On the Sunday before the presidential inauguration, thousands of people celebrated the upcoming presidency of Barack Obama at the “We Are One” concert, featuring performances and speeches from a wide range of celebrities. The festivities, held in front of the Lincoln Memorial, were launched with a powerful opening prayer by Bishop Gene Robinson, the first openly gay Episcopal bishop.
Bishop Robinson’s invocation unfortunately was not aired during HBO’s live broadcast of the event.
You can watch the entire “We Are One” concert, with the invocation included at the beginning, at HBO’s website. Below is a video of the invocation by itself and the text of the invocation:
Good afternoon. Before this celebration begins, please join me in pausing for a moment, to ask God’s blessing upon our nation and our next president.
Barack Obama
Last Tuesday, November 4, 2008, the United States elected its first African-American president: Barack Obama. While many people around the world celebrated the historic moment, other responses took the form of ugly race-related incidents, sending a reminder that this election does not mark the end of the fight against intolerance and hate.
TORRANCE, CA: This past Sunday morning, a few Obama supporters in Torrance awoke to an ugly message: their houses, cars, campaign signs, and trees where they had displayed Obama signs and stickers were defaced by hate graffiti. The vandalism included spray-painted swastikas, “Go Back to Africa,” “N****R,” and “Hitler.” Police are investigating the acts of vandalism as hate crimes. One resident, who found four swastikas painted on her car and her “Yes We Did!” banner torn down, said that many of her McCain-supporting neighbors had expressed their concern and support for her, saying, “This shouldn’t happen ever, and it was a hate crime.”
Read more: