Heard a great story on NPR that examines the link between Uganda’s deplorable anti-homosexuality proposal and U.S. evangelicals’ efforts to export their “culture war” to Africa.
As if these self-appointed moral crusaders hadn’t done enough damage here – fanning the flames of anti-gay hate and tearing rifts in families and churches, among other things – it now appears their speaking visits to Uganda may have been the genesis for a bill there that would impose the death penalty or life in prison on gay men and lesbians for homosexual acts.
Beyond calling out the nut jobs who actively pushed their agenda on Ugandan leaders, the NPR piece does a great job identifying mainstream Christian conservatives who have been awful silent on the issue since it surfaced. Definitely worth a listen or a read.
I agree with former Episcopal canon Jim Naughton, who told NPR these jokers should have been well aware that their message would play out with tragic results in Uganda.
“If you go to countries where there’s already a great deal of suspicion and maybe animosity towards homosexuals, and begin to tell people there, ‘Well, actually these people are child abusers, they’re coming for their children, that they’re the scourge that is being deposited on you by the secular West,’ you’re gonna get a backlash. (It’s like) showing up in rooms filled with gasoline, and throwing lighted matches around and saying, ‘Well, I never intended fire .’”