The Sin of Bearing False Witness

The dishonesty from those conservative christians who condemn homosexuality seems to be endless.

For example, there's this alleged Day of Truth phenonema. Quite the load of false witness.

Let's start with the big lie: "The Day of Truth was established to counter the promotion of the homosexual agenda and express an opposing viewpoint from a Christian perspective. "

There is no 'homosexual agenda' - there is the human agenda seeking equality, justice, freedom from persecution. The opposition to equal rights for GLBTQ people is hardly a Christian position - it is not Christian to promote persecution and injustice.

Another lie: "The Day of Silence is a national program of the Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network (GLSEN), which asks students to remain silent for an entire day to express their support for the promotion of the homosexual agenda in the public schools. Unlike the Day of Silence, the Day of Truth does not encourage students to engage in activities that are likely to disrupt the school’s academic mission. "

According to those who actually particpate in the Day of Silence, its purpose is quite different:
"The Day of Silence is an annual event held to bring attention to anti-LGBT bullying, harassment and discrimination in schools. Students and teachers nationwide will observe the day in silence to echo the silence that LGBT and ally students face everyday. In it's 11th year, the Day of Silence is one of the largest student-led actions in the country."

Now, isn't that strange? The reality is 'bring attention to anti-gay bullying, harassment, and discrimination' but some conservative christians deliberately misreport it. Let's look a little more closely, from the Day of Silence website:

"What do you have to say about potential opponents to the Day of Silence?

The issue at hand is the bullying, harassment, name-calling and violence that students see and face in our schools. The Day of Silence is an activity created and led by students to educate their peers and bring an end to this harassment.
We look forward to engaging all organizations and individuals who share The Day of Silence vision of schools free from anti-LGBT name-calling, bullying and harassment.
Those who do not support the Day of Silence often protest, but rarely contribute positively to finding ways to end anti-LGBT harassment. Some individuals and groups organize events in response to the Day of Silence. These events grossly mischaracterize or simply misunderstand the basic purpose of the Day of Silence. Bringing attention to these events only adds a false credibility to their misinformation about the Day of Silence, GLSEN and the thousands of American students taking action on April 18th. If you face hostile students or organizations in your school on the Day of Silence remember to remain calm. We encourage you to not get into a debate, make gestures, and certainly not to get into a physical altercation. If you continue to be harassed, we encourage you to contact your GSA advisor or other ally school staff person.
Some critics of the Day of Silence come from the perspective of “reparative” or “conversion” therapy and/or from the perspective of “transformational ministries.” It is important to note that “reparative therapy” has been rejected by all the major health and mental health professions. Additionally, the view of “transformational ministry” adherents is not representative of the views of all people of faith. Finally, the Day of Silence is about unacceptable behavior (anti-LGBT bullying, harassment, and name-calling in schools) not debates about beliefs. "

Emphasis mine.

Another relevant comment on people who counter the Day of Silence:
"During my silence, people responded in completely different ways. One person stopped me and thanked me for what I was doing for all the people who weren't able to. Another person told me that I was a pitiful excuse for a human being. I decided that the thank you was what was really important."

Wow, 'a pitiful excuse for a human being'. Is that really an example of Christian love?

Not much truth in the Day of Truth so far, and it only gets worse. The Day of Truth material speaks of 'speaking the truth in love'. Yesterday, we looked at a few examples of the 'love' in conservative christian actions regarding homosexuality - torture instruments used by the Catholic church for example. Now we'll examine just a few of the specific lies and falsehoods told about GLBTQ people by those who puport to be followers of Jesus Christ.

From "HOMOSEXUALITY FAQ SHEET ", available at the "Day of Truth" website:
"Can homosexuals change? Yes. Advocates of homosexual behaviors will often tout the fact that the APA removed homosexuality from its list of disorders. But Dr. Robert L. Spitzer, who was part of that decision, has done some research that has changed his mind. "Contrary to conventional wisdom," Spitzer said, "some highly motivated individuals, using a variety of change efforts, can make substantial change in multiple indicators of sexual orientation and achieve good heterosexual functioning." "

Dr. Spitzer repeatedly rebuked the Exodus ministries for mis-using and misreporting on his research. The flaws in his methodology have been reported on at length.

The truth of the matter is that there is no confirmed evidence that anyone has ever changed their sexual orientation. The reality is that organizations like Exodus inflict horrific harm on any GLBTQ person unfortunate enough to get involved with them. Suicide is a common result of reparative therapy and ex-gay ministries.

A report on a recent interview with Dr. Spitzer:
"Indeed, when asked Scientific American Mind's question — "Do gays have a choice?" — Spitzer replies, "They have a choice whether to go into therapy, about whether they adopt a gay lifestyle, whether they tell their friends and their family. They don't have a choice as to whether their basic sexual orientation is gay or straight — that they don't have a choice about."

More evidence about such therapies, and trust me, I'll cover this in great detail on a later date. Too many people have been destroyed not to cover it fully.

"The second APA paper, presented by Dr. Ariel Shidlo and Dr. Michael Schroeder, reported findings from a study of 202 homosexuals who were recruited through the Internet and direct mailings to groups advocating conversion therapy. Most of the participants (178, or 88%) reported that efforts to change their sexual orientation had failed. Only 6 (3%) achieved what the researchers considered a heterosexual shift. Drs. Shidlo and Schroeder also reported that many respondents were harmed by the attempt to change."

I know, I wrote above that there is no confirmed evidence that anyone has ever changed their sexual orientation, and this seems to indicate that 3% experienced a 'heterosexual shift'. But, there is a key flaw to the study. The initial orientation of the participants was not quantified in advance, and there is such a thing as bisexuality - having some degree of attraction to both genders. Given the testimonies of bisexuals, and frankly, the testimonies of so called 'ex-gays' - the most that can be concluded is that some bisexual people can be encouraged to focus on the heterosexual element of their sexual orientation.

We do not have any cases where someone, whose sexual orientation has been scientifically quantified as strictly homosexual has become strictly heterosexual. At best, we have some injured bisexuals.

That last link, by the way, provides a very good overview of the issue of ex-gay ministries and reparative therapies.
"Many interventions aimed at changing sexual orientation have succeeded only in reducing or eliminating homosexual behavior rather than in creating or increasing heterosexual attractions. They have, in effect, deprived individuals of their capacity for sexual response to others."

The "Truth", that some conservative christians are spreading public schools, is a lie that tries to deprive others of their capacity for sexual response to others. Mull that over a moment.

The next lie:
"How can homosexuals change? Exodus ministries work with individuals through counseling and also group support. The main focus is, of course, building a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and making him Lord over our lives. "

Here's the truth. There are hundreds of thousands of Christian gay men and lesbians who spent years begging Jesus to make them heterosexual, to no avail. These people report intensely personal relationships with Christ - that were actually weakened by anti-gay theology. When they stopped trying to change their God-given orienation, their relationship with Christ tended to reach even greater levels.

Technically, nearly every sentence in the document contains at least one false claim. An important consideration here is that this is a document in which people who are not gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender presume to know better than we do the truths of our lives.

How is that possible? How is it that someone who is not privy to my innermost thoughts and feelings, can know them better than I do, and do so for millions of human beings?

It is not possible, for humans. The sad sin here is that conservative christians assume for themselves abilities only possessed by God.

One other lie from the Day of Truth material, to bring this to a conclusion. From their document
"THE TEN BIG MYTHS OF HOMOSEXUAL BEHAVIOR":
"There is no convincing evidence for an epidemic of violence against homosexuals.2 "
(One could nitpick about the word epidemic, the heartless need for violence to be extreme in scale before it matters, but the general principle is relevant on its own.)

Day of Truth organizers have lied to us all about the reason for the Day of Silence, attempting to hide the truth: "to bring attention to anti-LGBT bullying, harassment and discrimination in schools". Some conservative christian writers go so far as to deny out of hand the existence of bullying, harassment and discrimination targeting GLBTQ students in public school. But the truth of the matter is:
What the Numbers Say About Harassment of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Students
"A study of Massachusetts high school students published in the journal Pediatrics reports that nearly one-third of gay teens had been threatened in the past month with a weapon at school, compared to 7% of heterosexual students surveyed. "

There is so much information there, you really owe it to yourself to read it directly. Reporting by students that no outside party ever intervened when they were harassed. Huge rates of homophobic remarks, harassment on a daily basis.

So, to summarize it all.

The "Day of Truth", produced by the Alliance Defense Fund, promotes hurtful and destructive lies about GLBTQ people, in protest to an effort to reduce the amount of verbal and physical violence in public schools. The Alliance Defense Fund, which claims to defend religious freedom and the sanctity of life, violates the religious freedom of GLBTQ students and works to keep their lives in physical danger at the hands of their classmates.

GLBTQ students, and heterosexual students who are perceived as being GLBTQ, have been harassed, beaten and abused in public schools for decades, and still are. Some conservative christians are actively working to keep public schools places of intimidation and violence against GLBTQ students, by spreading lie upon lie upon lie.

What kind of person works to ensure that bullying, violence, and harassment continues to take place in public schools? Is that what Jesus would do?

If you feel that you've been sinned against by the organizers of 'Day of Truth', whether it is through their efforts to maintain bullying in public schools, or through the pattern of deception they employ, you can write to them and invite them to repent of their sins.



By the way, this blog has more to say about 'Day of Truth'.

The Sin of Deception

It is always sad to see the lengths that conservative Christians will go to in order to deceive people about the consequences of their condemnation of GLBTQ people and our lives.

Like this quote from David Brody from the LA Times:
"Whatever stereotypes people have of Christians as hateful, intolerant — all those words — I'm here to say, 'You have a totally wrong perception. Totally wrong,' " Brody said. "Maybe people will realize that Christians are not so bad after all."

Totally wrong. Hmmm. Let's look at that.

The dictionary defines 'totally' as "wholly; entirely; completely". For Brody's claim to be accurate and honest, there can be no example, whatsoever, of any Christians ever who have done hateful things, intolerant things, or espoused hateful or intolerant ideas. Christianity, completely, entirely, wholly, must be free of anything hateful, for Brody's statement to be accurate.

Let's look first at some history.

There's the Inquistion. This remains synonymous with torture, including:

"Men had their genitals cut away, crushed or burnt off with balls of flaming brimstone.
Woman had their nipples torn out with cold or red hot pincers; or their entire breasts sliced off with shears.
Vaginas and rectums were mutilated with the "pear" - a device that, on insertion, was expanded by means of a screw causing the cavity to rip apart, often with fatal results. "

More about "the pear"

"Used during Medieval Times, the Pear of Anguish was an extremely painful device used to punish homosexuals, witches and women accused of inducing a miscarriage.The Pear of Anguish had the shape of a pear; As a handle was turned, the spoon-shaped lobes opened; increasing pain. - - - Causing severe pain, after this torture was employed on the mouth; the victim's teeth would get destroyed; making blood pour out of the victim's mouth often causing death. - - - The Pear of Anguish was rarely washed, thus causing infections very frequently. If the victim didn't die by an infection however, he would die by other diseases caused by the severe damage of his or her intestines."

Maybe I'm too kind-hearted, but that sure sounds like hate to me. The Inquisitions targeted Jews, "heretics" and "witches" and homosexuals - fitting the definition of intolerant.

But there's more. Conservative Christians denominations have a long history of torturing and killing homosexuals, among others. I want to draw particular attention to this passage from the linked essay:
"Laws criminalizing homosexuality may also encourage law enforcement officials to disregard the humanity of the detainee whose very identity is criminalized. By institutionalizing discrimination, they can act as an official incitement to violence against LGBT people in the community as a whole, whether in custody, in prison, on the street or in the home. By stripping a sector of the population of their full rights, they also deprive lesbian and gay victims of torture or ill-treatment of access to redress and allow their torturers to continue abusing others with impunity."

Emphasis mine. I'mgoing to return to this particular concept shortly. Let it sink in.

One last example from the past:
"Church-inspired mutilation, torture, and burning of "sodomites" in sixth-century Byzantium, medieval France, Renaissance Italy, and in Spain under the Inquisition. But Protestant authorities were equally committed to the execution of homosexuals in the Netherlands, Calvin's Geneva, and Georgian England."

In a future post, I'll detail at length the causal connection between anti-homosexual theology and hate crimes targeting gays and lesbians. If you are still reading at this point, you've been through enough for one day. On to the analysis.

Brody says that the perception of Christians as hateful and intolerant is 'totally wrong'. As he put it, he's here to say that, it is his purpose. Completely wrong, wholly wrong, entirely wrong, not a single example or case wrong.

Now had he said that such perceptions are not accurate regarding all Christians, that would be a different story. It would recognize that some Christians have, in fact, done hateful and intolerant things, while others have not. But he argued that the perception is totally wrong, asserting that the perception is completely false. And Mr. Brody is a professional writer; nuances like modifying the correct noun are kinda important in that line of work.

The evidence of history disproves his claim. Sadly, there is a huge element of truth to the aforementioned perception - many Christians have done hateful and intolerant things, many continue to do hateful and intolerant things to this day. Christians who are serious about following Christ's teachings in their lives have little choice but to acknowledge the abuses inflicted on others in the name of Christianity. People who are more interested in other people's lives, may of course exercise other priorities.

So, let's look at what that word, hateful, means. Maybe there's some loophole in the definitions that would make torture, or murder, or persecution, something other than hateful.

Hatred is defined as "the emotion of intense dislike; a feeling of dislike so strong that it demands action" The word Hate brings up concepts like hostility, extreme aversion, and hateful is defined as "full of or expressing hate; malignant; malevolent".

Sorry, but sticking the Pear of Anguish into someone's body counts as expressing hate. There's no loophole. Anyone who wants to prove otherwise need only cheerfully volunteer to experience it first-hand to prove it is not hate.

I doubt there'll be any volunteers.

Of course, torture is near the extreme, along with pistol-whipping someone. What about something a bit less bloody, like denying people basic civil rights? How about preventing them from protecting their families from material ruin through the use of a basic civil contract?

I'd call such things hostile, malignant, malevolent. I think deliberately and willfully hurting other people is at least malevolent.

Now, David Brody says that his values matched those of Focus on The Family, an organization with a long history of persecuting GLBTQ people.

"After two years of unemployment, he took a job as a radio reporter at the conservative ministry Focus on the Family, which fights abortion, pornography and homosexuality. "Their values and my values matched up," he said."

Focus on the Family's harassment of GLBTQ people is grist for many, many posts, and includes not only promoting lies and stereotypes about GLBTQ people, but actively campaigning to deny us basic civil rights, including freedom of religion. Remember, that chosing not to believe that homosexuality is sin - is a religious belief, one that is supposed to be protected. Every attempt by conservative Christians to deny us rights because they believe homosexuality is sin, intrinsically forces their religion into our lives, and abrogates our religious freedom to enforce their religious beliefs.

Mr. Brody is an employee of CBN, the Christian Broadcasting Network, founded by Pat Robertson. Pat Robertson's statements about homosexuals include:

“When lawlessness is abroad in the land, the same thing will happen here that happened in Nazi Germany. Many of those people involved in Adolph Hitler were Satanists. Many of them were homosexuals. The two things seem to go together.” - 700 Club, 1-21-93 (source: People for the American Way Foundation)

“...What kind of craziness is it in our society which will put a cloak of secrecy around a group of people whose lifestyle is at best abominable. Homosexuality is an abomination. The practices of those people is appalling. It is a pathology. It is a sickness, and instead of thinking of giving these people a preferred status and privacy, we should treat AIDS exactly the same way as any other communicable disease...” - 700 Club, 6-6-88 (source: People for the American Way Foundation)

“You know, one of the great misnomers in our society is the term `gay.’ That somebody who is involved in something that is leading to suicide, where the V.D. rate is 11 times that of others, which are almost driven and ashamed and fearful and confused and psychotic and all the others that we read about plaguing this part of our society. The term gay is the most serious misuse of the English language. They’re not gay, they’re very, very depressed and miserable.” - 700 Club, 5-6-82 (source: People for the American Way Foundation)

And worse.

Sorry, but the statements above qualify as hate. The ban on same-sex marriage is a manifestation of hate. The discriminatory laws still in force in states across the U.S., which penalize homosexuals for failing to live up to other people's religious beliefs, are manifestations of hate. Anyone who would wish to make a convincing argument to the contrary, need simply sign a legal statement irrevocably and permanently barring his or her self from the contract of marriage with anyone of any gender.

Again, I doubt there will be any volunteers. The legislative actions mentioned just above, which penalize and coerce GLBTQ people, are primarily the work of conservative Christians. The perception Mr. Brody dismissed is far, far, far from "totally wrong".


Now, here's the moral problem in Mr. Brody's statement. Either its author is not telling the truth, making a deliberately false claim, or

he doesn't consider torture, discrimination, persecution, abuse, murder, coercion to be hate when directed at certain kinds of people. What would that concept be called?

How about "disregarding their humanity"?

The point is, Brody's claim, patently false, not only disregards, but actively discards the very humanity of GLBTQ people, among many, many others.

It totally isn't hate, apparently, because we aren't people. Not totally.


I don't know about you, but I feel sinned against by David Brody. I feel lied to, and lied about. If you agree, you can email him and invite him to repent, his email is available at the last link. Be sure to extend your forgiveness to him for his sins against you or your family or friends.

Sin of Arrogance

Over the years, I've noticed many constant themes and positions in the arguments, explanations, essays written by people who believe that homosexuality, or homosexual love-making, is a sin.

When challenged by evidence from the lives of GLBTQ people, or by challenges to the theology behind the condemnation, these authors consistently responded within the premise that their belief (homosexuality is condemned in the Bible) is unquestionably correct.

These authors practice for themselves an intrinsic superiority - what they believe is automatically correct, they cannot be wrong, anyone who disagrees with them cannot be correct.

The effort to even consider that their interpretation could be in error is simply not made.


Here, Homosexuality & the Church - Part 1 , for example, despite several well-written challenges to the assumptions about the lives of GLBTQ people, challenges that contradict the notion that our loving relationships are intrinsically sin, responders simply refused to even consider the possibility, engaging in rather strained versions of 'yes, but' to hold onto their condemnation. Despite a post that crticized the trend to reduce GLBTQ people to a mere subject, issue, problem; subsequent posts continue to dehumanize GLBTQ people.

This is arrogance in action, this unwillingness to look at evidence that challenges their pre-conceived position fairly.

Another example is available here:"A Strictly Christian Policy?" -- Linda Hirshman Strikes Again". Rather than actually address the substance of Linda Hirshman's remarks, Dr. Mohler dismisses her premise out of hand. According to Dr. Mohler's other blog entries, homosexuality just is a sin, that's all there is to it - and thus, there is no need for him to consider the point Ms. Hirshman raised.

Trouble is, she raised a good point:

"In most western moral systems, immorality requires an element of harm to, or disregard for, others. The obvious examples are robbery or murder--though even sexual conduct that some call immoral supposedly degrades the moral climate of the community. That's mostly nonsense; on the rare instances when sexual conduct should be an object of moral scrutiny, it involves harming another--as (in Pace's other example) adultery does--through a hurtful breach of trust. But no one is actually harmed--and no civil liberties are trampled--by homosexuality. "

Dr. Mohler summarily dismisses this, as well as projecting assumptions she did not make , despite a key Christian teaching - a definition of morality, lawfullness, from Jesus Christ.

Ironically, it contains no mention of homosexuality.

16Now a man came up to Jesus and asked, "Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?"
17"Why do you ask me about what is good?" Jesus replied. "There is only One who is good. If you want to enter life, obey the commandments."
18"Which ones?" the man inquired.
Jesus replied, " 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, 19honor your father and mother,'[d] and 'love your neighbor as yourself.'[e]"
20"All these I have kept," the young man said. "What do I still lack?"
21Jesus answered, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."
22When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

34Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question:
36"Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" 37Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'[b] 38This is the first and greatest commandment. 39And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'[c] 40All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

In Matthew 19: 16-22, and Matthew 22: 34-40, as well as in parallel accounts in Mark and Luke, Jesus gives a very concise and clear statement about what morality is. Paul, in his letter to the Galatians 5: 14, wrote:
"The entire law is summed up in a single command: "Love your neighbor as yourself." "

These passages clearly validate Ms. Hirshman's point, her position is scripturally sound. But because same-sex relationships, sexual expression, intimacy do not intrinsically violate either clause of what Christ called the Greatest commandments, side-stepping becomes necessary for those who argue that homosexuality is sin. People who are openly inflicting harm on gays and lesbians, bisexuals and transgendered people have to reframe any discussion away from the concept of "an element of harm to, or disregard for, others" because that concept indites their position on homosexuality - the condemnation of homosexuality is intrinsically immoral.

Think that over for a moment. Those who condemn homosexuality based on the Bible, have an interpretation of a handful of passages, and there is in the same Bible, a statement by Jesus Christ that contradicts their interpretation.

Do they even re-evaluate their interpretation? Apparently not. Consistently, they chose their interpretation about homosexuality over direct statements from Jesus Christ.

To me, that qualifes as failing to Love God with your entire self. Further, because this behavior is used to justify and excuse persecuting and physically harming GLBTQ people, they are also violating 'love your neighbor as yourself' - and those of us whom they are harming, are allowed to invite the Dr. Mohler's of the world to repent of their sin against us. His email address is available on his website, let him know he owes you, or your family members, or your friends, an apology.