A little over a year ago, I wrote the following article in the online magazine, Whosoever that I think is appropriate to reprint at this time:
It must be emphasized that there is literally a world of difference between having a relationship with God and one's adherence to the construction of man-made religion! A relationship with God defines love and compassion as its essence, and when legalism and perfectionism enter the framework and dialogue of religiosity we can be sure that "religion" has trumped any "relationship with God" that that person may or may not have had.
Just because a person is a member of the clergy, or is a professing Christian lay person, doesn't necessarily mean that he or she has a relationship with God! We can safely say that he or she might be "religious," but that might well be far different from his/her having a relationship with God!
For example, many people have a relationship with God through one or more of the Church's sacraments, and that is authentic and meaningful for them; there is absolutely nothing wrong with having the sacraments be a vehicle or a vessel upon which to base and reinforce that relationship.
Others may have a relationship with God that is experiential apart from sacramental worship, and that, too, is authentic and meaningful for them; there is absolutely nothing wrong with having that experience or series of experiences be ones upon which to base and reinforce that relationship.
In other words, in Christianity, as in life, one size doesn't fit all!
However, regardless of the dynamics of one's relationship with Christ, Christianity is based solely on the Person of Christ!
Christianity knows nothing of man-made constructs that seek to replace Christ as the center of our lives! Neither the Bible nor any other man-made artifact is to substitute for the Person of Jesus in the lives of those whom He chose from the foundation of the world (e.g. Ephesians 1:4); no authentic teaching and preaching is to have as its subject anything other than Christ!
Jesus clearly tells us how to live the Christian life in the Gospels; His teaching is elaborated primarily by the Apostle Paul who is the main Apostle who explicates the Gospel (primarily in the Book of Romans and the Book of Galatians) that Christians, disciples of Christ, are to preach and live out.
As I've written many times, the only Gospel to be found in Christianity is comprised of: Grace (God's unmerited favor to us); Faith (trusting God over and above seen circumstances); Love (agape love which is love not based upon one's feelings but upon an act of the will independently of how one feels); Peace ("cessation of againstness," where we are at peace both with God and with others to the degree that the latter is possible); Reconciliation (with God and with each other to the degree that the latter is possible); Inclusiveness (where we recognize that we are all brothers and sisters who are equal in the eyes of God).
The purity of the Gospel reflects the purity of Christ, and to be a follower of Christ requires adherence to the Gospel that is implanted in the hearts of each and every one of Christ's disciples. And the ability to adhere to the Gospel is made possible by the Holy Spirit Who is implanted within us by God!
Anyone who perverts the Gospel does a grave injustice to the life, teachings, and ministry of Jesus; causes untold harm to vulnerable people in society who are victimized by the perverters of the Gospel; causes untold harm to people who are gullible enough to believe what the perverters call "Christianity," comprising and manifesting the false gospel of legalism and perfectionism; sticks a knife in the heart of God with each and every utterance and/or action that reflects that perversion.
Toxic religion in the name of "Christianity" has as one of its major consequences the understandable perception by many decent and intelligent people that a Christian is some harsh, censorious, judgmental freak who obsesses over what I call "The Theology of Genital Placement!" In the view of these perverters of the Gospel, genital placement becomes the litmus test of one's morality and one's standing with God, which tells us a lot about their own likely emotional/sexual insecurities and/or pathologies!
And this toxicity has infected most of the institutional Church; the perception many people have of Christians and of Christianity; the framing of what is called "Christianity" in most of the institutional Church and in the public square; the psychological, social, political, and even judicial dimensions of our lives.
Toxic religion has most notably spawned generations of guilt-ridden people who are made to feel that God doesn't love them because they are Gay! Although nothing could be further from the truth, the big lie perpetrated by the perverters of the false gospel of legalism and perfectionism has so infused our culture that the psyches of virtually everyone, Gay and Straight, have been affected to the degree that even seemingly reasonable people have come to accept many clergy's preconceived prejudices having to do with a distorted view of love and sexuality, and their perverted theology of genital placement that seems to be the hub of the wheel that defines their own form of what they mistakenly call "Christianity."
"Gay Liberty University Alum Recalls Repression at School" [Currently a dead link.] is about a young gay man, Jud Brown, who went to Liberty University founded by the late Jerry Falwell in 1971, and tells a bit about his struggles with being a Christian and being gay. It is not a particularly good article, but it's worth briefly exploring, given the destructive impact that toxic religion has had on him and on countless others.
I'm grateful to my good friend, Don Charles who blogs at "Christ, The Gay Martyr", for forwarding this article to me, and that I hope you will read in its entirety!
Here are some key excerpts from that article to which I want to call your attention:
Brown said there were other gay students at Liberty University who were having difficulty coping with their sexual orientation. He said he found gay porn on his roommate’s computer after using it one day.
“I’m not proud of it to this day, but because I was so guilt-ridden about my own sexuality, I was very intolerant toward him and I turned him into my [resident advisers],” he said....
Despite the experiences, Brown said he enjoyed his time at Liberty University because the school espoused Christian values that he shares.
“I have Christian values and identify myself as a Christian and there’s a lot of things that I believe that Liberty taught that are right — even though I don’t live up to them sometimes,” he said.
Brown said he doesn’t believe that it’s healthy to be promiscuous, drink to excess or do recreational drugs — values that he said Liberty University teaches. [MY NOTE: Even most atheists believe in living decently; "decency" is not restricted to Christians.]
He also said he enjoyed attending Liberty University because it was controversial and provoked interesting responses when he told people where he attended school....
Brown said he enjoyed his experience at Liberty University so much that, after obtaining his undergraduate degree, he went on to work to obtain a master’s degree in education through the school....
“I’m very comfortable being gay, but to be honest, I have one foot firmly planted in that past, and one foot firmly planted in being OK with being gay,” he said. “I have to kind of balance or find a neutral territory.”
Brown also said Liberty University shouldn’t be blamed for being intolerant of homosexuality.
“It’s a Christian culture and they have their own traditions, they have their own belief structures and you can’t go into a Christian structure and say, ‘You got to be OK with being gay,’” he said. “They don’t believe it.”
This young man's mindset greatly disturbs me! And I'm afraid that he represents not an insignificant number of Gay Christians who are ambivalent about their being able to reconcile (as if there has to be any attempt at reconciliation in the first place) between their being Christian and their being Gay.
Like so many others, he doesn't seem to see that God makes each and every one of us according to His/Her sovereign will, and we are to never chafe under the sovereign choices of God! There is no greater gift that God gives us than the ability to love others and to make a commitment to another human being with whom to share one's life!
This young man while at that university turns in his room mate, believing that his room mate will likely be expelled or, at the very least, be profoundly embarrassed, and he betrays him anyway. This alone says a lot about his degree of self-loathing that he sought to displace by undoubtedly using the defense mechanism of Reaction Formation, in part to likely deflect attention away from his own sexuality which he seemingly viewed at that time as being "sinful." By turning in his room mate, he may have thought that no one would question his own sexuality and, therefore, he acted in this traitorous, despicable, manner.
Also, he is apologizing for Liberty University, ignoring the tremendous harm that Jerry Falwell and that university did, and continue to do, to LGBT people and their families. And, to top it all off, he calls Liberty University "a Christian structure" and says it's not OK in that university for one to say it's OK to be gay because "They don't believe it."
It never seems to occur to him that just because "they don't believe it" doesn't make it true, and doesn't demand confronting within a professing "Christian structure" the lie that one can't be a Christian and also be a Gay man or woman who lives an abundant life as Jesus calls each of us to do.
And, despite his saying, "I'm very comfortable being gay....", his statement doesn't ring true to me, and I doubt that deep down he really believes it either, because he goes on to say, I have one foot firmly planted in that past, and one foot firmly planted in being OK with being gay....“I have to kind of balance or find a neutral territory.”
Toxic Christianity seems to have inculcated within him, and within so many others, the false belief that he feels that he has to "have a kind of balance or find a neutral territory," when that is a false notion and still shows him to believe that there is an inherent contradiction between being a Christian and being Gay.
He fails to recognize that he is already "balanced" in his being a Christian and his being a gay man! Like every other person who has experienced toxicity in his (or her) past, he doesn't have to "have one foot firmly planted in that past," and yet he still does, indicating his not perceiving his God-given "balance" as a Gay Christian.
Self-loathing people don't really believe that God makes each of us according to His sovereign will and, therefore, many feel the need to do something to "balance" their past with their present; their Christianity with their sexuality; the hateful messages "in the name of God" to which they have been exposed and the reality of their own experience of their lives. They don't realize that they are already "balanced" because God created them as balanced, and only they can let others' prejudicial rhetoric and/or actions blind them to and/or interfere with that balance.
And, tragically, many succumb to a falsely perceived lack of balance (often accompanied by despair and often by a whole host of risk taking behaviors) or spend the rest of their lives searching for that balance (also often accompanied by a whole host of risk taking behaviors), not recognizing that the balance they seek they have always possessed because that balance was given to them by God even before they left their mother's womb.
And, to make matters worse for himself, Jud seems to apologize for Liberty University, affirming that it is manifesting Christian virtues and values. Indeed, he even went to graduate school at that university, even after knowing and living through its antipathy toward same-sex love, and after hearing so many of the demagogic diatribes that the late Jerry Falwell visited upon Gay people, their families, and Straight people who were gullible enough to accept his perverted version of Christianity that was and is antithetical to the Gospel.
I don't know this young man, but I was very disturbed by this article and by my distinct feeling that he is not all that comfortable with the integration of his Christian life with his emotional/sexual life. He still seems to be in turmoil, and professes to have evolved to a place that he doesn't seem to occupy.
He strikes me as a person who is likely fraught with guilt and some degree of self-loathing, as he also announces for the world to hear that Liberty University is "a Christian structure," thereby consciously or unconsciously affirming the hateful rhetoric of Jerry Falwell and those of his ilk who falsely teach and preach that Christianity is antithetical to one's being Gay.
How purveyors of homophobia, ignorance, and even hate can be considered to be housed within the Christian paradigm, within "a Christian structure," is a mystery to me!
And whatever struggles, doubts, sufferings, and guilt that the Jud Browns of the world have are not only completely unnecessary, but have been foisted upon them by purveyors of toxic religion, many of whom call themselves "Christians," but who show themselves to know (or care) absolutely nothing about the life, ministry, and teachings of Jesus! And so many tragically believe these purveyors of toxic religion who help cause untold suffering of Gay people; parents to kick their Gay children out of the house; loss of jobs; suicides, assaults, and even murders of Gay people.
And so many people, many of whom are well-meaning, have become so poisoned by this toxic religion, drinking its Kool Aid, that they accept the lies of godless clergy and their followers, and even seek to make excuses for the often hateful clergy and organizational structures that presume to call themselves "Christian," but that seem to have a far greater affinity for the demonic than they have for God!
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Monday, September 27, 2010
IS GOPROUD MADE UP OF A BUNCH OF GAY MASOCHISTS?
The Gay conservative group, GOProud, invited Ann Coulter, who has been known to use the word "fag" and "faggot" to refer to some of those with whom she disagrees, to speak to them, and speak she did.
Here is an excerpt from her speech:
Marriage "is not a civil right -- you're not black," Coulter told the crowd, building upon an argument that claimed the equal protections provided by the Fourteenth Amendment -- and potentially used to build a case for marriage equality -- were only applicable to black people.
[For the full article, see here.]
When does "conservatism" turn into masochism?
It seems that Gay audiences who would invite Ann Coulter, let alone who may well have lapped up her vitriol, love to be reviled, and before this event GOProud even touted the hurt that they must have known would be inflicted on them, and is inflicted on all Gay people, as seen by their advertisement of the sold-out event entitled, Homocon 2010.
Just the label "Homocon 2010" should tell us a lot about the seeming masochistic mind-set of these limited human beings who are wittingly or unwittingly playing a role, not only in their own oppression, but in the oppression of other LGBT people!
In this connection, I'd like to reprint an article I wrote on this subject on May 10, 2007 entitled, The Pathology of the Gay Conservative:
Here is an excerpt from her speech:
Marriage "is not a civil right -- you're not black," Coulter told the crowd, building upon an argument that claimed the equal protections provided by the Fourteenth Amendment -- and potentially used to build a case for marriage equality -- were only applicable to black people.
[For the full article, see here.]
When does "conservatism" turn into masochism?
It seems that Gay audiences who would invite Ann Coulter, let alone who may well have lapped up her vitriol, love to be reviled, and before this event GOProud even touted the hurt that they must have known would be inflicted on them, and is inflicted on all Gay people, as seen by their advertisement of the sold-out event entitled, Homocon 2010.
Just the label "Homocon 2010" should tell us a lot about the seeming masochistic mind-set of these limited human beings who are wittingly or unwittingly playing a role, not only in their own oppression, but in the oppression of other LGBT people!
In this connection, I'd like to reprint an article I wrote on this subject on May 10, 2007 entitled, The Pathology of the Gay Conservative:
| To "conserve" in the political sense, means to adhere to traditions of fiscal responsibility and seek to minimizie the government's intrusion or encroachment on individual rights! If that is what we meant in today's U.S. by "conservative," that would be a perfectly understandable political position for a rational Gay person to take. However, the unfortunate reality is that what passes for "conservatism" today is diametrically opposed to those very traditional principles! President Bush inherited an economic surplus and in just a few short years we have come to the point where we have the largest debt that this nation has ever seen. We invaded a sovereign country based on lies and deceit, having 9/11 cynically used as a pretext to enter a war that I believe was planned before Bush even took office. Moreover, with the initiation of the Patriot Act, suspension of habeus corpus for those viewed as "enemy combatants," and a whole host of other encroachments on our civil liberties, this Administration is anything but "conservative," and has done a great deal to encroach upon our individual liberties, more than ably and willingly abetted by most of the mainstream media that has both uncritically accepted the sound bytes emanating from the self-serving White House, acting as mere stenographers of the political spin of the day, and airing hitherto unthinkable hateful rhetoric from assorted talk show hosts. However, one of the consequences of all of this relatively rapid change in our society is the demonization of LGBT people by the self-described "conservative" forces in this country, and the cowardly capitulation to those forces of the opposing, the Democratic, party that has to appeal to an electorate inundated with what is purported to be "conservative" ideas that are really pure naked hatred dressed in the drag of "conservatism." So we even have political opponents adopting many of the "ideas" of those who garner votes and market share of audience by frequently hateful rhetoric and the playing of the politics of exclusion, and who feel the need to intrude on others' private lives, deny them dignity and full and equal civil rights, and frame our political sport as one where one can't tell the players without a scorecard and, unfortunately, when it comes to LGBT rights, the scorecard doesn't show either side in a very favorable light. So, the reality becomes that every decent person who wants to partake of the political process in the U.S. has to support/choose the least of two evils, go into the voting booth, hold his/her nose, and vote! However, when a Gay person aligns him/herself with the political party that runs on a platform of writing an Amendment into the Constitution that would seek to prevent same-sex marriage, that largely demonizes LGBT people, that is quite comfortable with the fact that there are absolutely no federal civil rights protections for LGBT people, assiduously fights "hate crime" legislation (more accurately viewed as legislation against "terrorism," as I have written before), and where LGBT people are viewed as fodder for the purpose of garnering votes, it calls into question what manifestation of self-loathing or self-denigration would foster such an alliance and, even, an allegiance. |
| As I have previously written, "Being Gay need not be one's top priority, just as being straight is not to be one's top priority. However, when a Gay person aligns him/herself with a political party that has as its platform to prevent same-sex marriage, supports the fact that there are no federal civil rights protections for LGBT people, and is generally hostile to LGBT people, supporting that political party reeks of masochism in my book, and shows that person to be "ignorant and/or mendacious and/or traitorous'." I want to try to delve into the dynamics of Gay people aligning themselves with today's Republican party, a party that has fostered an anti-Gay agenda that is quite extraordinary from a number of perspectives, not the least being the fact that it regards itself as "conservative," all the while it seeks to limit the human freedom to legally relate to another whom one loves and to whom one seeks to make a lifetime commitment. Why would a Gay person seek to align him/herself with a politcal party and its allies that view same-sex marriage as an assault on "traditional family values," ruining "the sanctity of marriage" (posited by people many of whom have been married more than once or even twice), and who apparently feel no compunction about ridiculing Gay people? I've heard more than one such Republican Gay person say that, although they were Gay, that isn't all they were. They were not one issue voters, and that their being Gay wasn't the major part of their lives or identities. Fair enough! However, let's consider another scenario. If I lived on welfare and food stamps, would it make any sense if I aligned myself with the Democratic Party, for example, if it had as its platform that it was going to do away with welfare and food stamps, and deny those who were on those programs its benefits? Even though I might not consider my economic situation to be the most important "identity" I had, or the fact that I didn't consider myself to be a one issue voter, would it make any rational sense if I voted for the Democratic ticket if it largely ran on such a platform? I doubt many would answer, "yes," to this rhetorical question. I really believe that the bombardment of anti-Gay messages throughout our lives in assorted venues, not the least of which is most of the organized Church, has taken hold on many LGBT people's lives and psyches and, even though many are "out," they still harbor a visceral self-loathing that manifests itself by many identifying with their oppressors. This phenomenon is quite common in a variety of arenas, and it's called "the stockholm syndrome," where the oppressed become emotionally attached to their oppressors. Succumbing to this phenomenon doesn't denote any necessary intentional malice (although the subsequent consequence of that decision can provoke maliciousness) on the part of the victim. It seems to me that it merely denotes that in order to maintain one's "ego integrity," and one's inner sense of "dignity," one feels that he/she must identify with his/her oppressors (though not consciously acknowledging them as such), so as to consciously reject the role of "victim" and embrace the role as being one of their comrades. Indeed, in this case, "comrades in arms." (This phenomenon is seemingly quite widespread, as I remember reading a poll shortly after the last Presidential election that about 23% of LGBT people voted for President Bush who largely ran on the platform of placing an amendment into the Constitution preventing same-sex marriage.) Of course, Gay people, like many of the rest of the population, care about higher taxes (though it could be viewed as irrational to support a political party that has virtually guaranteed higher taxes to pay for the profligate spending that has occurred in these past several years), limited government (though that, too, is irrational, if one is supporting a party that has grossly intruded on many of the bulwarks of our judicial system, such as habeus corpus, and wiretapping without judicial oversight or even prior approval), and would want to vote accordingly. However, the reality of today's "conservatives," of today's Republican party, does not address these concerns, and it doesn't take a Democrat or an Independent to point out that fact. Basically, I believe that when one supports a political party that works against that person's very dignity, personhood, and right to pursue happiness that is the right of every human being to enjoy in the U.S., he/she is manifesting his/her conscious and/or unconscious self-loathing in a "Stockholm Syndrome" that not only affirms the party that largely institutionalizes that oppression, but devalues the dignity of the person succumbing to that syndrome and casts him or her as one who is "ignorant and/or mendacious and/or traitorous'." |
Sunday, September 26, 2010
REV. EDDIE LONG'S SERMON ON 9/26/2010
Rev. Long said that he was not the man that the TV portrayed him to be, but he never denied during that sermon that he seduced young men; said that he couldn't comment any further on advice of his lawyers.
He portrayed himself as the victim, and never once expressed any compassion for the young men who alleged that he had same-sex relationships with them. He neither straightforwardly affirmed nor denied those young men's allegations!
Long has deep pockets, as can be seen by his lavish lifestyle and estate, and he may well be counting on that fact to enable him to successfully fight the charges leveled against him.
He likened himself to being David against Goliath, and enjoyed much applause during his brief sermon; it seems to me that his congregation is solidly behind him at this point.
Here is Rev. Eddie Long's sermon addressing the sexual scandal in which he is currently embroiled, followed by assorted commentaries and other related news items:
He portrayed himself as the victim, and never once expressed any compassion for the young men who alleged that he had same-sex relationships with them. He neither straightforwardly affirmed nor denied those young men's allegations!
Long has deep pockets, as can be seen by his lavish lifestyle and estate, and he may well be counting on that fact to enable him to successfully fight the charges leveled against him.
He likened himself to being David against Goliath, and enjoyed much applause during his brief sermon; it seems to me that his congregation is solidly behind him at this point.
Here is Rev. Eddie Long's sermon addressing the sexual scandal in which he is currently embroiled, followed by assorted commentaries and other related news items:
Saturday, September 25, 2010
REV. EDDIE LONG TO STEP DOWN AMID ALLEGATIONS OF HOMOSEXUALITY
Please read this full article some excerpts of which follow:
In a 2007 report, the Southern Poverty Law Center described Long as "one of the most virulently homophobic black leaders in the religiously based anti-gay movement." The report quotes a Long sermon in which he targets lesbian behavior.
"It is the most unattractive thing I have ever seen, when I see women wearing uniforms that men would wear, and women fighting to get in the military!" Long shouted to his congregation then. "The woman gets perverted to turn towards woman … and everybody knows it's dangerous to enter an exit! And everybody knows, lady, if you go to the store and buy these devices [marital aids], it's Memorex! It ain't real!"
The audience, seated in a congested sanctuary, erupts in laughter. [And these haters profess to be Christians and do so with a straight face!] But what Long says next is no joke.
"God says you deserve death!"
Also read this article entitled, “Ministering Treachery”, The Truth Concerning Bishop Eddie Long’s Spiritual Wilderness that further fleshes out this issue.
Again, if these allegations are factual (and I personally believe that they are), the issue isn't his being closeted; it isn't the fact of his hypocrisy.
The issue is the evil perpetrated upon LGBT people by clergy and others who externalize their psychic pain and/or self-loathing and/or hate that resides in their hearts which causes untold damage to LGBT people, and these wolves in sheep's clothing have the temerity to spew their homophobic venom in the name of God.
Venomous homophobic rhetoric spewed in the name of God meets material and/or psychological and/or social needs that are antithetical to anything and everything that Jesus teaches those who are His disciples, and it's high time that all people of good will, Gay or not, understand this very important fact!
In a 2007 report, the Southern Poverty Law Center described Long as "one of the most virulently homophobic black leaders in the religiously based anti-gay movement." The report quotes a Long sermon in which he targets lesbian behavior.
"It is the most unattractive thing I have ever seen, when I see women wearing uniforms that men would wear, and women fighting to get in the military!" Long shouted to his congregation then. "The woman gets perverted to turn towards woman … and everybody knows it's dangerous to enter an exit! And everybody knows, lady, if you go to the store and buy these devices [marital aids], it's Memorex! It ain't real!"
The audience, seated in a congested sanctuary, erupts in laughter. [And these haters profess to be Christians and do so with a straight face!] But what Long says next is no joke.
"God says you deserve death!"
Also read this article entitled, “Ministering Treachery”, The Truth Concerning Bishop Eddie Long’s Spiritual Wilderness that further fleshes out this issue.
Again, if these allegations are factual (and I personally believe that they are), the issue isn't his being closeted; it isn't the fact of his hypocrisy.
The issue is the evil perpetrated upon LGBT people by clergy and others who externalize their psychic pain and/or self-loathing and/or hate that resides in their hearts which causes untold damage to LGBT people, and these wolves in sheep's clothing have the temerity to spew their homophobic venom in the name of God.
Venomous homophobic rhetoric spewed in the name of God meets material and/or psychological and/or social needs that are antithetical to anything and everything that Jesus teaches those who are His disciples, and it's high time that all people of good will, Gay or not, understand this very important fact!
Thursday, September 23, 2010
THIRD ACCUSER OF REV. EDDIE LONG COMES FORWARD
UPDATE, 9/24/2010: FOURTH ACCUSER COMES FORWARD.
New pictures have surfaced of Bishop Eddie Long, prominent pastor of a 25,000-member megachurch outside Atlanta, as a third man has come forward accusing the anti-gay advocate of coercing him into sex.
CBS News' Erica Hill reports the pastor allegedly sent his accusers numerous photos of himself including at least several of him wearing spandex and workout clothes....
Long has called for a national ban on same-sex marriage and his church counsels gay members to become straight. In 2004, he led a march with Bernice King to her father's Atlanta grave to support a national constitutional amendment to protect marriage "between one man and one woman." He also has released several gospel albums, authored books on relationships and spirituality, and hosts a weekly television program.
Gillen said Long will speak directly about the allegations to his church congregation Sunday.
[For the full article, see here.]
Assuming these allegations are factually true, Rev. Eddie Long, a strident homophobe, must be confronted not with the fact that he is in the closet; not with the fact that he is a hypocrite, but with the fact that he spoke evil!
It's one thing to be in the closet and keep quiet about LGBT people. It's another thing to be stridently homophobic and seek to enshrine Gay people as second-class citizens in the U.S. Constitution, and Long was doing just that!
Who knows how many lives he's ruined and/or how many suicides, assaults, and murders of LGBT people have occurred because of strident religious homophobes, some or many of whom are closeted?
He should be confronted, not because he's in the closet or because he's a hypocrite! He must be strongly confronted because people like him express evil, and have the temerity to do so in the name of God.
Strident religious homophobes, closeted or not, have blood on their hands, and that fact must never be forgotten!
New pictures have surfaced of Bishop Eddie Long, prominent pastor of a 25,000-member megachurch outside Atlanta, as a third man has come forward accusing the anti-gay advocate of coercing him into sex.
CBS News' Erica Hill reports the pastor allegedly sent his accusers numerous photos of himself including at least several of him wearing spandex and workout clothes....
Long has called for a national ban on same-sex marriage and his church counsels gay members to become straight. In 2004, he led a march with Bernice King to her father's Atlanta grave to support a national constitutional amendment to protect marriage "between one man and one woman." He also has released several gospel albums, authored books on relationships and spirituality, and hosts a weekly television program.
Gillen said Long will speak directly about the allegations to his church congregation Sunday.
[For the full article, see here.]
Assuming these allegations are factually true, Rev. Eddie Long, a strident homophobe, must be confronted not with the fact that he is in the closet; not with the fact that he is a hypocrite, but with the fact that he spoke evil!
It's one thing to be in the closet and keep quiet about LGBT people. It's another thing to be stridently homophobic and seek to enshrine Gay people as second-class citizens in the U.S. Constitution, and Long was doing just that!
Who knows how many lives he's ruined and/or how many suicides, assaults, and murders of LGBT people have occurred because of strident religious homophobes, some or many of whom are closeted?
He should be confronted, not because he's in the closet or because he's a hypocrite! He must be strongly confronted because people like him express evil, and have the temerity to do so in the name of God.
Strident religious homophobes, closeted or not, have blood on their hands, and that fact must never be forgotten!
Friday, September 17, 2010
FLEE TOXIC CHURCHES AND CLERGY
The following article entitled, Flee Toxic Churches and Clergy was published in the current issue of whosoever.org, and I think it contains a message that all people, LGBT and Straight, need to take to heart.
Whosoever is an excellent online magazine that is primarily geared to LGBT people and allies, and I strongly urge you to read many of its current and past articles.
By attending homophobic churches inhabited by clergy who preach the false gospel of genital placement rather than the only Gospel to be found in Christianity that is comprised of God's grace (unmerited favor) to us that we can only appropriate by trusting God over and above seen circumstances, LGBT people (and all decent people) are submitting themselves to indignities, to a false Christianity, and to humiliation that serves no other purposes than to lend credibility to those heretical clergy and their blind followers, and also exacerbates internalized homophobia within those LGBT people who attend those churches.
I truly believe that any LGBT person who attends a homophobic church, or any church that doesn't allow him/her full participation in the life of the church and the partaking of all of its sacramental rights, to be a masochist!
Why would you seek your "spiritual sustenance" from any church that views you as a second class citizen; views you as "disordered"; seeks to deprive you of equal civil and sacramental rights that heterosexuals enjoy and take for granted; is in the vanguard of discriminating against LGBT people to the point that many LGBT people commit suicide, are assaulted, and are even murdered; stridently lobbies for denying you and others equal civil rights?
And don't delude yourself by saying of a homophobic church that you attend, "It's my church too!" It's not you're church at all! You can't preach from the pulpit; you don't determine church dogma or doctrine; you can't excommunicate anyone! No! It's not your church too!
A true Church is made up of the ecclesia, the called out ones, those called out by God to be God's disciples! And being housed in a building whose clergy espouse legalism, perfectionism, prejudice, discrimination, and affirm through action and/or silence the denial of civil and sacramental rights to anyone does not make one a Christian any more than being in a garage makes one a car!
If you want to be truly emotionally and spiritually intact, and truly live out your authenticity and ministry ordained by God, flee those toxic churches and clergy as fast as your legs can carry you!
The following is my article entitled, Flee Toxic Churches and Clergy:
As I've often written, many clergy within the institutional Church preach and teach the false gospel of legalism, perfectionism, and exclusion and thereby do immeasurable harm to the emotional and spiritual lives of those who allow themselves to be exposed to that kind of toxic religion.
The only Gospel to be found in Christianity is the Gospel of grace (God's unmerited favor); faith (trusting God over and above seen circumstances); love; peace; reconciliation; inclusiveness. Any other gospel is a false gospel!
If you allow yourself to be subjected to preaching and/or teaching other than the Gospel of Christ (the "Good News" that all of our sins have been forgiven by the Sacrifice of Christ), flee those churches, or other such venues, as fast as your legs can carry you!
Moreover, if you take seriously the rhetoric of those who claim to speak for God and for the Bible, and who teach and preach a false gospel, you are not only being subjected to a warped version of Christianity that is really not "Christianity," but you are making decisions about your spiritual and emotional life that are based on lies and perversions of: the grace of God; the teachings, ministry, and Sacrifice of Jesus; the Bible; Christianity itself.
Unfortunately, those who pervert Scripture and the Gospel, those who deny the full and final Sacrifice that Jesus made to cover over all of our sins, are those who spit in the very face of God and seek to impose their false and perverted gospel onto others, falsely taking on the role of being possessors of moral authority; an authority that they do not deserve and which must be given no credibility.
Needless to say that these perverts have done enormous harm, and caused untold suffering, to so many of God's LGBT children!
I recently received an email from someone who wrote of his and his family's heartbreaking experiences in the church that they attend. He said that the pastor preached his reactionary political positions from the pulpit, and he felt depressed at the state of that church that he and his family have faithfully attended for many years.
I wrote him the following reply that I thought you might be interested in reading:
"Thank you for your heartfelt letter to me. You and I share exactly the same sentiments, save for the fact that you view the institutional Church as being equivalent to Christ's Church and I don't. I feel that most of the institutional Church has defamed the name of Christ and, in many cases, has spit in the very face of God through its proclamation of a false gospel of legalism, perfectionism, and exclusion.
"You say, 'My family and I have declared a fasting from TV.' I suggest that you declare a fast from that church you attend, as that pastor is most likely reflecting the ungodly and political sentiments of most of the congregation of that "church."
"He and most of the rest of that congregation are more likely to change you than you are likely to change them.
"Run from such a 'church' as fast as you can! If you can't find a church that is truly reflective of the Gospel of Jesus, then worship with other Christians in a home Bible study or, if that is impossible, it is far better for you and your family to stay home and study the Bible and worship together.
"What you describe is toxic religion, about which I've often written, and is terribly harmful to one's spiritual and emotional life. My very best wishes, Jerry."
You, too, have my very best wishes, and I strongly urge you to not be taken in by the smug, self-righteous teachers of a false gospel that puts unnecessary yokes of bondage on you.
Don't be fooled by the seeming urgency and sincerity of their message that they often profess with an air of oracular authority; a message for which many are quite handsomely rewarded materially and/or psychologically and/or socially and/or politically.
The Gospel of Christ is so simple that even a child can understand it: You have been saved, through the grace of God, from the wrath of a righteous and just God by the sacrifice of God's Son, and by having faith in Christ's teachings and Sacrifice for your redemption and for your eternal reconciliation with God.
That's the Gospel, and it is the Gospel for all of God's children, be they Gay, Straight, Bisexual, or Transgender!
You and I have been saved by the Sacrifice of Jesus; there is nothing we can do to win God's approval, as God already approves of us due to the Sacrifice of Jesus. All we have to do is to plug into God's grace by having faith in Jesus' Sacrifice that covers over all of our sins.
That is why the Gospel is called "Good News!" After all, if we have to obey all sorts of rules, regulations, doctrines, etc., what's the good news in that?
Communicating this message has been one of my major goals, and I just hope that this message gets through so that no one feels condemned by the ignorant and/or hateful homophobic rhetoric that emanates from the lips of all too many clergy and other professing "Christians" who erroneously claim to speak for God.
Whosoever is an excellent online magazine that is primarily geared to LGBT people and allies, and I strongly urge you to read many of its current and past articles.
By attending homophobic churches inhabited by clergy who preach the false gospel of genital placement rather than the only Gospel to be found in Christianity that is comprised of God's grace (unmerited favor) to us that we can only appropriate by trusting God over and above seen circumstances, LGBT people (and all decent people) are submitting themselves to indignities, to a false Christianity, and to humiliation that serves no other purposes than to lend credibility to those heretical clergy and their blind followers, and also exacerbates internalized homophobia within those LGBT people who attend those churches.
I truly believe that any LGBT person who attends a homophobic church, or any church that doesn't allow him/her full participation in the life of the church and the partaking of all of its sacramental rights, to be a masochist!
Why would you seek your "spiritual sustenance" from any church that views you as a second class citizen; views you as "disordered"; seeks to deprive you of equal civil and sacramental rights that heterosexuals enjoy and take for granted; is in the vanguard of discriminating against LGBT people to the point that many LGBT people commit suicide, are assaulted, and are even murdered; stridently lobbies for denying you and others equal civil rights?
And don't delude yourself by saying of a homophobic church that you attend, "It's my church too!" It's not you're church at all! You can't preach from the pulpit; you don't determine church dogma or doctrine; you can't excommunicate anyone! No! It's not your church too!
A true Church is made up of the ecclesia, the called out ones, those called out by God to be God's disciples! And being housed in a building whose clergy espouse legalism, perfectionism, prejudice, discrimination, and affirm through action and/or silence the denial of civil and sacramental rights to anyone does not make one a Christian any more than being in a garage makes one a car!
If you want to be truly emotionally and spiritually intact, and truly live out your authenticity and ministry ordained by God, flee those toxic churches and clergy as fast as your legs can carry you!
The following is my article entitled, Flee Toxic Churches and Clergy:
As I've often written, many clergy within the institutional Church preach and teach the false gospel of legalism, perfectionism, and exclusion and thereby do immeasurable harm to the emotional and spiritual lives of those who allow themselves to be exposed to that kind of toxic religion.
The only Gospel to be found in Christianity is the Gospel of grace (God's unmerited favor); faith (trusting God over and above seen circumstances); love; peace; reconciliation; inclusiveness. Any other gospel is a false gospel!
If you allow yourself to be subjected to preaching and/or teaching other than the Gospel of Christ (the "Good News" that all of our sins have been forgiven by the Sacrifice of Christ), flee those churches, or other such venues, as fast as your legs can carry you!
Moreover, if you take seriously the rhetoric of those who claim to speak for God and for the Bible, and who teach and preach a false gospel, you are not only being subjected to a warped version of Christianity that is really not "Christianity," but you are making decisions about your spiritual and emotional life that are based on lies and perversions of: the grace of God; the teachings, ministry, and Sacrifice of Jesus; the Bible; Christianity itself.
Unfortunately, those who pervert Scripture and the Gospel, those who deny the full and final Sacrifice that Jesus made to cover over all of our sins, are those who spit in the very face of God and seek to impose their false and perverted gospel onto others, falsely taking on the role of being possessors of moral authority; an authority that they do not deserve and which must be given no credibility.
Needless to say that these perverts have done enormous harm, and caused untold suffering, to so many of God's LGBT children!
I recently received an email from someone who wrote of his and his family's heartbreaking experiences in the church that they attend. He said that the pastor preached his reactionary political positions from the pulpit, and he felt depressed at the state of that church that he and his family have faithfully attended for many years.
I wrote him the following reply that I thought you might be interested in reading:
"Thank you for your heartfelt letter to me. You and I share exactly the same sentiments, save for the fact that you view the institutional Church as being equivalent to Christ's Church and I don't. I feel that most of the institutional Church has defamed the name of Christ and, in many cases, has spit in the very face of God through its proclamation of a false gospel of legalism, perfectionism, and exclusion.
"You say, 'My family and I have declared a fasting from TV.' I suggest that you declare a fast from that church you attend, as that pastor is most likely reflecting the ungodly and political sentiments of most of the congregation of that "church."
"He and most of the rest of that congregation are more likely to change you than you are likely to change them.
"Run from such a 'church' as fast as you can! If you can't find a church that is truly reflective of the Gospel of Jesus, then worship with other Christians in a home Bible study or, if that is impossible, it is far better for you and your family to stay home and study the Bible and worship together.
"What you describe is toxic religion, about which I've often written, and is terribly harmful to one's spiritual and emotional life. My very best wishes, Jerry."
You, too, have my very best wishes, and I strongly urge you to not be taken in by the smug, self-righteous teachers of a false gospel that puts unnecessary yokes of bondage on you.
Don't be fooled by the seeming urgency and sincerity of their message that they often profess with an air of oracular authority; a message for which many are quite handsomely rewarded materially and/or psychologically and/or socially and/or politically.
The Gospel of Christ is so simple that even a child can understand it: You have been saved, through the grace of God, from the wrath of a righteous and just God by the sacrifice of God's Son, and by having faith in Christ's teachings and Sacrifice for your redemption and for your eternal reconciliation with God.
That's the Gospel, and it is the Gospel for all of God's children, be they Gay, Straight, Bisexual, or Transgender!
You and I have been saved by the Sacrifice of Jesus; there is nothing we can do to win God's approval, as God already approves of us due to the Sacrifice of Jesus. All we have to do is to plug into God's grace by having faith in Jesus' Sacrifice that covers over all of our sins.
That is why the Gospel is called "Good News!" After all, if we have to obey all sorts of rules, regulations, doctrines, etc., what's the good news in that?
Communicating this message has been one of my major goals, and I just hope that this message gets through so that no one feels condemned by the ignorant and/or hateful homophobic rhetoric that emanates from the lips of all too many clergy and other professing "Christians" who erroneously claim to speak for God.
Monday, September 13, 2010
CONFRONTING INTERNALIZED HOMOPHOBIA
About two years ago, I wrote the following article that I think is very important if we are to succeed in the struggle for equality for LGBT civil rights. Before meaningful activism to achieve that goal can be undertaken, frivolous displays in Pride parades and in other contexts, and the use of hateful epithets by LGBT people as self-identifiers (eg, "queer," "fag," "dyke," etc.), must be rejected, for they wittingly and/or unwittingly denote abnormality, deviance, shame, and self-loathing; provide additional ammunition for strident homophobes to alienate potential Straight allies who are needed in this fight for equality; divert and subvert needed time and energy from meaningful and coordinated activism; serve as negative role models for future generations of LGBT people and our youth regarding the need to show dignity and engage in meaningful activism that demands full and equal civil and sacramental rights.
And, I must add, exuding, exacerbating, and capitalizing on internalized homophobia are those self-appointed "Gay activists" and their acolytes who confuse being "edgy" with "activism"; who take pride in touting the hateful stereotypes historically and contemporarily used to "justify" discrimination against LGBT people; who value fun and frivolity over and above meaningful activism; who confuse hedonism with being Gay; who show their lack of dignity by allowing their civil rights to be voted upon by the electorate; who delight in viewing themselves as sexual outlaws; who even seem to revel in their status as second-class citizens. Therefore, they are witting and/or unwitting traitors to the struggle for equal rights for LGBT people.
And the sooner these realities are recognized and confronted, the sooner full and equal civil and sacramental rights will become a reality!
My good friend, Don Charles, said it beautifully:
...Before we can effectively arm ourselves to fight organized religion, institutionalized heterosexism and transphobia, an intransigent political system, or whatever, we've got to secure our home front. By “home front”, I mean our self-concept, that place where our much-ballyhooed LGBT pride is supposed to be. There's no Achilles Heel more vulnerable in battle than the belief that your gender or sexuality is screwed up! If we're not prepared to slay the dragon within that preys on our self-esteem, we might as well forget about our Civil Rights and concede the equality struggle right now.
To me, this is the essence of true LGBT activism: unlocking the cages that imprison our minds and souls! Contrary to what you've been told, it ain't never been about pulling "face time" with politicians, getting Straight folks to support us at the ballot box, or courting the mainstream media. It's always been about uprooting our own entrenched shame, which is the most formidable oppressor we'll ever grapple with.
Here is my article entitled, Confronting Internalized Homophobia:
I know right out of the starting blocks that this article is going to offend a great many people, but I feel very strongly that many LGBT people are seriously sabotaging the cause for full and equal civil rights by referring to themselves by the use of historically and current hateful epithets, using such terms as "Queer," "Dyke," "Fag," and other such demeaning and hateful words that have been historically used by their oppressors, and are still being used by their oppressors. Also, the many behaviors and images that are viewed by most potential allies as offensive, and that become public presentations of self, help reinforce the fallacious stereotype that Gay people are sex-obsessed deviant and abnormal hedonists, and these public images are doing tremendous harm to the struggle for, and the cause of acquiring, full and equal civil rights.
I'm Jewish, and not only have I never considered myself a "Kike," or a "Yid," I would verbally assault anyone who would dare use those epithets in referring to me or to any other Jewish person. It's a matter of honor! It's a matter of dignity! It's a matter of having a healthy self-esteem. It's a matter of self-respect.
And there are some Gay people who use self-denigrating and historically offensive epithets as self-identifiers and who articulate them to the world, and by so doing not only show themselves to be lacking in these characteristics, but they are also unwitting victims of a variation of the Stockholm Syndrome where, in this case, one helps provide the very ammunition that one's abuser can and does use to help maintain the oppression of the individual. By so doing, these Gay people are actually knowingly or unknowingly facilitating and enhancing the rage of the homophobes, the oppressive abusers, many of whom would even kill them if they could get away with it. Indeed, some homophobes do assault and kill LGBT people, all the while using these hateful epithets!
The reason that virtually no one would even think of publicly using words like "Kike" and "Yid" is because they know that all Jewish (and all decent) people and organizations would come down on them like a ton of bricks. (Is it even conceivable that any university in the world would have a course, program, minor, or major entitled, "Kike Studies?" Yet it is very common for faculty and students in universities to routinely use and normalize the word "Queer" when titling courses, programs, minors, and majors dealing with Gay issues.)
However, when people use hateful epithets in reference to LGBT people, they not only know that nothing like that will happen, that there will be absolutely no negative or threatening repercussions awaiting them, but they also see there to be nothing wrong with using these hateful epithets, as many of the people about whom they are publicly talking seem to revel in, and frequently use, those words themselves.
So, for example, universities think they are doing Gay people a favor by using those epithets, such as by entitling courses, programs, minors, or majors "Queer Studies" (apparently not realizing, or perhaps even caring, that a meaning of "queer" means "abnormal.") and think that they are thereby being "progressive."
Jews usually don't have self-loathing; LGBT people all too often do have witting or unwitting self-loathing, and use those historically punishing words on themselves in the name of "liberation," ignorantly (or stupidly) thinking that they are appropriating and neutralizing those words, even when gay bashers use those very words when bashing their victims and, furthermore, they even perpetuate and encourage further use of those words among university students when titling those courses, programs, minors, or majors, and freely use those words within the curricula as they do in other public venues.
Like Jesus says: "Forgive them Lord, they know not what they do." At least on the conscious level!
Sanam Hakim wrote an excellent article entitled, "Words you can't reclaim," on the subject of the use hateful expletives regarding certain minority groups. She concludes her article by saying:
"Words like 'nigger' or 'redneck' or 'bitch' or 'fag' were never words that were originally 'good'. They are words that were created solely out of hatred and it is not our responsibility to add fine print and use them in a different context. It is not our responsibility to convince black people that they actually are 'niggaz,' but that it's a good thing; to convince white working class Americans that they are rednecks, but that it's a good thing; to convince women that they are bitches, but that it's a good thing; to convince homosexuals that they are fags, but that it's a good thing.
"It is our responsibility to make sure when Tim McGraw asks if there are any rednecks in the house, no one cheers. It's our responsibility to stare blankly if DMX asks 'where my niggaz at?' It is our responsibility to make sure our children know these words, the history of where they come from and to make sure they don't ever use them, even if they mean it in a nice way."
She gets it!
As I wrote in a February 21, 2008 article entitled, "On The Need To Grow Up":
"There is a point when one has to own his/her dignity, demand the respect due to any human being, demand full and equal civil and sacramental rights regardless of the negative messages and hostility that have been visited on that person in the past, or even in the present. And those goals will not be realized as long as the minority group accepts its inferior status, and revels in it by referring to its members by the very same terms used by the most virulent homophobes throughout history and in our midst.
"No self respecting person, Gay or Straight, stands for being treated as less than fully human; no self respecting person, Gay or Straight, uses negative self-identifiers that have been historically (and contemporarily) used by their oppressors. The slave mentality is blamed on others, but the fact is that it ultimately resides within each human being whether or not to accept that mentality."
I recently received an email from a good friend of mine who wrote me the following:
"I'm just thinking about some of the horrid monikers we've encountered on the 'Net: 'The Old Dyke.' 'The Angry Fag.' 'Queer Kid Of Color'. "Faggoty-Ass Faggot." Straight people see and hear these vulgar identifiers. What do they make of them? Do they feel they have permission to use them, too? What also occurs to me is that these names don't just speak to a shameful feeling about one's gender and/or sexuality; they speak to an obsession with it! … I've been called the 'b' word, the 'p' word, the 'f' word, and just about every dirty slur you can name. I could never in a million years get my mind around 'reclaiming' that kind of ignorance. Yet, I don't consider myself any different from any other Gay man who's grown up in a homophobic society. Why do I react differently?"
I then wrote him the following response, which I know seems harsh, but this issue is crucial enough to demand such harshness and confrontation if the goal of acquiring full and equal LGBT rights is to be realized, particularly when LGBT rights activists are trying to win the hearts and minds of potential allies, and when the future of civil rights for LGBT people, such as the most pressing and immediate issue of the future of same-sex marriage in California will be put to voters in California in November:
I responded to him with the following: "My answer to your question is that …you have integrity and dignity and refuse to be treated as a second-class citizen, and many of them revel in being second-class citizens; you aren't self-loathing; they are self-loathing; they love to vent by cursing the candle and loving the darkness; you want the light of full freedom, and outspokenly light that candle; they are apolitical; you see this as a political and religious struggle; they usually hate God and the things of God; you love God and the things of God; they love this world and the things of this world; you know that God wants liberation from yokes of bondage for all of His children; they frequently suffer from the Stockholm Syndrome; you definitely do not; you have a healthy self-esteem; they feel they deserve to be treated as 'outsiders'; you know you're 'normal'; they view themselves as 'deviants' and are proud of it. As I've said before, they are traitors and saboteurs to the cause of, and struggle for, full and equal civil rights, and you and I, and I'm sure many others, hate traitors and saboteurs to and of those things that anyone who is emotionally intact seeks for themselves and for others."
Regarding their being witting or unwitting traitors to, and saboteurs of, the struggle for full and equal civil rights, they have become mutual allies with the most reactionary homophobic forces in the religious and secular worlds. The religious right and other homophobic forces just love them, for they manifest their fear and self-loathing by engaging in rhetoric and behaviors that are wittingly or unwittingly designed to alienate potential allies in the fight for full and equal civil rights, and provide these homophobic leaders with their needed ammunition to shore up their base of homophobes, be they in the "religious" or political arenas.
All a James Dobson, a Ken Hutcherson, a Pete LaBarbera, a Pat Robertson, or any number of other religious homophobes have to do is exhibit one or more of countless images of blatant and public hedonism (fulfilling and reinforcing the ugly stereotype that Gay = Abnormal; Gay = hedonism; Gay = deviant; Gay = immorality; Gay = perverted, etc.) to show those who might be on the fence regarding the acquisition of full and equal civil and sacramental rights for LGBT people that their hateful rhetoric has been correct after all. One cannot present public images that are patently and frequently deliberately offensive and even threatening to potential allies and then expect them to embrace and support full and equal civil rights for LGBT people who are all too often solely identified with those images!
In essence, the professional homophobes, many of whom make a veritable career out of homophobia, can then say to our potential allies, while showing them such images, "See, I told you what homosexuals are like. I told you how destructive they are to the very fabric of society and to civilization as we know it. I told you that they are not fit to be around children. They even want, and sometimes even have, the right to adopt and raise children. They seek to destroy Christianity and our Judeo-Christian way of life and will succeed unless we fight against this evil. And they even want their perverted lifestyle sanctified by law by insisting that they be allowed to marry one another. Before you know it, these people will want to marry their own children. Would you put anything past them after looking at these pictures that represent only a fraction of what they do and what they are?"
And we are to make no mistake: that's exactly what religious homophobes do, and continue to do, by proudly presenting blatant exhibitions of hedonism by some Gay people, further exacerbated by the use of pejorative epithets as self-identifiers by many Gay people that merely reinforce the hateful stereotypes and hateful rhetoric of the homophobes in "justifying" to as many as will listen the evidence as to the "deviance," the "otherness," the "abnormality" of LGBT people.
These epithets and images thereby confirm and reinforce the hateful rhetoric that is spewed by powerful religious homophobes in all sorts of venues, from the pulpit to the media, and serves no better purpose than to provide these religious homophobes with further ammunition that they need and use to sway potential allies away from our cause for equal rights.
Hence, the use of these epithets and the projection of these images that are viewed as offensive (many of which are seemingly designed to be offensive) by most people who conceivably make up our pool of potential allies, makes the purveyors of those epithets and images collaborators with the religious reactionary homophobes; making them partners in the goal of preventing the acquisition of full and equal civil and sacramental rights for LGBT people and their families.
Of course, confirmed homophobes will not be persuaded to become affirming of LGBT people no matter what we do or what we say! However, our concern must be winning over potential allies, those who might be on the fence and confused about this whole issue of LGBT rights. And the rhetoric and images used and projected for public consumption by self-loathing traitors are sabotaging that goal, by their being witting or unwitting allies with those very influential homophobes, by helping to do the homophobes' work for them.
By portraying Gay people as Godless, hedonistic, sexually obsessed individuals who revel in being "abnormal," and who pridefully display depictions that seem designed to offend all decent and religious people, virtually guarantees that those who engage in these practices are the allies of the avowed enemies of LGBT rights who stupidly feel free to vilify and even ridicule and make jokes about LGBT people, knowing that they will be greeted with hearty applause and laughter by their audiences, be they homophobic or potential allies.
Regarding the dynamics of those who manifest self-loathing and the unwillingness or the inability to directly confront the enemies of full civil rights and civil liberties, I absolutely think that seeing themselves as being forever "outsiders" and who revel in that outsider status by manifesting counter-productive and even risk-taking behaviors gives them a sense of security! It enables them to avoid confronting the horrifying fact that they are viewed by the oppressor as inferior, and in order to anesthetize themselves from that reality, they find a seemingly "legitimate" reason to bond with other like-minded people in a subculture that they wish to make a counterculture so as to both affirm themselves (which is understandable) but also insulate themselves from the insults and, at least at this point in their lives, they don't have the ego strength or the will to directly confront their oppressor in a politically meaningful and constructive way.
Hence, not only the use of denigrating epithets about themselves and their very identities, and their often egregious public displays that are bound to offend potential allies, but their rage at anyone who would dare suggest that by so doing they are helping to destroy themselves and their right to be treated with dignity and respect by those oppressors; telling them that by so doing they are witting or unwitting allies of those oppressors.
Because that would mean coming out of their cocoon, confronting a very harsh and even frightening reality, and having to confront both their own homophobia as well as the homophobia that would be visited upon them in direct proportion to their public and consistent demands that they be treated with full respect and as fully equal to their oppressor, and demand the acquisition of the very same rights that their oppressor enjoys.
That takes guts, and ego strength, and too many feel themselves to be too vulnerable, too wounded, to engage in the necessary fight for full and equal civil rights. Hence, to not confront that reality, and to not admit that they are too cowardly to fight the necessary battles for full and equal rights, they create a world where they demean themselves and create the rationalization for that demeaning of themselves by stating that they are doing so to merely appropriate, reclaim (Although those hateful words have never been renounced by the oppressor in the first place.), and neutralize those hateful words, and thereby claim that they are "liberated."
It's a profound tragedy, no matter how we look at it.
But it's a tragedy that must be confronted, overcome, and renounced so that positive, coordinated grassroots activism can occur, in conjunction with the increased assertiveness needed by major LGBT rights organizations, so that increasing numbers of potential allies can be recruited in the fight for equal rights; other LGBT people can become emboldened to demand that they be treated with dignity and demand nothing less than full and equal civil rights that are enjoyed by every other citizen; political savvy and activism be substituted for the counterproductive use of hateful epithets and the assorted public displays of images that denote and communicate a patently offensive public persona virtually designed to drive away allies and thereby sabotage the movement for full and equal civil rights.
As I've written before, such grassroots activism on the part of LGBT people and allies would take the form of "picketing homophobic churches (and there are plenty to choose from!), writing letters to the editors of their local newspapers, having groups of Gay couples who seek to marry continuously demand the same marriage rights as their heterosexual counterparts, speaking out to neighbors and friends, boycotting businesses that in any way discriminate against Gay people, and other such modes of activism to aid and abet the cause of acquiring full and equal civil rights!"
Only then will the homophobic oppressor be forced back under the rock from which he or she came, and the acquisition of full and equal civil and sacramental rights will become a reality!
And, I must add, exuding, exacerbating, and capitalizing on internalized homophobia are those self-appointed "Gay activists" and their acolytes who confuse being "edgy" with "activism"; who take pride in touting the hateful stereotypes historically and contemporarily used to "justify" discrimination against LGBT people; who value fun and frivolity over and above meaningful activism; who confuse hedonism with being Gay; who show their lack of dignity by allowing their civil rights to be voted upon by the electorate; who delight in viewing themselves as sexual outlaws; who even seem to revel in their status as second-class citizens. Therefore, they are witting and/or unwitting traitors to the struggle for equal rights for LGBT people.
And the sooner these realities are recognized and confronted, the sooner full and equal civil and sacramental rights will become a reality!
My good friend, Don Charles, said it beautifully:
...Before we can effectively arm ourselves to fight organized religion, institutionalized heterosexism and transphobia, an intransigent political system, or whatever, we've got to secure our home front. By “home front”, I mean our self-concept, that place where our much-ballyhooed LGBT pride is supposed to be. There's no Achilles Heel more vulnerable in battle than the belief that your gender or sexuality is screwed up! If we're not prepared to slay the dragon within that preys on our self-esteem, we might as well forget about our Civil Rights and concede the equality struggle right now.
To me, this is the essence of true LGBT activism: unlocking the cages that imprison our minds and souls! Contrary to what you've been told, it ain't never been about pulling "face time" with politicians, getting Straight folks to support us at the ballot box, or courting the mainstream media. It's always been about uprooting our own entrenched shame, which is the most formidable oppressor we'll ever grapple with.
Here is my article entitled, Confronting Internalized Homophobia:
I know right out of the starting blocks that this article is going to offend a great many people, but I feel very strongly that many LGBT people are seriously sabotaging the cause for full and equal civil rights by referring to themselves by the use of historically and current hateful epithets, using such terms as "Queer," "Dyke," "Fag," and other such demeaning and hateful words that have been historically used by their oppressors, and are still being used by their oppressors. Also, the many behaviors and images that are viewed by most potential allies as offensive, and that become public presentations of self, help reinforce the fallacious stereotype that Gay people are sex-obsessed deviant and abnormal hedonists, and these public images are doing tremendous harm to the struggle for, and the cause of acquiring, full and equal civil rights.
I'm Jewish, and not only have I never considered myself a "Kike," or a "Yid," I would verbally assault anyone who would dare use those epithets in referring to me or to any other Jewish person. It's a matter of honor! It's a matter of dignity! It's a matter of having a healthy self-esteem. It's a matter of self-respect.
And there are some Gay people who use self-denigrating and historically offensive epithets as self-identifiers and who articulate them to the world, and by so doing not only show themselves to be lacking in these characteristics, but they are also unwitting victims of a variation of the Stockholm Syndrome where, in this case, one helps provide the very ammunition that one's abuser can and does use to help maintain the oppression of the individual. By so doing, these Gay people are actually knowingly or unknowingly facilitating and enhancing the rage of the homophobes, the oppressive abusers, many of whom would even kill them if they could get away with it. Indeed, some homophobes do assault and kill LGBT people, all the while using these hateful epithets!
The reason that virtually no one would even think of publicly using words like "Kike" and "Yid" is because they know that all Jewish (and all decent) people and organizations would come down on them like a ton of bricks. (Is it even conceivable that any university in the world would have a course, program, minor, or major entitled, "Kike Studies?" Yet it is very common for faculty and students in universities to routinely use and normalize the word "Queer" when titling courses, programs, minors, and majors dealing with Gay issues.)
However, when people use hateful epithets in reference to LGBT people, they not only know that nothing like that will happen, that there will be absolutely no negative or threatening repercussions awaiting them, but they also see there to be nothing wrong with using these hateful epithets, as many of the people about whom they are publicly talking seem to revel in, and frequently use, those words themselves.
So, for example, universities think they are doing Gay people a favor by using those epithets, such as by entitling courses, programs, minors, or majors "Queer Studies" (apparently not realizing, or perhaps even caring, that a meaning of "queer" means "abnormal.") and think that they are thereby being "progressive."
Jews usually don't have self-loathing; LGBT people all too often do have witting or unwitting self-loathing, and use those historically punishing words on themselves in the name of "liberation," ignorantly (or stupidly) thinking that they are appropriating and neutralizing those words, even when gay bashers use those very words when bashing their victims and, furthermore, they even perpetuate and encourage further use of those words among university students when titling those courses, programs, minors, or majors, and freely use those words within the curricula as they do in other public venues.
Like Jesus says: "Forgive them Lord, they know not what they do." At least on the conscious level!
Sanam Hakim wrote an excellent article entitled, "Words you can't reclaim," on the subject of the use hateful expletives regarding certain minority groups. She concludes her article by saying:
"Words like 'nigger' or 'redneck' or 'bitch' or 'fag' were never words that were originally 'good'. They are words that were created solely out of hatred and it is not our responsibility to add fine print and use them in a different context. It is not our responsibility to convince black people that they actually are 'niggaz,' but that it's a good thing; to convince white working class Americans that they are rednecks, but that it's a good thing; to convince women that they are bitches, but that it's a good thing; to convince homosexuals that they are fags, but that it's a good thing.
"It is our responsibility to make sure when Tim McGraw asks if there are any rednecks in the house, no one cheers. It's our responsibility to stare blankly if DMX asks 'where my niggaz at?' It is our responsibility to make sure our children know these words, the history of where they come from and to make sure they don't ever use them, even if they mean it in a nice way."
She gets it!
As I wrote in a February 21, 2008 article entitled, "On The Need To Grow Up":
"There is a point when one has to own his/her dignity, demand the respect due to any human being, demand full and equal civil and sacramental rights regardless of the negative messages and hostility that have been visited on that person in the past, or even in the present. And those goals will not be realized as long as the minority group accepts its inferior status, and revels in it by referring to its members by the very same terms used by the most virulent homophobes throughout history and in our midst.
"No self respecting person, Gay or Straight, stands for being treated as less than fully human; no self respecting person, Gay or Straight, uses negative self-identifiers that have been historically (and contemporarily) used by their oppressors. The slave mentality is blamed on others, but the fact is that it ultimately resides within each human being whether or not to accept that mentality."
I recently received an email from a good friend of mine who wrote me the following:
"I'm just thinking about some of the horrid monikers we've encountered on the 'Net: 'The Old Dyke.' 'The Angry Fag.' 'Queer Kid Of Color'. "Faggoty-Ass Faggot." Straight people see and hear these vulgar identifiers. What do they make of them? Do they feel they have permission to use them, too? What also occurs to me is that these names don't just speak to a shameful feeling about one's gender and/or sexuality; they speak to an obsession with it! … I've been called the 'b' word, the 'p' word, the 'f' word, and just about every dirty slur you can name. I could never in a million years get my mind around 'reclaiming' that kind of ignorance. Yet, I don't consider myself any different from any other Gay man who's grown up in a homophobic society. Why do I react differently?"
I then wrote him the following response, which I know seems harsh, but this issue is crucial enough to demand such harshness and confrontation if the goal of acquiring full and equal LGBT rights is to be realized, particularly when LGBT rights activists are trying to win the hearts and minds of potential allies, and when the future of civil rights for LGBT people, such as the most pressing and immediate issue of the future of same-sex marriage in California will be put to voters in California in November:
I responded to him with the following: "My answer to your question is that …you have integrity and dignity and refuse to be treated as a second-class citizen, and many of them revel in being second-class citizens; you aren't self-loathing; they are self-loathing; they love to vent by cursing the candle and loving the darkness; you want the light of full freedom, and outspokenly light that candle; they are apolitical; you see this as a political and religious struggle; they usually hate God and the things of God; you love God and the things of God; they love this world and the things of this world; you know that God wants liberation from yokes of bondage for all of His children; they frequently suffer from the Stockholm Syndrome; you definitely do not; you have a healthy self-esteem; they feel they deserve to be treated as 'outsiders'; you know you're 'normal'; they view themselves as 'deviants' and are proud of it. As I've said before, they are traitors and saboteurs to the cause of, and struggle for, full and equal civil rights, and you and I, and I'm sure many others, hate traitors and saboteurs to and of those things that anyone who is emotionally intact seeks for themselves and for others."
Regarding their being witting or unwitting traitors to, and saboteurs of, the struggle for full and equal civil rights, they have become mutual allies with the most reactionary homophobic forces in the religious and secular worlds. The religious right and other homophobic forces just love them, for they manifest their fear and self-loathing by engaging in rhetoric and behaviors that are wittingly or unwittingly designed to alienate potential allies in the fight for full and equal civil rights, and provide these homophobic leaders with their needed ammunition to shore up their base of homophobes, be they in the "religious" or political arenas.
All a James Dobson, a Ken Hutcherson, a Pete LaBarbera, a Pat Robertson, or any number of other religious homophobes have to do is exhibit one or more of countless images of blatant and public hedonism (fulfilling and reinforcing the ugly stereotype that Gay = Abnormal; Gay = hedonism; Gay = deviant; Gay = immorality; Gay = perverted, etc.) to show those who might be on the fence regarding the acquisition of full and equal civil and sacramental rights for LGBT people that their hateful rhetoric has been correct after all. One cannot present public images that are patently and frequently deliberately offensive and even threatening to potential allies and then expect them to embrace and support full and equal civil rights for LGBT people who are all too often solely identified with those images!
In essence, the professional homophobes, many of whom make a veritable career out of homophobia, can then say to our potential allies, while showing them such images, "See, I told you what homosexuals are like. I told you how destructive they are to the very fabric of society and to civilization as we know it. I told you that they are not fit to be around children. They even want, and sometimes even have, the right to adopt and raise children. They seek to destroy Christianity and our Judeo-Christian way of life and will succeed unless we fight against this evil. And they even want their perverted lifestyle sanctified by law by insisting that they be allowed to marry one another. Before you know it, these people will want to marry their own children. Would you put anything past them after looking at these pictures that represent only a fraction of what they do and what they are?"
And we are to make no mistake: that's exactly what religious homophobes do, and continue to do, by proudly presenting blatant exhibitions of hedonism by some Gay people, further exacerbated by the use of pejorative epithets as self-identifiers by many Gay people that merely reinforce the hateful stereotypes and hateful rhetoric of the homophobes in "justifying" to as many as will listen the evidence as to the "deviance," the "otherness," the "abnormality" of LGBT people.
These epithets and images thereby confirm and reinforce the hateful rhetoric that is spewed by powerful religious homophobes in all sorts of venues, from the pulpit to the media, and serves no better purpose than to provide these religious homophobes with further ammunition that they need and use to sway potential allies away from our cause for equal rights.
Hence, the use of these epithets and the projection of these images that are viewed as offensive (many of which are seemingly designed to be offensive) by most people who conceivably make up our pool of potential allies, makes the purveyors of those epithets and images collaborators with the religious reactionary homophobes; making them partners in the goal of preventing the acquisition of full and equal civil and sacramental rights for LGBT people and their families.
Of course, confirmed homophobes will not be persuaded to become affirming of LGBT people no matter what we do or what we say! However, our concern must be winning over potential allies, those who might be on the fence and confused about this whole issue of LGBT rights. And the rhetoric and images used and projected for public consumption by self-loathing traitors are sabotaging that goal, by their being witting or unwitting allies with those very influential homophobes, by helping to do the homophobes' work for them.
By portraying Gay people as Godless, hedonistic, sexually obsessed individuals who revel in being "abnormal," and who pridefully display depictions that seem designed to offend all decent and religious people, virtually guarantees that those who engage in these practices are the allies of the avowed enemies of LGBT rights who stupidly feel free to vilify and even ridicule and make jokes about LGBT people, knowing that they will be greeted with hearty applause and laughter by their audiences, be they homophobic or potential allies.
Regarding the dynamics of those who manifest self-loathing and the unwillingness or the inability to directly confront the enemies of full civil rights and civil liberties, I absolutely think that seeing themselves as being forever "outsiders" and who revel in that outsider status by manifesting counter-productive and even risk-taking behaviors gives them a sense of security! It enables them to avoid confronting the horrifying fact that they are viewed by the oppressor as inferior, and in order to anesthetize themselves from that reality, they find a seemingly "legitimate" reason to bond with other like-minded people in a subculture that they wish to make a counterculture so as to both affirm themselves (which is understandable) but also insulate themselves from the insults and, at least at this point in their lives, they don't have the ego strength or the will to directly confront their oppressor in a politically meaningful and constructive way.
Hence, not only the use of denigrating epithets about themselves and their very identities, and their often egregious public displays that are bound to offend potential allies, but their rage at anyone who would dare suggest that by so doing they are helping to destroy themselves and their right to be treated with dignity and respect by those oppressors; telling them that by so doing they are witting or unwitting allies of those oppressors.
Because that would mean coming out of their cocoon, confronting a very harsh and even frightening reality, and having to confront both their own homophobia as well as the homophobia that would be visited upon them in direct proportion to their public and consistent demands that they be treated with full respect and as fully equal to their oppressor, and demand the acquisition of the very same rights that their oppressor enjoys.
That takes guts, and ego strength, and too many feel themselves to be too vulnerable, too wounded, to engage in the necessary fight for full and equal civil rights. Hence, to not confront that reality, and to not admit that they are too cowardly to fight the necessary battles for full and equal rights, they create a world where they demean themselves and create the rationalization for that demeaning of themselves by stating that they are doing so to merely appropriate, reclaim (Although those hateful words have never been renounced by the oppressor in the first place.), and neutralize those hateful words, and thereby claim that they are "liberated."
It's a profound tragedy, no matter how we look at it.
But it's a tragedy that must be confronted, overcome, and renounced so that positive, coordinated grassroots activism can occur, in conjunction with the increased assertiveness needed by major LGBT rights organizations, so that increasing numbers of potential allies can be recruited in the fight for equal rights; other LGBT people can become emboldened to demand that they be treated with dignity and demand nothing less than full and equal civil rights that are enjoyed by every other citizen; political savvy and activism be substituted for the counterproductive use of hateful epithets and the assorted public displays of images that denote and communicate a patently offensive public persona virtually designed to drive away allies and thereby sabotage the movement for full and equal civil rights.
As I've written before, such grassroots activism on the part of LGBT people and allies would take the form of "picketing homophobic churches (and there are plenty to choose from!), writing letters to the editors of their local newspapers, having groups of Gay couples who seek to marry continuously demand the same marriage rights as their heterosexual counterparts, speaking out to neighbors and friends, boycotting businesses that in any way discriminate against Gay people, and other such modes of activism to aid and abet the cause of acquiring full and equal civil rights!"
Only then will the homophobic oppressor be forced back under the rock from which he or she came, and the acquisition of full and equal civil and sacramental rights will become a reality!
Friday, September 10, 2010
AN OPEN LETTER TO POTENTIAL STRAIGHT ALLIES OF LGBT PEOPLE
Last year, I wrote the following article that I'd like to reprint here:
There are to be no second-class citizens in the United States! We established a long time ago that "separate is not equal," and all American citizens are entitled to enjoy equality under the law. Any society that presumes to refer to itself as "decent" and "civilized" must not in any way discriminate against any group of people through its laws or their enforcement.
We should have learned this painful lesson during the struggle for African American civil rights, and we must now apply that lesson in this struggle for full and equal civil rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (hitherto referred to as LGBT) people. LGBT people are entitled to the same rights and privileges that accrue to all other citizens of the United States
Gay people are certainly entitled to full and equal civil rights, including the right to marry! The lies and other nonsense purveyed by many self-proclaimed arbiters of "morality," often cloaked in the guise of religion, that same-sex marriage destroys "the sanctity of marriage" is ludicrous on its face!
I have been married to my wife for 47 years, and I can't see how same-sex marriage will in any way negatively impact my marriage or in any way destroy the sanctity of my marriage! No rational person can believe that same-sex marriage in any way compromises the institution of marriage, an institution that has taken many forms in our history.
As a Christian, I am profoundly embarrassed and outraged by those professing Christians who are in the vanguard of discrimination against LGBT people; who spew hateful rhetoric, borne out of their ignorance and/or their hatred and/or their avariciousness, that is diametrically opposed to anything Jesus said, lived, or taught to all who would claim to be His disciples! Indeed, Jesus saved His harshest words for those who claimed to be "godly" and yet sought to put yokes of bondage onto others!
Christians love other people, and the only Gospel to be found in Christianity is comprised of: grace (God's unmerited favor to us), faith (trusting God over and above seen circumstances), love, peace, reconciliation, and inclusiveness. There is no other Gospel!
Jesus makes it abundantly clear that we are to love and not judge or condemn others! Any professing Christian who thinks that he/she is representing Jesus by doing the very opposite of what Jesus told us to do is not only seriously misled, but is woefully misleading the public, many of whom are gullible enough to take the purveyors of the false gospel of legalism and perfectionism seriously.
Moreover, we are under the Constitution of the United States and we are not a Theocracy! Since when are we to take a group of people's understanding of the Bible, an "understanding" far more informed by their preconceived prejudices than it is by anything else, and enshrine those prejudices into our laws of the land; impose those prejudices onto a minority group that all too many professing Christians and others view as being relatively "safe" to persecute?
The discrimination against LGBT people in the names of "Christianity," "morality," "tradition," "the well being of our children," and any other specious reasons given for this oppression has many of us saying: "Enough is enough!" We're not going to take it anymore!
For those of us who are Christians, we are sick and tired of having those who would hate and/or discriminate against others presume to speak for us! For those of us who are heterosexual, we are sick and tired of watching our LGBT sisters and brothers be oppressed! For those of us who are LGBT, we are sick and tired of being viewed and treated as second-class citizens, denied marital and other rights and benefits that heterosexual tax paying citizens are given and take for granted.
In sum, LGBT rights activists demand full and equal civil rights that every other citizen of the United States possesses, and we won't rest or stop until that goal is achieved!
In this connection, you might also be interested in reading the following article that I wrote ten years ago that is entitled, A MESSAGE OF GRACE TO A ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST.
There are to be no second-class citizens in the United States! We established a long time ago that "separate is not equal," and all American citizens are entitled to enjoy equality under the law. Any society that presumes to refer to itself as "decent" and "civilized" must not in any way discriminate against any group of people through its laws or their enforcement.
We should have learned this painful lesson during the struggle for African American civil rights, and we must now apply that lesson in this struggle for full and equal civil rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (hitherto referred to as LGBT) people. LGBT people are entitled to the same rights and privileges that accrue to all other citizens of the United States
Gay people are certainly entitled to full and equal civil rights, including the right to marry! The lies and other nonsense purveyed by many self-proclaimed arbiters of "morality," often cloaked in the guise of religion, that same-sex marriage destroys "the sanctity of marriage" is ludicrous on its face!
I have been married to my wife for 47 years, and I can't see how same-sex marriage will in any way negatively impact my marriage or in any way destroy the sanctity of my marriage! No rational person can believe that same-sex marriage in any way compromises the institution of marriage, an institution that has taken many forms in our history.
As a Christian, I am profoundly embarrassed and outraged by those professing Christians who are in the vanguard of discrimination against LGBT people; who spew hateful rhetoric, borne out of their ignorance and/or their hatred and/or their avariciousness, that is diametrically opposed to anything Jesus said, lived, or taught to all who would claim to be His disciples! Indeed, Jesus saved His harshest words for those who claimed to be "godly" and yet sought to put yokes of bondage onto others!
Christians love other people, and the only Gospel to be found in Christianity is comprised of: grace (God's unmerited favor to us), faith (trusting God over and above seen circumstances), love, peace, reconciliation, and inclusiveness. There is no other Gospel!
Jesus makes it abundantly clear that we are to love and not judge or condemn others! Any professing Christian who thinks that he/she is representing Jesus by doing the very opposite of what Jesus told us to do is not only seriously misled, but is woefully misleading the public, many of whom are gullible enough to take the purveyors of the false gospel of legalism and perfectionism seriously.
Moreover, we are under the Constitution of the United States and we are not a Theocracy! Since when are we to take a group of people's understanding of the Bible, an "understanding" far more informed by their preconceived prejudices than it is by anything else, and enshrine those prejudices into our laws of the land; impose those prejudices onto a minority group that all too many professing Christians and others view as being relatively "safe" to persecute?
The discrimination against LGBT people in the names of "Christianity," "morality," "tradition," "the well being of our children," and any other specious reasons given for this oppression has many of us saying: "Enough is enough!" We're not going to take it anymore!
For those of us who are Christians, we are sick and tired of having those who would hate and/or discriminate against others presume to speak for us! For those of us who are heterosexual, we are sick and tired of watching our LGBT sisters and brothers be oppressed! For those of us who are LGBT, we are sick and tired of being viewed and treated as second-class citizens, denied marital and other rights and benefits that heterosexual tax paying citizens are given and take for granted.
In sum, LGBT rights activists demand full and equal civil rights that every other citizen of the United States possesses, and we won't rest or stop until that goal is achieved!
In this connection, you might also be interested in reading the following article that I wrote ten years ago that is entitled, A MESSAGE OF GRACE TO A ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
SISTER PAULA'S SERMON ON THE SINS OF SODOM
As you probably know, I'm a great fan of Sister Paula whose messages never fail to inspire. This message of hers entitled, "The Sins of Sodom," seemingly largely referenced from the eminently scholarly book entitled, Gay Christian 101 by Rick Brentlinger, is excellent, as it shows the lies propounded by many homophobic clergy and professing Christians that are falsely, ignorantly and/or mendaciously used by them to seek to justify their prejudices against LGBT people.
Homophobic professing Christians create God in their own dysfunctional image, and we must never forget this truth!
Moreover, I strongly urge you to own Rick Brentlinger's book that is both scholarly, comprehensive, and eminently readable, as it will finally lay to rest any doubts you may have regarding fallacious Christian objections to homosexuality and to LGBT people!
PLEASE CLICK ON THIS LINK TO BE BOTH BLESSED AND EDUCATED BY SISTER PAULA REGARDING THE FACT THAT THE SINS OF SODOM, THAT ARE OFTEN USED BY PROFESSING HOMOPHOBIC CHRISTIANS, HAVE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH HOMOSEXUALITY OR LGBT PEOPLE.
Homophobic professing Christians create God in their own dysfunctional image, and we must never forget this truth!
Moreover, I strongly urge you to own Rick Brentlinger's book that is both scholarly, comprehensive, and eminently readable, as it will finally lay to rest any doubts you may have regarding fallacious Christian objections to homosexuality and to LGBT people!
PLEASE CLICK ON THIS LINK TO BE BOTH BLESSED AND EDUCATED BY SISTER PAULA REGARDING THE FACT THAT THE SINS OF SODOM, THAT ARE OFTEN USED BY PROFESSING HOMOPHOBIC CHRISTIANS, HAVE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH HOMOSEXUALITY OR LGBT PEOPLE.
Friday, September 3, 2010
BEING GAY IS A GIFT FROM GOD
Several years ago, I wrote the following article that is slightly edited for reprinting here:
Gay-affirming congregations understand the Gospel of inclusiveness that puts all of us in the same tent for worship and ministry.
To be able to love another person is a gift from God! As human beings we have the capacity to love another person, putting that other personís feelings and interests ahead of our own. This is agapao in the Greek and is the word Jesus uses when He commands His disciples to love others.
Yet, in addition to agapao, there is also eros and phileo. Eros is love based upon pleasure and phileo is love based upon reciprocity of feelings and actions. In other words, phileo occurs when one loves the other if that love is reciprocated and doesnít love the other when that love is not reciprocated. Most of the world operates on eros and phileo! Christians are called upon to exercise agapao!
However, in our intimate relations, eros is also very important! It is the bonding of two souls and bodies in love that is faithful and enduring. The Gay couple well understands this bonding!
Troy Perry was a Pentecostal-Baptist minister at a very young age. He knew he was gay and tried to smother his feelings. He even attempted suicide! Fortunately, he was found after slashing his wrists, taken to a hospital and survived. He then realized that God doesnít create someone whom He can sit around and hate. God created Troy Perry, just like He created all of His gay and lesbian children! Troy Perry went on to start the Metropolitan Community Churches which particularly ministers to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities. They are world wide and have an Internet site.
The Bible doesnít condemn same-sex love! In a previous article I wrote in the "Sacramento Valley Mirror" in which I have a weekly column entitled, "Christianity and Society," I elucidated the passages traditionally used to condemn Gay people and showed that they dealt in a context of the need to propagate, with idolatry and exploitation, as well as with acts against nature where heterosexuals engage in homosexual acts undoubtedly to various pagan deities. Nowhere in the Bible is same-sex committed love condemned!
The last bastion of the civil rights movement is the stigma and exclusion of Gay people from our churches and from our secular society. Yet, they can be seen to be a gift to us from God in that, despite their terrible persecution, many remain steadfast in their loving relationships. Despite all of the barriers set up by Christians and non-Christians alike, many remain in committed relationships.
Being constitutionally Gay is not a disorder any more than having brown eyes is a disorder! Most Gay people have been born that way and like the old Sunday School saying goes, "God doesn't create junk!"
If you're Gay, you have been blessed by God in that you are capable of loving another human being. The most dangerous people in the world are those who either have nothing to lose or who are incapable of loving others. There is no reason not to assume that God blesses the monogamous Gay couple every bit as much as He blesses the heterosexually married couple!
As Jesus said to the Scribes and Pharisees, we make void the Word of God by our traditions (Matthew 15:3,6,9) Mere fallible human beings interpreted the Bible to condemn same-sex unions! Mere human beings call being Gay an "affliction" and Gay sex as "intrinsically evil."
Many Gay people walk around with guilt and shame because they think that they are condemned before God and their fellow man. Read the Bible with new eyes, taking account of the most recent biblical scholarship (See, for example, The New Oxford Annotated Bible), and see for yourself that God created you just as you are and He affirms and loves you just as you are. God shows far more grace than do mere human beings!
If you're Gay, you have been given the gift of the capacity to love by God, your creator. Don't take that gift lightly and don't deny it as a gift from God.
You have the capacity to love another human being, and nothing is more sacred or godly than that.
Gay-affirming congregations understand the Gospel of inclusiveness that puts all of us in the same tent for worship and ministry.
To be able to love another person is a gift from God! As human beings we have the capacity to love another person, putting that other personís feelings and interests ahead of our own. This is agapao in the Greek and is the word Jesus uses when He commands His disciples to love others.
Yet, in addition to agapao, there is also eros and phileo. Eros is love based upon pleasure and phileo is love based upon reciprocity of feelings and actions. In other words, phileo occurs when one loves the other if that love is reciprocated and doesnít love the other when that love is not reciprocated. Most of the world operates on eros and phileo! Christians are called upon to exercise agapao!
However, in our intimate relations, eros is also very important! It is the bonding of two souls and bodies in love that is faithful and enduring. The Gay couple well understands this bonding!
Troy Perry was a Pentecostal-Baptist minister at a very young age. He knew he was gay and tried to smother his feelings. He even attempted suicide! Fortunately, he was found after slashing his wrists, taken to a hospital and survived. He then realized that God doesnít create someone whom He can sit around and hate. God created Troy Perry, just like He created all of His gay and lesbian children! Troy Perry went on to start the Metropolitan Community Churches which particularly ministers to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities. They are world wide and have an Internet site.
The Bible doesnít condemn same-sex love! In a previous article I wrote in the "Sacramento Valley Mirror" in which I have a weekly column entitled, "Christianity and Society," I elucidated the passages traditionally used to condemn Gay people and showed that they dealt in a context of the need to propagate, with idolatry and exploitation, as well as with acts against nature where heterosexuals engage in homosexual acts undoubtedly to various pagan deities. Nowhere in the Bible is same-sex committed love condemned!
The last bastion of the civil rights movement is the stigma and exclusion of Gay people from our churches and from our secular society. Yet, they can be seen to be a gift to us from God in that, despite their terrible persecution, many remain steadfast in their loving relationships. Despite all of the barriers set up by Christians and non-Christians alike, many remain in committed relationships.
Being constitutionally Gay is not a disorder any more than having brown eyes is a disorder! Most Gay people have been born that way and like the old Sunday School saying goes, "God doesn't create junk!"
If you're Gay, you have been blessed by God in that you are capable of loving another human being. The most dangerous people in the world are those who either have nothing to lose or who are incapable of loving others. There is no reason not to assume that God blesses the monogamous Gay couple every bit as much as He blesses the heterosexually married couple!
As Jesus said to the Scribes and Pharisees, we make void the Word of God by our traditions (Matthew 15:3,6,9) Mere fallible human beings interpreted the Bible to condemn same-sex unions! Mere human beings call being Gay an "affliction" and Gay sex as "intrinsically evil."
Many Gay people walk around with guilt and shame because they think that they are condemned before God and their fellow man. Read the Bible with new eyes, taking account of the most recent biblical scholarship (See, for example, The New Oxford Annotated Bible), and see for yourself that God created you just as you are and He affirms and loves you just as you are. God shows far more grace than do mere human beings!
If you're Gay, you have been given the gift of the capacity to love by God, your creator. Don't take that gift lightly and don't deny it as a gift from God.
You have the capacity to love another human being, and nothing is more sacred or godly than that.
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