Black later told Reclaiming America organizers that the partisan nature of the conference conflicted with his duties as Senate chaplain, and, through his spokeswoman, charged that he hadn't been fully informed about the nature of the conference - which will feature discussions on "making America safe for the unborn," "the battle to defend marriage," "homosexuality and the church" and "Darwin's deadly legacy" -- his fellow speakers.

Refuting Black's charge that his invitation to speak was misleadingly vague and "very generic," Reclaiming America published a copy of the invitation which describes the purpose of the "grassroots training conference":

This two-day event is to specifically inform, train and equip Christians to be salt and light in their own communities. We are certain that your knowledge and experience would encourage individual involvement to help restore our God-given freedoms and to defend and implement the Biblical principles on which our country was founded. A spectacular and inspiring patriotic concert closes the conference on Saturday evening."

Clearly political and partisan? Of course it is, to anyone who's paid any attention to the news in the past ten years, and especially to someone who's working smack in the middle of the intersection between religion and politics. In this regard, the conference's organizers are being (marginally) more honest than Black when they explain their grassroots training session: "We are a conservative evangelical ministry. Our conference is an outworking of our faith. It's not political; it's moral, it's ethical. Does it have political implications? Certainly."

It's certainly good news that Black pulled out of the engagement, and the implication within the cancellation that church-state separation watchdog groups such as Americans United have enough influence and media-power to convince moderate politicians and government staffers to avoid such religious right extravaganzas. But the flimsiness of Black's excuse is also testament to how necessary such watchdogs are -- if only to expose the very evident political implications of a conference such as Reclaiming America. One doesn't need Black's theological training to understand the nature of a conference that seeks to train grassroots Christian activists to fight for biblical fundamentals in a democracy, or one that promises to end with a patriotic spectacular. Nor would Black's staffers need a whole lot of insight into radical right theology to understand that a website that proclaims, "The advancement of the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ: that's the business of America," might be at odds with their duties as government employees.