Pat Robertson's legal beagles bred at the American Center for Law and Justice he founded have landed in Hawai'i along with the top-ranking generals in his Christian Coalition. They are arriving to map strategy and to galvanize support by showing Hawaiians their "need" to accept Robertson's proposed state constitutional amendment.

This amendment would ban same sex marriages. Hawaiian observers are already joking about Robertson's post-visit weather reports should his minions prove unable to frighten a proud island into what he believes will better its egalitarian constitution.

The Christian Coalition claims 1.9 million members, though its numbers in Hawaii have not, apparently, been ascertained, say Hawaiian organizers, leading to suspicions that the number is low.

David Welch, the Christian Coalition's Western regional field director, complains that too many Hawaiian ministers and their parishioners throughout the islands limit their political activities, fearing to cross certain lines because, he says, they believe in a narrow interpretation of church-state separation.

"The core issue of civilization -- the definition of marriage – is at stake," Welch insists.

The Coalition's foot soldiers will initiate Pat Robertson-style voter registration drives, attempting to enlist the help of local churches, encouraging congregations to become "active citizens" battling in social causes of Mr. Robertson's choosing.

"The main constraint is that the church cannot endorse or oppose candidates. Churches cannot engage in partisan activities. But a pastor individually can; a pastor does not give up his free speech rights," director Welch says.

Welch as field director, and Kevin Theriot, who directs the center's work in the West, planned to meet with 25 evangelical Christian and Catholic ministers, as well as conservative Jews, according to the meeting organizers. They would discuss the pitfalls of same-sex marriage from the standpoint of orthodoxy. vTo do such politically-charged work without illegally crossing church-state borders, Pat Robertson's Coalition troops are attempting to make clear to Hawaiian ministers that they can crusade against same-sex marriage without jeopardizing the tax-exempt statuses of their churches.

The Human Rights Campaign has established an affiliated political action committee in Hawaii called Protect Our Constitution/ Human Rights Campaign. The Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund , headquartered in New York, is also monitoring the behaviors of the Pat Robertson groupings.

A chief counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice, located, as is Pat Robertson's headquarters, in Virginia Beach, Virginia, believes that the struggle in Hawaii to stop same-sex marriages on American soil will be a pivotal battle between his forces and those he believes are the anti-Christs.

The Christian Coalition's Welch likened their first meeting to a grass-roots educational and training effort that starts out with a small group "that recruits others to the cause."