Gomes

The Rev. Peter Gomes has died.  He walked a long path in his life, most recently from conservatice Republicanism to the Democratic Party and his own crusade against homophobia and intolerance.

From today's New York Times obituary at http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/us/02gomes.html?src=twrhp, quote:

“I now have an unambiguous vocation — a mission — to address the religious causes and roots of homophobia,” he told The Washington Post months later. “I will devote the rest of my life to addressing the ‘religious case’ against gays.”

He was true to his word. His sermons and lectures, always well attended, were packed in Cambridge and around the country as he embarked on a campaign to rebut literal and fundamentalist interpretations of the Bible. He also wrote extensively on intolerance.

“Religious fundamentalism is dangerous because it cannot accept ambiguity and diversity and is therefore inherently intolerant,” he declared in an Op-Ed article in The New York Times in 1992. “Such intolerance, in the name of virtue, is ruthless and uses political power to destroy what it cannot convert.”