December, 18 2008, 05:27pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Vaishalee Raja, Communications Director,PHONE: (916) 284-9187,EMAIL:,vaishalee@eqca.org
EQCA Executive Director turns down invitation to Presidential Inauguration
WASHINGTON
In
declining his invitation to attend inauguration of President-elect
Barack Obama because of Rev. Rick Warren giving the invocation, EQCA
Executive Director Geoff Kors released the following statement:
It
is extremely disappointing and hurtful that President-elect Obama has
chosen California Rev. Rick Warren, who actively supported Prop 8 and
the elimination of existing civil rights for LGBT Californians, to give
the invocation at his inauguration.Accordingly, I
have decided to decline the invitation to attend the inauguration as I
cannot be part of a celebration that highlights and gives voice to
someone who advocated repealing rights from me and millions of other
Californians.I was looking forward to hearing a
speech by the new President about his vision of a new America and an
end to the politics of division where one group is pitted against
another.Rick Warren does not share that vision. Far
from it. Instead, he actively works to divide Americans based on who we
are and has been an ardent supporter of efforts to ostracize LGBT
Americans.It would be impossible for me to attend the
Inauguration where a person who has worked to deny my and Equality
California members equality is setting the tone.
EQCA is asking its members to sign the following petition at www.eqca.org/takeaction that will be delivered to President-elect Barack Obama:
We,
the undersigned, demand that you revoke the invitation of California
Pastor Rev. Rick Warren due to his opposition to equality for LGBT
Americans and his active support of Proposition 8 which eliminated the
right of same-sex couples to civil marriage in California and wrote
discrimination into the California Constitution.
Rev.
Rick Warren actively supported Proposition 8, the initiative to
eliminate the right to marry for same-sex couples and has compared
marriage rights for LGBT couples to incest, pedophilia and polygamy.
Equality California is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, grassroots-based, statewide advocacy organization whose mission is to achieve equality and civil rights for all lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Californians.
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