Way down toward the bottom of the New York Times‘ report on this past weekend’s One Nation Working Together rally, you’ll find this paragraph:

On Thursday [Glenn] Beck warned that the march included Marxist, Communist and revolutionary groups. Among the organizations endorsing the march were the Communist Party USA, the United Church of Christ, Jewish Funds for Justice, the National Urban League, the National Baptist Convention, People for the American Way and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

My first reaction to this was to wonder why the Times is acting as Glenn Beck’s hatchet man. About the only thing these groups have in common is that they endorsed this rally. What, exactly, is the point of listing them all together? To make clear who Beck doesn’t like? To convince readers that the UCC, black Baptists and other justice-minded organizations form a fifth column for the Communists?

I mean, this is like an updated enemies list dictated from beyond the grave by Richard Nixon.

And that’s when it hits me: good. Good that they’re lumping the religious left [sic] in with the scary people who want to distribute the money differently and help poor people. Good that they’re lumping us in with the people who think such radical thoughts as: conservative religious nutjobs should not be given a free pass to run the nation, and gays and lesbians should enjoy equal protection under the law. Good that they think we’re a bunch of wild-eyed radicals. If I and the members of my denomination scare Glenn Beck, that’s a good thing. It means they’re off-balance.

Same goes for the ever-execrable Mark Tooley, writing the same hack piece for the 40,000th time at the Weekly Standard. He strains at gnats because ultimately he has nothing else to fall back on, no compelling ideology, no good news for anyone who hasn’t been following his worn-out shtick for thirty years.

So, good if they’re afraid of the religious left. It means we’re doing our job. And just in case anyone missed the number of religious progressive groups endorsing the rally, here’s a list culled from One Nation site. Their list of endorsers is pretty long, so I apologize if I missed somebody:

Rainbow PUSH Coalition

The Shalom Center

Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations

Sikh Coalition

The Religious Institute

The Community Church of NY Unitarian Universalist

Pennsylvania Council of Churches

The New Testement Revival Cathedral

Resurrection Temple of the Lord

Prayer, Praise and Worship Centers of America

National Missionary Baptist Church

National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc.

Mother A.M.E. Zion Church

Lemeul Haynes Congregational Church

Jewish Labor Committee

Harlem Congregations for Community Improvement

Greater Allen A.M.E. Cathedral

United Church of Christ

American Muslim Association of North America (AMANA)

Beulah Church of the Nazarene

Bethel Tabernacle AME Church, Brooklyn

Pax Christi USA

Tikkun-Network of Spiritual Progressives

Jewish Funds for Justice

Disciples Justice Action Network

Sojourners

Scary people, all of them. Scary!