Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann has quietly set aside her vocal campaign against gay rights, in particular marriage rights, that propelled her to celebrity status among conservatives as she seeks the 2012 GOP nomination for president.  But she hasn't stopped singing the praises of anti-gay social conservatives, RightWingWatch.org reported.

“One of the [Oral Roberts University] professors who had a great influence on me was an Iowan named John Eidsmoe. He's from Iowa and he's a wonderful man. He has theology degrees, he has law degrees, he's absolutely brilliant,” Bachmann said during a March speech at the Rediscovering God in America conference in Iowa. “And he taught me about so many aspects of our godly heritage.”

Eidsmoe's 1997 book God & Caesar encourages Christian conservatives to enter politics and support legislation that imposes biblical law.

Gay rights, Eidsmoe argues, are an attack on society.

“Homosexuality is not only a moral issue, but a political one, and it is largely the gay liberation advocates who have made it so. … But homosexuality is not simply an individual matter; it affects society as a whole. It influences the entire moral strength and moral fiber of society. Furthermore, the more widespread homosexuality becomes, the greater the likelihood that homosexuals will recruit our children into homosexuality, voluntarily or involuntarily.”

“And homosexuality invites the judgment of God upon all of society. The great sin that brought destruction by fire and brimstone upon Sodom and Gomorrah was homosexuality (Genesis 19:5, 8). It is a mistake to suggest that the decision to become a homosexual affects no one but oneself.”