Richard Dawkins interviewed Ted Haggard as part of his "Root of all evil?" TV documentary. It can be found in YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkUi6dhwWx0

I was in North Carolina when the Bakers (remember Jim & Tammy?) were getting sent to jail, and the folks were saying "The devil pulls hardest on those doing the Lord's work."

What, exactly, is the devil pulling on?

too easy, I apologize.

The ones who scream the loudest about the sins of homosexuality are usually those who fear it the most, and they fear it the most because They. Are. Secretly. Gay.

Mind you, it could be all a hoax (or something cooked up by those pesky Democrats! THIS is the October surprise that Rush has been waiting for! Except it's November!). But I wouldn't be surprised.

Joel Osteen holds forth, not from the Astrodome, but rather from the former Rockets basketball area which his church bought and renovated. Before becoming a huckster house, it was an entertainment center known as The Summit.

Lakewood does not meet in the Astrodome. It meets in the former Compaq Center and accommodates 16,000 sheep, oops, patsies, er... worshipers.

Fact check: Lakewood Church meets in the former Compaq Center, not the Astrodome.

-- livinggreen

Houston, TX

I began thinking about the issue of gay bashing generally, and gay-bashing gays, more specifically, during the Foley eruption. The Haggard situation, if true, is another in a chain of the self-righteous falling.

Why, I wonder, are some people so consumed by their hatred for gays? Objectively, there's not much there to get worked up about. A gay man isn't going to steal your wife, or lead your straight son into perdition. His "sin" does not impact you or society the way the sin of a murderer or thief (or an "abortionist") does. What harm can the actions of consenting adults in their own homes possibly do in the world?

Perhaps this is a bit too "armchair pyschiatrist" and perhaps its been written about before in studies that I have overlooked, but it seems to me that only the self-hatred of a sinner could provoke such passion. A biblical literalist evangelical who also happens to be gay must face a horrible internal conflagration. The inner conflict would surely be unimaginably intense. Can it be that their violent crusade against the "homosexual agenda" is but an effort to atone for and cast out what they see to be their own demon, and a reaction to their failure to "overcome" their own sexuality?

I'm interested in hearing what others with more experience and insight in these matters has to say on the issue. I realize I could very easily be completely full of shit here, but what are some other theories on this matter?

His organization claims to represent 30 million, but is just a blanket organization with loose affiliations with a bunch of disparate churches and partner organizations. This is nothing more than a self aggrandizing media think tank, that attempts to influence the public by appearing in the media and giving the appearance of a large representation. This is not an actual organization with literally 30 million dues paying members that vote the way the leadership commands.

the way this is going of late it seems ALL evangelicals are gay!!

i always knew dobson had a lisp he's the gayest of them all - rush limbaugh has a fetish for dobson in his underroos!

i vote the new symbol of the republican party is the pink triangle!

of course they are all gay why else would they hate gays so much!

self loathing has never been so evident!

I love how everyone simply accepts the word of a guy who produces zero evidence of his claim--coincidentally a mere four days before Colorado votes on an amendment to its constitution banning gay marriage. What conventient timing for this "gay prostitute" to suddenly decide to speak.

Disagree with Ted Haggard all you want, but one thing he's not is stupid. He would never carry on a three-year affair knowing how visible he is.

You suckers are so ready to hate and so gullible, you'll believe anything that comes down the road that simply confirms your own prejudices.

Richard Dawkins pisses me off.

There. I've said it. I've been wanting to say that since I got bored one day and typed his name into the search field on youtube.com. If you do that too, you'll find all kinds of interesting clips from shows he's done - and one of those clips is an interview that Dawkins did with Ted Haggard.

If you're unfamiliar with Richard Dawkins do a search here on Salon. They interviewed him not too long ago. If that's not enough, the cover story in this month's Wired magazine is about the "New Atheists", of which, he is their leader, at least according to Wired.

My problem with Richard is perfectly exemplified when you watch the interview he does with Ted Haggard. In the clip, Richard goes to one of Ted's church services and then speaks with him afterward. This man of reason, of science, opens his interview thusly:

(watch it here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=gmNjfpoRZpE)

RD: "That was really quite a show you gave us today. A fair amount of money seems to have been spent here."

TH: "Yes, I wanted people to be able to worship and enjoy and to be in a setting where the speaker is close to them. That's why it's in the round. And so they can be close to me, and so I can look at them."

RD: "Well it's certainly very effective what you do. I mean it seemed to me to have all the arts (otts?) of the - I mean I was almost reminded of - if you'll forgive me - of sort of a Nuremberg Rally. I mean, such incredibly... Dr. Goebbels would have been proud."

TH: "I don't know anything about the Nuremburg Rallies but lots of Americans think of it as a rock concert."

Dude, I'm reasonably sure there's no God. I've invested much of my teenage and adult life pondering and researching that question and I'm inclined to agree with Richard Dawkins. But, that being said, he misses completely the point of religion. He wants to sweep aside thousands of years of belief structure because God cannot be proved by science. What he fails to see is that there's an entire social structure built around a common reference (God / the Bible) that needs replacing and that can’t be done by marching into an interview with Ted Haggard and commenting that his services remind him of Nazi rallies. That's not science or even proper debating. That's demonizing and name calling.

And that's more or less where I put this accusation of Ted at the moment. I would be a touchstone moment, I believe, if it is proven that Ted Haggard is a closet homosexual. I believe that there's some good to be had by interjecting the idea of human fallibility (as it will be seen within his congregation) into a persona that is built largely on the us-versus-them mentality that he preaches. He certainly can use clumsy confrontations like the one provided by Richard Dawkins as evidence of this us-versus-them situation. But if he is gay, while being vocally anti-gay, hopefully this will be cause for some introspective thought among some of his flock.

That being said, he's an easy target. He's practically an inevitable target due to his stature within the Evangelical Community. I do not subscribe to his belief structure. I bet I disagree with the majority of his politics but clearly a known male prostitute has less to lose than Ted Haggard when it comes to leveling these accusations.

Before we here on Salon jump up in down with glee at the thought of one more moralist being revealed to be as human as the rest of us, I suggest we ponder the facts for one moment and unlike Richard Dawkins engage in a sustentative discussion based on fact rather than one unproven accusation.

We should not be the side that traffics in sliming somebody because we heard a rumor in the Internet/blogosphere echo chamber. There's enough real dirt to go around without having to make any of it up.

If we do otherwise, we do so at the expense of our credibility and, like Dawkins, we'll look foolish in the process.