at how much harm extremist religious organizations are doing to the nation, state, and communities I love.
One of these candidates will win tomorrow. We are all on the same team. There are no trolls on this thread. There are no liars. There are no racists, no sexists, no shills.
I’m going to try and leave this thread along for at least a few weeks.
He called Rick Warren his brother on multiple occasions.
I also want to be very clear that I’m not advocating in favor of Mr. Sanchez. I’m very happy with Denise Provost, and I can’t imagine her tolerating any of this rubbish.
Does her religios denomination accept gay clergy and bless gay marriages? That’s apparently your litmus test now.
There is a world of difference between not accepting gay clergy and leading a public charge against gay marriage.
Provost is next to useless without more allies to help her. Elguardo would be such an ally, Sanchez has already proven he is not.
I’m even more confused now. You seem to be casting back to the mid-2000’s and the celebration of a victory. Ok. What does that have to do with Elugardo, who’m you have all but accused of bigotry? You also seem to be deeply averse to ‘naming names’ without a similar aversion to casting aspersions upon the named. Independent (but cursory) googling suggests that Nika Elugardo is a member of the Cambridgeport Baptist Church and not ‘Lion of Judah.’ Is this correct? If not, say so. Is Cambridgeport Baptist ‘deeply homophobic?” If it isn’t it looks like you want to tar Elugardo with somebody elses homophobia.
Can you make an actual effort to make declarative sentences about specific people and specific churches so that we can assess your above diary — which prominently focuses on Nika Elugardo — on the merits and not on some casual fog of possibly mis-directed accusations, purported ‘guilty consciences’ and the nostalgia of the 2000’s??
Declarative statements, such as: Candidate ________ is a member of _______ church. This church [is/is not] “deeply homophobic.” should help, and should not at all hinder, your argument.
Again, how about *letting the candidate speak for herself.*
While I’m all for that, in all the general and in all the specific instances that pertain….
What I’m trying to do here, however, is to get this person to actually speak clearly. If long2024 has a valid point, he/she is not helping it by being vague. If long2024 doesn’t have a valid point, it doesn’t help us if we let him/her get away with vaguery.
Here’s another shocker, there’s a pretty homophobic church based in Rome with a large footprint in Boston that also campaigned locally against gay marriage that a lot of progressive Democrats are a part of. Including Sonia Chang Diaz and Jeff Sanchez. It has not affected their progressive record on gay marriage, neither will Nika’s Church affect her judgment. Using your logic,
we should have voted for PCUSA member Donald Trump over UMC member Hillary Clinton in 2016, since the formers church is more LGBT inclusive even if the latter candidate was clearly better on the issues.
Hillary Clinton had a record. Not just of words, but of actions, while in government, having to actually make the hard choices. And Trump loudly announced his terribleness. If he had run on, say, a Sandersian platform, would you have voted for him despite his record of birtherism just because he pinky swore he was really a progressive? That’s the analogy that actually fits.
A record that once included opposing gay marriage until she evolved. She continued to participate in a church that opposes gay marriage and ordination after her evolution. Which is totally fine, so do I, so does Jeff Sanchez and allegedly do does Nika Elguardo.
Ehm, so if we’re going to disavow those who belong to a “homophobic church”, that’s going to count out anyone who’s Roman Catholic.
People have always had varying attitudes towards what they hear from the pulpit. That’s part of religious life. But I’m going to assume that Elugardo can speak for herself. And gosh, on her issues page, here it all is (my emphasis):
Now, why didn’t the original poster simply look this up and mention it? Gotta wonder.
Because Sanchez has actions to back up his words. You don’t get divorced because some attractive strangers promises they won’t do the annoying things your spouse does.
Actions like killing the Healthy Youth Act and Safe Communities Act in the last budget? The former would have funded more LGBT health and inclusion programs in public schools, which as a public school teacher I can attest to how desperately needed both are right now in this climate.
The latter is an abandonment of progressive principles toward immigrants more broadly, but we know LGBT immigrants who are out here and deported back to less forgiving home countries face an additional burden and risk of dangers on top of everything else. Two groups Sanchez let down to keep DeLeo happy.
There’s a bad legislative record contrasted with innuendo on social media you refuse to provide real evidence for. You’re another new anonymous troll account sent by the Sanchez campaign. The good news is, sending you shows this challenge has legs.
Now you’ve veered into outright lying. I’ve had a BMG account for about 9 years. I don’t post that often but I do it often enough that you and I have had conversations on BMG before. So you know you’re lying. Plenty of people on here know my real identity, because it’s pretty easy to figure out.
Btw your guy Jimmy Tingle supports local police cooperating with ICE. . So I don’t see why opposing Safe Communities is a dealbreaker in one office and not another.
The long2024 who previously posted here made substantive contributions and did not post garbage like this. DeLeo and his errand boy Sanchez killed Safe Communities, not Tingle.
It happens that I support Quentin Palfrey in the LG race, but I can’t stand seeing candidates’ positions misrepresented. Here is the full paragraph which you misleadingly boil down to “supports local police cooperating with ICE”:
James, I don’t know where you’re coming from here. I really don’t.
This BMG participant (long2024) has been here a LONG time. He is no “anonymous troll”.
This is a twist that might explain the supporters ardent defense of Elugardo (at least as much as a purported ‘guilty conscience’ might.) Fervent support isn’t required to derive from the darker emotions and mayhap those people rushing to her defense understand the gap between the churches stance and her purported internal efforts. (I’m still not entirely convinced that Elugardo is a ‘member’ of the church and, as noted, there was link I found stating her involvement with Cambridgeport Baptist. So the water remains muddy in that respect)
Having myself been a member of an evangelical church (but no longer) but also as someone who remains an adherent of the moral and spiritual teachings of Jesus (and on some of these very topics, in particular) I can attest that such attempts to create understanding and acceptance are frequent, intense and fraught with emotion and resentments and the strong voice set against the preacher (who’s always, as they say, on a pulpit placed 10 feet above contradiction) often have adherents who might take facebook umbrage. It can look like ‘guilty conscience’ I suppose, in a specious way…
Heh. Well, Charley, you broke the ice on that one (Homophobic Church => Roman Catholic). I enthusiastically agree with you about that, and chose not to go there.
If I understand the content of the link in question (and maybe I don’t — it’s hard to tell with social media), I see the candidate herself using these words (emphasis mine):
I’m pretty sure that’s the candidate herself speaking. It certainly looks to me as though Ms. Elugardo is speaking for herself when she describes “Lion of Judah” as “my CLJ family”.
If I encountered a candidate who chose to affiliate with the KKK and talked about his or her “work to create understanding and acceptance” within the KKK, I’d immediately discount him or her. In my view, the “Congregación León de Judá” is just as bigoted and just as hateful as the KKK. America is full of born-again evangelicals who are passionately convinced that God made white men superior to white women and white men and women superior to black men and women. Those same born-again evangelicals loudly and sincerely proclaim homosexuality as “an abomination”. I can’t force them to change their beliefs, but I don’t have to elect them to public office.
We in the Episcopal Church had a very high-profile schism that caused certain parishes who chose to define themselves by their homophobia and misogyny to break off from the Episcopal Church to form their own “Anglican Church of North America”. Membership in that sect is equally disqualifying in my view.
Nobody forces anybody to affiliate with an extremist religious sect. So far as I’m concerned, such extremist sects have far too much political power already. I see such religious extremism as one of the major drivers of today’s horrific crisis in American society. I think 2018 is a critical time to loudly reject such extremism — especially in our elected officials.
I don’t know about anyone else — I’m saying that the recent (22-Mar-2018) facebook post from Ms. Elugardo (linked to here) puts her well outside the envelope of any candidate I would vote for in any election.
So now a Facebook post and possible religious affiliation>her publicly stated commitment to LGBT rights and public endorsement by LGBT representatives? I was invited to a house party for Nika in Cambridge hosted by a gay couple. I can’t speak for her faith or personal history, but I can say many African Americans friends of mine still stay in homophobic churches to keep up with family and friends. Particularly the churches that are formed from close knit immigrant communities.
Probably for the same reasons a lot of Catholics stick with it or my in laws keep their Methodist affiliation despite that denominations ban on gay clergy and marriage. If the bar has to be conversion to Episcopal to pass your litmus test, that’s just the exclusion of the religious right in reverse.
I’m reminded of all the flak Barack Obama took for sticking with his church and pastor despite some pretty confrontational sermonizing. It’s probably never a good idea to assume that an individual agrees with all the tenets of his/her denomination even if they speak highly of the people they personally know through the church.
@ Barack Obama sticking with his church and paster: In fact, he left that church and pastor. The sermonizing was no more “confrontational” than is found in a host of other black congregations. Not to put too fine a point on it, but it was no more “confrontational” than any of the multiple of sermons preached by MLK or, for that matter, the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
I might also add that the black community has a terrible history of both misogyny and homophobia (like others).
Hate and bigotry is an equal-opportunity character flaw.
I thought you said her race and ethnicity had nothing to do with this?
It doesn’t. I’m referring to the reaction to Barack Obama’s church, to its pastor (Jeremiah Wright) and to the difference between black and white worship styles.
I’m observing that being black is no indicator of attitudes towards women or gender identification/preference.
Once again some of us lean on religion to hide from bigotry.
No sale.
And some of us lean a little too much on bigotry to justify slapping around religion:(
Where on earth did I say anything about converting to Episcopal? As bad as some of the mainstream churches are, they pale in comparison to the CLJ.
Would you support a candidate who called the KKK their “family”? How about someone who did the same for the White Nazis?
America is filled with women who stay with partners who beat, rape, humiliate, and abuse them for similar reasons (“keep up with family and friends”). Is that a sign of health?
The bar to pass my litmus test is that a candidate must reject extremist hate-groups. There is a WORLD of difference between CLJ and any of the mainstream religious traditions we’ve talked about here.
Roman Catholicism is a big tent and I don’t see it as aggressively homophobic as the fundamentalist denominations.
The fundamentalist denominations have a bigger tent in the pews than they let on. It’s a generational thing. A lot of black churches and denominations hold dogmatic beliefs on homosexuality rejected by their laity under 30. I know Wheaton and Liberty graduates my age who are openly questioning their alma maters approach to gender and sexuality. I know gay Mormons who still practice their faith.
So I think it’s an increasingly similar dynamic to Catholics in that regard. Also you give us too much credit Christopher, it is still considered intrinsically disordered in the Catechism and depending on the diocese, you can still be fired for being openly LGBT. Our church is just as divided between urban and suburban, north and south.
I went to Mass in a massive suburban VA parish the summer I lived in DC and the atmosphere and preaching was indistinguishable from the Southern Baptist service my brother used to go to, other than the railing against birth control. It was apparently a favorite of the neocon converts (Newt, Santorum, and Brownback).
The latest round of horrendous pedophile disclosures has lead to a renewed push on the Catholic right for blaming gays in the priesthood and Pope Francis’ modest shift in tone for pedophile priests. Half of the church is now openly calling for his resignation, we might go the way of the Anglican Communion sooner rather than later.
Short version, a lot of people stay in churches for cultural and family ties as much as for theological or ideological reasons. I actually enjoy that church is one of the last places where people with different political backgrounds can come together and break bread. I hope that doesn’t go away or fall victim to the political sorting that’s going on everywhere else.
@ jconway and christopher: You REALLY need to spend some more time in the deep south.
You sound EXACTLY like the white racists in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Georgia explaining why their churches who led the way in promoting Jim Crow and all the other abuses of the deep south weren’t racist.
You do understand, I hope, that the split between the “Southern” Baptist convention and what had been plain “Baptist” in the 19th century was explicitly because the Southern Baptist convention insisted that only whites could worship in the main congregation (they allowed blacks to set in the galleries above, in churches that had them, so long as they were “respectfully” quiet).
How very nice that each of you — as heterosexual white males — are able to “come together and break bread” with fellow Roman Catholics.
Nope. No dice. You each seem to forget that the Jesus of the Gospels also turned over the tables of the money-changers. He was not always sweet and mild-mannered.
Homophobia is deeply wired into fundamentalism, no matter which of the Abrahamic traditions that fundamentalism springs from.
Um, I’ve called out Fundamentalists pretty hard – see below.
@ calling out fundamentalism: I read that. The kind of religious fundamentalism that leads to this bigotry and hate is by no means limited to Protestant evangelicals in the deep south.
I suppose I could be trading in some stereotypes myself here, but when I hear the term Fundamentalism, homophobia is one of the first things that comes to my mind, whereas when I hear Catholicism, that term is very far down the list if it crosses my mind at all. Maybe having grown up in MA and even attended Catholic high school I just see the Church as normal and Fundamentalism as the alien province of those dreaded Southerners, too many of whom haven’t completely shaken their Confederate sympathies. Yes, I know intellectually I’m being extremely simplistic here, but I’m just trying to explain how my reflexes work.
I want to remind you that it was Roman Catholic fundamentalists who surrounded my Brookline Episcopal parish with angry anti-abortion protesters calling parishioners all sorts of vile and disgusting names, carrying their signs with bloody fetuses, and so on, all because our Rector had the audacity to offer Planned Parenthood temporary office space after another Roman Catholic crazy (John Salvi) murdered workers in cold blood in our neighborhood.
I guess you never had to walk the gauntlet of Catholic crazies that surrounded the clinic in Coolidge Corner, blocking the sidewalk and terrorizing young women going there for needed medical care.
All this while Bernard Law was hiding hundreds of sex-abusers who were preying on thousands of boys and young men. More than one observer has pointed out that similar abuse of young women was almost surely happening before and after — it was and is ignored because the institution cares only about men.
Even when it was revealed, our Attorney General — himself a good Roman Catholic — was unable to find ANY pretext for bringing charges against Mr. Law or anybody else. That’s what your “big tent” looks like to me from the outside.
The fact that you see the misogyny and homophobia of “the Church” as “normal” is a huge part of the problem.
It is not normal. There is nothing “normal” about thousands of sex abuse victims. There is nothing coincidental about the institution’s rigid dogma regarding sexuality and celibacy and the way its clergy prey on boys and girls (not to mention men and women) foolish enough to turn to the institution for spiritual guidance.
The particular extremist evangelical sect that Ms. Elugardo calls her “family” is among the most virulent homophobic cults that shame the Protestant tradition. My opposition to that sect has nothing to do with race, gender, or age, and I think each of you know that.
This hostile, hate-filled homophobia is a poison in our midst. We already have far too many elected officials spreading that poison in our secular government and society.
The first step towards someone getting my vote is to walk away from such hate-mongers who call themselves “churches”.
I agree with nearly 100% of your criticism of the Catholic Church and have even attended a Brookline Episcopal parish off and on this year. Saint Cecilia’s is a great RC parish that comes as close as you can to full inclusion and Fr. Unni is a no bs pastor who is unafraid to criticize popes and bishops who mess up.
That said. I still had to step away since one good parish can’t clean up a rotten church. I hope to come back someday, until then, the TEC is a fine sweet spot between UMC and RC. That’s my own journey after a lot of ups and downs and twists and turns.
I owe my own evolution on abortion rights to my wife and to a lot of arguments with people like you, and would hope my prior statements defending the church on this or that would not reflect my current views.
I don’t see those views as normal and certainly do not defend them. I just have enough experience with the Catholic Church to see the positives attributes of the institution and the people within it as well.
@ go the way of the Anglican communion: Some would say that this already happened in 1536, twenty years after Martin Luther’s famous act of disobedience.
Haha we needed a good laugh on this thread! Indeed, in many ways since I want to protest what Rome is doing and reform it, I’ve realized I’ve crossed over!
I want to say again that my objection is very narrowly focused on the extremist group that this candidate has chosen as her “family”. I have no issues with the candidate herself — it doesn’t matter because I don’t vote in that district anyway.
You, Christopher and I have a long history of candid and frank exchanges of views regarding churches, extremist religious organizations, and candidates. We each argue our respective cases passionately and — at least most of the time — fairly.
The standard I apply is not so absolute as some characterize it here. As several of us have observed, if the standard is “any organization that formally discriminates against homosexuality and women”, then pretty much every religious tradition and a good many “mainstream” secular organizations fail. That’s not what I mean.
In our exchanges about the extremist organizations within the Roman Catholic tradition, both you and Christopher emphasized that the various extremist organizations like “Operation Rescue” were just that — extremist organizations. You each were adamant that membership in such an organization (such as Operation Rescue and Army of God) was fundamentally different from membership in the Roman Catholic church, and that the latter could not be held responsible for the former.
It is that extremism that to me differentiates the CLJ from mainstream Protestantism. The Rev Jeremiah Wright was well within the mainstream of black Protestant worship, in a way that certain other extremist black congregations are not. There are extremist sects of every organized religion.
If a candidate were a member of the FLDS, would we agree that such membership is qualitatively different from membership in the mainstream Mormon tradition?
In my view, extremist religion is among the most grave threats to modern society as we know it. I view the CLJ as an example of an extremist Protestant evangelical organization, notable for its long and very public history of homophobia.
That extremism, using religious belief to excuse misogyny and hate, is a disqualifier for public office (not to mention blasphemy and heresy).
That’s a very logical way of looking at it, but your attitude toward the Catholic Church seems to entrap the entire Church as opposed to just, say, Opus Dei which would be the analogous extreme sect therein. (Operation Rescue is of course pretty extreme too, but it is not part of the Church or in any way claim to be the true Church.)
@ My attitude toward the Roman Catholic church: Perhaps I wasn’t clear enough in my fourth paragraph above. I obviously do not put the entire Roman Catholic church in the same category as CLJ. I would reject a candidate who proclaimed “Operation Rescue” as their “family”. I’m already on record he as enthusiastically supporting Mike Capuano — a self-identified practicing member of the Roman Catholic church.
In the context of this discussion, I do think it’s worth reminding us that it was the Roman Catholic Church, in the person of Pope John Paul II, who ordered that Father Robert Drinan step down from his Congressional seat. I’m not aware of ANY other mainstream religious tradition that has made such a demand of any member — ordained or otherwise. The Roman Catholic Church has been active in advancing its agenda of misogyny in far more explicit way than the other religious traditions of America.
I do, like the author of the above piece, enjoy the irony that the effect of forcing Mr. Drinan to step down was to replace him with Barney Frank. If the institution actually cared about its agenda, then replacing Mr. Drinan with Mr. Frank was counter-productive — to the great benefit of women and reproductive freedom in the US.
I strive to separate the institution of the Roman Catholic Church from its members. I see no conflict between the many men and women who serve in public office and their membership in the Roman Catholic Church. I view Operation Rescue and CLJ as VERY different from that.
There is no ambiguity whatsoever in the homophobic hate-speech spewed by this sect and its self-described “culture warrior”, Roberto Miranda. Nothing from Jeremiah Wright compares to this.
I reject any candidate who refuses to disassociate with any hate-group like this.
Allow me to disagree with the whole other half of this post, which is the proposition that Jeffrey Sanchez is a solid progressive champion. As organizers in JP, we in JP Progressives have been consistently disappointed with his unwillingness to support progressive bills until after their passage is inevitable. Even more telling than his mediocre voting record is his poor cosponsorship record. Of Progressive Mass’s sixteen legislative priorities this cycle, he only cosponsored four. By comparison, JP’s other Rep Malia cosponsored thirteen. Four out of sixteen is an okay record for some parts of MA, but definitely not JP.
When it comes to the important legislative issues his constituents care about, Jeff Sanchez doesn’t even bother to understand what they are. Last year he wouldn’t listen to us about mandatory minimums and criminal justice reform. At this year’s JP Progressives forum, he passed on a question of carbon-pricing because he didn’t know anything about it. That same night he then claimed that Medicare-for-All was bad because it would take away his mother’s Medicare card. (3-minute video highlights here)
It all might have been worth it to get that seat in Ways & Means, but then he delivered those massive blows all in a row – killing Safe Communities Act budget provisions, reducing education funding for low-income and English-language-learners from Sonia Chang-Diaz’s Foundation Budget bill, and pushing back the state’s renewable energy targets by fifty years.
^this post is way more important than spreading some rumors from Facebook.
Come on, James, you’re sounding downright Trumpist now. “some rumors from Facebook”?
Give me a break. It’s a Facebook POST made by the candidate herself proclaiming CLJ as her “family”. That’s not “some rumor”. It’s an awkward fact about a candidate that you support.
It looks a lot as though your passion in support of your candidate is seriously distorting your perception of people who you’ve known here for a very long time.
The role of CLJ in fomenting homophobia and spreading hate and anger towards the LGBTQ community is no “rumor”. The leader of that sect is all over the public record spreading fear and lies about gay marriage and those of us who made it happen. The recent (March of this year) post from Facebook by your family is a clear affirmation of CLJ as your candidate’s “family”.
Your candidate has been caught in a conflict between her public persona and her chosen church. Only your candidate can resolve that conflict.
I differ to Gumby and Charley and refer you to her issues page and the multiple articles about Sanchez abandoning the progressives who elected him to serve the Speaker. The voters will decide Tuesday. If they want to re-elect a DeLeo lapdog, they do so knowing an amazing progressive challenger who is a lifelong LGBT ally backed by gay friends of mine is ready to do a better job. I do not see her church membership as a problem, as I have not with Catholic or Jewish or Protestant or even Mormon progressives I’ve supported in the past.
I can’t comment at all on this contest, but Deleo is where progressive bills on climate and immigration go to die. He prevents votes and has to go. I love my state rep,Jen Benson, but I want her to support new House leadership.