A powerful, cultic religious order whose founder and clergy are accused of sexually abusing minors; admissions of children born out of wedlock… As often happens, Talk To Action articles written years ago are now suddenly relevant to the news cycle.
Back in June 2009, TTA contributor Frank Cocozzelli wrote a story titled CBS’s Go To (Rightwing) Catholic Guy–about Thomas D. Williams, the far-right Catholic spokesperson who has just announced (as covered in the NYT and the Catholic News Agency), that he is leaving public ministry after admitting to fathering a child out of wedlock.
From early 2008 into late 2009, Father Williams, author of such works of religious moralism as Knowing Right From Wrong (2008, Thomas Nelson, Inc.), made multiple appearances on CBS with Katie Kouric, Jeff Glor, and Maggie Rodriguez, on the Early Show. As Cocozzelli described,
“
The go to guy at CBS News for all-things Catholic is one Father Thomas D. Williams. Never heard of him? Well, if you watch The Morning Show’s Maggie Rodriguez or the CBS Evening News’s Katie Couric you may very well see Fr. Williams appear live via satellite from Vatican City. But “the Tiffany Network” will also probably fail to disclose that Fr. Williams is also a member of the Legion of Christ, a reactionary order that is squarely aligned with American movement conservatism and that espouses the most conservative of Catholic views on bioethical issues such as LGBT equality, abortion and stem cell research.
[...]
…[T]he Legionaries of Christ is a secretive, ultra-conservative order with a troubling past and an uncertain future. Its activities have been restricted or it has been banned outright in at least eight American dioceses for practicing cult-like control over its members. Archbishop Edwin O’Brien of Baltimore was going to expel the organization until the Vatican stepped in and asked that that he instead engage in a dialogue with the group’s superior general. Still suspicious of the group’s activities (Archbishop O’Brien has accused the Legionnaires of ”blind allegiance, lack of “respect for human dignity for each of its members,”" as well as “heavily persuasive methods on young people”), the Baltimore archbishop keeps the Legionnaires on a very tight leash.
And then there are the sex scandals of the Legionnaires’ founder, Father Marcial Maciel. Maciel had been accused of pedophilia since the 1950s and again in the 1970s. Originally to have been found innocent of the earlier charges, the Vatican reopened the investigation to the later incidents. In 2006 the Vatican forced Maciel into retirement addition and subsequently died in 2008. A year after his death the news surfaced that he had also fathered a child.
The group’s influence is significant in part because it targets wealthy and influential individuals for recruitment.”
The bigger scandal here isn’t so much the issue of the sexual transgressions of powerful Catholic religious order members but, rather, the fact that far-right wing religious pundits, whether Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, or from other religious traditions, who show deep disrespect for pluralism, have been getting widespread exposure through mainstream media.
This tracks a more general trend in media bias, as evidenced in a 2011 Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting study which showed that 70% of Sunday morning guests on ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox news shows were registered Republicans.
In a subsequent story on Thomas D. Williams, CBS, Rev. Thomas D. Williams and the Theoconning of America, Cocozzelli examined that issue, writing,
“Last week I discussed the disturbing worldview of CBS’s go-to rightwing Catholic guy, pundit Rev. Thomas D. Williams, a member of the far right Legion of Christ. This is part of a larger trend that merits further discussion.
Neoconservatives and their theocon allies have had considerable success in getting us to see the world through their eyes; and each other as solely as all good or all bad; enemy or friend. These distortions often contribute to grotesque distortions of fact being presented as given truths.
This Manichean framing has infected the news media, which in turn functioned as a carrier of the disease…
[...]
…Rev. Williams believes that the only truth that should prevail is traditionalist Catholic orthodoxy, and that this worldview should be favored by and reflected in government.
Williams is a perfect example of the way that pundits pass for reporters, telling us what to think and how to act, while democracy is packaged for us as entertainment. The spectacle of media gladiators and bloviators is glorified over the participation of an informed citizenry. While this critique is not new, less well developed is the increasing role of religious right framed presentation of the news, and the risk of discounting the centrality of religious pluralism as a key to constitutional democracy. One consequence of the creeping theoconism in the media is that we often fall prey to historical revisionism — the weapon of choice of the Religious Right. Naturally, the narrative that emerges from this history of convenience attacks the very tenets of liberalism, such as religious pluralism as being sinister and evil. Faith and reason are not synonymous, but antithetical entities.”
Talk To Action contributor Frank Cocozzelli is author of what may be the longest running and most extensive series of articles available Internet or in print, 221 thus far, on the Catholic Right.
The religious right, with Billy Graham himself weighing in, has just convinced North Carolina voters to undermine their own economic well-being. I doubt many North Carolina residents asked, in the abstract, whether they would vote to sabotage their own state’s economy would answer “yes!” But that’s what 61% of Tar Heel state voters have probably just done.
NC’s misleadingly titled “Defense of Marriage Act”, just voted into the NC state constitution, probably won’t have any impact on the institution of straight marriage in North Carolina, judging by the Massachusetts experience. But it likely will hurt the NC economy. That’s the irony. It’s not just that LGBTI Americans will be less inclined to spend their tourism dollars in NC – research shows that anti-gay bigotry is bad for the economy other ways too.
[below: A classic 2006 Daily Show spoof examines religious right's claim that gay marriage has destroyed Massachusetts.]
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Mass. Hysteria | ||||
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As researcher Richard Florida has demonstrated, American urban areas that can attract “cultural creatives” – especially intelligent, talented residents – do better economically, and attracting gay residents is an important part of that. As Florida described in a 2003 USA Today op-ed,
“Research I conducted with Gary Gates, an Urban Institute demographer, shows that the big new-ideas and cutting-edge industries that lead to sustained prosperity are more likely to exist where gay people feel welcome. Most centers of tech-based business growth also have the highest concentrations of gay couples. Conversely, major areas with relatively few gay couples tend to be slow- or no-growth places. “
There’s a more subtle component to Florida’s argument – he also points out that diversity, in itself, confers an economic advantage – because gay-rights friendly areas also tend to be more accepting of ethnic and cultural diversity in general. “Tolerance”, or even outright support, for LGBTI rights works as a rather accurate proxy for acceptance of diversity in general, and diversity tends to spur innovation. Wrote Florida, in his USA Today column,
“Creative, innovative and entrepreneurial activities tend to flourish in the same kinds of places that attract gays and others outside the norm. To put it bluntly, a place where it’s OK for men to walk down the street holding hands will probably also be a place where Indian engineers, tattooed software geeks and foreign-born entrepreneurs feel at home. When people from varied backgrounds, places and attitudes can collide, economic home runs are likely.”
This is far from a new phenomenon, I would point out — for thousands of years, port cities – mercantile hubs which have for obvious reasons enjoyed high levels of ethnic and cultural diversity – have been known for their exceptional economic prosperity.
What is most astounding about yesterday’s decision, by sixty one percent of North Carolina voters, to enshrine a radically restrictive anti-gay rights amendment barring not only same-sex marriage in the NC state constitution, but also banning civil unions and domestic partnerships for both gay and straight couples, is the likelihood that South Carolina voters of the “Tar Heel” state have just sent a resounding message to exceptionally talented and economically valuable young Americans from a wide range of minority groups — not just LGBTI citizens but Asian and Hispanic Americans, indeed just about any American minority group one cares to think of — “you’re probably not welcome here”.
It’s unlikely that my own gay rights-friendly state, Massachusetts, will see an immediate flood of established, disgruntled gay couples fleeing institutionalized repression in the South, resettling to the Bay State. The results will be more gradual. But over time more exceptionally talented young gay and minority American citizens will opt to settle in the Bay State, where they’re obviously more welcome.
After eight years, legalized same sex marriage has had no discernible impact on the institution of straight marriage in the Bay State – as many straight Massachusetts residents have no doubt noticed. Dire warnings from the religious right didn’t pan out; there was no downside, only the upside of an expansion of human rights for Massachusetts LGBTI residents.
In 2004, opponents of same-sex marriage were emitting warnings about the alleged threat they said was posed by the legalization of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts that look even more ridiculous now than eight years ago.
My favorites include a claim, from James Dobson, that gay marriage would cause [straight] families to crumble, “presaging the fall of Western Civilization itself.” Another was from MA Democratic State Representative Emile J. Goguen, who warned “It’s like a rolling ball of snow. It gets bigger and bigger. You allow it in Massachusetts, it’ll spread to God knows where.”
One could have just as easily reversed the equation, to warn, “opposition to gay rights? You allow it in Massachusetts, it’ll spread to God knows where”. That would have proved prescient, because more U.S. states have banned same-sex marriage than have legalized it.
Back in 2005, on the principle that it’s always advantageous to shoot fish in a barrel – because it’s hard to miss – I set out to demonstrate that same-sex marriage would have in practical terms zero impact on marriage in Massachusetts by tracking the state divorce rate. The results were predictable.
In 2004, Massachusetts had one of the lowest divorce rates in the nation and four years later the MA divorce rate was still among the lowest of any U.S. state and other notable trends had even improved, leading me to write a sarcastically-titled story, MA Gay Marriage Brings Perilous Drop in Divorce, STD, Teen Pregnancy Rates?.
Indeed, by 2009 the Massachusetts divorce rate had dropped to roughly the point it was at in the 1940’s prior to the time when the United States entered World War Two. There are some downsides, it’s fair to point out – MA has some of the most restrictive divorce laws in America.
But MA also has traditionally led the nation in having some of the lowest state rates of teen pregnancy, infant mortality, and overall health ranking. Much of that, critics could argue, simply has to do with the fact that Massachusetts is a comparatively wealthy state, and wealthier American populations tend to have lower rates of teen pregnancy and infant mortality and better health.
But glancing at the maps below, which I compiled back in 2005, looking North from MA, to Vermont, we notice these trends all hold in VT – which is a much less wealthy state than Massachusetts. It’s hard to escape the impression that some of this is culturally driven. Vermont, by the way, legalized civil unions between same-sex couples in 2000 and legalized gay marriage in 2009.
Wrapping up, back in 2009 I wrote,
“In a similar way, Galileo’s insistence that the Earth revolved around the Sun and not vice-versa caused problems for opponents of the Heliocentric theory such as the Catholic Church. But, in time the Church learned accept the new outlook because scientific data supported it. So, perhaps there’s hope that… critics of gay marriage may yet come to accept that after a half decade of legal gay marriage in Massachusetts, life continues as before.”
I’m still hoping.
map key: red=higher rates, green=lower rates
Teen Births, 15-19, 2003
Infant Mortality, 2004
Overall State Health Ranking, 2004
For many young Americans, the Westboro Baptist Church has become the face of extreme antigay hatred from the religious right ; Mike Bickle’s Kansas City-based International House of Prayer, with its smooth pop-rock driven exterior, would seem almost the antithesis of Westboro Baptist. But today, Friday April 27th, 2012, IHOP is slated, according to a news release from ChristianNewsWire, to publicly screen a movie-length video featuring a Ugandan religious leader, Julius Peter Oyet, who has stated that “even animals are wiser than homosexuals.” and has openly called for practicing homosexuals to be hunted down and imprisoned or even executed.
Oyet even claims (see video at end of story) to have played a central role in a pending Ugandan bill, the internationally condemned Anti Homosexuality Bill, designed to make that happen; in a 2010 interview with French journalist Dominic Mesmin, Oyet stated that he had served on a committee that picked MP David Bahati to introduce the bill in Uganda’s parliament and had a special government commission to rally public support behind the bill, which has been internationally denounced – including by President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hlllary Clinton.
Julius Oyet has also worked closely with Ugandan evangelist Martin Ssempa, a former close ally of Saddleback Church pastor Rick Warren. In 2010, after Warren had distanced himself, Ssempa subsequently became known for ostentatious incitement of antigay hatred that has included screening, in churches and other public venues, fringe gay pornography, in an attempt to convey the impression that coprophagia is a common homosexual practice.
In early 2011, Ssempa and Oyet co-presented to Uganda’s parliament a petition signed by millions of Ugandans calling for speedy passage of the Anti Homosexuality Bill. Julius Oyet has been consistent – in his interview with Dominic Mesmin, Oyet stated that he was able to rally millions of Ugandans behind the bill.
For his own part, IHOP founder Mike Bickle has stated that during the End-Times “Marriage as an institution will be forbidden in parts of the earth. As one of the signs of the times, the gay marriage agenda, which is rooted in the depths of hell – this is not about love, this is deception.”
These are far from IHOP’s only connections to the incitement of antigay hatred. One of the ministry co-directors of IHOP is Lou Engle, whose The Call ministry rents space from IHOP for its main base of operations. In May 2010, Engle brought his The Call to Uganda, to stage an event billed as fighting rampant immorality, including homosexuality, idolatry, and witchcraft.
Appearing at the event, held at one of the Ugandan capital Kampala’s biggest universities, were major supporters of the Uganda Anti Homosexuality Bill including prominent Ugandan evangelist Julius Oyet, who has ties to Uganda’s President and First Lady and declared from the stage,
“We call upon our parliament not to waste time. Uganda says no to homosexuality… our children today are being deceived by the West to buy them, to give them school fees, so that they can be homosexuals.”
read the rest of the story here, at Talk To Action
“A-1 Self Storage was one of the original donors who helped the founders of Invisible Children travel to Uganda and make the documentary Invisible Children: The Rough Cut which led to the creation of Invisible Children, Inc the 510 C 3 non-profit organization… The contributions of A-1 Self Storage have been crucial to the growth and success of Invisible Children”
– quote from current Invisible Children web page, crediting the Caster family business A1 Self Storage with providing crucial funding that launched Invisible Children. The Caster family was one of the biggest donors funding California’s Proposition 8 and has just been exposed as one of the biggest funders, in 2008, of the virulently anti-LGBT rights National Organization For Marriage.
Today, Friday the 20th, two national human rights efforts will hold awareness events in American schools. One, the Gay, Straight, and Lesbian Education Network (GLSEN) will hold its annual Day Of Silence, to raise awareness about anti-LGBT bullying and harassment in schools.
The other effort, Invisible Children, is also holding an event today, called “Cover The Night”. While IC, behind the KONY 2012 viral video, states that it is pro-LGBT rights, the organization has extensive ties to the hard, antigay politicized evangelical right; in fact, Invisible Children’s own website states that the organization was started with “crucial” seed money from one of the top funders of both California’s anti-same sex marriage Proposition 8 and the anti-gay rights group the National Organization For Marriage.
Back when I wrote my April 4th report on the “extensive social and institutional ties” between the Invisible Children nonprofit and the Uganda branch of The Family / The Fellowship, credited by Ugandan MP David Bahati with having helped inspire, and even provide “technical support” for, the internationally condemned Anti Homosexuality Bill looming before Uganda’s parliament since late 2009, I missed some rather obvious connections.
A current page of Invisible Children’s website titled “Our Network” identifies two entities, as part of IC’s network, that are directly connected to the California Caster family — one of the biggest funders of the 2008 anti-same sex marriage Proposition 8, and also a major funder of the virulently antigay National Organization For Marriage.
According to a leaked NOM 2008 tax return form, members of the Caster family donated over $256,000 to the National Organization For Marriage in 2008, the largest collective donation next to a whopping $450,000 gift from John Templeton. According to California Watch, the Caster family donated over $700,000 to the effort to pass the anti-same sex marriage Proposition 8:
“[Terrence] Caster drew fire in 2008 after his family donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the ballot proposition to ban same-sex marriage. Caster gave $172,500 individually, and his Caster Family Trust gave $622,000 to the Prop. 8 campaign, according to campaign filings. At the time, Caster told The San Diego Union-Tribune, “Without solid marriage, you are going to have a sick society.” “
In addition, confidential National Organization For Marriage memos leaked to the pro-LGBTI rights group the Human Rights Campaign outlined the strategic goal of targeting young Americans in the “millennial” age range – which mirrors Invisible Children’s targeting of millennials outlined in IC’s 2007 application to join the elite evangelical Barnabas Group.
read the rest of this article here, at Talk To Action.
Since the eruption of Invisible Children’s record-breaking KONY 2012 viral video in early March, a considerable body of evidence has emerged which ties the nonprofit, and its leadership, to the American Protestant evangelical right. This is a summary of that evidence – which includes the recent revelation, by LGBT rights group Truth Wins Out, that in 2007 Invisible Children officially applied to be one of the Christian ministries supported by an evangelical right-wing nonprofit called the Barnabas Group.
Evangelicals launch KONY 2012
[image, below: Invisible Children Facebook page photos show February 23, 2012 kickoff of KONY 2012 campaign, at Mt. Soledad Cross in California]
The Invisible Children promotion campaign for the KONY 2012 video was launched by a February 23, 2012 afternoon rally, of Invisible Children leaders and “roadies”, who tour with IC to bring its message to schools and college campuses across America, at the Mount Soledad Cross, one of the most notorious flashpoints in recent history of recent legal fights over church-state separation. As reported in the La Jolla, CA La Jolla Light newspaper on March 7, 2012, Invisible Children members met at the cross for lunch, then the organization sent out its 16 IC vans, with IC teams, to fan out across America.
Even the launch of the KONY 2012 video through social media happened very differently from what one might have expected if Invisible Children were truly the secular liberal venture it has been portrayed as. As noted by Forbes writer Anthony Kosner, a study by the SocialFlow research group showed that, rather than emerging from big liberal enclaves on the American coasts, the initial wave of social media traffic that launched the KONY 2012 video originated in mid-sized, relatively conservative cities in middle America.
By analyzing the geographic location of the first 5,000 people to use the #KONY2012 hashtag on Twitter, SocialFlow determined that the original epicenter, by far, was Birmingham, AL, followed by Pittsburgh, PA. Other major epicenters were Oklahoma City, OK, Noblesville, IN, and Dayton, Ohio. SocialFlow’s analysis of the user profiles of those first 5,000 showed that Invisible Children is “heavily supported by Christian youth, many of whom post Biblical psalms as their profile bios”. IC tapped that preexisting supporter base for its KONY 2012 launch.
Jesus talk
One of the first looks at Invisible Children’s evangelical roots was my March 8, 2012 Alternet story, concerning a November 2011 appearance by Jason Russell at the conservative evangelical Liberty University, founded by the late Jerry Falwell. As Invisible Children co-founder told Liberty students,
“the trick is to not go out into the world and say, “I’m going to baptize you, I’m going to convict you, I have an agenda to win you over.”
You agenda is to look into the eyes, as Jesus did, and say, “who are you? And will you be my friend?” – Like he did to the prostitutes, the tax collectors, the fisherman.
[...]
A lot of people fear Christians, they fear Liberty University, they fear Invisible Children – because they feel like we have an agenda. They see us and they go, “You want me to sign up for something, you want my money. You want, you want me to believe in your God.” And it freaks them out.”
On April 5, 2012, LGBT rights nonprofit Truth Wins Out released audio of a Jason Russell conference appearance from 2005 in San Antonio according to TWO, in which Russell described Invisible Children as an evangelical missions project that could, as a “Trojan Horse”, bring the message of Jesus into public high schools:
“Coming in January we are trying to hit as many high schools, churches, and colleges as possible with this movie. We are able to be the Trojan Horse in a sense, going into a secular realm and saying, guess what life is about orphans, and it’s about the widow. It’s about the oppressed. That’s God’s heart. And to sit in a public high school and tell them about that has been life-changing. Because they get so excited. And it’s not driven by guilt, it’s driven by an adventure and the adventure is God’s.”
As I reported on March 21, 2012, following Jason Russell’s very public naked meltdown on a San Diego street corner, Invisible Children lawyer and “Director of Ideology” Jedidiah Jenkins, who has attended the evangelical Christian Pepperdine University law school, wrote a post on his blog that cast Russell as a Jesus-like figure sacrificed for the greater good. Jenkins also wrote on the blog, concerning LRA commander Joseph Kony,
“power can be used for evil and sinister spirituality and magic and murder and the LRA and G-d understands this better than i that when our flesh falls He has something to do with it… i believe the physical life matters, but i think the spiritual life matters more… may G-d have mercy.””
In an October 2010 blog post, Jenkins appeared to characterize Islam as a false religion, stating that he had never read the Koran because he had been “born into the truth.” Jenkins then referred to,
“the Christian scriptures that predict a very real deception
and an anti-christ
and a season of unrest
and violence
and a worldly kingdom ruled by Jesus”
As a July 2, 2010 Wall Street Journal story by Brad A. Greenberg noted, “Invisible Children’s media kit emphatically states that its founders “believe in Christ, but do NOT want to limit themselves in any way.” Later on, Invisible Children scrubbed the reference to Jesus.
The Fellowship
Jenkins and Russell were not the only Invisible Children leaders with strong evangelical backgrounds and ties. In an April 4, 2012 7,000-word report, I explored the “extensive social and institutional ties” between Invisible Children and The Fellowship, the Washington DC-based global evangelical network which hosts the yearly National Prayer Breakfast:
“Invisible Children, which has branded itself as welcoming cultural, religious, and sexual diversity, also enjoys extensive institutional and social ties to the global evangelical network known as The Fellowship (also known as “The Family”) – which has been credited with inspiring and providing “technical support” [see footnote 1] for Uganda’s internationally-denounced Anti Homosexuality Bill, also dubbed the “kill the gays” bill. “
The report contains the startling revelation that Invisible Children’s Schools For Schools mentoring program in Northern Uganda had been described, by Invisible Children itself, as being under the supervision of Ugandan who is now head Education Director for the school system run by the Fellowship in Northern Uganda, Paul Lukwiya.
[video, below, describes co-mingling of Invisible Children's Ugandan education program with The Fellowship's academy system in Uganda]
Invisible Children’s ties to The Fellowship were anything but casual. As I described in the report,
Among the current and past Invisible Children leaders and employees with professional and social ties to Fellowship members are Jason Russell, Laren Poole, Ben Keesey, Ben Thomson, Adam Finck, James A. Pearson, and Jared White – who in late 2009 went on a cross-Africa motorcycle trip with three young Americans who are working to develop The Fellowship’s programs in Uganda, including Eric Kreutter – son of Tim Kreutter, The Fellowship’s longtime American leader on the ground in Uganda.
Kreutter oversees Cornerstone Development, the principal umbrella effort of The Fellowship in Uganda. A leading Cornerstone initiative is its educational programs. Head Cornerstone Education Director Paul Lukwiya has been reported to be overseeing Invisible Children’s mentoring program in Uganda.
Funding
Initially, when I reported, writing for Alternet on March 11, 2012, that the Invisible Children nonprofit had been launched with substantial early funding from the “antigay, creationist religious right”, critics of the analysis claimed that this was inconsequential, because Invisible Children had received funding from across the ideological spectrum, which was true, and in any case it was possible to use money from partisan or problematic sources to do good work.
But the religious right funding entities which provided major, early financial support for Invisible Children, such as the behemoth National Christian Foundation, have a strong partisan agenda – which attacks LGBT rights, advances Young-Earth creationism, and backs some of the most politically extreme religious right ministries in America.
Why would such a sectarian Christian, politically partisan funding entity back a secular, nonpartisan charity? Here are ministries that, along with Invisible Children, also received National Christian Foundation funding in 2008:
2008 grants from National Christian Foundation, and subsidiaries
Focus on The Family: $4,268,000
Family Research Council: $2,387,000
The Fellowship Foundation (AKA “The Family” or the “International Foundation”): $515,000
Lou Engle’s The Call: $166,000
Ed Silvoso’s Harvest Evangelism: $817,000
The Discovery Institute: $702,000*
Invisible Children: $414,000**NCF’s 2008 990 lists $139,000 to IC; NCF subsidiary ProVision Foundation’s 2008 990 lists a $150,000 grant to IC; NCF subsidiary ProVision Trust’s 2008 990 lists a $125,000 grant to IC.
*Answers in Genesis, which directly promotes “Young Earth” creationism,received over $35,000 from the NCF in 2008.
Conclusion: IC is an evangelical Christian ministry
To sum up, Invisible Children’s key support base was evangelical, as is much of its leadership; the IC nonprofit was launched with key, early funding from religious right funding sources; Invisible Children, and its leadership, is extensively connected to what is probably the most influential evangelical network on Earth, The Fellowship; IC’s programs in Uganda appear to have become intertwined with Fellowship projects in that country.
Lastly, and perhaps most tellingly, Invisible Children is officially a Christian ministry with the right-wing evangelical nonprofit the Barnabas Group, reports the LGBT rights nonprofit Truth Wins Out, which characterizes Barnabas, a 501(c)(3) charity, as “antigay”. As TWO Executive Director Wayne Besen described,
“In May 2007, Invisible Children’s CEO Ben Keesey, and IC’s Development Director Chris Sarette, submitted an application, which identified Invisible Children as a “ministry”, asking for support from the Barnabas Group — a politically far right-wing Christian nonprofit which helps cutting edge stealth ministry evangelizing efforts that target Jews and Muslims, youth, Hollywood, and even apartment dwellers around the globe.
The Barnabas Group, which takes on only a small number of elite applicants per year from the Christian ministries that seek its support, accepted Invisible Children’s application. The Group assists such evangelizing efforts by networking them with Christian business leaders and entrepreneurs, and with Christian foundations.
In 2006, a post on the Invisible Children website declared that IC “is not a religious organization, meaning we are not affiliated with a certain church or ministry” and according to Josh Kron of The Atlantic, on March 18th of this year a statement on Invisible Children’s website read, “Invisible Children is not affiliated with any religious organization.”
Judging by its stable of ministries – which, along with Invisible Children, also includes the Family Research Council, identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group, the Barnabas Group is dedicated to evangelizing, fighting LGBT rights, and advancing Christian supremacy worldwide. “
Mounting suspicions about the evangelical nature of the Invisible Children nonprofit, which released the blockbuster KONY 2012 viral video hit in early March, have now been confirmed. As reported by the LGBT rights nonprofit Truth Wins Out, in 2007 Invisible Children officially applied to become one of the elite Christian ministries supported by the politically right-wing, evangelical Christian nonprofit the Barnabas Group – which accepted IC’s application. Wrote TWO Executive Director Wayne Besen,
“In May 2007, Invisible Children’s CEO Ben Keesey, and IC’s Development Director Chris Sarette, submitted an application, which identified Invisible Children as a “ministry”, asking for support from the Barnabas Group — a politically far right-wing Christian nonprofit which helps cutting edge stealth ministry evangelizing efforts that target Jews and Muslims, youth, Hollywood, and even apartment dwellers around the globe.
The Barnabas Group, which takes on only a small number of elite applicants per year from the Christian ministries that seek its support, accepted Invisible Children’s application. The Group assists such evangelizing efforts by networking them with Christian business leaders and entrepreneurs, and with Christian foundations.
In 2006, a post on the Invisible Children website declared that IC “is not a religious organization, meaning we are not affiliated with a certain church or ministry” and according to Josh Kron of The Atlantic, on March 18th of this year a statement on Invisible Children’s website read, “Invisible Children is not affiliated with any religious organization.”
Judging by its stable of ministries – which, along with Invisible Children, also includes the Family Research Council, identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group, the Barnabas Group is dedicated to evangelizing, fighting LGBT rights, and advancing Christian supremacy worldwide.
Leading up to this point, there has been considerable evidence of Invisible Children’s stealth ministry nature: a 2005 declaration from IC co-founder Jason Russell that Invisible Children functions as a “Trojan Horse” and 2011 statements made by Russell at evangelical Christian Liberty University; Invisible Children’s funding from major right-wing evangelical financing entities; and the organization’s extensive social and institutional ties to the Washington D.C. based global evangelical network known as The Fellowship (also known as “The Family”.)
In sum, that evidence is compelling. But Invisible Children’s membership in the Barnabas Group is unambiguous. The Barnabas Group only accepts applications from Christian ministry efforts.”
The Barnabas Group serves as a feeder system for the behemoth National Christian Foundation, which has been a major source of funding for Invisible Children as well as hard-right evangelical ministries such as Focus on The Family, the Family Research Council, Lou Engle’s The Call, Ed Silvoso’s Harvest Evangelism ministry, and the Fellowship Foundation – one of the central nonprofits of the Washington D.C. based evangelical network known as The Family (or The Fellowship) which has been credited both with inspiring and also providing “technical support” for Uganda’s internationally denounced Anti Homosexuality Bill that has loomed before Uganda’s parliament since late 2009.
Truth Wins Out’s revelation comes amidst other disturbing news, confirmation that Invisible Children has served as an intelligence asset for the government of Uganda. As originally reported by Milton Allimadi of the New York City based Blackstar News Service, now confirmed by the Invisible Children nonprofit according to the Raw Story news service, in 2009 Invisible Children provided intelligence to the Ugandan government that led to the arrest of a political opponent of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni.
This is part of a wider pattern. As Joshua Keating, writing for Foreign Policy magazine observed,
“Invisible Children has been criticized by a number of observers in the United States and Uganda for working with the Ugandan government — which has itself been implicated in a number of human rights abuses — as part of its campaign to apprehend Kony. The group responded to this critique last month on its website, noting that it “does not defend any of the human rights abuses perpetrated by the Ugandan government” and “none of the money donated through Invisible Children has ever gone to support the government of Uganda,” but that nonetheless, “The Ugandan military (UPDF) is a necessary piece in counter-LRA activities.” “
Ugandan People’s Defense Force troops hunting for Joseph Kony in the DRC Congo have been accused by Western human right groups of raping and looting, and recent Ugandan government human rights abuses also include large-scale eviction of Ugandan citizens from their traditional lands.
Late last year, even as Invisible Children was organizing its young partisans who were to play a major role in the online launch of Invisible Children’s breakthrough KONY 2012 video, by promoting the video on social media websites such as Reddit.com, Ugandan government troops and police were evicting some 20,000 Northern Ugandans from their farmlands and burning their houses – as the New York Times, the UK Guardian, and OXFAM reported in September 2011. The Ugandan citizens were evicted so that a British company could start a tree farming operation.
What’s a ‘Trojan Horse’? See footnote
[below: in audio obtained by Truth Wins Out, from a 2005 San Antonio conference, Jason Russell states that Invisible Children is a "Trojan Horse".]
As the LGBT rights watchdog group Truth Wins Out reported yesterday, in an April 5th, 2012 press release, the Invisible Children nonprofit behind the viral video hit KONY 2012, and its video sequel “Beyond Famous”, appears to have an invisible agenda – which TWO’s Executive Director Wayne Besen calls “stealth evangelism”:
“In audio TWO discovered from a 2005 Christian conference in San Antonio, Invisible Children’s co-founder Jason Russell called his organization a “Trojan Horse” designed to infiltrate secular institutions and surreptitiously promote his group’s version of Christian fundamentalism. The audiotape reveals that that his organization is particularly focused on targeting youth in public schools. According to Russell’s remarks (0:44):
“Coming in January we are trying to hit as many high schools, churches, and colleges as possible with this movie. We are able to be the Trojan Horse in a sense, going into a secular realm and saying, guess what life is about orphans, and it’s about the widow. It’s about the oppressed. That’s God’s heart. And to sit in a public high school and tell them about that has been life-changing. Because they get so excited. And it’s not driven by guilt, it’s driven by an adventure and the adventure is God’s.”
“This vividly reveals Invisible Children’s invisible agenda,” said Truth Wins Out’s Executive Director Wayne Besen. “This group is not simply about exposing LRA leader Joseph Kony, but engaging in stealth evangelism.
Invisible Children and The Family
While most of mainstream media continues to uncritically report on the Invisible Children effort — despite a growing body of reporting tying the KONY 2012 authors to the politicized Christian right — at least a few mainstream media venues have picked up on my 7,000-word report that investigates extensive institutional and social ties between Invisible Children and the Washington, D.C. based neo-fundamentalist evangelical network called “The Fellowship” (or “The Family”). As I wrote in the executive summary to my report (cited by Forbes, USA Today, and The Guardian),
It is unlikely that many Americans who watched Invisible Children’s record-smashing viral video hit KONY 2012 were aware of IC’s evangelical nature (1, 2) or of the nonprofit’s early financing from foundations that back the hard Christian right, including one of the biggest funders of the 2008 push for California’s anti-same sex marriage Proposition 8.
But Invisible Children, which has branded itself as welcoming cultural, religious, and sexual diversity, also enjoys extensive institutional and social ties to the global evangelical network known as The Fellowship (also known as “The Family”) – which has been credited with inspiring and providing “technical support” for Uganda’s internationally-denounced Anti Homosexuality Bill, also dubbed the “kill the gays” bill.
“This, of course, is sickening”
The efforts of Invisible Children, and KONY 2012, have been sharply criticized by a wide range of voices, especially Ugandans — who jeered and threw stones at the screen during a screening of KONY 2012 in North-Central Uganda — as well as journalists [1, 2, 3, 4] familiar with conflict in Northern Uganda and the DRC Congo, and academics [1, 2, 3] who study the Northern Uganda region.
According to Rosabell Kagumir, a young Ugandan journalist, the war in Northern Uganda was, in the beginning, “much more about resources and about marginalization of people of Northern Uganda.” Kagumir, who has studied at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, observed that “the situation [shown] in the [KONY 2012] video was [from] five, six years ago” and noted that the video shows Westerners and Americans as rescuers who swoop in and “save” helpless, benighted Africans. “if you are showing me as voiceless, as hopeless… you shouldn’t be telling my story if you don’t believe that I also have the power to change what is going on”, said Kagumir.
In a March 12, 2012 op-ed in Al Jazeera, Dr. Adam Branch, senior research fellow at the Makerere Institute of Social Research, Uganda, and assistant professor of political science at San Diego State University, USA — and author of Displacing Human Rights: War and Intervention in Northern Uganda — called out Invisible Children for,
“the warmongering, the narcissism, the commercialisation, the reductive and one-sided story they tell, their portrayal of Africans as helpless children in need of rescue by white Americans.
As a result of Invisible Children’s irresponsible advocacy, civilians in Uganda and central Africa may have to pay a steep price in their own lives so that a lot of young Americans can feel good about themselves, and a few can make good money. This, of course, is sickening”
Voicing a similar view in a March 8, 2012 op-ed, Michael Deibert, a Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Peace and Reconciliation Studies at Coventry University and the author of the forthcoming Democratic Republic of Congo: Between Hope and Despair (Zed Books), wrote,
“The problem with Invisible Children’s whitewashing of the role of the government of Uganda’s president Yoweri Museveni in the violence of Central Africa is that it gives Museveni and company a free pass, and added ammunition with which to bludgeon virtually any domestic opposition, such as Kizza Besigye and the Forum for Democratic Change.
By blindly supporting Uganda’s current government and its military adventures beyond its borders, as Invisible Children suggests that people do, Invisible Children is in fact guaranteeing that there will be more violence, not less, in Central Africa.”
Are Western charities and the Ugandan government the real problem ?
One critic whose voice carries special weight is former South Park writer (and atheist) Jane Bussmann, whose investigation in Northern Uganda (around the same time Invisible Children was shooting footage that wound up in KONY 2012 ) led her to a sharply different take on the situation.
Bussmann subsequently donated the proceeds from her book about the conflict, The Worst Date Ever Or How it Took a Comedy Writer to Expose Africa’s Secret War to start up charity to run a home for former kidnapped children, victims of the conflict.
In a scathingly acerbic op-ed April 3, 2012 in the UK Guardian, which upends Invisible Children’s brilliantly crafted but ultimately deceptive narrative frame, Jane Bussmann suggested that the horrific suffering which plagued Northern Uganda for two decades probably had less to do with Joseph Kony and more to do with the corrupt regime of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, and with Western charities that enabled Museveni and used the horrific suffering in Northern Uganda as a fundraising cash cow:
“Kony stopped being solely an African problem when western charities helped Museveni keep 2 million Ugandans in semi-starvation camps at gunpoint while he “looked” for Kony. These “protected villages” were so badly protected that Kony was able to commit massacres inside them, and simply could not have existed without western complicity. It was President Museveni’s job to stop Joseph Kony, but he’d have been an idiot to stop Kony when half his budget came from foreign aid and a fat chunk of that aid was earmarked for the Kony mess. The cash keeps coming despite Museveni’s dodgy 26 years in office, dodgier shooting up of protesters and political opposition … and mysterious failure to stop the LRA. (Incidentally, Museveni’s army beat up and burned local religious leaders who were peacefully rescuing kids from Kony as early as 2002.)
Charities pimping Africa as victim is reverse child pornography – send us money or we’ll keep showing you pictures of children getting screwed…
Meanwhile, out of sight, the fight against Kony was bungled for 26 years. The World Bank funded a rehab centre for children who escaped Kony. Terrific. Who did they pay to run it? Kony’s “Brigadier” Kenneth Banya. Kony ran a city of kids in Sudan, systematically raping thousands; luckily the international community had maps showing its location…
Kony, cash cow of charities and bent governments alike.”
[Below: 2:45 video investigates some of the ties between Invisible Children and The Family - specifically, the apparent co-mingling of Invisible Children's education programs in Uganda with the Ugandan leadership academy system run by The Fellowship, which - as I wrote in my report, "works to raise up a cadre of elite Jesus-centered leaders who will transform their nation along "Biblical" lines - with one apparent objective being the categorical elimination of homosexuality."]
footnote: What’s a ‘Trojan Horse’? – For those unfamiliar with the story, the Trojan Horse was a device said to have been used by the besieging Greek army to infiltrate the ancient walled city of Troy. After a long and ineffective siege, the Greeks had declared their intent to abandon their effort to conquer Troy, and their intent to sail back across the Mediterranean, to their homelands in Greece. They offered the Trojans a huge wooden, wheeled horse, as a peace offering; the Trojans opened the gates and rolled the horse inside their city. That night, a select team of Greek commandos emerged from the horse, which was hollow, and opened the gates of Troy, allowing the Greek army to rush in and take the sleeping Trojans by surprise. The Greeks killed or enslaved all the Trojans and reduced their once-might city to rubble.
What does Invisible Children share in common with the Discovery Institute, the leading organization promoting “Intelligent Design”, a pseudo-scientific theory created to insinuate creationist ideas into public schools — or with The Call, whose leader Lou Engle claims homosexuals are possessed by demons, calls God an “avenger of blood” and a “terrorist”, and in May 2010 staged a rally in Kampala, Uganda, at which Engle warned of a gay menace to society and shared a stage with one of the authors of Uganda’s notorious Anti Homosexuality Bill ?
990 IRS tax forms and yearly reports from Invisible Children, and 990s from its major donors, tell a story that’s jarringly at odds with the secular, airbrushed, feelgood image the nonprofit has cultivated.
Among the tens of millions of people who have watched Invisible Children’s KONY 2012 viral video, including Oprah Winfrey – a dedicated supporter of LGBT rights who also has given $2 million dollars to Invisible Children, how many were aware of IC’s extensive financial ties to far-right fundamentalism, including major funders of the mounting global war on gay rights ? IC doesn’t go out of its way to advertise these things.
But Invisible Children’s first yearly report, from 2006, gives “special thanks” to the “Caster Family Foundation” and IC’s 2007 report is more specific, thanking Terry and Barbara Caster. In the lead up to the 2008 election, the California-based Caster family was identified as one of the biggest financial backers of the push for California’s anti-same sex marriage Proposition 8.
Capping the pro-Prop 8 push was a November 1, 2008 San Diego stadium rally held by The Call, whose leader Lou Engle warned that same sex marriage could unleash a “sexual insanity” that would be “more demonic than Islam” and suggested believers should carry out acts of martyrdom to stop gay marriage and legal abortion, which Engle predicts will lead to a second American civil war.
One of The Call’s major donors in 2008 also gave, that same year, over 400,000 dollars to Invisible Children. These links weren’t anomalies. They were part of a pattern.
What does Invisible Children share in common with James Dobson’s Focus on the Family, the Family Research Council (pegged by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “hate group”), or the Fellowship Foundation — one of the nonprofit entities of the Washington-based evangelical organization also known as “The Family” (covered in two books by journalist Jeff Sharlet) whose leader Doug Coe has been captured on video celebrating the dedication inspired by Hitler, Lenin, and Mao ?
What does IC have in common with the ministry of California evangelist Ed Silvoso, who works directly with leading Ugandan author and promoter of the Anti Homosexuality Bill (also called the “kill the gays bill”) Julius Oyet — who claims that “even animals are wiser than homosexuals”?
The answer? — all of these ministries – the Discovery Institute, Focus on the Family, the Family Research Council, The Fellowship Foundation, The Call, Ed Silvoso’s Harvest Evangelism, and Invisible Children – received at least $100,000 in 2008 from what has emerged in the last decade as the biggest funder of the hard, antigay, creationist Christian right: the National Christian Foundation.
2008 grants from National Christian Foundation, and subsidiaries
Focus on The Family: $4,268,000
Family Research Council: $2,387,000
The Fellowship Foundation (AKA “The Family” or the “International Foundation”): $515,000
Lou Engle’s The Call: $166,000
Ed Silvoso’s Harvest Evangelism: $817,000
The Discovery Institute: $702,000*
Invisible Children: $414,000**NCF’s 2008 990 lists $139,000 to IC; NCF subsidiary ProVision Foundation’s 2008 990 lists a $150,000 grant to IC; NCF subsidiary ProVision Trust’s 2008 990 lists a $125,000 grant to IC.
*Answers in Genesis, which directly promotes “Young Earth” creationism,received over $35,000 from the NCF in 2008.
Since it came into existence in 1982, cooked up by canny tax lawyers, the National Christian Foundation–covered in a story by journalist Michael Reynolds published in the December 2005 issue of Mother Jones (extended version of story available here)– has swollen into a financial behemoth that disperses over 1/2 a billion dollars a year to Christian charities. But not just any Christian charities.
The NCF, which counts billionaire, controversial Rick Santorum-backer Foster Friess among its donors, funds nonprofits that advance its agenda which, as stated on the NCF website, is to “enable followers of Christ to give wisely to advance His Kingdom”.
(Joining with Foster Friess, as one of the top 2 donors to Rick Santorum’s Red, White, and Blue Fund Super-PAC, was Templeton Foundation head Dr. John Templeton, Jr. – who donated $35,000 to Invisible Children in 2007 according to the group’s 2007 990.)
The National Christian Foundation’s statement of belief is solidly fundamentalist: “We believe that the entire Bible is the inspired and inerrant Word of God; the only infallible rule of faith and practice.” Also stated on NCF’s website:
“Our board members know they are charged with a great responsibility. Their goal is to make certain every dollar that comes to us is ultimately distributed according to our Christian mission”
2008 wasn’t the first year Invisible Children benefited from National Christian Foundation largesse – IC’s 2007 990 tax form lists three grants, totaling $350,000, from NCF subsidiary the ProVision Foundation (which is also specifically thanked in IC’s 2007 and 2008 annual reports).
Invisible Children’s first filed 990 tax form, for the calender year running from mid 2005 to mid 2006, listed a $30,000 cash donation, IC’s biggest cash gift that year, from another fundamentalist granting organization, based in Colorado Springs, called the Christian Community Foundation, Inc. (also known as “Waterstone”)
In 2009, CCF assets surpassed $138,000,000 and the foundation made over $20,000,000 in grants, including $365,000 to the Family Research Council and $297,000 to Focus on The Family, as well as small grants to Answers in Genesis and the Fellowship Foundation.
The membership of the Christian Community Foundation, Inc.’s board of directors overlaps with board membership of National Christian Foundation subsidiaries; what this suggests is that, from its first calendar year, Invisible Children had appeared on the radar screen of some of the world’s largest Christian fundamentalist grant-making organizations–which apparently deemed Invisible Children to be a worthy investment that would help advance particular visions for establishing God’s kingdom on Earth.
IC was also on the radar screen, judging by his $5,218 donation listed on the Invisible Children 2006 990 tax form, of Philip Anschutz – the reclusive, Colorado-based devout Christian billionaire, dubbed the “stealth media mogul”, who was in 2007 worth an estimated $6.7 billion dollars.
According to journalist Bill Berkowitz, Anschutz has helped fund the Discovery Institute and supported Colorado’s 1992 anti-gay marriage Amendment 2. In 2005 Anschutz co-produced, in conjunction with Walt Disney Pictures, the Christian-themed fantasy film “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe.”
Along with the pro-Proposition 8 Caster Family, another backer specifically thanked in Invisible Children’s first yearly report was the Circle Family Foundation, also known as “Malachi 3″, a small foundation which funds a stable of ministries including Campus Crusade For Christ, whose founder the late Bill Bright patterned his ministry along the lines of revolutionary communist cell groups.
Bright, who once declared himself to be “involved in a conspiracy with thousands of others to ‘overthrow the world’ “, also helped birth the dominionist “Seven Mountains” mandate, which instructs believers to take control of significant sectors of society and culture including: media, arts and entertainment, government, business and finance, the family, religion, and education.
[note: this story explores almost wholly overlooked ties between the Invisible Children nonprofit and the politicized fundamentalist right. It is not intended as a dedicated critique of Invisible Children's effort to publicize Joseph Kony and the LRA, or the nonprofit's conduct generally. Subsequent installments will address those issues. For a very different profile of American evangelical involvement in Uganda, see my 20-minute documentary video Transforming Uganda, cited in 2010 testimony before Congress.]
[update: Why does it matter, if Invisible Children was funded by controversial donors? Two reasons - one, we can assume those donors thought IC aligned with their agenda - which is antagonistic to LGBT rights. Two, it fits an emerging pattern in which Invisible Children appears selectively concerned about crimes committed by Joseph Kony but indifferent to crimes, perhaps on a bigger scale, committed by their provisional partner, the government of Uganda - whose president shot his way into power using child soldiers, before Joseph Kony began using child soldiers. While Kony was *indicted, by the International Criminal Court, in 2005 for crimes against humanity, the government of Uganda was charged that same year, in 2005, by the International Court of Justice, for human rights abuses and looting in the DRC Congo (PDF file of ICJ ruling against Uganda). Like Kony, the Ugandan army has been accused of preying upon civilians and is currently accused, by Western human rights groups, with raping and looting in the DRC Congo, where it is hunting for Kony. In the late 1990s, Uganda helped spark a conflict in DRC Congo that, by the middle of the next decade it is estimated, had killed up to 5.4 million civilians, more than any conflict since World War Two. See appended "Resource" section for more information. For a very different perspective on IC, Kony, and Northern Uganda, see this editorial by Milton Allimadi, of the NYC-based Blackstar news service]
*Note: this story originally identified the 2005 charges against the government of Uganda as coming from the International Criminal Court. That was incorrect – my thanks to Milton Allimadi, of Blackstar News, for pointing out the error. As Allimadi wrote in his March 8, 2011 Blackstar News editorial (also linked above),
“Kony is a nightmare, but Museveni has caused the deaths of millions of people in Rwanda, Uganda and Congo. In 2005 the International Court of Justice found Uganda liable for what amounts to war crimes in Congo: mass rapes of both women and men; disemboweling pregnant women; burning people inside their homes alive; massacres and; plunder of resources. Congo lost six million people after Uganda’s occupation of parts of Congo. The Court awarded Congo $10 billion in reparations; not a dime has been paid.
Congo then referred the same crimes to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Hague for war crimes charges. On June 8, 2006, The Wall Street Journal reported that Gen. Museveni personally contacted Kofi Annan, then UN Secretary General and asked him to block the criminal investigation.
“
RESOURCES
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/samuel-olara/496-accounting-for-post-war-crimes-in-northern-uganda-monitor.html ( the best summary I’ve yet seen of conflict in Northern Uganda, 1986 – 2007 )
Critiques of Invisible Children
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-deibert/joseph-kony-2012-children_b_1327417.html
http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/post/18890947431/we-got-trouble
http://www.wrongingrights.com/2009/03/worst-idea-ever.html/
http://chrisblattman.com/2009/03/04/visible-children/
http://www.blackstarnews.com/news/122/ARTICLE/6586/2010-06-02.html ( “How Invisible Children Falsely Marketed The LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act” )
http://www.thegauntlet.com/article/1320/18249/Barry-from-Look-What-I-Did-responds-to-Invisible-Children-Organization.html ( Invisible Children confirms pro-interventionist stance )
Alleged crimes and human rights abuses by Uganda and the Ugandan People’s Defense Forces
http://www.observer.ug/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=17456:updf-in-kony-hunt-accused-of-rape-looting&catid=78:topstories&Itemid=116 ( UPDF, hunting for Kony in DRC, accused of rape, looting )
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upITVcXw_Gk ( Yoweri Museveni, president of Uganda, shot his way into power using child soldiers )
http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/116/10521.pdf ( Uganda was charged, in 2005, by the International Court of Justice at the Hague, with looting in the People’s Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and with a range of human rights abuses and atrocities in the DRC. note: this story originally identified the indictment as coming from the International Criminal Court.)
Reports, from UN, on Uganda & Rwanda war crimes in DRC Congo
http://www.afrol.com/Countries/DRC/documents/un_resources_2002_rwanda.htm
http://www.afrol.com/Countries/DRC/documents/un_resources_2002_uganda.htm
http://www.afrol.com/Countries/DRC/documents/un_resources_2002_intro.htm
Wikipedia cover of DRC conflict
Accusations of an Acholi Genocide
[ Yoweri Museveni has been accused of engineering a planned, slow genocide against the Acholi people of Northern Uganda (note: Blackstar News links to web-cached versions of stories - site under heavy traffic load)]
http://www.musevenimemo.org/ ( David Todd Whitmore, of University of Notre Dame, studies traditional Acholi culture, says 1980s memo, allegedly from Yoweri Museveni, indicates plan to depopulate Acholi areas of Northern Uganda, to open up access for fertile farmland. )
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2007/05/secret_photos_r/ ( ABC report suggests Ugandan government coverup )
http://www.acholitimes.com/culture/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13:genocide-in-uganda-the-african-nightmare-christopher-hitchens-missed&catid=3:genocide-in-acholi-the-conspiracy-of-silence&Itemid=23 – ( ” Genocide in Uganda: The African Nightmare Christopher Hitchens Missed ” )
http://www.independent.co.ug/News/news/3865-planned-massacre-of-the-acholi ( Uganda Independent covers accusations of an Acholi genocide )
http://allafrica.com/stories/201101050048.html
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/documents/20/65-structure-a-agency-in-acholi-genocide.html ( “Structure and Agency in Acholi Genocide” )
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=68&Itemid=43 ( “Genocide in Comparative Perspective; the Jewish and Acholi Experience” )
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/columnists/161-the-achol-qfinal-solutionq.html ( “The Acholi Final Solution”, 2007, by Milton Allimadi, editor of NYC-based Blackstar News )
http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=book/export/html/10361 ( “Ending Uganda’s “Brilliant” Genocide”, Allimadi )
http://www.km-net.org.uk/conferences/KM97/papers_htm/causes.htm
http://www.ugandagenocide.info/ ( general source for writings on Acholi conflict & Ugandan gov. )
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:BPk1NvWo7_cJ:www.blackstarnews.com/%3Fc%3D122%26a%3D4751+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us ( report from Dr. Adam Branch, whose research is based in Northern Uganda )
http://www.david-kilgour.com/mp/Ugandan%20IDP%20Camps%20&%20Children.htm ( Canadian parliament member, on Acholi camps )
http://www.blackcommentator.com/93/93_otika_uganda.html ( Ugandan student, studying in US, weighs in )
“We feel like God calls us to be joyful in the work that we’re doing, no matter what we’re doing. [...]
A lot of people fear Christians, they fear Liberty University, they fear Invisible Children – because they feel like we have an agenda. They see us and they go, “You want me to sign up for something, you want my money. You want, you want me to believe in your God.” And it freaks them out.”
— Jason Russell, speaking at Liberty University, November 7, 2011
Is Invisible Children a nonprofit devoted to human needs, or is it a ministry devoted to bringing souls to Jesus ? Judging by a talk co-founder Jason Russell gave last November at Liberty University, it would seem to be a bit of both.
A few days ago, Russell’s Invisible Children nonprofit began to blitz the Internet with posts on social media promoting the nonprofit’s new KONY 2012 video, which by now has received over 36 million hits. The media campaign has already provoked a backlash of well informed criticism, from academics and other with expertise concerning Joseph Kony and the LRA, and the conflict in Northern Uganda and the surrounding region (see links and material, below transcript).
Foreign Affairs charges Invisible Children with misrepresenting the facts, and Foreign Affairs guest contributor Michael Wilkerson notes the deceptive nature of the KONY 2012 video, narrated by Jason Russell, which mentions only in passing that Joseph Kony is no longer in Northern Uganda (his LRA hasn’t operated there for years).
Another common objection of critics has been that Invisible Children’s approach is simplistic and neglects the fact that the Ugandan government (whose armed forces now hunting for Joseph Kony are accused of rape and looting) has itself been accused of crimes against humanity that at least rival but may exceed those of Joseph Kony and his LRA (see appended story resource links).
Some, such as Democratic Republic of Congo: Between Hope and Despair author Michael Deibert, warn that Invisible Children’s effort, which endorses increased US military involvement in the region, may actually make things worse.
The evangelical magazine Christianity Today has covered the growing controversy over the Invisible Children publicity campaign, and Invisible Children has issued a response to the gathering criticism.
So far few have noticed the decidedly evangelical ties of Invisible Children. But that’s not surprising:
Judging from the organization’s website and promotional material, Invisible Children would seem to be non-religious, purely devoted to the health and well-being of children in Northern Uganda and the surrounding region, to “ending genocide”, and to capturing Joseph Kony.
On its face, the effort appears secular, and evangelizing is not mentioned as an objective.
But in a November 7, 2011 appearance at Liberty University, as part of Liberty’s Fall Convocation speaker series, Invisible Children co-founder Jason Russell hinted that Invisible Children was also an evangelizing effort, and during his talk Russell coached Liberty University students on what could be characterized as extremely low-key, or stealth, evangelism.
Joining Russell onstage, during his November 7 Liberty University appearance, was Alex Harris, credited with playing a key role in driving Mike Huckabee’s 2008 presidential bid. At 20:20 into the 39 minute discussion, Harris received a question from the Liberty University student audience – “What is the greatest challenge to the millennial generation, in impacting the world for Christ ?”
Jason Russell fielded the following question from the audience which was, as characterized by Johnnie Moore, Liberty University Vice President of Teaching Projects, “How do you motivate hypocritical, apathetic Christians to, kind of, `get in the fight’? “
What was “the fight”? The message was ambiguous. Earlier in the discussion, Jason Russell had stated his goal of “ending genocide” and capturing Joseph Kony, but that goal seemed framed within the larger project of evangelizing the nations. During the discussion, as a backdrop, hung a blue curtain that proclaimed, “Liberty University: 40 Years of Training Champions For Christ”.
The lineup of notables on Liberty’s Fall Convocation speaker roster also included Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Christian history revisionist David Barton, and pastor Jim Garlow, who spearheaded the project of organizing evangelical pastors in California, in the 2008 campaign to pass the anti-same sex marriage Proposition Eight (both Barton and Garlow also have ties to the Gingrich presidential campaign effort).
[video, below: Jason Russell, with Alex Harris, at Liberty University, November 7, 2011]
“Liberty University Convocation Discussion, November 7, 2011,
Jason Russell, co-founder of “Invisible Children”
[13:00] Russell: “We feel like God calls us to be joyful in the work that we’re doing, no matter what we’re doing. [...]
[25:18] Question: How do you motivate hypocritical, apathetic Christians to, kind of, `get in the fight’?
Russell: People are scared. Of Liberty University. [Addresses graduating students] You guys know this. They’re scared because they see the power and potential in this room, the conviction you have, the connectivity you have. And they look at this arena and they go, “that’s scary – if they realized what they could do, it would revolutionize the world.” That’s why you’re here.
And so I think that it is that insecurity or that realizing, “I don’t have what it takes” – but you DO. We DO. And, the trick is to not go out into the world and say, “I’m going to baptize you, I’m going to convict you, I have an agenda to win you over.”
Your agenda is to look into the eyes, as Jesus did, and say, “who are you? And will you be my friend?” – Like he did to the prostitutes, the tax collectors, the fisherman. The biggest mistake that we make is to saying, we make a line and we say, “black, white, are you in or are you out?”
I just, I have a hard time digesting that mentality. And I think that’s why a lot of people fear Christians, they fear Liberty University, they fear Invisible Children because they feel like we have an agenda. They see us and they go, “You want me to sign up for something, you want my money. You want, you want me to believe in your God.
And it freaks them out.
So figure out a way, you know – I have totally been there. I have been there so many times. I’m like, “I wonder if they know?” I wonder if they’re in the group.” And it’s like, “No! That is judgment itself.” “
RESOURCES
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/samuel-olara/496-accounting-for-post-war-crimes-in-northern-uganda-monitor.html ( the best summary I’ve yet seen of conflict in Northern Uganda, 1986 – 2007 )
Critiques of Invisible Children
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-deibert/joseph-kony-2012-children_b_1327417.html
http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/post/18890947431/we-got-trouble
http://www.wrongingrights.com/2009/03/worst-idea-ever.html/
http://chrisblattman.com/2009/03/04/visible-children/
http://www.blackstarnews.com/news/122/ARTICLE/6586/2010-06-02.html ( “How Invisible Children Falsely Marketed The LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act” )
http://www.thegauntlet.com/article/1320/18249/Barry-from-Look-What-I-Did-responds-to-Invisible-Children-Organization.html ( Invisible Children confirms pro-interventionist stance )
Alleged crimes and human rights abuses by Uganda and the Ugandan People’s Defense Forces
http://www.observer.ug/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=17456:updf-in-kony-hunt-accused-of-rape-looting&catid=78:topstories&Itemid=116 ( UPDF, hunting for Kony in DRC, accused of rape, looting )
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upITVcXw_Gk ( Yoweri Museveni, president of Uganda, shot his way into power using child soldiers )
http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/116/10521.pdf ( Uganda was indicted, in 2005, by the International Criminal Court for War Crimes in DRC Congo )
Reports, from UN, on Uganda & Rwanda war crimes in DRC Congo
http://www.afrol.com/Countries/DRC/documents/un_resources_2002_rwanda.htm
http://www.afrol.com/Countries/DRC/documents/un_resources_2002_uganda.htm
http://www.afrol.com/Countries/DRC/documents/un_resources_2002_intro.htm
Wikipedia cover of DRC conflict
Accusations of an Acholi Genocide
[ Yoweri Museveni has been accused of engineering a planned, slow genocide against the Acholi people of Northern Uganda (note: Blackstar News links to web-cached versions of stories - site under heavy traffic load)]
http://www.musevenimemo.org/ ( David Todd Whitmore, of University of Notre Dame, studies traditional Acholi culture, says 1980s memo, allegedly from Yoweri Museveni, indicates plan to depopulate Acholi areas of Northern Uganda, to open up access for fertile farmland. )
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2007/05/secret_photos_r/ ( ABC report suggests Ugandan government coverup )
http://www.acholitimes.com/culture/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13:genocide-in-uganda-the-african-nightmare-christopher-hitchens-missed&catid=3:genocide-in-acholi-the-conspiracy-of-silence&Itemid=23 – ( ” Genocide in Uganda: The African Nightmare Christopher Hitchens Missed ” )
http://www.independent.co.ug/News/news/3865-planned-massacre-of-the-acholi ( Uganda Independent covers accusations of an Acholi genocide )
http://allafrica.com/stories/201101050048.html
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/documents/20/65-structure-a-agency-in-acholi-genocide.html ( “Structure and Agency in Acholi Genocide” )
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=68&Itemid=43 ( “Genocide in Comparative Perspective; the Jewish and Acholi Experience” )
http://www.friendsforpeaceinafrica.org/columnists/161-the-achol-qfinal-solutionq.html ( “The Acholi Final Solution”, 2007, by Milton Allimadi, editor of NYC-based Blackstar News )
http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=book/export/html/10361 ( “Ending Uganda’s “Brilliant” Genocide”, Allimadi )
http://www.km-net.org.uk/conferences/KM97/papers_htm/causes.htm
http://www.ugandagenocide.info/ ( general source for writings on Acholi conflict & Ugandan gov. )
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:BPk1NvWo7_cJ:www.blackstarnews.com/%3Fc%3D122%26a%3D4751+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us ( report from Dr. Adam Branch, whose research is based in Northern Uganda )
http://www.david-kilgour.com/mp/Ugandan%20IDP%20Camps%20&%20Children.htm ( Canadian parliament member, on Acholi camps )
http://www.blackcommentator.com/93/93_otika_uganda.html ( Ugandan student, studying in US, weighs in )
[Introduction: Newt Gingrich's ties to the religious right go to back to the 1980s, and the Former Speaker of the House has worked hard to line up evangelical backing in advance of the 2012 election. As detailed in a February 27, 2012 article in The Nation, Gingrich has cultivated leaders of the New Apostolic Reformation, who shifted support from Rick Perry, as the Texas governor's presidential bid faltered, to Gingrich, whose Faith Leaders Coalition features several NAR leaders, including some with unabashed dominionist agendas, and controversial approaches to faith healing.
But presidential candidate Rick Santorum has NAR leadership support too and, in a general election, if he prevails against Gingrich and Romney, it is likely that the Champion The Vote voter registration initiative - which is financially backed by one of the NAR's "marketplace apostles", as well as factually challenged narratives of the once and future American Christian nation promoted by history revisionist David Barton - will be deployed for the Santorum campaign.]
There are no explicit references to God or Christianity in the U.S. Constitution, the foundational document for American government. But in advance of the 2012 election, a well-funded voter registration initiative called Champion The Vote, which seeks to register 5 million conservative Christian “biblical values” voters before the November vote, is distributing a 2-hour video, “One Nation Under God”, that claims key concepts in the United States Constitution are based on scriptures from books in the Old Testament of the Bible, including Leviticus and Deuteronomy.
Starring in the video? – Newt Gingrich, the only 2012 presidential election candidate featured in One Nation Under God. The Gingrich footage in the video was taken last October, while media attention was still fixated on now-withdrawn candidate Rick Perry, then touted as the alleged conservative evangelical favorite.
[below: excerpts from Champion The Vote's "One Nation Under God" video]
On October 20-21, 2011, Gingrich spoke before hundreds of gathered Florida pastors at a secretive, closed-to-the-media meeting held in an Orlando hotel, at which the former House Speaker told (link to video from Gingrich speech) the clergy that “half of what is taught in American colleges and universities is false” and that “the academic left… is determined to propagandize our children.”
Rick Perry, the other presidential candidate to address the Orlando pastors gathering, gave a speech by telescreen. Footage of Perry’s speech was not included in One Nation Under God. But footage of former Vice Chair of the Texas GOP and close Gingrich ally David Barton, another major speaker at the October Orlando pastors event, was featured in the video.
In his talk Barton, who claimed (link to video from Barton speech) that ideas expressed in the Constitution came from scriptures in Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and other books of the Old Testament, told his audience,
“Strikingly, if you look through that document, it is amazing how many Biblical clauses appear in Constitutional clauses. Biblical verses and phrases – you’ll find them throughout – so many concepts, the founding fathers pointed to bible verses as the source of those concepts.”
Barton’s speech was accompanied by Powerpoint slides showing the pairing of important clauses in the Constitution with their alleged sources in scripture from the Bible’s books of Jeremiah, Isaiah, Ezra, Exodus, Deuteronomy and Leviticus.
The Book of Leviticus prescribes stoning as a capital punishment for a range of transgressions including blasphemy and cursing, witchcraft, homosexuality, and adultery – a crime to which Newt Gingrich has himself confessed, in a March 2007 radio show appearance with Focus on The Family founder James Dobson.
Unlike Barton, mainstream historians do not credit the Bible as having been a direct source of conceptual inspiration for the Constitution.
David Barton, who serves as a co-Director of the Gingrich-founded Renewing American Leadership 501(c)(3) organization whose mission is to “preserve America’s Judeo-Christian heritage”, also informed pastors at the Orlando gathering that the authors of the Constitution “gave us the First Amendment, not because it guarantees separation of church and state – there’s no such thing”.
Among Barton’s other claims was the statement that “more than half the guys who signed the Declaration [of Independence] were ministry trained guys”. But only four of the signers Barton cites went to school to study theology, and only two of those went on to become ministers.
In his speech at the Orlando event, Gingrich declared,
“half of what is taught in American colleges and universities is false, it is a lie and I think we ought to take it head on… I’m talking about the academic left, which dominates American history, dominates American social studies, and is determined to propagandize our children with values and ideas alien to the American tradition and alien to American civilization.”
One of the centerpieces of the Gingrich plan to combat the alleged threat is a document to be found at www.newt.org, a draft of a proposed “Presidential Commission on Religious Freedom” that Gingrich promises to create if elected president, to help beat back the purported secularist and atheist assault on religious speech.
On page 8, Gingrich’s draft document showcases a quote often incorrectly attributed to Patrick Henry, “It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ!”
According to Americans United For the Separation of Church and State researcher Rob Boston, the Patrick Henry quote cited in Gingrich’s draft was one of nine quotes incorrectly attributed to America’s Founding Fathers that Barton featured in his 1989 book The Myth of Separation, to demonstrate their Christian faith and supposed intent to establish a Christian nation. Barton now identifies the quotes as “unconfirmed”.
Gingrich has pledged to seek Barton’s advice during his 2012 presidential campaign.
David Barton has been publicly identified by author Chris Rodda as a “liar for Jesus” and was recently the subject of an extensive report from the liberal nonprofit People For The American Way, which lambastes Barton for “sloppy scholarship” and outlines his notable political positions – that include a claim the environment is self-regulating because of “divine provenance” and an assertion Jesus was opposed to the minimum wage.
Founding Father misquotes promoted by David Barton have been recited on the floor of the U.S. Senate and have appeared on the printed program of the National Prayer Breakfast, and Barton’s interpretation of church-state separation has also found its way into civics textbooks used by the national Junior ROTC program.
In 2007, a poll conducted by the Center For First Amendment studies revealed that 65% of Americans believe the founders intended America to be a Christian nation, and 55% thought the Constitution established the United States as a Christian nation as well.
Newt and the Religious Right
While some commentators have missed Newt Gingrich’s ties, the reality is that the Former Speaker of the House, who led the stealth Republican takeover of the House and Senate in the 1994 election, has been a strong partisan of the religious right for decades.
Newt has not always cloaked himself in Christian piety and nationalism. In an interview for a 1984 profile of Gingrich published in Mother Jones magazine, Lee Howell, Gingrich’s former press secretary and speechwriter, recalled,
“In 1974 I wrote this speech for his opening night kick-off. I come from a Southern Protestant background, and Southern Protestants quote the Bible. Newt had me take out all the references to God, because he was not very religious–and isn’t very religious. He went to church in order to get a nap on Sunday morning. He became a beacon because of who he was, not what he believed. He did not like us to use God in his speeches; he didn’t want people to think he was using God, because he said that would be hypocritical. He said, ‘I’m not a very strong believer.’”
But following the 1979 launch of the Moral Majority, and other subsequent efforts to mobilize the evangelical right as a political force, Newt found God–as a political tool at least.
In 1985 Gingrich, as described in a story from the Institute From First Amendment Studies, gave a keynote speech at the Reverend Tim LaHaye’s Washington DC “How To Win An Election” conference, held by LaHaye’s American Coalition for Traditional Values (ACTV) – along with seminal architects of the American religious right political movement such as Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Tim LaHaye, D. James Kennedy, and Paul Weyrich. The conference featured the slogan “Serve the Lord by running for public office”, emphasized that Christians have a “Biblical mandate” to become involved in politics.
[below: flyer for 1985 ACTV "How To Win An Election" conference]
The politicized evangelical right has come a long way over the past two and a half decades. Democratic strategist Rob Stein recently told liberal donors, according to the Los Angeles Times, “The Christian activist right is the largest, best-organized and, I believe, the most powerful force in American politics today.” Emphasized Stein, “No other political group comes even close.”
Now in his 50s, David Barton is one of a younger generation of Christian right leaders coming to the forefront as the older generation of leaders retires and dies off. Named one of the “25 most influential evangelists” in America by Time Magazine in 2005, Barton has launched an entire cottage industry of books and videos purporting to demonstrate America’s Christian heritage and, since the late 1980’s, has been on an almost perpetual tour of the United States–speaking in churches and other venues to promote his factually challenged interpretation of American history.
Used as textbooks widely across the growing Christian homeschooling movement, at private Christian schools, and at some of the nation’s biggest and most influential evangelical universities, Barton’s books claim the United States was founded as an expressly Christian nation, present church-state separation as a myth, and paint America’s founding fathers as pious forerunners of contemporary conservative evangelical leadership.
During his speech to the Orlando pastors, Barton told his audience,
“Now, after you get the Constitution done, you got the first congress, now you need a Bill of Rights. And so we come back with the Bill of Rights – those first ten amendments to the Constitution… they gave us the First Amendment, not because it guarantees separation of church and state – there’s no such thing – it guarantees the free exercise of religion. They weren’t trying to secularize the public square. They wanted to make sure that you could include God in those areas… Now, we don’t teach that much in history anymore, but the documents are really clear.”
Echoing Barton’s claims during his Orlando speech, Gingrich fulminated,
“It is a lie to teach American history as though this is a secular nation in which God did not reappear, again and again and again for every generation…
Frankly, we should be very direct about this fight. I, for one, am tired of the long trend towards a secular, atheist system of thought dominating our colleges, dominating our media.”
The Orlando gathering was organized by David Barton and California pastor David Lane, who began staging pastor meetings in California and Texas during the 1990s. Dubbed a “Pastor’s Policy Briefing”, it was one in a long line of similar events held over the last decade sponsored by ad-hoc state efforts called “renewal projects” aimed at politically mobilizing pastors and increasing conservative evangelical voter turnout.
Barton’s Christian nationalist history revisionism is typically the centerpiece of such pastors briefings, and at a March 24th and 25th, 2011 Pastor’s Policy Briefing also sponsored by Champion the Vote and organized by Lane, Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee introduced David Barton by quipping that he wished every American citizen could be forcibly indoctrinated with Barton’s history, at gunpoint if necessary.
These briefings also feature politically polarizing themes – such as the need to oppose same-sex marriage and end legalized abortion, and combat an alleged secular assault on Christianity. The latter is often couched within a wider narrative structure that depicts evangelical Christians as unwilling combatants in a war against liberals and Democratic politicians, unnamed humanists, atheists and secularists, and militant Islam.
In a late 2010 fundraising letter for Newt Gingrich’s Renewing American Leadership (ReAL) nonprofit, Mike Huckabee, the conservative evangelical insurgent favorite against John McCain in the 2008 Republican presidential primaries, warned recipients of terrible, looming threats against America and its people:
“Should we be surprised that – after 50 years of driving God from our schools, our history and our public lives – America is facing some of the most devastating crises we have ever faced…
…an economy (driven by socialist schemes) on the brink of collapse, the threat of violent death by radical Islamic terrorists that grows every day, crime, abortions and drug use more rampant than ever?”
[...]
“If you fully believe as Newt Gingrich and I do, that the Founding Fathers fully intended for expressions of religious belief to be incorporated into American life, then I ask you to join in the fight to defend our values.
The stakes are immense; imagine a crippled, socialist, bleak, anti-God America. Is this the nation we want to bequeath to our children, or will you stand with me and Newt Gingrich and fight to preserve America as that “shining city on a hill, one nation, under God?”
Any support you can send to ReAL today is tax-deductible.
And as a personal “thank you” for your gift of $35 or more today, I will send you a copy of Newt’s wonderful book
Rediscovering God in America. ”
Why do Huckabee, Gingrich, Barton, and other leaders on the Christian right promote such ideas? As author and journalist Frederick Clarkson explained, in a 2007 Public Eye Magazine analysis, History is Powerful – Why the Christian Right Distorts History and Why it Matters,
The notion that America was founded as a Christian nation is a central animating element of the ideology of the Christian Right. It touches every aspect of life and culture in this, one of the most successful and powerful political movements in American history. The idea that America’s supposed Christian identity has somehow been wrongly taken, and must somehow be restored, permeates the psychology and vision of the entire movement. No understanding of the Christian Right is remotely adequate without this foundational concept.
…The contest for control of the narrative of American history is well underway.
Newt Gingrich’s alliance with David Barton goes back at least as far as the mid 1990s. In an October 5, 1995 speech at the Heritage Foundation, Gingrich praised Barton’s book “The Myth of Separation” as “most useful” and “wonderful” and, as Speaker of the House, collaborated with Barton in a failed attempt to pass an amendment that would have allowed teachers and school officials to lead prayer in public schools.
The prayer amendment was part of a wider effort, the Christian Coalition’s “Contract with the American Family” which was launched at a May 18, 1995 press conference by Christian Coalition Executive Director Ralph Reed, with Newt Gingrich at his side.
Besides allowing mandatory prayer in schools, the “Contract With The American Family” included a list of objectives, many of which would later pop up over a decade later on the agenda of the tea party movement – abolishing the Department of Education, creating school vouchers to fund religious schools, defunding Planned Parenthood and banning late-term abortions, tax deductions for stay-at-home mothers, terminating Public Broadcasting, the National Endowment For the Arts, and the legal services corporation, which provides lawyers for the poor, and restricting pornography.
Gingrich supported the ten-point plan, stating that it represented “key values that matter most to Americans.”
Gingrich’s ties to Barton, and to Barton’s falsified history oeuvre, have only grown over time.
Leading up to the 2004 election, the Republican National Committee hired David Barton for a national speaking tour to get evangelical voters to the polls for George W. Bush. California megachurch pastor Rob McCoy recalls a 2004 Orlando, Florida, event stating, “I had the privilege to hear from speakers like Mike Huckabee, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, Congressman Bob McCewen, and historian David Barton… there was so much information I felt at times like I was drinking from a fire hydrant and couldn’t absorb it all.”
Since 2004, Gingrich and Barton have appeared together with increasing frequency at such “pastors events”, and by 2006 Gingrich had made Barton’s revisionist Christian nationalist history narrative his own, and even turned it into a side business, co-managed by Gingrich’s current wife Callista – launched with the 2006 publication of Newt Gingrich’s book Rediscovering God in America: Reflections on the Role of Faith in Our Nation’s History, which recapitulates David Barton’s “walking tours” of Washington D.C. that showcase Christian symbolism and language expressed on capital buildings and monuments.
Gingrich’s book also reiterates Barton’s misleading and inaccurate claims that Thomas Jefferson promoted the use of government funds to evangelize Indian tribes and recommended the use of the Bible as a text in the District of Columbia school system.
