In fairness, Lively says he didn't know that Michael J. Frediani had served three years in prison in the late 90s for having "deviate sexual intercourse" with an 11 year old girl in Canandaigua, New York. Nor did he know that his coffee shop manager had been listed in New York as a class 3 offender, considered at high risk of committing new offenses. In Massachusetts, he is listed as a class 2 moderate risk of repeating his crime. On the other hand, Lively didn't run a criminal background check before making him responsible for the care of children. For his part, Frediani says he is a changed man, and a "minister of Jesus."  But when approached by the Republican, he gave a false name, calling himself "Michael Free." (He also gave this alias to The Boston Globe when the paper recently profiled Lively.) He pleaded innocent to the charge of failure to register as sex offender.

For his part, Scott Lively told The Boston Globe that he too has changed and is now engaged in other things. But he has a long and ugly record to put behind him. Political Research Associates compiled selected quotes from a presentation "exposing the homosexuals' agenda" Lively gave to members the Ugandan Parliament in 2009.  These include:

"The gay movement is an evil institution that's goal is to defeat the marriage-based society and replace it with a culture of sexual promiscuity in which there's no restrictions on sexual conduct except the principle of mutual choice."

"...That is the gay agenda...it is the recreation of society on a different moral foundation and the problem with that is that moral foundation will lead to social chaos and destruction."

The Globe reported:

Lively also wrote on his blog that a respected observer of Ugandan society had said his presentation was "like a nuclear bomb against the `gay' agenda in Uganda.''

"I pray that this, and the predictions, are true,'' Lively wrote.

A week after the conference, a bill was introduced in the Ugandan Parliament that would allow gays to be executed under certain circumstances. Gay rights and human rights activists said Lively's presentation helped set the stage for the bill, which was condemned by the United States and other governments.

Lively told the Globe that he is toning down the anti-gay rhetoric and doing other "stuff."   This, if true, is nice as far as it goes.  But one thing we do not hear from Lively and the many others who have spewed hateful words and ideas for a very long time, is any apology for the harm they have done to so many people.

(This is something we need to bear in mind as we enter a national period of reflection about the culture and consequences of violent rhetoric, primarily from the political and Religious Right. Even if people back off from their most incendiary rhetoric, that does not mean that their views have changed much if at all.)

Lively claims that he was surprised by and does not support the death penalty provision of proposed antigay legislation in Uganda.  But what has he done about it?  Indeed, while there are grounds for skepticism about his claim not to support the bill it is worth noting that he has not returned to Uganda to apologize or to try to undo the damage he has done. He currently claims, as has been the fashion among conservative evangelical for years, to hate the sin but love the sinner. OK, fine.  But where, exactly, is the love?