Gay rights activists had protested Howard Schultz's scheduled appearance.
Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz will no longer be one of the key speakers at this week's Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit. He will be replaced by Pat Lencioni, author of The Five Disfunctions of a Team. Lencioni has spoken at the summit three previous times, and according to his published bio, was rated among the conference's "top 10 general sessions of all time. "
Schultz, who has not previously spoken at Willow Creek's leadership summit, recently published his second book on leadership, Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul.
His appearance was the subject of an online campaign at Change.org, launched by political consultant Asher Huey.
"Schultz is speaking at a conference hosted at and sponsored by an anti-gay church. This is unacceptable," the petition said. "The church has long practiced dangerous conversion therapy to 'cure' people of their sexual orientation. "¦ Not denouncing these practices is tacit approval."
It is not known at this time whether Schultz's withdrawal has anything to do with the campaign on homosexuality, and a staffer at Willow Creek Community Church said Schultz did not provide a statement regarding his withdrawal. Willow Creek senior pastor Bill Hybels will reportedly comment on the withdrawal at tomorrow's session.
Five days ago, Gina Woods, Starbucks director of executive communications for Starbucks, apparently left a message on the Change.org petition page: "I work for Starbucks in Communications. I wanted to let you all know that Howard is not speaking at Willow Creek. The conference web site has just not been updated."
(Update: In response to CT questions about why Schultz withdrew, Woods told CT in an e-mail, "I can only confirm that Howard Schultz will not be speaking at the Willow Creek Leadership Conference. Unfortunately, the event website was not updated to reflect this change.")
728 people signed the petition. This year's Willow Creek Leadership Summit is expected to draw 165,000 attendees at 450 locations (185 of those are live satellite locations in the U.S. The others are international locations that will watch a videocast in the fall.)
The petition references Willow Creek Community Church's longstanding relationship with Exodus International, as well as the ending of that relationship in 2009, which Christianity Today reported last month.
"Willow Creek has a whole host of ministries for people dealing with these issues, and we would never intend for them to feel sidelined," Susan DeLay, director of media relations at Willow Creek, told CT's reporter for that story. "All we've changed is how we've gone about inviting them into the church, which is the primary issue here."
Change.org petitions were recently credited with getting TOMS Shoes founder Blake Mycoskie (who spoke at last year's Willow Creek Leadership Summit) to cut ties with Focus on the Family, and with getting Apple to remove an iPhone app for the Manhattan Declaration and a business relationship with the Christian Values Network.
Update 8/11/11 9:45: Andrew Marin, author of Love is an Orientation, said on Twitter that he was attending the summit "as [a] special guest of Willow Creek re: Starbucks CEO cancellation." Marin's eponymous foundation attempts to build bridges between evangelicals and the LBGT community.
Posted by Ted Olsen on August 10, 2011 6:45PM
The conference that Mr. Schultz was, going to speak at was a conference on leadership. Willow Creek Church invites the best leaders to speak and teach about how to be a better leader. If the desire of Mr. Huey and the rest who signed this petition really is bring about lasting change, it would seem that this kind of platform would be something you would clamor for. Howard Schultz's involvement in this conference, I had hoped, was based more on his desire to build into leaders than to make a political statement. Lastly, it's interesting to me that there are threats being made against Starbucks, and a call to join in with those threats, and Christians are the ones that are called "hate-mongers." Mr. Huey, please stop the bigotry and closed-mindedness.
Posted by: Chris at August 10, 2011
It seems to me that the "movement" that is castigating Willow Creek for its supposed stand on homosexuality is more interested in controlling lives and keeping individuals as followers instead of leaders. It really has little to do with the issue of homosexuality as it does with power and money. Maybe if more individuals who align themselves with the Evangelical movement express themselves to Starbucks, we would see a change in action and attitude from Starbucks. It is all about who makes the most noise and yields the heaviest hand.
Posted by: Thomas E. Jones at August 10, 2011
At some point the pro-gay movement is going to be called out for its blatant hypocrisy and agenda against evangelicals. They're overplaying their hand and almost forcing anyone who might appear to not automatically acquiesce to their agenda to bow down to them.
I'm don't blame the Starbucks people for their descision. They lack courage and are afraid of the results of a small but overly vocal community that might stop buying their coffee.
Leading in modern American culture requires fortitude and principles. Clearly Starbucks lacks this. They might have a fine product but due to their inability to develop competent leadership principles they aren't built to last. In another 20 years they'll be a funny reminder like Members Only jackets.
Posted by: Robert at August 10, 2011
Cutting ties and separatism? I thought that those actions were primarily characteristic of Christian Fundamentalism. I must not be paying attention.
Posted by: Basil at August 11, 2011
is this really surprising? When a conference is built around leadership, and not necessarily Biblical/Christian leadership, there will always be stockholders/board/advocacy groups to answer to.
Posted by: Chris Blackstone at August 11, 2011
What would have been more appropriate is if Schultz had engaged Change.org and said, "Look, we're never going to get anywhere if we don't dialogue. And dialogue includes talking with people with whom you don't always agree on every single topic." We will never get anywhere if people are not brave enough to make these kind of statements and to forge ahead despite opposition.
Posted by: Pat Pope at August 11, 2011
Change.org is already being called out on its problems stretching the truth -- a few groups have reversed course after learning that Change has flat-out lied about Christian groups position on homosexuality.
This group is kind of the LulzSec of gay groups: It's only a matter of time before the law catches up with them.
Posted by: David at August 11, 2011
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