Black Clergy Wooed for Values Fight

Conservative black pastors from across California were urged Tuesday to join white evangelicals on the front lines of the nation’s culture wars -- particularly in the fight against gay marriage.

The campaign debuted at the 27,000-member Crenshaw Christian Center, one of Los Angeles’ biggest churches, at a summit organized by ministers who backed President Bush’s reelection last year and now are seeking an expanded role in the Republican Party.

It was the first of several such meetings set to take place across the nation in the coming months -- an effort closely watched by GOP strategists eager to forge alliances with black churches long associated with Democrats.

As heads nodded affirmatively, the 70 black pastors in attendance Tuesday were urged to pressure lawmakers in Sacramento and Washington to oppose gay marriage -- harnessing the power of churches that in some cases have tens of thousands of members.

“We are the spokesmen for this issue,” said Bishop Frank L. Stewart, pastor of the Zoe Christian Fellowship of Los Angeles, who said he was a lifelong Democrat but backed Bush because of moral issues. “Black people have to change their whole paradigm of thinking. There is a philosophical war going on.”

The organizer of Tuesday’s summit, the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, a white evangelical minister and lobbyist with close ties to the White House, set the tone by playing a video, “Gay Rights, Special Rights.”

Distributed to all attendees, the video explored tensions between blacks and gays and assailed Democrats such as President Clinton for supporting the “homosexual agenda.” The video graphically detailed gay sex acts and showed scantily clad gay and lesbian activists dancing at rallies and invoking Martin Luther King Jr.

A narrator in the film accuses gays and lesbians of “hijacking” the traditional civil rights movement for an unholy cause. Graphics illustrate the economic disparities between gays and blacks, noting that gays have higher incomes, often hold management positions and frequently travel overseas.

The video includes an interview with Sen. Trent Lott, the Mississippi Republican who once enraged black leaders by suggesting that a segregationist would have made a good president.

Lott, speaking to the camera, called gay marriage a “moral degradation of our great country” and urged viewers to “express their indignation.”

“What’s at stake is the future of our boys and girls, and what’s at stake is the future of America,” Lott said.

The issue erupted as a motivator for Christian conservatives and some black voters during the 2004 election after a Massachusetts court legalized gay marriage and San Francisco’s mayor defied state law by issuing marriage licenses to gays and lesbians. Evangelical leaders, with the backing of the White House, fought to place anti-gay marriage initiatives on ballots in several battleground states. The amendments are credited with boosting turnout for Bush and other Republicans last year.

Tuesday’s summit marked the most forceful effort since the election to mobilize black clergy on the marriage issue and other topics that GOP strategists hope will appeal to black conservative churchgoers.

A Washington, D.C.-area pastor working with Sheldon kicked off the event by announcing a “Black Contract With America on Moral Values,” a six-point plan loosely patterned after the “Contract With America” that former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a Georgia Republican, used 10 years ago to cement GOP dominance in Congress.

The contract proposed by Bishop Harry R. Jackson Jr. calls for action on education reform, Social Security privatization, prison issues and Africa. But marriage topped the list and sparked the most controversy.

A black woman injected herself into a morning news conference that was called by Jackson to announce the contract.

“I feel like I’m at a KKK meeting,” said Jasmyne Cannick, who described herself as a lesbian and gay rights activist. She questioned how black leaders who have experienced discrimination could challenge the rights struggles of others, including gay blacks.

Despite the criticism, Cannick said the effort of Sheldon and other Republicans was having an impact.

“They have been able to influence black church leaders, and these pastors are going back and spreading this to their congregations. It ends up affecting tens of thousands,” she said.

That, in fact, is the plan of evangelical leaders. Sheldon, a self-described Christian lobbyist, emphasized the importance of learning the political pathways of Sacramento and Washington as the best way to counter the financial and political influence of gays and lesbians.

“The homosexual lobby has become extremely formidable and seeks to undo the laws that we have,” Sheldon told the black clergy summit, which included local radio preachers and ministers. He urged them to contact African Americans in the California Legislature, who, he said, have not spoken up sufficiently in opposition to proposed legislation that would permit same-sex marriages.

Legislation written by Assemblyman Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) would define marriage as between two people, not necessarily a man and woman. His proposal has been backed by more than two dozen lawmakers.

The host of Tuesday’s summit, the Rev. Frederick K.C. Price, said he has shied away from political activism in the past, but that the marriage issue has moved him to act.

“There’s big change blowing in the wind,” he said. “I don’t know where it’s headed, but it’s blowing.”

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Times staff writer Larry B. Stammer contributed to this report.