by Karen Ocamb

Out MSNBC host Rachel Maddow knit her brow and looked into the camera as if sharing a confidence. “Uncertainty is all that’s certain,” she said about the proposed $700 billion federal bailout for the nation’s dire economic crisis.

California’s own record-late budget, which does not take into account the national fiscal emergency, predicts a budget deficit estimated at $1.5 billion, with a subsequent shortfall to Los Angeles County of at least $126 million. Huge cuts are coming to social services, among other vital government programs; one item Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger scratched with his line-item veto, for instance, was funding for beach water quality monitoring.

“We can expect ‘doldrums’ to be the operative word describing the California economy over the next 18 to 24 months,” Jerry Nickelsburg, an author of the UCLA Anderson Forecast told the Los Angeles Times. Oh, and did we mention the looming credit crisis?

And yet in the midst of this financial fiasco, the religious right is pitching its fiercest battle in the Culture War, with networks of churches and socially conservative organizations around the country pouring millions of dollars into the state to pass Proposition 8, the constitutional amendment on the November ballot that “eliminates [the] right of same-sex couples to marry.”

Ironically, last June the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law issued a report estimating that the fiscal impact of same-sex marriage on state and local government would result in approximately $63.8 million in revenue over the next three years. Indeed, the Legislative Analyst noted for the official election ballot that if Prop. 8 passes, the potential revenue loss could be “in the several tens of millions of dollars.”

But for the proponents of Prop. 8, money is incidental. This is “spiritual warfare,” with religious freedom and the very word of God at stake if same sex-marriage is allowed to survive and spread beyond California’s borders.

“If sexual freedom is the ultimate liberty, then you have to rewrite the Bill of Rights,” Chuck Colson, founder of the Prison Fellowship Ministries, says on a Yes on Proposition 8 video produced by the American Family Association (afa.net/prop8video/index.html) for distribution to pastors and Christian activists. “This vote on whether we stop the gay marriage juggernaut in California is the Armegeddon. We lose this, we’re going to lose in a lot of other ways, including freedom of religion.”

The Family Research Council (FRC) is among the national religious and socially conservative organizations participating in a massive fundraising and motivational conference call on Sept. 24 with “up to” 3,000 pastors, according to People for the American Way’s (PFAW) Right Wing Watch which monitored the call. Rev. Jim Garlow announced a massive fundraising drive to pass Prop. 8 in California and ballot initiatives in Arizona and Florida, as well as several religious actions, including a 40-day fast and a mobilization of “God’s Army”—a 100,000-volunteer GOTV push—that will culminate in a Nov. 1 rally at Qualcomm stadium in San Diego.

“Thirty-five years of an American abortion holocaust, the civil imposition of homosexual ‘marriage’ upon America and the indoctrination of America’s public school children in pro-homosexual ideology are practices that a Holy God will not tolerate,” FRC’s National Prayer Director Rev. Pierre Bynum says in an e-mail.

FRC President Tony Perkins wrote in an e-mail to supporters, “Discerning people realize that God’s judgments, pronounced in Scripture, have already broken out upon America and will only increase if we do not repent, change our ways and return to God and His fundamental moral laws. … The future of our nation hangs in the balance!”

The PFAW e-mail about the mass mobilization effort noted that ProtectMarriage.com Campaign Manager Frank Schubert told pastors on the conference call that “the [Latter-Day-Saints] Church has carried the heavy lifting, Roman Catholics are coming through, it’s time for evangelicals to step up.”

The Church of Latter Day Saints (LDS), or Mormon Church, has emerged “as a dominant fundraising force in the hotly contested California ballot fight to ban same-sex marriage,” the Wall Street Journal reported Sept. 20, having raised more than a third of the approximately $15.4 million for Yes on 8 since June 1 when top church leaders issued a letter telling parishioners to “do all they can” to support the measure. The Knights of Columbus, a Roman Catholic group, the Journal noted, gave more than $1.25 million; the Colorado Springs-based evangelical Focus on the Family gave more than $400,000 and is expected to contribute more this month.

In addition to the call for evangelicals to “step up” their support for Prop. 8, the Catholic Church has also increased its participation. The most recent development is a call for pastors to speak directly from the pulpit on Sept. 28 about the importance of voting, the Los Angeles Times reported Sept. 24, deliberately challenging the IRS ban against campaigning by nonprofit groups.

“Pastors should throw away the muzzle of fear and replace it with a megaphone of boldness,” Mathew Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel and dean of Liberty University School of Law, said in a Sept. 26 press release. “It was sermons of pastors that fueled the American Revolution. America needs her pastors to once again speak up and address the religious and moral issues of the day. Pastors can preach biblical truths and educate their congregations about the critical moral issues at stake in this election without violating any IRS rules.”

Lou Sheldon, head of the Anaheim-based Traditional Values Coalition, is parachuting in to conservative areas such as Whittier to whip up the Whittier Area Evangelical Ministers Association, according to the Whittier Daily News.

“We can give information on Proposition 8: why it’s important, why we need it and why it’s not discriminatory,” Sheldon said in the meeting at the Zoe Christian Fellowship. “Pastors can talk about it easily to their congregations ... Churches often are hesitant to get involved in something that is political,” he said. “This is not partisan. The IRS has said you may be involved … Let’s be adult and understand that marriage is consummated between a man and a woman. Two men can’t consummate a marriage. Two women can’t.”

“[Gays] have just as much a right to marry as anyone else,” said Gloria Duran, a former Los Nietos School Board member and mother of openly gay West Hollywood City Councilmember John Duran. “If you’re offended by it, that’s your issue … I sit here and think that God must have a plan for this,” she said. It’s just not possible that so many could be wrong or that God made it so wrong.”

According to Elizabeth Media, the transgender executive director of the Whittier Rio Honda AIDS Project, the evangelical group is using the local Republican Party headquarters as a centralized pick-up/drop-off point for literature, lawn signs and campaign paraphernalia.

“I had been content to raise funds and voice support from the sidelines for those spearheading the No on Prop 8 movement. Now we have no choice but to hit the streets,” Mendia told IN Los Angeles magazine. “We will not achieve true equality until we can convince people in Whittier and other remote parts of our county and state that ‘gay marriage’ is an issue of justice—separate is not equal. Domestic partnership is not marriage. And we cannot allow intolerance disguised as religion to violate our birthrights as Americans ... We have the moral advantage and we must show an equal measure of moral courage.”

Mendia is organizing a local community meeting for Oct. 2 at 7:30 a.m. at a Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf at 7201 Greenleaf in Whittier.

Meanwhile there have been little signs that God may not exclusively favor Yes on 8. A Sept. 23 report on the Calitech website offered some explanation for what happened to the Yes on 8 campaign’s 1 million lawn signs, which were all to be displayed simultaneously for a one day publicity splash. According to an e-mail from Gena Downey, producer of the Mormon film, God’s Army, the “Yes on Prop 8 yard signs have been delayed in route from China”—apparently missing their target date by three weeks.

“It is only fitting that a campaign trying to take away freedom from Americans would be funding a totalitarian regime by printing their campaign materials in Red China,” Scott Olin Schmidt, the openly gay campaign manager for Republicans Against 8, told IN.

The No on Prop 8 statewide counter-rally on Sept. 20 went well, however. California Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, West Hollywood City Councilmember Abbe Land, and L.A. County Democratic party Chair Eric Bauman all turned out for a rally at the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center’s Village. Garamendi promised to contribute some of his own money to the campaign, while Villaraigosa promised to call a list of friends to raise money.

The following day, at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force’s annual Leadership Awards at the Beverly Hills Hotel—which raised more than $100,000 for No on Prop 8—new Executive Director Rea Carey talked about the effort.

“We are in the fight of the century to win something very dear—to have our love, our basic humanity, respected as equal under the law,” Carey said. “I want to make one thing clear, we are not assured of winning this unless we pull out all the stops. You have and will see polls about our being ahead by some number of points. Do not be lulled into a false sense of security. This ballot measure is far closer than any of these polls would suggest. We must stay engaged, and we must put everything we have into this fight in order to win.”

On Sept. 18, a new Field Poll indicated that 55 percent of Californians oppose Prop. 8, while 38 percent support it. “The Field Poll is encouraging,” Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California and a leader in the No on Prop 8 fight, said. Kors told IN that the 10 percent of undecided voters could sway the election. “With the other side launching on unprecedented ad campaign, we cannot rest for one minute or we risk losing this election and having our right to marry eliminated by the voters.”

A Sept. 25 poll from the Public Policy Institute of California showed that 55 percent opposed the measure, while 41 percent support it.

The fight to defeat Prop. 8 has galvanized the national LGBT community.

“The vote in November in California is pivotal.” Jennifer Levi, director of the Transgender Rights Project at the Boston-based Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders, told IN.

“What Californians decide on this issue affects our lives deeply in Massachusetts,” she said.

“Many who wish to enter into a same-sex marriage, who do not identify as gay, are also affected by this decision,” Denise Penn, director of the American Institute of Bisexuality, told IN.

“What is at stake goes far beyond the issue of marriage: It is every person’s right to equal dignity, stature and respect,” Jon W. Davidson, legal director of Lambda Legal, wrote in a personal fundraising pitch. “If we lose, it will send a message that, yes, in 2008, it is still acceptable to treat lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and any other unpopular group as second-class citizens. A message like that would reverberate for years, making it difficult for gay people, all across the U.S., to recover on any of the issues we face.”

Lambda recently sent out an e-mail fundraising pitch and changed their website to underscore the importance of the issue but has not contributed to the No on Prop 8 fight as an organization.

“We give as much as we can through our work fighting crucial legal fights and partnering in civil rights campaigns with community leaders and sister groups,” senior counsel Jenny Pizer told IN. “As an organization, we don’t write checks to other organizations. We give as individuals, and ask our friends and members to give, and when there’s work to be done, we are ‘all in.’ So we’re all doing double-duty now, pulling as hard as we can in one direction to achieve a nationally critical goal—protecting our freedom to marry—by stopping Prop. 8 decisively.”

Others contributing to the effort to defeat the anti-gay constitutional amendment include New York Gov. David Paterson, who hosted a private fundraiser Sept. 25 with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom (California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger also opposes Prop 8. but has not contributed financially, so far); the L.A. County Board of Supervisors (the L.A. City Council already voted no); ProgressiveVictory.com, mega-contributors PG&E, Levi Strauss & Co., the California Federation of Teachers, the California State Council of Service Employees Political Action Issues, the board of directors of the Pacific Association of Reform Rabbis and the board of the Valley Industry and Commerce Association.

Individuals continue to contribute, including philanthropist David Bohnett, who recently contributed an additional $500,000, making his total donation $1.1 million. Director Steven Spielberg and his wife Kate Capshaw donated $100,000 after actor Brad Pitt contributed $100,000.

”It’s phenomenal that Kate and Steven are affirming their unwavering commitment to equality in such a significant a way,” said Oscar-winning producer Bruce Cohen (American Beauty), noting that he came out to Spielberg 15 years ago. “It is my fervent hope that other entertainment industry leaders will follow the lead of Brad Pitt and the Spielbergs and fight to maintain equal rights for all Californians,” Cohen said.

At the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Awards event where he was honored with legendary Hollywood mogul Sid Sheinberg, and Cohen’s creative team behind the new biopic, Milk, about the life and assassination of San Francisco gay Supervisor Harvey Milk, Cohen reminded the audience that Milk’s first political fight was defeating Prop. 6, one of the first anti-gay initiatives aimed at curtailing LGBT rights.

“This is the first time our Constitution is being used to eliminate a right of a minority. We have to defeat Prop. 8 in order to prevent a small group of [anti-gay] activists from changing the California Constitution to eliminate a right the Supreme Court said is a fundamental right for all people ... It’s one of the most important battles in this country,” said political strategist Chad Griffin, with Californians Against Discrimination—No on 8 PAC, to IN.

Griffin and Cohen are producing a major entertainment-industry fundraiser in mid-October at the Green Acres home of straight billionaire businessman Ron Burkle.

TV host Ellen DeGeneres, who is hosting a Yes on Prop 2 event for the animal rights initiative, asked fans on her website to vote No on Prop. 8.

“There’s a California Proposition on the ballot that’s a little confusing. It’s Proposition 8. It’s called, ‘The California Marriage Protection Act,’ but don’t let the name fool you. It’s not protecting anyone’s marriage. Not yours. Not mine,” she wrote. “So, in case I haven’t made myself clear, I’m FOR gay marriage. And in order to protect that right, please VOTE NO on Proposition 8. And now that you’re informed, spread the word. I’m begging you. I can’t return the wedding gifts—I love my new toaster.”

Meanwhile, the No on Prop 8 campaign released a commercial—introduced in L.A. by Center CEO Lorri Jean—featuring the straight parents of a lesbian daughter and asking voters not to take her right to marry away.

“Right now, the other side is out-raising us by a wide margin,” Equality California’s Kors told IN. The No on Prop 8 campaign has about $14 million to the Yes on 8’s approximately $20 million. “Soon, their ads—undoubtedly filled with lies and distortions about Prop. 8, about us and about our families—will be on the air. Our ads will tell the real story—how real families will be affected if Prop. 8 passes. Their ads won’t. We need to keep our messages on the air as much as we can.”

For more information, go to NoOnProp8.com.