Pro-family pastor withdraws from Obama inauguration after backlash from gay activists
Rev. Louie Giglio , the pro-family pastor picked by President Obama to deliver the benediction at his Jan. 21st inauguration, has backed out after a pressure campaign by homosexual activists. Rev. Giglio, who heads Atlanta ’s Passion City Church, said he did not want the inauguration to “be dwarfed by those seeking to make their agenda the focal point.” Rev. Louie Giglio Immediately after Giglio announced his withdrawal, Fox News political analyst Kirsten Powers tweeted : “The intolerant Left claims another scalp.” Obama’s choice of Giglio on Tuesday quickly came under attack by activists who highlighted a sermon the pastor delivered in the 1990s offering a “Christian response to homosexuality.” In the sermon, the pastor expressed Christian teaching that homosexuality is a sin and that it is possible to leave the homosexual lifestyle “through the healing power of Jesus.” He said Christians must “lovingly but firmly respond” to an “aggressive agenda” by some in the hom