Broadcaster Damian Goddard has come to the defense of Manny Pacquiano after the boxer faced criticism for opposing same-sex 'marriage.'
WBO welterweight boxing champion and member of the Philippines House of Representatives Manny Pacquiao caused a storm of controversy when he said he opposed same-sex “marriage” and Examiner.com reporter Granville Ampong added a quote from Leviticus 20:13 (“If a man lies with a man… they must be put to death”) which the boxer did not utter. Immediately there were petitions calling for boycotts of Pacquiano’s sponsors and The Grove, an outdoor Los Angeles shopping mall, banned him from its facility where he was to have an interview later.
Pacquiao later issued a following statement clarifying: “I am against gay marriage, but I’m not condemning gays. I have family – a cousin – who’s gay, and friends too. I’m just against gay marriage.”
was fired in May 2011 from his job at Rogers Sportnet for tweeting in defense of traditional marriage. He applauded Pacquiano in an article for LifeSiteNews: “It’s one thing to say you are Christian. It is quite another to actually pick up your cross and follow Him; even when it comes to having to tell people things they don’t want to hear. Things like, marriage is the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others.”
Goddard said Pacquiano’s opponents were displaying an intolerance worse than what they accused the boxer of because Pacquiano’s comments were based in love.
Goddard, currently a spokesman for the Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance and occasional on-air host for the Sun News Network, will be the keynote speaker at the Toronto Pro-Life Forum dinner on June 15.
