Gay Bishop Barack’s “First”

Barack Obama called on Gene Robinson three times this year to ask him advice on being “the first.”

Robinson, you’ll recall, is the Episcopal Church’s first openly gay Bishop and received death threats before his ascension in 2004. Obama, you may have heard, had just been elected our nation’s first black president, a position that’s sure to be a bit stressful. Thus, in his quest for understanding and advice, Obama gave Robinson a ring:

[Robinson] said That Mr Obama’s campaign team had sought him last year and he had the “honor” of three private conversations with the future president of the United States last May and June.

“The first words out of his mouth were: ‘Well you’re certainly causing a lot of trouble’, My response to him was: ‘Well that makes two of us’.”

He said that Mr Obama had indicated his support for equal civil rights for gay and lesbian people and described the election as a “religious experience”.
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The Anglican church’s first gay bishop and the United States’ first black President-elect discussed in depth the place of religion in the state.

Bishop Robinson said: “He and I would agree about the rightful place of religion vis-a-vis the secular state. That is to say, we don’t impose our religious values on the secular state because God said so. Our faith informs our own values and then we take those values into the civil market place, the civil discourse, and then you argue for them based on the Constitution. You don’t say to someone, you must believe this because this is what God believes.”

Of Obama’s personality, Robinson gushed, “He is impressive, he’s smart, he is an amazing listener. For someone who’s called on to speak all the time when he asks you a question, it is not for show, he is actually wanting to know what you think and listens.” Sounds like the perfect date.