Asking questions sincerely is not sin : )

Jamie asked a couple of questions of me, in comments to my blog post "Consistency and Prejudice". After mulling 'em over, I realized that they really deserved a post of their own.

"I read in your post that you were raised in a conservative denomination. May I ask what the teachings of that denomination were on homosexuality?"

And
"So, for those of us that literally been taught all our lives that Scripture teaches homosexuality is sin, what do you suggest for an honest study? If you were raised in a denomination that taught that homosexuality=sin, what was your journey? "

I hope, Jamie, that you don't mind the use of direct quotes. I didn't want to lose anything by paraphrasing.

The denomination that I grew up in taught that the orientation itself, as well as the intimate acts of lovemaking, were among the most horrible of sins. It employed the standard list of gotcha verses, including Leviticus 20:13 with its mandatory death sentence. It wiggled around its own 'saved by grace through faith' by teaching Romans 1 as saying that people are homosexual because they first reject God, and that He then punishes them by 'giving them over' - rejecting them in this life, as a precursor for fully rejecting them after death. Ironically, though the denomination I grew up taught that we were liberated from the Law by Christ, it also demanded that GLBTQ people still be imprisoned by the mainstream interpretation of the laws in Leviticus.

It was extremely destructive and damaging, then, to pass into puberty and discover that I was not at all interested in the opposite sex. It meant that God had rejected me, 'given me over' and that as devout and dedicated as I had been (extremely so), it had not been enough, I was still accused and convicted and punished for a rejection I had no awareness of making.

You asked about my journey, Jamie. My first thought on this is that I'm pretty ordinary, that there is nothing remarkable or different about my journey at all, except, just slightly, that I survived it. So I'm going to ask you, and anyone else interested, to do a little work. I hope that's ok.

"Our Stories" is a collection of the journeys of a wide variety of GLBTQ people of faith. Many, perhaps most, identify as Christian, but some are not. There are a lot of stories there; it is not a brief document. And there is a lot of sadness and despair, as well as a lot of joy and faith; it is not a cuddly document. But it is well worth reading. An account of my journey is there, you'll recognize it. But I'm not going to tell you where it starts, because I know from experience that the total of that collection is far, far, far more meaningful than any of its parts.

The real value in my journey is not the events, feelings, transitions, at all, but rather, the way my experience has so much in common with so many other people's experiences.

Millions have walked this road, encountering much of the same scenery.

But, just to whet an appetite, here are a few selections:

"Long before I had ever been physically assaulted, verbally abused or suffered discrimination, I had learned to hate myself.I prayed desperately every night for God to “fix” me, because I believed that all things were possible with God. I knew if I just had enough faith, God would “fix” me. When I didn’t become straight, I assumed it was because even God hated me. When my father found out I was gay (he was a minister and I thought he could help me), he beat me into unconsciousness, screaming Bible verses at me. It was the first of regular beatings intended to beat “being gay” out of me. After that, he would only hit me where the bruises didn’t show as much, like my groin. When I was 15, he allowed his drunk friends to rape me so that I would know “how bad gay sex was.” "

(From RanchHand's story)

"I “tried” it with a woman friend of mine. A last ditch effort to see if there was anything that could persuade me to “go back” to being straight. I faked the orgasm..out of boredom!And I prayed. I tried to tell God who I was and who I should be. The answer I got back was “How dare you tell me who I created?” Later, out of the mouth of a friend of mine came: “You think too much. If you are ever going to be in love you have to act from the heart…and stop THINKING!”

(From Robinsgarret's Story)

"Then I wrote to my parents again, telling them where I was and that I was okay. Dad wrote back that he no longer had two daughters and that I had been written out of his will. Mom sent me a Bible with portions of Leviticus and Romans highlighted along with a note saying that I had shamed them horribly and was no longer part of the family but that they might consider taking me back if I gave up my abominable lifestyle.

Over the next 25 years or so, I’d send presents home for Mom and Dad’s birthdays and anniversaries and notes telling them they had grandchildren and what was going on in my life. They’d return everything unopened but with Bible verses attached saying I was an abomination."

(From BobbiCW's Story)

One more. I've been told that I exagerate the consequences of teaching 'homosexuality is sin', that it is really a loving thing to teach. Judge for yourself from just one life:

"Suicide Hotline(note-this story was edited to delete the specific church reference)

If anyone believes they are helping a homosexual person when they spew their bigoted, close-minded nonsense at them:A friend of mine works for a suicide helpline. After keeping a man on the phone yesterday for three hours, he shot himself in the head with her still on the phone.My friend wanted to share this man's story, in the hope that it would reach someone, and at least make them think about the horrible things they put people they profess to care about through, just because they can't see past their own, tiny little corner of reality.

This is the post she made on another message board. This is one of the most disgusting things I have ever seen anyone do, and I survived 767s flying into the buildings I worked in almost two years ago. *...shakes head...* I will never understand how some people can be this way...I would like for people to know why he did it.

He was raised [religious]. He was born gay. Yesterday he went to his pastor and wanted to know what to do. He loved a man very much, and couldn't understand how love could be wrong. He was told that homosexuality is "immoral", and he "just thinks he is gay". Society does that to men like him and that he could put those urges aside and live the right way. That if he didn't disciplinary action would have to be taken. The pastor spoke with him for over an hour. He went home loaded a gun and called and I said hello. He had gone for help and got judgement. He went about love and got told his love wasn't good enough or right. He wanted acceptance and got none.I am sorry but if you stand by and watch hate speak in action and don't say anything, you helped promote hate. I doubt that bishop wanted to see this man die, but his words helped him die.I think his story should be told --- nods-- he deserves at least that."

That collection of lifestories is a treasure. I see it as a kind of testament of its own, a spiritual account of God working in people's lives just as instructive as any letter by Paul.

So - what do I suggest for study?

That was actually the hardest question, Jamie. There are so many different answers, and a lot of them are in the personal stories linked to above. But to introduce some specific examples of Scripture, I offer the following.

When I was struggling with Romans 1, as a teen, I found myself repeatedly encountering Matthew 7, in parts, the whole, you name it. One piece really gnawed away at me.

There I'd be, 2 AM, face down in the carpet before the altar at church, begging and crying, and I'd suddenly remember this (Matthew 7: 7,8):

7"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. "

Well, I was asking. I was begging, I was pleading, I was weeping and grieving. What happened to the receiving, the finding, the opening of doors?

The many, many people I've encountered who believe 'Homosexuality is sin' tended to tell me, to my face, that I just wasn't sincere enough, as if they could know. Or that I hadn't asked long enough, asking me to suffer even longer than I had. Oh, the horrible thing such folks have said to me. Forgiving them was a challenge.

And one such night, I actually got up, pulled a Bible from a pew, and looked up Matthew 7: 7,8. I probably intended to lecture God about it, and call Him on his unfilled promise. I happened to read past verse 8:

9"Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! 12So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets."

Now, I was stubborn in my attachment to the interpretation that fallible humans had taught me. It took several more years. But eventually, I realized that our self-ness - our capacity for love, our curiousity and intelligence, our hungers and fears, strengths and weakness, the who of who we are, is a deliberate gift from God. Humans were saying my sexuality was an abomination but 'how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask Him". God gave me the gift of my sexuality, God gives good gifts, and if humans say differently about some gift, who was more believable?

I was in real emotional, spiritual and physical agony, trying to become what fallible humans said I should be. And when I prayed, when I asked, what I received was not heterosexuality, but acceptance, and when I could accept it, joy.

The conscious understanding, though, occured after spiritual understanding. I had a direct, personal encounter with God, and God basically told me that my sexual orientation was not sin, but like anything else, if I used it to harm myself or others, it could be used for sin. Just like heterosexuality.

Of course, the learning doesn't end in kindergarten. Over the subsequent decades, I've prayed, studied, researched and analysed. I've learned that Paul did not use either of the greek two words that actually conveyed the concept 'men who have sex with men' when he wrote his letter to the Corinthians.

The title of this thread comes from one of the lesson I learneds. Something that causes as much destruction as 'homosexuality is sin' causes, simply cannot be from God. Said teaching only bears evil fruit, so it cannot be from God. I plan on exploring this with real life examples over the coming life of this blog.

I learned that an examination of the traditional interpretation "homosexuality is sin" through the microscope, the analytical tool, of Christ's life, ministry and teachings, thoroughly disproves the traditional interpretation. I learned that analysis of the texts as texts - the concepts conveyed by the original Hebrew or Greek words, the textual context that each passage is nested in, and the historical context of these texts, clearly refutes the traditional interpretation.

But at the heart, the lives recounted in "Our Stories" disprove the traditional interpretation beyond even the hint of a possibility of a shadow of a doubt.

And in the end, my faith is placed in God, not in the interpretations of texts, any texts, made by other fallible humans, even Paul.

Consistency and Prejudice

Sunday afternoon, late, I discovered a blogswarm titled 'Blog against Theocracy'. First I'd ever heard of blogswarms, but then, there's a lot about blogging I'm learning by doing. My initial good feelings were quickly soured though, for while many of the blog posts were well-researched and thoughtfully written, many settled for promoting religious prejudice instead.

Over and over again "Christians this" and "Christians that" as if Christians were some vast collection of clones, the ultimate super-organism comprised of millions, billions in the long term, of people who believe, feel, do, think exactly the same thing about everything.

We are not. Having grown up in a conservative denomination of Christianity, my father a minister, I've seen first hand just how much diversity there is in thought, belief and deeds within even a single congregation with very explicit and precise statements of faith. When one then considers the huge range of disagreement over just about every possible detail, assumption, conclusion, interpretation among the various sects of Christianity - it becomes pretty darned safe to say:

When you really look at what individual Christians believe, there are as many understandings of what Christianity believes as there are Christians.

Blaming all Christians for supporting homophobia, the Iraq war, or anything else, is prejudice. Focus on the specifics, the harm, the ideas, processes and the profits.

I realize that it can be difficult to define terms, when rebuking something, with complete accuracy. One cannot add enough modifying terms to completely eliminate overly broad generalizations. But, there is a huge difference between "Christians believe homosexuality is sin" and "Conservative Christians believe - - -" and even more with "Some Conservative Christians believe - - -" or "Those Conservative Christians who believe - - -". There is a real challenge to find the appropriate level of specificity.

For those who do write about the abusive skeins of Christianity, there are options that are far more accurate than the blanket "Christians". You can use "Conservative Christians" and be more accurate, though there are exceptions at that level. You can use "Evangelical Conservative Christians" to increase specificity, though there will still be exceptions. Terms like "dominationist" and "dominionist" work well, for they focus on the specific mindset of seeking control over others. I'm rather partial to the term "theofascists". And the catch-all "Some" leaves plenty of room for all of the exceptions, while acknowledging that there are real examples that fit the accusation to follow.

But the blanket generalization about Christians that some atheists make are no different from the blanket generalizations made by some conservative Christians about homosexuals, or the blanket generalizations made by some light-skinned people about dark-skinned people, etc.

I would just ignore it, but there is a real problem involved here. When someone who is not religious engages in the same dominationist tactic as employed by some religious people, even to criticize them, he or she has actually affirmed their behavior.

And, trust me, from years and years of experience - the Pat Robertsons and Fred Phelps don't want or seek anyone else's approval - they seek affirmation and repetition of their behavior. If they can get you to revile and harass others, to employ prejudice and advocate discrimination, that's all the really matters, for it makes their own abusive acts acceptable.

The guess 'homosexuality is sin' is not really about "what the Bible says" and especially not about "what would Jesus do". It is about something far more primal than that.

Most living organism engage in some form of dominance behavior. Beetles fight for mates or food, coral polyps fight for space and sunlight, meerkats fight for social dominance within their group, and with other groups for territory. Presented as a formula, one way of expressing it is:

Seek dominance by harming others for personal gain

Harming others can be significant as violence, as intangible as insults and false accusations, as pervasive as laws and imprisonment. In very social organisms, like humans, it can be enough just to harm someone's reputation, to malign their appearance in the eyes of the rest of the community. The rewards of dominance can be as extreme as theocracy, and other forms of autocratic control over people's very lives, as intangible as feeling better than others, or feeling less a sinner. It can be material as well: let's not forget the many conservative christians who use their condemnation of homosexuality to make money. It can be an increased status within the social group, or simply the exclusion of competitors.

This is the core process beneath any prejudice - racial prejudice, anti-semitism, misogyny, homophobia. A group of people actively seeking to harm others for their own personal gain.

And sadly, that process is also at work in claims that revile all Christians, or that, as has happened to me, dismiss us as mentally ill, stupid, delusional, etc. Someone is seeking dominance over others by harming them with negative labels. It isn't honest, it isn't helpful, it actually encourages and supports every other flavor of prejudice.

And, by employing that particular process to attack Christians in total, just as homophobes use it to attack GLBTQ people in total, or racists use it to attack people of color,

those who make such 'Christians this' and 'Christians that' claims are supporting what actually does matter to theocrats - the use of power to achieve material goals at the expense of others.

I'm opposed to theofascism, but also opposed to atheofascism as well.

There is one other, huge problem with defining Christians by those Christians who violate the civil rights, humanity, physical bodies of others. Since they tend to claim that they have "the truth" about God, when someone says "look, that anti-gay legislation, that's Christianity" even in rebuke, he or she is confirming the very premise that dominationist Christians are trying to establish in order to achieve domination. They need to define Christianity in their terms, to pre-silence rebuke.

It is important to remember that dominationist Christians are no less capable of reason than anyone else. Sure, those who stand to gain the most materially may be all but unreachable, but, the people in the pews, if given accurate information, are capable of analysis, reason, and consideration. But it does have to presented within their context, and with at least a moderate about of tolerance for their faith, and some trust that they are reporting their own experiences accurately.

After all, we cannot expect them to trust GLBTQ people's accounts of their own lives, after rejecting out of hand the religious experiences (not interpretation, but experience) of religious people. I would like to see those of us who stand up against any prejudice, to be so much more specific and accurate, careful and precise, that the lies of those who condemn homosexuality, or mock Judaism, or defame women, or vilify people of color - stand out in stark and ugly contrast.

Lastly, I'm sure that despite my best efforts, I have in the past, and will most likely in the future, slip and post a phrase or sentence that is more generalized than is really necessary or appropriate. For that reason, I have not linked to any specific blog or comment or essay that played the 'Christians this and Christians that' card. The point here is focus, as much as possible, on the processes, the harm, the ideas, and when truly necessary, the specific individuals, and do one's best to avoid criticizing too broadly.

After all, who wants to be just like this guy?

Resurrection

Today, no talk of sin, no lengthy screeds about injustice. Today is Easter, a day to contemplate and anticipate resurrection.

Well, how about less talk of sin and injustice. It would be difficult to fully contemplate and anticipate resurrection without considering sin and injustice, for destruction is the context for resurrection.

One of the key expository histories in Christianity is the life, ministry, capture, torture, death, descent into hell, and subsequent resurrection of Jesus Christ. Though sectarian arguing over the details and meanings and what if's and maybe's have divided Christians for centuries, the story continues to resonate, to be told year after year.

Over those years, and from sect to sect, Christ's descent into hell has varied in significance and meaning, ranging from a hastely chanted phrase in a statement of faith, to a rich story of freeing the patriarchs from the outermost realms of hell.

Recently, I read post to post all the way through a long, and at times tedious, argument about the factuality of Christ's resurrection, triggered by an essay about the value of the event as metaphor. Over and over again, people did their best to frame it as an either/or scenario. Either the resurrection is factual, or it is metaphorical.

As if something cannot be both at once.

In this life, despite what any theologian or layperson or clergy or scientist declares, we humans cannot actual prove beyond even a reasonable doubt, that the resurrection was or was not factual. That would require time-travel. The best we can do is opine based on what we know and believe.

Understandably, that will create a wide variety of opinions.

All sides really ends up relying on faith, and to me, that is as it should be.

But with factuality unprovable, unfalsifiable, untestable on this side of the grave, there is an aspect of the resurrection story that we can experience.

The metaphorical.

People can create hell in life for themselves. Ask anyone who has racked up $50,000 or more in credit card debt while trying to making ends meet on middle-class salary in a consumerist society. Ask anyone who made bad decision after bad decision after bad decision.

People can stumble into hell in life, much as Dante got lost in the dark woods. Ask anyone with an addiction.

The ebb and flow of life, good ol' entropy, blast it, can certainly create hell in life. Just ask anyone living with chronic diseases, cancer, AIDS, Lyme disease, and so on. Ask anyone who lost their home and employment to Katrina.

And people are extremely good at making hell in life for others. My last three posts have touched on the hell in life that some people have inflicted on other people, from instruments of torture, to kids being threatened at gunpoint by other kids at school.

Of the many kinds of hell in life, that is the most preventable, and thus, to me, the most horrible. We cannot control plate tectonics to prevent tsunami and earthquakes. We cannot pre-cure disease before they strike and destroy. But we can each of us chose whether or not we oppress and destroy others.

Sadly, no, horrifyingly, there are people today who are deliberately creating hell in life for others to endure. And there are people who are, like Christ is said to have done, passing through hell in life, or who have passed through hell in life, on their way to a resurrection in life.


I set out to find you examples of resurrections in this life, on this side of the undiscovered country. I've heard many over the years, but I didn't want to tell other people's stories for them. I found this first:

"On December 17, 1997, when our son Adam told us he was gay, our world was turned upside down. We were absolutely devastated. We desperately needed someone to comfort us, to assure us that our son, our family would be okay. But we were too embarrassed and scared to admit this secret to anyone, to reach out for comfort."

How much that sounds like the reaction of someone grieving a deceased loved one. I mean no criticism there, not in the slightest. In a very real sense, when a child comes out to his/her parents, one understanding of that child dies, and a new one, hopefully, is reborn.

Resurrected.

I strongly encourage you to read the entire account of Jeff and Patti's son, Adam. Yes, it may wring you from ego to id, but it has an Easter of its own. What follows are some particular passages that wrung me.

"His popularity pretty much ended by the fourth grade when sports became important in the social fabric of the school. Because Adam wanted no part of sports, he hadn't cultivated relationships with other boys, which come naturally by being part of a team. If he were invited to parties, he now started to show signs of being ill at ease and not being included with the other boys. He just didn't seem to fit in because they always gravitated toward sports related activities. Seeing our son being treated as a social misfit was a painful thing to watch. "

"At the local fall fair, Adam was to meet a girl who was interested in him. She was the daughter of the minister of a very large Baptist church. - - - Anyway, without much fanfare, the relationship was over with the Royal family's Princess. - - -Then came the unsettling part. For some unknown reason, she started telling her friends that Adam was gay. Here is a 12 year old girl, clueless about homosexuality, spreading a rumor. This was years before Adam came to grips with his own sexuality so she was just being malicious. She enlisted all those in her sphere of influence, especially those in her youth group at church, to help make Adam's life a living hell. She was very successful."

"Through all of this public pain and humiliation, Adam was constantly wounded and battered but he was never broken. I wonder how many of his classmates could go through that endurance test and come through it like Adam did.
Middle school was a living hell for all of us and we couldn't wait for it to be over. Our hope was that high school would provide a clean start with the students becoming more mature and less cruel. We must have been the most naive parents in the world."

"I started noticing a pulling away from us. He seemed to not be as open as he had in the past about the events of the day. In his eyes I could see a sadness that was bothersome to me. The eyes have always been a window to the soul for me. Especially, in my children. I kept asking him what was wrong. He would say everything was fine. I knew better. I wanted to believe that it was just normal teenage growing up, but I knew deep inside, there was more.
Then, on December 17, 1997, Adam told us he was gay. We don't want to relive those days ever again. They were the most desperate and darkest days I have yet to live. It was so hard to go on every day at work pretending to be okay when what I believed to be the truth about my son was now upside down."

It may sound overly-dramatic to anyone heterosexual, who hasn't been taken into the confidence of a GLBTQ person who they loved and who trusted them, but

realizing that you are not heterosexual, in this world that for all intents and purposes worships heterosexuality, is very much like dying. That's not just my experience, it is something that has been shared with me by gays and lesbians and transgendered people from every walk of life a person can meet in the U.S.

The life you were supposed to have, according to church and school and literature and movies and comics and cartoons and art and everything else - is dead.

In its place is a hell in life - no, not arguing Garland vs. Streisand. Something much, much worse.

A hell made of hate speech on tv, on the internet, in the pulpit, in the newspaper, in paperbacks and movies. A hell where the demons are your classmates, and Cerberus has the face of a certain preacher from Topeka Kansas. A hell where, if you survive to adulthood, and find someone to love an "abomination" like you, you still will not be able to protect your life with that person, you'll always be at best a second class citizen, the scapegoat of every disreputable politician with nothing meaningful to contribute to humanity but his or her own lust for authority over others.

And trust me, those of you readers who haven't walked this particular path - you know. Every remark, every condemnation, every insult - you know it is about you.

Hell in life.

We journey through, most of us. Not all of us get out of it alive, and few make the journey unscathed, unscarred. It helps to have a Virgil beside you, as Dante did. I had one, a friend who save my life in more ways that I could ever explain. Adam had one as well:

"We hoped Danielle could be the one to bring Adam out of what we thought was his sexual confusion. She was not. Instead of being the girl to bring him out of this confused state, she became the only person in whom he could confide.
Danielle was the only person he "came out" to for most of his high school years. She kept this secret for Adam and it gave him the freedom to have someone to talk to about his feelings. She also helped him understand our feelings. Her family knew too and that gave Adam a place of refuge to go to, when there was too much stress and awkwardness at home. Even though our love never wavered for Adam, we were struggling to understand him. That often made our home a place that was uncomfortable and unfamiliar to all of us. "

This next passage is something that should never, ever have needed to be said, not once, and yet, is true an uncountable number of times a day:

"But I also knew that I had to help Adam hold on to that love in his heart because he will not be reminded of God's love from most people."

I'm not cruel, I'm not going to hold back the Easter in this story, making you wait till I'm done meditating here to read it for yourself.

"Are you wondering, "Where is God's perfection in a child who is gay?" I believe that the perfection that God seeks is in the way people react to this child. "

And finally, having accepted that the tomb is indeed empty, that the death of a 'supposed to be' need have no sting:

"We were allowed to see that our love was purest when we released Adam to be who he was meant to be. Through our son, we were awakened to the fact that a change must take place in our hearts if we were to be made whole. For wholeness would come from our acceptance of Adam, not our judgment. "



There are resurrections possible for us in this life, metaphorical journeys through some kind of death to a resurection and a new life. There are accounts of very bigotted people who have been resurrected from the hell in life they made for themselves hating Jews, or people of color, or women, or gays and lesbians. There are accounts of people who have been resurrected from material oppression, and political oppression, and societal oppression. There are gay Christians.

Here is another account of a resurrection.

"Living without fear of losing the grace of God gives me great freedom to enter into debate on the profound moral issues of our time, recognizing that it’s the on-going conversation that’s most important. It even gives me the freedom to learn, to develop, and to change my mind as my faith grows."

The factuality of Christ's resurrection is untestable, it is a matter of faith. Seen as factual through the lens of faith, it is a powerful and healing promise. Seen as metaphor as well, it is a powerful and healing roadmap for our lives.

Happy Easter.

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.