The calls, which feature the voice of Republican Joy Corning and were paid for by gay rights group One Iowa, say the Iowa Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage continues “Iowa’s tradition of protecting the civil rights of all Iowans.”

One of Branstad’s rivals for the 2010 gubernatorial nomination, Bob Vander Plaats, said the calls are another reason to question Branstad’s commitment to opposing same-sex marriage.

“Terry Branstad enters the governor’s race on Saturday night without stating where he truly stands on the issue and on Tuesday night his lieutenant governor does an automated call urging Iowans to support same-sex marriages. All of that takes place not too long after his former chief of staff wrote an opinion piece saying the Republican Party needs to nominate a candidate with ‘centrist’ views on social issues,” Vander Plaats said. “Urging Iowans to support same-sex marriage is not only out of touch with Republican values but it is overwhelmingly out of touch with Main Street Iowa.”

Conservative group Iowa Family Policy Center issued a statement saying if Branstad had never appointed a “public supporter of abortion and homosexuality” to be his lieutenant governor she would never have a platform to “undermine traditional family values.”

“Joy Corning has given us another clear example of just exactly why as Christians and conservatives we should no longer sacrifice our convictions for perceived political victories,” said Chuck Hurly, president of IFPC. “When we elect people like Joy Corning, we elevate and advance the destruction of the family.”

Conservative blogger Craig Robinson believes that since the calls didn’t encourage people to attend One Iowa’s Marriage Equality Public Forums in December, they could be attempts by liberals to thwart a Branstad candidacy.

“…Corning’s call might have also been orchestrated by gay activists and liberal Democrats to lessen the chance that Branstad will win the Republican nomination for governor,” Robinson said.

He also wonders whether One Iowa is “taking advantage of the 77 year-old former lieutenant governor in hopes to advance their own political agenda.” Corning is a long time supporter of marriage equality, even writing joint letter to the editor of the Des Moines Register promoting same-sex marriage with former Democratic Lt. Gov. Sally Pederson. She is also a member of Plymouth Congregational Church in Des Moines, which is a prominent supporter of civil rights, including same-sex marriage.

After the past grueling months, and the marathon that has been the last three weeks, it’s good for us to be reminded why we are fighting so hard to save traditional marriage.  Unfortunately, due to the Supreme Court opinion, the inactivity of the governor, and the complacency of the state legislature, many young people will experiment with the homosexual “life-style.”  People will die.

The email goes on to feature a video of an older couple whose son died of an AIDS-related illness, which they say was brought on by his ‘homosexual lifestyle.’  According to the video (posted below the page jump), the couple’s son was too ashamed to tell anyone he had been diagnosed with HIV until he got sick.

Of course, viewing HIV/AIDS as ‘the gay disease’ fell out of fashion sometime around 1985.  It afflicts people of all stripes and can be transmitted many different ways.  Risky sexual behavior is a common form of transmission, but that affects heterosexuals, too.  And marriage, whether between a same-sex couple or an opposite-sex one, typically discourages it.

According to an independent media monitoring service, IFPC’s television media presence reached an audience of over 5 million viewers this year. News stories that included information from IFPC totaled over 4 ½ hours of video in 2008. That free “earned” television reporting represented nearly $200,000.00 in real world value. When the newspaper articles, radio interviews, and internet posts are taken into account, the monetary value of the work produced in our media department is well over a half a million dollars.

Your voice is being heard in the secular media each time a story runs that includes information from IFPC. The media comes to IFPC for insight into issues that shape society because we are the group that does research, informs citizens, lobbies legislators, and consistently articulates a clear and concise message based on a Biblical worldview.

Hurley closed the correspondence by indicating that he and the IFPC are prepared to “stand strong as your voice in the public arena” in 2009, but that the group requires financial support to complete the mission.

As I lay still, listening to the wind swirl outside before another spring storm, I let the previous day’s events play behind my eyes, compartmentalizing those items that needed further attention and discarding those that were complete. As the scenes flickered, one dominated: the email sent by Iowa Family Policy Center President Chuck Hurley in response to the “Day of Silence” scheduled for Friday. The student-led event gives young adults an opportunity to call attention to an evil within their own community — violence, harassment and bullying based on sexual orientation. It provides this population, so often left to suffer the consequences of adult actions in silence, a voice. Ironically, it is the student’s refusal to speak that provides them the loudest of voices on this one day.

Hurley’s prayer request continued to replay in my mind. “Pray throughout the day for the salvation and healing of ‘openly gay’ students.” Now, I grew up in an extremely religious family. I take prayer requests seriously and fully believe in the power of asking for assistance from something/someone larger than myself. This particular prayer request, however, left me feeling both sad and frustrated. The emotions were so great that I got out of the bunk bed and fumbled through the house for the dictionary.

sal – va – tion (s?l-v?’sh?n) – noun

1. Preservation or deliverance from destruction, difficulty, or harm.
2. A source, means or cause of such preservation or deliverance.
3. Saving someone or something from harm or from an unpleasant situation.
4. The state of being saved or preserved from harm.
5. In Christianity, union or friendship with God and deliverance from original sin and damnation.

The “original sin” for Christians was the eating of the forbidden fruit by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The act led to their expulsion from Eden by God. The act also caused humans’ fall from divine grace. Because of this event, most Christians believe that from the moment a child is conceived, he or she, as a descendant of Adam and Eve, is already in a state of sin. Most Christians also believe that the crucifixion of Jesus on the cross and his subsequent resurrection was atonement for original sin. So, any individual who believes in Jesus and accepts baptism is freed from the confines of original sin and experiences salvation.

One of the things I learned at an early age through my Christian upbringing is that salvation, in the Christian sense, is a gift. No one can earn it and no one deserves it.

Since salvation is a gift, neither earned nor deserved, everyone already has it. Hurley is not requesting we ask God to grant salvation to others, because God has already done that. He’s requesting that we all ask God to make others behave in a way that Hurley (and not necessarily God) deems appropriate.

Looking at salvation in terms of the secular definitions, it appears that Hurley is actually praying for the success of the Day of Silence. Tomorrow students will refrain from speaking to draw attention to violence against LGBT students in their schools. If we are to pray for the salvation of gay students — i.e., their protection from harm — then we are praying for the violence, harassment and bullying to stop.

The second part of the prayer request still gives me pause. Hurley requests that we pray for the “healing” of gay students. Given Hurley’s deliberate manipulation of the Gospel in the first part of his request, I’m not inclined to believe that Hurley is requesting we pray for the healing of those gay students who have been the victims of school violence. Hurley wants us to pray to God for gay people to be healed, much like we’d pray for a person suffering with cancer to have the disease eradicated and the body made whole.

As far back as 1901, however, Havelock Ellis joined Sigmund Freud in arguing that homosexuality was not immoral, that it was not a disease, and that many homosexuals made outstanding contributions to society. Those beliefs were backed up by the research of Evelyn Hooker, a noted psychologist, in 1957, but it took until the early 1970s before the American Psychiatric Association voted to remove homosexuality from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

Despite all of this scientific evidence and despite the fact that many religious institutions now welcome homosexuals into their congregations, Hurley affirmed his belief that being gay is the same as being stricken with a disease this morning in the Des Moines Register. “…I have a problem with an effort to legitimize behavior that is physically, socially and spiritually destructive. Promoting destructive behavior is not the job of our schools. They should be promoting healthy behavior,” Hurley said.

Last night, after considering Hurley’s prayer request, I decided instead to offer my own. I prayed for Hurley, that his eyes might be opened to the word of the God he professes to love so dearly. I prayed for him to be provided unconditional love and tolerance for all creation. Above all else, I prayed for peace — deep, soul-calming and spirit-quenching peace to enter Hurley’s life and allow him to see the value of all people, even those who do not share his Biblical interpretations. I closed with a request that next year there will be no need for the Day of Silence, that each young person who enters our schools will be treated with dignity and respect. Amen.

“I have received many phone calls and emails voicing understandable frustration about this event,” Hurley wrote in an email to supporters. “Admittedly, the promotion (especially to children) of such a harmful lifestyle that is directly contrary to God’s perfect design provokes righteous anger in me also. The question then becomes, what do we do with our anger that will bring glory and honor to God?”

While acknowledging that this year’s Day of Silence event is being held in memory of Lawrence King, a gay 15-year-old Californian who died at the hands of a classmate in February, Hurley calls on supporters to not remain passive.

“By Christ’s example, we are clearly not to remain passive,” Hurley wrote. “Jesus did not throw his hands in the air and turn away when he saw sin in the world. Instead, he came into the world with his arms wide open. He made no excuse for sin, teaching that, ‘Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.’ (Matthew 5:19) Jesus was clear that certain behaviors are unacceptable to God, yet people flocked to him because he also made it clear that God loves them in spite of sin. Jesus’ love for sinners does not equate to acceptance of sin, but to a deep and passionate desire to redeem them from it.”