Progressive Religious Leaders Fill New Inaugural Spots

If you were angry about Rick Warren delivering the invocation at President elect Obama's inauguration and you let the transition team know, your voice did some good.

Despite protestations to the contrary, the announcement that Gene Robinson (the Episcopal Church's first openly gay bishop) will give an invocation at the pre-inaugural concert at the Lincoln Memorial on January 19 with Obama in attendance is pretty clearly a reaction to the concern and distress voiced over Warren.

Apparently the woman who will deliver the sermon at the national prayer service the following day, Sharon Watkins, has a good progressive record and will be the first woman to give said sermon (she is already the first woman chosen to head a national Protestant denomination).

So feel good about having spoken up, Warren may not be gone (rescinding the invitation would have created a much bigger fiasco then trying to just ignore it) but things did change.