Ten Things I've Learned As a Straight Conservative Christian Blogging on Homosexuality

1. No straight person can fully appreciate how difficult it is to be gay in a largely heterosexual world.

2. As soon as someone equates "homosexuality" with "having gay sex," the rest of what they have to say on the subject will be pretty much useless.

3. When some Christians hear the word "love," all they think is "liberalism."

4. "Gay Christian"--until you can think of a better, more accurate term, it stays.

5. You can't understand someone else's sexual orientation unless you first understand your own.

6. Christians who are determined to be persecuted by gays can't be convinced otherwise.

7. How much you believe God loves and accepts others in Christ is a reflection of how much you believe he loves and accepts you.

8. Love begins with listening to what people have to say about themselves.

9. Conservative Christians should have no problem with celibate gay Christians, unless they have a problem with the gospel.

10. Don't assume God brought someone gay into your life so you can teach them. Chances are it is the other way around.

What will happen if I love?

"The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried." - G.K. Chesterton

There must be a reason Jesus told us that loving our neighbor is the greatest commandment next to loving God. He not only commanded us to love but he went out and did it himself without regard for his own reputation, safety, popularity. . . and ultimately his life. The rabbi who defended adulteresses and prostitutes. The holy man who touched lepers and other unclean types. The king who was abandoned to torture, mockery and a humiliating public death.

We speak of his suffering in reverent tones because that's how he atoned for our sins. That's the theological side of the story. But the human side of the story is that his sufferings came about as a direct result of loving all those despised, unwanted people. The hatred, the persecution and the outrage that led to his crucifixion came about because he healed a withered man's hand on the Sabbath and stood up for a prostitute who dumped a fortune in perfume on his feet and other such scandals. So when Jesus commands us to love as he loved--and also commands us to suffer as he suffered--he is speaking of two sides of the same coin. You cannot love the way he loved and not suffer the kinds of consequences he did.

Many Christians will fight you tooth and nail if you dare to bring up loving gay and lesbian people. The way they talk, you'd almost think there was a verse in the New Testament where Jesus answered and said to his disciples, "Know that you should love one another, as long as the conditions are right. Amen." That must be it, because all I ever hear is: I know we should love people, but I oppose the gay agenda. I know we should love people, but I'm not going to approve of their sin. I know we should love people, but they're indoctrinating my child at school. I know we should love people, but I'm not going to be manipulated by a bunch of sob stories.

What I'm actually hearing is this: Love sounds like a great idea, but I'm afraid if I love I something bad will happen. Yes, something bad will happen, but not what you think. Loving gay people probably won't lead you to approve of sexual sin, but it will most likely get you accused by fellow Christians of approving of it. It won't mean you'll support schools indoctrinating your children about homosexuality, but you will have to face the more real worry that the church is indoctrinating them to despise gay people. And you will definitely listen to people's sob stories, but instead of feeling manipulated you will never stop aching over the needless pain and injustice so many gays and lesbians suffer on a daily basis.

Simply put, loving gays and lesbians will mean many of your friends will forsake you, you will never be a part of the "in" crowd at church, your reputation will be tarnished, and you will carry the sorrows of others around in your heart until you feel like you're going to break. Downside: you will suffer. Upside: you will know the blessing of following in the path of a certain Someone who walked in those sufferings before you.

"Anger Issues with God"

My article, "Anger Issues with God," was published in the summer 2014 issue of PRISM magazine. Check it out.

Discomfort level

I just heard recently that a gay Christian friend of mine is going to be leaving his conservative church. Even though he is not in a gay relationship and never has been, he is being shunned by a core group of people in the congregation. The only excuse they have given for the way they treat him is, "We're not at a place where we feel comfortable interacting with gay people."

Sure, I get it. That's my favorite Bible verse too. The one that says, "They will know that we are Christians by the way we love only those brothers and sisters with whom we have come to a place where we feel comfortable interacting."

Which also brings to mind some of my favorite passages out of the Gospels where Jesus goes around touching, healing, befriending and sharing meals only with the people with whom he had gotten to a place where he felt comfortable interacting. Because if you want to change the world, that's the winning formula right there.

Speaking of changing the world, I can't recall any time in church history where the gospel caught fire and spread because Christians were interacting only with those respectable people with whom they felt comfortable. Saint Patrick, who is credited with bringing Christianity to Ireland, largely ministered to slave girls who suffered being raped regularly by their masters. John Wycliffe was the first to translate the Bible in English for the benefit of lay people, whom the church of his day regarded as "swine." John and Charles Wesley were condemned by the clergy of their day for preaching the gospel in open fields to the uneducated masses.

If there's any spiritual lesson to be learned from the past, it is run, don't walk, from any temptation to center your Christian life around being comfortable, respectable and insulated. No great spiritual advancement has ever happened in the kingdom of God because Christians were afraid to love the really tough-to-love people.

Which is why there's hope for my gay Christian friends, because I see so many of them struggling to love their straight brothers and sisters in Christ in spite of our perverse ignorance and obnoxious self-righteousness. From a certain perspective we are the really tough-to-love people, not them. We need to understand the true nature of our spiritual situation. If we don't get our act together and learn how to love, the kingdom will surely march forward without us. And gay Christians will be leading the way.

Am I being sentimental or hyperbolic when I say that? Let me put it this way. If you want to know how God is working to advance his kingdom, observe what he is doing among the people on the margins. The poor, the homeless, the persecuted, the forsaken, the ill, the feeble, and the despised. God calls his people from within those situations and uses suffering to train them in love, forgiveness, patience and meekness. They may never get to be senior pastor at the newest megachurch everyone is flocking to. They may never even be allowed to lead a Bible study. They may struggle just to be accepted in their churches. But they are the ones whom Christ will lift up, they are the ones he will strengthen, and they are the ones he will reveal himself to. If you despise them, you do so at your own spiritual peril.

Come again?

So let me get this straight. World Vision announced three days ago that it will be hiring Christians who are in same-sex marriages and the reaction, according to Rachel Held Evans, was that thousands of Christians withdrew support from the children they were sponsoring, thus forcing World Vision yesterday to renege on their original policy change to stop the financial hemorrhaging.

Thousands of needy children were abandoned because some Christians didn't want to be working on the same team with gay Christians in same-sex marriages.

What kind of gay Christians are these people whom others found so abhorrent? Well, they are married, which means they are not living a "lifestyle" of promiscuous sex and one-night stands. They are Christians, which means they seek to live as sexually chaste as possible. Not everyone can handle living celibate so many gay Christians get married to same-sex partners. The apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 7:9, "But if they cannot exercise self-control let them marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion." These gay Christians have taken that biblical exhortation to heart.

What kind of gay married Christian would want to work for World Vision? Probably someone who has a heart for children and for the poor, who wants to serve Christ's kingdom, and who is willing to make the financial sacrifice of working for a non-profit organization. Usually someone like that is a fairly committed Christian, kind, idealistic and compassionate. It's amazing how many gay Christians I've met who have a heart for missions and the poor. The marginalized relate with great tenderness and empathy to other marginalized people. It's a perfect fit.

World Vision probably recognized this too, which is why they didn't see a problem with the change in policy. I keep wondering why they didn't count the cost before taking that step. My best guess is that they expected blowback, but they didn't expect that Christian supporters would actually drop their sponsorships with their children as a way of protesting. I mean, who does that?

And what was the reason again for so many Christians dropping their sponsorships? Because they didn't want to labor on the same team as some of the most dedicated gay Christians in our midst, who have made the sexually responsible commitment of being in a marriage relationship, embracing the church's teaching not to be promiscuous or live the lifestyle. These are the Christians that others couldn't abide working with, even for the sake of relieving the suffering of a destitute child.

Never mind

Aaand within hours of my post supporting World Vision's very reasonable decision, they reverse themselves. Object lesson: don't underestimate the clout conservative evangelicals have on organizations that try to take even a conciliatory stance on gay issues. It explains why progress at evangelical leadership levels moves so slowly. The peer pressure, financial pressure, and threat of ostracization make it hard to think outside the box. Whether or not you agree with World Vision's original decision, surely you can see that this culture of conformity is just not healthy.

World Vision's surprising rationale for hiring Christians in same-sex marriages

I'm impressed that World Vision president Richard Stearns gives surprisingly logical reasons for the organization's recent policy change that they will now hire Christians in same-sex marriages. According to Christianity Today, Stearns says:

Changing the employee conduct policy to allow someone in a same-sex marriage who is a professed believer in Jesus Christ to work for us makes our policy more consistent with our practice on other divisive issues. It also allows us to treat all of our employees the same way: abstinence outside of marriage, and fidelity within marriage.

Stearns explains that World Vision is a parachurch organization that doesn't take sides on controversial issues that divide the church. Unlike the church they do not make doctrinal pronouncements, but seek to include Christians from all sides in an effort to fulfill their ministry's goal of serving the poor.

"Denominations disagree on many, many things: on divorce and remarriage, modes of baptism, women in leadership roles in the church, beliefs on evolution, etc.," [Stearns] said. "So our practice has always been to defer to the authority and autonomy of local churches and denominational bodies on matters of doctrine that go beyond the Apostles' Creed and our statement of faith. We unite around our [Trinitarian beliefs], and we have always deferred to the local church on these other matters." 

World Vision has hardly tried to court favor with the LGBT community in the past. They've recently fought for their legal right to hire and fire according to their own religious beliefs and resisted USAID pressure to employ non-discrimination hiring policies covering sexual orientation.

But that's what I admire about World Vision's approach. Fight for your legal right to control your own hiring and firing policies as a faith-based organization, then make fair policies on your own terms. Allowing gay Christians who are in same-sex marriages to work for World Vision is fair and consistent with their organization's historical approach to any controversial issue.

There are those who say that this is about moral compromise. "Would World Vision allow adulterous Christians to work for their organization?" some conservatives are asking. I guess it depends. There are those who say that Christians who have divorced unbiblically and remarried are adulterers, but others say grace should be extended in such situations. World Vision says they defer to local churches and denominations on the issue of divorce and remarriage, which implies they do hire Christians whom some would define as adulterers. But the point is, because there are valid arguments on both sides of the divorce and remarriage issue within the church, World Vision recognizes that professing Christians can believe one way or the other. And being a professing Christian is all they ask of their employees.

Likewise, there are Christians on either side of the same-sex marriage controversy. That is why entire denominations are splitting down the middle over it. Those who accuse World Vision of morally compromising are missing the point. The point is whether there are legitimate biblical arguments on both sides of this issue. "Legitimate" isn't defined as "what I agree with." I personally don't believe blessing same-sex marriages in the church is biblical, but I understand that many of those who disagree with me are also Christians like myself. They have biblical arguments for their position and at times they have come close to persuading me. World Vision is simply acknowledging that the same-sex marriage issue has proven to be, over time, a legitimately tough call for churches, and therefore they are going to adjust their hiring policy to be consistent with the way they have dealt with similar issues in the past. It's an amazingly rational and fair step to take.

All over the Internet I see 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 being quoted by conservatives who are throwing down the challenge for Christians to "truly" believe this verse:

Or do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor homosexual practicers . . . shall inherit the kingdom of God.

But lately, I've been wondering if I "truly" believe this verse in Galatians 5:19-21:

Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you just as I have forewarned you that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God (italics mine).

What should I believe about those professing Christians who have shown open, unrepentant hostility toward gay and lesbian people, making false accusations against them about their experience of sexual orientation, and contributing to needless, hurtful conflict within their families and church congregations because of these accusations? The Bible says persons who practice such enmity, strife and divisiveness "will not inherit the kingdom of God." Should I "truly" believe what this verse says about the many conservative evangelicals who seem to fit this description?

For my part, I would rather hope that grace and Christ's blood can cover some of these follies, and leave those who seem caught up in them in God's hands to sanctify or judge as he sees fit.

Why the legal case for gay civil marriage is also a moral one

Recently I saw this YouTube of Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway, a devout Catholic, announcing tearfully to his constituents why he is not going to defend Kentucky's ban on recognizing same-sex marriages from other states. As I saw this man's struggle of conscience it occurred to me that the legal arguments for civil same-sex marriage, which Conway clearly anguished over, aren't understood all that clearly by the average Christian who opposes gay marriage on religious/moral grounds.

For years now I've given my fellow Christians a pass if they bristled at the mention of gay civil marriage. "Look," I'd tell them, "you don't have to agree with my political views," then I'd try to discuss something about gay issues that was a little less advanced. But how long can evangelicals insist that they oppose gay civil marriage on moral grounds when they fail to see that there are also moral grounds for supporting it?

Many Christians have an underlying suspicion that people who focus on the constitutional arguments for same-sex civil marriage are doing so because they don't have biblical morals. Civil liberties is just a secular morality, a substitute ethic that has blinded the secular person from seeing the truth of the Bible's teaching.

There may be something to that. But what's damaging to our Christian witness is that the reverse is also true. Fixating on the Bible's moral teaching on gay sex blinds many evangelicals from seeing that the case for gay civil marriage is more justified, both legally and morally, than they think. It isn't about those who care about morals versus those who don't. In fact, the reason secular people are quicker to catch on to the civil liberties argument is that they don't have a religious prejudice against understanding it. As a Bible-believing Christian myself I hate to say it, but I think it's true.

Attorney General Jack Conway stated, "I came to the inescapable conclusion that if I [defended this case], I would be defending discrimination. That I will not do." As a Catholic he is not unaware of the moral teaching of his church on homosexuality, but as attorney general he knows he would betray the public trust in his office if he supported legal discrimination against gays. For Conway opposing discrimination is also a moral stance, and one that evangelical Christians would do well to understand better.

I'm not a law expert by any means, so I will explain my own lay understanding of the legal case for gay marriage in the best way I can:

• We have something called the Fourteenth Amendment in our U.S. Constitution. It states the following:

"No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

• The part I italicized contains what's called the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses. Due process protects individuals against arbitrary government intrusion into life, liberty or property. It has to do with interfering with a fundamental right. Equal protection has to do with treating all citizens equally under the law. 

• If a law either 1) interferes with someone's fundamental right (Due Process), or 2) denies Equal Protection to a group of people who fall under a "suspect classification" (more on that later), then such a law can only be justified if passes the standard of "strict scrutiny."

• "Strict scrutiny" is the highest standard of judicial review (as opposed to the lesser standards of "rational basis review" and "intermediate scrutiny"). Strict scrutiny means you have to demonstrate that this law serves a "compelling government interest" (e.g., our national security is at stake, multiple lives are in danger . . . that level of urgency). Plus, it must be "narrowly tailored" to achieve that government interest using the "least restrictive means." Discrimination is serious business, so if the law in question isn't directly on target to achieve this compelling interest, or if it is in any way overly restrictive, then it doesn't pass strict scrutiny. It gets the eject button.

• There are two possible grounds for arguing that laws prohibiting gay marriage should be subject to the highest standard of strict scrutiny: 1) they interfere with a fundamental right to marry the person of one's choice, contra Due Process, 2) they discriminate against gays and lesbians because of their sexual orientation, contra Equal Protection. 

• Re. ground #1: In the Loving v. Virginia decision which struck down laws against interracial marriage, Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote "marriage is one of the 'basic civil rights of man,' fundamental to our very existence and survival." Denying gays and lesbians the right to marry the person of their choice is denying them a fundamental right. 

• Re. ground #2: If gays and lesbians are denied the right to marry because their choice of partner is dictated by their sexual orientation, then they are being discriminated against because of their sexual orientation. Now, remember I mentioned earlier something called "suspect classification"? This refers to a classification of groups of people that meets certain criteria making them susceptible to discrimination. The Supreme Court currently recognizes race, national origin, religion and alienage (being a foreigner) as suspect classifications. Whenever a law targets a suspect class, the courts subject it to strict scrutiny to determine whether it violates Equal Protection. Right now, sexual orientation is not considered a suspect classification. 

• However, in the recent Proposition 8 case Judge Vaughn Walker argued that sexual orientation should be a suspect classification because as a group, gay and lesbian people fit the criteria: 1) they have a history of being discriminated against, partly due to stereotypes, 2) they have an immutable and/or highly visible distinguishing trait, 3) they are powerless to protect themselves in the political process, 4) their distinguishing trait does not prevent the group from contributing meaningfully to society.

• It turned out Judge Walker did not need to make the case for sexual orientation as a suspect classification (requiring strict scrutiny) because he determined that Proposition 8 did not even pass "rational basis review." What's that? Well, if strict scrutiny is the highest standard of judicial review, rational basis review is the lowest standard. It demands only the barest rational justification for the unequal treatment of one group of people over another (e.g., 18-year-olds are allowed to drive but 12-year-olds aren't). The judge apparently thought Proposition 8 was so discriminatory it couldn't even clear the lowest hurdle of review.

• Some say that sexual orientation is currently being treated as a "quasi" suspect classification where an intermediate standard of review is being applied. Whatever the case, it's clear that whichever standard of review ends up being used, at minimum you have to come up with a rational reason for treating gay and lesbian people differently than everyone else. You have to show that their sexual orientation makes them psychologically unstable, less capable of contributing to society, morally inferior, a danger to others, or something of that nature, and you have to provide evidence that this is true of them as a class. There are simply fewer and fewer psychiatrists, sociologists and historians who are willing to stand up in court and testify as an objective fact that gay people are inferior to straights across the board.

So here's the takeaway. "Discrimination" in the legal sense shouldn't be taken as a word people are using just to sound off about their feelings or suspicions or political leanings. Laws that target specific classes of people for unequal treatment must be examined with the greatest of care, otherwise we are in danger of discrimination. We are in danger of legalizing the treatment of certain types of people as inferior human beings.

When Attorney General Jack Conway said, "I came to the inescapable conclusion that if I [defended this case], I would be defending discrimination. That I will not do," he wasn't capitulating to secular values but standing for his Christian beliefs. Opposing discrimination is very much a Christian moral issue because our Constitution, in its own methodical, pedantic way, upholds the principle that all human beings should be treated with dignity as creatures made in God's image.

We think we are being a good Christian testimony when we take a moral stand against same-sex civil marriage. But it may be that the message we are really sending to outsiders is that we think gay and lesbian people are less deserving of legal protection, fairness, dignity and respect than everyone else. If that's not how we want to be understood, then like the attorney general we should start concerning ourselves with the more fundamental moral issue of opposing discrimination, and leave the moral question of gay sex to the 5% of our society's population for whom it is personally and directly relevant.

The comments section: my four and a half year experiment

On June 24, 2009 I enabled the comments section of this blog in order to participate in "Synchroblog Day" on which I and sixty other bloggers addressed the same question on how to bridge the gap in our conversations about faith and sexuality. Until that point I didn't allow comments on this blog. However, I decided to try it since the whole point of the synchroblog experiment was to interact with other bloggers and share readers' reactions. Afterward I kept the comments section enabled to see what would come of it.

These past four and a half years, I've learned that the readers of this blog are far more respectful and restrained than some of the commenters I've read on other blogs. I've gotten to know many of you better from the comments you've left. I've seen encouraging feedback and thoughtful interaction. Some of you have shared prayer requests or put up links to additional material that might be of interest to other readers. I'm grateful for all the good that's come out of that kind of sharing.

All that said and acknowledged, I think it's time to close off the comments section once again. I came to this conclusion because I am also a big reader of blogs and websites, and lately I've noticed that there has been an increasingly negative feeling toward comments sections in general. You read a great article that makes excellent points and you wonder what's not to like. Then along comes the comments section. It's not that there aren't worthwhile comments being made by people who actually read and understood the article. It's that what usually carries the day are the inflammatory remarks on tangential points, and the long thread of debate that results.

The outcome is that a lot of intelligent people are discouraged from posting feedback because they don't want to be attacked by those who just like to be inflammatory. No one likes to "toss their pearls before swine," to use the biblical metaphor. So my suspicion is that many of the people whose feedback would be most worth reading aren't sharing it, at least not publicly.

I've been a long time fan and supporter of Andrew Sullivan's blog The Dish and have benefitted from much of his wisdom about blogging when I first started out. The Dish has never had a comments section, which for one thing makes it more pleasant to read. Instead Andrew will often share excepts of what readers email to him privately, and I've noticed that they are some of the most memorable and insightful contributions I've seen published on any blog. What you write privately to an audience of one individual is more honest and free than what you will say publicly before strangers. In a public forum some of the best stuff necessarily gets held back.

I've jumped on the bandwagon of having a comments section for the past four and a half years, but now I'd like to go back to the way things were.

If there are any posts or links from any of the past comments sections on this blog that you would like to copy and save for yourself, I will keep those available until the end of this month (March). But after that I am closing it all down. Blogger assures me that comments won't be erased but merely hidden on this blog, so if there is something you would like to retrieve after I've already closed down the comments section, email me and I will send you a copy of what you want.

Come April send me your feedback by email. If I want to share what you've written in a post I will ask your permission to do so.

Thanks, everyone.

"Spiritual Friendship"

Check out Spiritual Friendship, a blog founded by Ron Belgau and Wesley Hill, where a solid line-up of Side B gay Christian writers reflect on celibacy as a positive calling and vocation, attempting to get away from the largely negative message of the evangelical church that celibacy is all about "don't do this" and "don't do that."

In this recent interview by Martyn Jones, Wes Hill explains:

Jesus had some very counter-cultural things to say about family, and he ended up relativizing its importance (Matthew 12:46-50). What ultimately mattered to him was no longer marriage and the begetting of children; he required absolute loyalty to himself, and for some people this meant renouncing marriage and childbearing for the sake of the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 19:12). Because we’ve downplayed those themes in evangelicalism, we haven’t really been motivated to think hard about how to support the celibate vocation and how its witness could enrich—or, to switch the metaphor, be folded into and knit together with—the vocation to marriage.

. . . I’d like to see all kinds of things change in our churches: I’d like more teaching from our pulpits and classrooms about the why and how of celibacy (lots of biblical material to draw from here, especially 1 Corinthians 7). I’d like to see single people integrated into all levels of ministry, from committees and task forces to pastoral teams and vestries and Sunday School teachers. I’d like to see every after-church meal (whether in the fellowship hall or in members’ homes) include an odd number of chairs. I’d love to see singles feeling free to invite married people over for lunch or dinner without being afraid of getting head-patting comments about how nice it is that a single person knows how to cook!

I would add, if I may, that I'd like to see more gay celibate men ordained to the gospel ministry. As long as straight conservative Christians like to advocate celibacy as a solution for gay Christians, then such churches should be willing to ordain many of them as those who have a calling similar to the apostle Paul's.

He who is unmarried cares for the things of the Lord--how he may please the Lord. But he who is married cares about the things of the world--how he may please his wife. -- 1 Corinthians 7:32-33

For other counter-cultural musings that ruffle feathers all around--whether in the conservative church, the liberal church or the secular world--please check out Spiritual Friendship.

Welcome aboard!

The newest members to join this blog are:

Bea
Quoiabean
Kanani
jkrunsalot
Yoja Young
Bill Baldwin
Mark Grassman

Thanks, guys!

On having gay friends, part 2

In a previous post I already talked about what it means to have gay friends, and you may have gathered from what I discussed that most of them are Christians. Gay Christians, to use the controversial term. So what do we talk about? No doubt many people think that my conversations with gay Christians centers around sex, sex, and more sex. How do I stomach it? Either I am extraordinarily tolerant, or there is something seriously wrong with me.

Actually it's neither. To give you an idea of what I mean, how many of you have straight Christian friends? Show of hands. Now, how often do you discuss sex with any of them? Over pancakes at IHOP? Over coffee in the fellowship hall? During play dates? I'd expect the two most popular answers would be: Rarely or Never. Well, that pretty much sums up my own experience with gay Christian friends. And I'm leaning toward Never.

What do we talk about then? I suppose everything you ought to talk about when you count honest fellowship time as precious and rare. When I talk to gay Christians, the unspoken rule seems to be that nothing is off the table. Everything is okay, this is a judgment-free zone. I don't sense the usual barriers of pride, or the subtle game of spiritual one-upmanship. I can talk about having doubts, for instance. I can talk about being angry with God. I can talk about depression and disillusionment. I don't always talk about these things, and I make sure I do my share of listening. But knowing I can talk about them is what makes the difference.

You see, gay Christians face a problem with many of their straight Christian friends. Either they have to keep their conversation superficial because their friends don't know they are gay. Or if these friends do know, they still have to keep the conversation superficial because most straights get uncomfortable or even hostile when it comes to honest talk about the struggles and challenges of being gay.  

But gay Christians aren't the only ones who have to do the stifling. A lot of straight Christians can also relate to the depressing reality that sometimes church is the last place you are allowed to share your real problems. Like when your marriage is about to collapse. Or your teenager is cutting herself. Or you suffer depression from the secret abortion you had ten years ago.

When you're aching for fellowship that's authentic and truthful, you need to seek out people who know what it really means to walk by faith through deep waters, who won't judge you as you flounder through your own journey. And if you know what I'm talking about then you'll understand why my gay Christian friends are such a treasure to me. They are a blessing and a gift from God. I wish everyone would avail themselves of such a blessing, but if not, I'd be more than happy to enjoy it all for myself.

Some brief remarks about "Duck Dynasty"

I don't watch "Duck Dynasty" but I get an idea of what the show is about from what I've heard. There are three reasons I think A&E's move to suspend Phil Robertson from the series is highly unfortunate.

First, the whole point of the show, as I understand it, is to showcase what redneck Christian fundamentalists are really like. A&E profits from people's fascination with (and perhaps identification with) the Robertson family. If Phil Robertson makes offensive and ignorant remarks about homosexuality, is this shocking news? What else is a reality TV show for except to give us glimpses of what real people are like? Now A&E is punishing the guy for being exactly the type of person that they are exploiting for profit. Why did they even air the show in the first place?

Second, why not trust the public to decide how they want to take Phil Robertson's remarks? Let the viewers decide if they want to send in fan mail or hate mail, or whether they want to support or pity or have mixed feelings about a guy who compares same-sex relationships with bestiality. I think the general public would not have supported what Phil Robertson said in GQ, and he would have effectively hung himself. But now that the man is being shut down, it creates instant sympathy for him. Even I'm feeling sympathy for him, even though I found his remarks to be offensive and troubling.

Third, GLAAD's successful crusade against the show only plays into the hands of conservative Christians who have been claiming for years that the "homosexual agenda" is all about taking away freedom of speech from people who uphold the belief that homosexual practice is sinful. I, for one, am tired of hearing from Christians who are practically begging to be persecuted by gays and lesbians so that they can justify being even more morally outraged against homosexuality than they already are. Score one for them thanks to this fiasco. As a straight ally who is trying to help my fellow Christians understand gay issues better from within the conservative church, this sure doesn't make my life any easier.

Where does the difference lie?

Recently our family had an opportunity to do some emergency hospitality. A teenage girl needed a place to stay for about a week. She was pregnant and homeless and living on the streets. I found out about the need from my pastor, who found out from another pastor out of state, who found out from one of his congregation members.

For a long time we had been prepared to take someone into our home in an emergency. There were a couple of years when I was regularly corresponding with a gay friend whom I felt certain was going to end up on the street because of a volatile home situation. I always imagined the living room couch and extra bathroom stood ready for the day of his phone call. But this situation of a pregnant teenager was not at all what I had in mind.

To protect the privacy of everyone involved, I'm reluctant to say much more about it except that it turned out to be a tremendous blessing for two reasons. One, our young guest felt like a part of our family and became like a daughter to me. Two, I saw Christians come together to help her in ways that I didn't know was possible. Nobody judged, everyone lent a hand and gave a word of encouragement. The out-of-state congregation member kept in touch with us every day. Someone else was securing a job for the girl and a more permanent living arrangement somewhere across the country. Another person was buying the plane tickets to get her there.

I was on the phone with two doctors' offices and three crisis pregnancy centers, trying to secure an ultrasound appointment. Some of these places, I could tell, were Christian-run organizations. I didn't want the girl to be subjected to high-pressure tactics about what decision she should be making. She was a professing Christian, and I felt she had a better chance of making the right decision if she were given safety, space and the right encouragement. These pregnancy counselors understood that. There were no threats or condemning pronouncements, only helpful medical information, a chance to see the tiny beating heart on the ultrasound screen, and some free gifts like a baby blanket and tiny knit hat that she could take home with her. Nobody told her they were loving her in spite of her sin. Nobody told her that if she made the wrong decision she wasn't a Christian. Nobody told her that if she had an abortion she would be going to hell.

Apparently the Spirit of Jesus Christ still lives in the church. I was--I freely admit--shocked by the graciousness, the generosity, the compassion and the hospitality I saw in the random Christian strangers I came into contact with during those seven days. After years of being immersed in stories of the cruel, heartless, inhumane treatment of gay and lesbian people by their churches, I guess I'd been starving to see the gospel in action. For one week of my life I felt like I was a part of something great, the church of Jesus Christ working together as the hands and feet of a vast spiritual body to serve someone in need.

Now, in the aftermath, I am left wondering when can we transfer that generous, open-hearted love to the gay and lesbian people in our churches? I wonder when can I stop crying myself to sleep over another gay friend who tells me he would rather be dead than face a Christian father's hatred? I wonder when I won't have to go through weeks of torture because I hadn't heard back from a depressed gay friend who has been all but spit upon by his church, and can only imagine that he's lying alone in his apartment with a bullet through his brain?

Would it help Christians to imagine that a lesbian daughter who is contemplating a same-sex relationship is not much different than a pregnant teenage daughter who is contemplating an abortion? As a Christian parent, if your teenage daughter got pregnant, would you kick her out of the house? If you found out she had an abortion, would you tell her she is an abomination and is going to hell? The angry part of you might want to, but the sane part of you knows that she is a sinner, and desperate sinners commit desperate sins and this is why Jesus had to die for us. This is the situation where you most need to preach gospel hope, not drive a stake through her heart and walk away. And as tempting as it may be to point out the differences between the two situations ("My lesbian daughter defends her relationship! She wouldn't defend an abortion!"), isn't the real difference in our own heart attitude? Why is there such a difference? Why does there have to be?

Hymn of the month

My favorite hymn is "O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go" because every time I sing it, I think about the story behind it. It was written by a forty-year-old preacher named George Matheson. Matheson was born in 1842 in Glasgow, Scotland, the eldest of eight children and the only one with poor eyesight. He needed powerful glasses to help him see, yet he was a brilliant student with aspirations to become a minister. His very supportive sisters rallied around him and learned Greek, Hebrew and Latin so they could help him in his studies. By age twenty he was almost completely blind, and the woman he hoped to marry rejected him because she didn't think she could be married to a blind man. Yet his eldest sister was always at his side as he entered the ministry, assisting him at home and with his sermons. Soon Matheson became quite famous as a preacher, and many people didn't know he was blind because he could recite his sermons and huge portions of Scripture from memory.

Then came the day for his sister, the one he relied upon so much for help and companionship, to get married. The night of her wedding, while the rest of his family was staying elsewhere, Matheson was alone at the manse and experiencing "severe mental suffering." Some speculate that it was not just his sister's marriage, but the reminder of his own rejection from marriage years ago that caused him so much pain. In that moment he wrote this hymn, which he said took about five minutes. It turned out to be his most lasting legacy. Matheson died at age 64, having never married.

O Love that wilt not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

O Light that follow'st all my way,
I yield my flick'ring torch to thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in thy sunshine's blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.

O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be.

O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life's glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.

On having gay friends

Remember how it was when you were a kid and your mom talked about you in the third person to someone else while you were standing right there? Annoying, yes? Well, I'm about to do a similarly annoying thing--which is one of the difficult things about having a blog that is read by people on both sides of a divide. I would like to talk to straights about what it means to have a gay friend, which obligates me to talk about my friendships with some of you guys who read this site in that annoyingly objectifying third-person way. Sorry, I hope this is not too off-putting. Most of all, I hope the day comes when it will no longer be necessary to have to write a post like this.

But it is necessary to write this post. Because quite often when I talk about having gay friends to straights, I get the odd feeling that I wasn't supposed to bring that up, like talking about some unmentionable tattoo you got in your wild days. Or occasionally I'll be congratulated on my great condescension to befriend people who are "so different" and yet who are, of course, "sinners like ourselves"--a humbling lesson for us all as we go about being light and salt in a dark world.

In the former situation, I never manage to feel as embarrassed as everyone expects. In the latter situation I am embarrassed, because I just stand there taking undeserved credit while some well-meaning person goes on and on praising my supposed piety.

So allow me to clear the air and talk about what it means when I say I am friends with someone who is gay or lesbian.

For me, the first rule of friendship is that I have to like this person. I don't make friends with people I don't like (and neither should you, by the way). Fortunately, it's not difficult for me to find things I like about people who are thoughtful, honest, introspective, compassionate and courageous, which fits the profile of many gay and lesbian people I know simply because of kind of hardships they've been through. I also like people who think outside the box, have a sense of humor, and understand that life can be disappointing so that they appreciate how things like a good meal, good conversation or a decent movie can get you through the day. Now, you may not care for the crowd I hang with, and that's fine. My point is, being friends with someone who is gay should have nothing to do with heroism, condescension or even tolerance. When you're friends with someone, gay or otherwise, you should enjoy hanging with them.

You might object that loving people is more important than liking them, so shouldn't I be emphasizing that instead? I know that love is supposed to be biblical and all, yet I've become somewhat suspicious of that approach. I've noticed that we tend to justify committing all sorts of abuses and cruelties against people in the name of love (at least our idea of love), particularly against our gay friends and family members. Don't ask me why. All I know is that if you work on how you're going to "be loving" toward someone who is gay, you're liable to say or do something very un-Christian. But if you work on liking someone, you'll have a much better chance of being like Christ to them.

Second, I am friends with people I have stuff in common with. I'm a Christian so I have gay Christian friends. I'm conservative in my theology and many of my political beliefs, so I tend to have gay friends who are theologically and/or politically conservative. I'm a seminary grad, a former pastor's wife and currently an elder's wife, so I have gay friends who are involved in the ministry. You get the idea.

I bring up this obvious point because I have a feeling that some people, when they hear me talk about having gay friends, wonder how I manage to befriend that guy marching in the pride parade with only his army boots and a leather thong. Truth is, I probably don't have much in common with that guy so I don't end up befriending him. See how simple that is? Now, I did have a good friend (now deceased) who was an atheist and a frequenter of leather bars. But we shared similar political views, a dry sense of humor, a passion for writing, and various nerdy intellectual interests. We talked about those things, and once in a while we'd discuss atheism and religious belief, but we didn't talk about leather bars, which I knew next to nothing about anyhow.

Third, friendship is a two-way street. My friends are people who are helpful to me as I am to them, who encourage me as I encourage them, and who understand me as I seek to understand them. And unless they are atheist, we will even pray for one another. This brings us back to the problem with "love" because here is where I think Christians get tripped up. Sometimes when you determine that you are going to "love" another person, you subtly start viewing that person as someone who needs you, not as someone whom you need just as much. And since this person who is the object of your great loving affection needs you, your approval and your advice so much, that gives you the right to be stern, instructive and somewhat overbearing, particularly when you believe you know what is best for them.

On the other hand, if someone is truly your friend, then you ought to have the humility to recognize that you can't just say whatever the heck you want, because if you drive them away you are hurting yourself too. You will be more gentle, more respectful, and make a genuine effort to be winsome and helpful. If you hurt that person and they walk away, you won't smugly tell yourself that "that's just the collateral damage of speaking the truth in love." You would feel quite devastated, and you wouldn't rest until you made things right.

Now you might be saying, "This is all fine and good, but where am I going to find gay or lesbian friends whom I like, with whom I have stuff in common, and whom I genuinely value having in my life?" The answer is, you probably already have them in your life, they just haven't come out to you yet. So I suppose for most of you who are reading this, the best way to go about having gay friends is this: don't reject the friends you already have when they do come out to you. Stay the course. Remember that you like this person, you like hanging with them, and that's why you're friends. And if this friend has trusted you so much that he or she is willing to come out to you, your friendship with them should deepen, not grow more distant.

Where we're at with ex-gay ministries

Conservative evangelicals may want to believe that Alan Chambers' recent apology and the unanimous decision by Exodus International's Board of Directors to shut the organization down are all about caving in to the pressures of the "homosexual agenda." But for those of us who've been following the ex-gay movement over the years, it's just the last bastion to fall amidst an avalanche of evidence and testimony that ex-gay ministries don't work.

Back in June 30, 2007 I attended the first Ex-Gay Survivor Conference in Irvine, CA where I was with a gathering of people who testified not only to the failure of ex-gay ministries but the spiritual and psychological devastation such ministries cause. I had already been aware of the non-success of reparative therapy, that was nothing new. But being at this conference showed me that ministries like Exodus International were simply churning out a growing army of credible witnesses against its claims of orientation change. It would only be a matter of time before that number would reach a critical mass. Something was going to give, and with Alan Chambers' recent announcement about the closing down of Exodus International, it looks like that moment has arrived.

To be clear, this is not a case of ex-gay ministries producing both the success stories and the not-so-successful stories, with the not-so-successful ones grabbing more media attention. I'm in my thirteenth year of knowing gay and lesbian Christians and talking to them about their experiences, and I've never met a single person who credibly testified to having a successful orientation change. What's more, I've never even met someone who knew someone who had such a testimony.

I'm not talking about ex-gay poster boys and girls who are willing to testify to some type of "change" loosely defined. There are plenty of people around who talk glowingly of their "diminishing desires," opposite-sex marriages, and of leaving behind "the lifestyle." What I'm talking about is a credible orientation change from homosexual to heterosexual.

Shall I be more specific? A credible example of orientation change would be a man, who once could only get physically aroused by looking at naked men, who has changed so that he can now only get physically aroused by looking at naked women. Not only is the girlie porn giving him a physical response, but it has become a temptation. He may even be sneaking onto the Internet at night to look at it. Now if this accurately describes our transformed guy's behavior, then I would be willing to knight him a bonafide heterosexual male. Anything short of that is just a big pile of so-what.

When you hang out with a lot of gay Christians and hear them talking amongst themselves, you discover that going through an ex-gay phase in life is like a running joke with them. Been There, meet Done That. It's like being at a reunion of war veterans. How many years were you in it? How badly were you traumatized? How are you doing now? There are some who try to defend ex-gay therapy a little, saying they weren't too traumatized and they did grow spiritually from it. Then there are others who were so hurt they won't even discuss it. The one conversation you never hear is people reminiscing about their amazing experience of finding out what real heterosexual feelings are like.

You can say that I'm hanging out with the wrong crowd, and to be fair there are still plenty of ex-gay Christians out there who are true believers in the miracle that awaits them. But for these ex-gay loyalists, I find that the story is always about being on a journey toward a great hope. Maybe orientation change hasn't happened for them yet, but they have faith that they are well on their way, and what right do you have to take that hope away from them?

A conversation between ex-gays and ex-gay survivors reminds me of the sticky interaction between teenagers and their parents. A teenager who is just starting out on the journey of life has hopes and aspirations. He or she feels a bit touchy about having his or her decision to become, say, an art major criticized. He or she doesn't want to hear a lecture about "when I was your age" or "someday when you're older you'll understand." The parents, on the other hand, have been down that road already. They remember what it's like to have rosy ideals and remember also the disappointment of shattered dreams. They don't want to rain on their teen's party, but they don't want to have to say "I told you so" years down the line either. What can you do about a person with such aspirations except to let them continue on the journey and find out for themselves where it leads? The problem with this analogy is that it does break down at one point, which is that it isn't too hard to find successful art majors who have proven their parents wrong.

People joined, though I did nothing

Nine new followers joined while I was on hiatus. Thanks, guys. I'm glad this blog can still be a resource and help to many of you even when I'm on break.

Sharlene
Jonathan Hugus
Ronald S. Batson
Lisa S.
Tristan Fugatt
Leigh Miller
Theresa
Random Christian
Gay Christian

Thanks, also, to those of you who were praying for me. Some of the worst stress is over, and I'm hoping the rest of 2013 will be smoother sailing.

Ordinary people

The culture war is getting kind of lop-sided these days. President Obama has announced he is in favor of civil same-sex marriage. The military has dropped Don't Ask Don't Tell. A conservative lawyer has led the challenge against California's Proposition 8. Alan Chambers has backed away from Exodus's former claims that gay people can "change." And a veteran NBA player has come out as gay. All this may be an indication that saner minds are finally starting to prevail on this issue. Or it could mean that Satan is implementing a grand plan to blind weak and faithless minds through cultural influence and the secular media.

For a conservative Christian like myself who supports the more open stance society is taking toward gay and lesbian people, the issue is not about whether I believe or disbelieve the secular media, or whether I am choosing to go with or against the flow of our cultural times. I was in favor of civil same-sex marriage, critical of ex-gay therapy, and wanted the abolition of DADT all the way back in 2000, before our society and secular media were entirely comfortable with those ideas. So it wasn't that I capitulated to culture, society and media, but rather it feels like those entities, over time, became weirdly in sync with where I'm at on those particular issues.

Basically, what I believe has happened is that most of the younger generation (and many in the older generation) have become persuaded by the same observations and understanding that persuaded me some thirteen years ago: that being gay isn't a lifestyle choice, political ideology, or consequence of rejecting God. Being gay is something that people find themselves to be--and as a result some gay or lesbian people may have to make choices about their politics, religion or lifestyle that may or may not be in step with those who have never wrestled with having a minority sexual orientation.

My view used to be that perverts are gay, the immoral are gay, the rebellious are gay. The difference now is that I think people are gay. By "people" I mean the "people in your life" people. People that life insurance ads appeal to. People who buy Coke instead of Pepsi, or vice versa. The people we mean when we say, "people like convenience" or "people want a president who cares." Once you see that people are gay, that changes everything.

But the fact is, you can't see gay people as people unless you come to realize it for yourself. This is not something you are convinced of by simply reading a blog post. For instance, back when I still had the idea that only rebellious, perverted child molesters were gay, I would "push back" in my mind against anything I encountered that seemed to contradict my view. In early 2000 when my thinking was still in transition, I once saw a story about a high school kid, the quarterback and team captain of the school football team, who came out to his teammates as gay and was well received. I was annoyed that the secular media didn't highlight the moral issue of being gay and simply presented it as a touchy-feely, triumph-of-the-human-spirit thing. I pushed back at the story with my mind because it wasn't a Christian presentation, and I ended up rejecting the whole thing.

But upon later reflection, I realized that I missed the whole point of the story. Sure, there are moral issues about being gay when you approach it from a Christian perspective. But the more foundational question is, who is this person to begin with? Your standard issue pervert? Or just a high-school kid, feeling like he needed to be honest with his teammates, so scared he was shaking when he stood in front of them in the locker room and came out, finding relief once the truth was out and his family and friends accepted him.

Whatever moral journey that high school kid might take from that point on in his life, you have to recognize that it is a person who is going to make that journey. You have to ask yourself, what you would do if you were in his shoes? It is a question you only ask when you recognize that he is someone just like yourself.

And that circles us back to approaching this boy's story, and everyone's story, from a Christian moral perspective. When Jesus says "love your neighbor as yourself," he is saying that in order to fulfill our primary moral obligation to another person, we must first put ourselves in his or her shoes, so that we would know how to love them. We must first treat them like people. Because even Jesus recognized that neighbors are people.

Be back soon

Sorry for my recent absence on this blog, guys, but I have a couple of major ongoing stresses I'm dealing with. Over the past weeks I tried getting started on at least three blog posts, yet I wasn't able to finish. I haven't forgotten about all of you.