“By embracing gay marriage, President Obama is leading the country down an immoral path, ” said Rev. William Owens, president of the Coalition of African-American Pastors, in a statement. “The black church has always been the conscience of America, and today we are calling on black pastors and black Christians to withhold support from President Obama until he corrects course.
The Coalition of African-American Pastors, or CAAP, has launched a marriage petition at 100000Signatures4Marriage.com. The group describes itself as “a grass-roots movement of African-American Christians who believe in traditional family values such as supporting the role of religion in American public life, protecting the lives of the unborn, and defending the sacred institution of marriage.” It notes that it “is not affiliated with any political party or denomination.”
The announcement followed a press conference this week during the Annual Convention of the African, Methodist, and Episcopal, or AME, Church Convention in Nashville, Tenn. Owens urged the church to actively defend traditional marriage.
“In the midst of this great moral struggle, we are also asking the great AME Church to reaffirm biblical views on marriage that is between one man and one woman,” Owens said. “The AME Church has not taken a position on this important issue in more than 20 years, and it is time to get off the sidelines.”
CAAP has requested a meeting with Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder to discuss the same-sex marriage issue.
According to the organization, the White House has not responded to that request.
A letter to the Obama administration read in part:
“We pray for the president. … President Obama is the fulfillment of our dreams for our sons –and he has broken our hearts by using his power and position to endorse as a civil right something that is simply wrong.
“Some things are bigger than the next election.”
When Obama was a U.S. senator, he was a keynote speaker at the AME Church’s 2008 general conference. Just last week, Michelle Obama spoke to a crowd of 10,000 at the 2012 conference in Nashville.
“We were once proud of President Obama, but our pride has turned to shame,” Owens lamented. “The man holding the most powerful position in the world is stooping to lead the country down an immoral path. As AME pastor Luke Robinson said of the president: ‘His pronouncement is, in fact, a direct attack on the God of the Bible and the Christian faith.’
He concluded, “It is with this background and strong belief, that we – and the AME pastors who joined with us – challenge the entire African Methodist Episcopal Church to stand with other denominations and speak out against President Obama’s endorsement of same-sex marriage and officially and formally reaffirm support for the Bible’s view of marriage as the union of one man and one woman.”
