When this rumor referenced Al Gore back in 1999, it was readily spread by conservative commentators. (Paul Harvey, for example, mentioned it during his noontime broadcast on 6 July 1999.) Oddly enough, conservative columnist Cal Thomas maintained that the story was indeed true, only it had to do with President George H. W. Bush (father of George W. Bush):

Bush said it in my presence at a religious broadcasters convention about 1990, and I wrote about it in my book, Blinded by Might: Can the Religious Right Save America. But somehow it got twisted around and stuck on the Internet and put in Al Gore's mouth. He's got a lot of stuff that he has to defend, but that's not one of them.