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Tuesday, July 25, 2006

Real Christians Fight Intolerance

By Rev. Jim Rigby for AlterNet.

July 14, 2006

Progressive Christians tend to be non-judgemental and to feel that challenging the intolerance of others is itself intolerant. For that reason we often sit by silently when Fundamentalist Christians criticize homosexual persons. We tend to think of this as being open minded. Not that long ago, it was considered consistent to be a Christian, and yet, hold slaves. The day came when slavery was understood as an affront to the gospel itself. I want to suggest that the day has come when Christians must declare that gay bashing is an attack on the gospel and that real Christians do not participate in any form of discrimination. Several years ago, I was asked to do the funeral of a gay man who had been beaten to death in a hate crime. At that time, I had never thought deeply about the danger many gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people face in this culture. That week as I worked on the service, I kept hearing a local "Christian" radio station blaming gay and lesbian people for everything wrong in America. By the end of the week I understood the link between religious hate speech and the funeral I was performing.

I know that critics of homosexuality do not consider themselves to be hateful. They would say they "love the sinner but hate the sin." If the shoe were on the other foot, however, and someone were attacking their families, trying to take their children away, and constantly working to pass legislation to deprive them of basic civil rights, at some point they would understand that "homophobia" is too mild a word for such harassment. "Hatred" is the only proper term. I was raised in Dallas, Texas and had classmates who were in the Klan. I remember that they did not consider themselves to be attacking other people. They perceived themselves to be defenders of Christian America. Their "religion" consisted of an unrelenting attack on people who were black, Jewish or homosexual. If anyone challenged these views, these Klan members considered themselves under attack and believed that their right to free exercise of religion was being threatened. In other words, they felt that harassing other people was a protected expression of their own religious faith.

In the Gospel, biblical literalists and judgmental people were the negative example in many of the stories. The point of those stories was to teach us the hypocrisy of judgmental religion. When a woman was caught in adultery, the Biblical literalists lined up to protect family values. They pointed out that the Bible literally says that adulterers are to be stoned. If Jesus took the Bible seriously, they claimed, he would have to participate in the mandated biblical punishment of an adulteress. Instead of following scripture, Jesus tells the woman to get her life together and tells everyone else to drop their stones of judgment. The only way to take this story seriously is to conclude that real Christians don't use the bible to condemn other people.

It violates the teaching of Christ to say that God will get angry if America does not confront homosexuality as a sin. Jesus did not mention homosexuality and it is a lie to say he did. Furthermore, Jesus said "Judge not or you will be judged." These false prophets are saying "Judge or else you will be judged." Jesus was kind and understanding, but he was not silent about those who abused the vulnerable. He called them "wolves in sheep's clothing." Christians must follow the example of Jesus and confront those vicious predators who use the Christian religion as a camouflage for bullying. We must be as understanding and kind as we can be, but to be tolerant of the oppression of others is not true tolerance. I believe the time has come to say that genuine followers of Jesus Christ do not participate in discrimination against gay and lesbian persons. Is it intolerant to challenge intolerance? Are we doing the same thing as those we are challenging?

Gay bashing is not just an opinion, it is an assault. Just as the Klan did, religious fundamentalists have a right to believe that homosexuality is a sin. They even have a right to preach a message of hate. But when they harass people in public, it is time for Christians to rise to challenge their intolerance. We have an obligation to protect our neighbors from harassment and slander, especially when it is done in our name. It is time to say that gay bashing is not only wrong, it is unchristian. If Christianity is grace, then judgment is the ultimate apostasy. If Christianity is love, then cruelty is the ultimate heresy.

9 comments:

Juggling Mother said...

As a child, I only came into contact with moderate religious people most of the time. I assumed the fanatics were the tiny minority - and all lived in those nice closed communities you see dotted around all the big cities. I was tolerant of religion.

As I've grown older I've met more and more of those fanatics - not he gun-toting suicide bombers that the media show, but the bigoted, closed mi nded, dogma-spouting fanatics that live all around us.

I find myself less and less tolerant of them as they encroach further and further into my everyday life. I don't tell them how to live their home life, what right do they have to tell me how to live mine?

snaars said...

I shudder to think that I went through a period of several years where I bought into all the things the "religious right" teaches about homosexuality.

Then I enrolled in an English course taught by a gay professor. It was "The Scripture in Literature." All of us students knew/strongly suspected that the professor was gay.

It was about three weeks into the semester when he "came out", officially. At the time, I thought the man was immoral for living the lifestyle he did, but I respected him for his courage in making a stand during class. About half of his students dropped the class because they couldn't handle being taught about scripture from someone who was so "immoral."

I had never met a deeply religious gay man before. I saw that he was sincere, and had insight into many scriptures. Even though I disagreed with him often, he had thought through many issues more deeply than I had.

I was already in the process of coming to terms with inconsistencies and lies that I had been taught about scripture, so perhaps I was more open to hearing his views, than were my fellow classmates.

I grew to like him, I learned a lot from him, and the next time I had the opportunity I took another class with him.

CyberKitten said...

snaars: Cool story & welcome to my world.... [grin].

Personally I wouldn't care if my teacher was a slime creature from the planet Zerg as long as he/she/it was any good as a teacher. Why should I (or anyone) care what they get up to in their private life? I find the whole concept rather confusing.

OldLady Of The Hills said...

That article is a very hopeful piece of writing CK! If only more people agreed with this thinking and acted on it, you know? What a strange world we live in where so much thought is convoluted and re-interpreted by 'man'. "The Bible says..."....I have never understood how anyone totally accepts a book that was written by men...and re-written and changed God Knows how many times...And then there is the mis-quoting of this book, too! OY! Convoluted and Corrupted, too.

CyberKitten said...

Naomi said: I have never understood how anyone totally accepts a book that was written by men.

Me neither. The only thing I can think of is that some people *really* can't cope with uncertainty. a TOTAL belief in anything (not just the Bible) gives them that certainty. Have you noticed how some people who are always quoting Chapter & Verse have a look of fear about them and get really angry when you question them? They are like drowning men hanging on to anything to keep them afloat.

Mark said...

ahh another Reverend cherry picking God's word. "Jesus did not mention homosexuality and it is a lie to say he did."
Paul did, but I guess Paul was not writing the inspired word of God. If that is true, the Bible as a whole becomes reference material rendering it worthless. The good Rev Rigby is now on the same level as Rev Fred Phelps.. walking in Their OWN righteousness and Not Christ's Shame on both!

Read Matthew 5:20-26 and consider this:

'Let none suppose that Christ allows his people to trifle with any commands of God's holy law. No sinner partakes of Christ's justifying righteousness, till he repents of his evil deeds. The mercy revealed in the gospel leads the believer to still deeper self-abhorrence. The law is the Christian's rule of duty, and he delights therein. If a man, pretending to be Christ's disciple, encourages himself in any allowed disobedience to the holy law of God, or teaches others to do the same, whatever his station or reputation among men may be, he can be no true disciple. (Just as Rev Rigby is doing) Christ's righteousness, imputed to us by faith alone, is needed by every one that enters the kingdom of grace or of glory; but the new creation of the heart to holiness, produces a thorough change in a man's temper and conduct.'

If you claim to be a 'Christian' and minimize your sins, like 'Gay Christians' and many others do, you remain an enemy of God even has you sit in church. For me Not to tell you that, would be like watching you burn while holding a Fire Extinguisher.

CyberKitten said...

Welcome Mark.... Though I have a feeling that you're not going to like it here......

Mark said...

I don't uberchap, you missed my point perhaps.

Thanks for the welcome CyberKitten, our views may differ but I hold nothing personal towards anyone. If God has forgiven me, I certainly will forgive others. :)

CyberKitten said...

Welcome back uberchap. Glad you liked the article. It was pretty neat wasn't it - which is why I decided to post it of course!

As to the "shifty fearful Christians" I was talking from personal experience. Maybe I've only largely met that type. They certainly made the impression on me that their faith was based on a real 'fear of God' more than anything else. Maybe it can be explained by the fact that I grew up in a largely Catholic community...?

I agree about the 'angry atheists' - there are rather a lot of them about. I get rather annoyed at the condescension I have experienced myself at times though.

I think quite a bit of the anger is caused by the fact that, because of their basically opposed points of view, theists and atheists are talking different languages or at least different dialects. There's just enough information passing across the divide to produce anger, but not enough to produce understanding.

Mark - Oh, I'm sure that our views will differ quite a lot... but its not impossible that we might have some useful exchanges of ideas...!