A House Divided

As I continue to write this blog, I praise God for the fact I have at least one regular reader, my mentor, my friend and sometimes my nightmare, “the Questing Parson. If you have not checked out his blog you should, it is one of the best.

He told me in e-mail;

“Blogging, when one takes it seriously, brings more discipline, more clarity of thought, and more desire to inform one’s self. I’m betting you’re going to start doing more reading and studying than you ever imagined.”

Of course he was right.

I read an old sermon by Dr. L. Bruce Miller of Robertson-Wesley United Church of Christ from Alberta, Canada. His sermon was about Canada’s Supreme Court decision to include in the Human Rights portion of the constitution the words “sexual orientation”. He likens this to the resurrection of Christ.

He sees the gay, lesbian community being dead spiritually. Through no fault of their own, but rather the Church is killing them. The methodology for killing us is through its lethargy and apathy, by tolerating and perpetuating institutions and patterns of death rather than life. He states that resurrection is about transformation.

“Transforming from death to life, from spiritual alienation and estrangement to spiritual fulfillment and genuine connectedness to others.”

He goes on to give several life-transforming examples including the high court’s decision.

He has a point. Our LGBT community is under going a slow death. It is a very deliberately planned and well-carried out death sentence.

Something as simple as safe housing for Trans folks seems to be a good example. Recently, there was the denial of safe housing for one who did nothing wrong except express her correct gender. None of the shelters in Atlanta would open their doors to this pre-op male to female trans person. I might also add that several “main-line Christian organizations and churches” refused to help as well. The cost for this person of God was much too high.

After losing her job, her family, and ultimately being denied a safe place to rest, she took her own life by placing a .357 into her mouth and pulling the trigger. How very sad, especially when a little compassion and guts might have saved her life. Before people say, “Well she could have come to us, we would have helped”.

Atlanta is a big city and very few churches are marketing themselves as being progressive, welcoming and a place where there are no walls. Come on if we are honest LGBT issues in most churches is really more like “Don’t ask, don’t tell” because pastor’s doesn’t want to split the church. LGBT issues are spoken of in a whisper. It is no big surprise she did not find you.

Yet, I am even more terrified, because this is happening right in front of the leadership of the GLBT community and they are too busy trying to fit in to see it. We as a community have become too focused on being acceptable and respectable.

I am terrified because we (LGBT folks) are trying to hold hands with the very institution perpetuating a genocide. Like those living the “battered wife syndrome” we keep going back for more because

“we just know they will change”

.

My friends might be saying: “How are we doing this?” We are doing this by trying to blend in and be a part of the church rather than calling it out in truth and claiming our rightful place within the creation of God. While the Church is telling us we are loved…under the radar the Church is telling us we are an abomination.

The Lutherans are saying, “we will ordain you to ministry, but don’t have sex.”

The Roman Catholics say, “come to church just don’t take communion, have sex or want to get married. “If one of our priests messes up, we will cover it up.”

There is a part of the Episcopal Church that not only doesn’t want gay folks in ministry but they don’t want women either so they have declared war. They say they haven’t but what else would you call it when you set up your own church within a church?

The United Methodist Church, oh God where do I go with this, let it suffice to say as a former member of the UMC “people who live in glass houses ought not being throwing stones at the LGBT community under any circumstances”.

By bringing this up I will be told I am bashing the Church. Yet one cannot get away from the evil effects of abusive and oppressive use of the Bible and religion against the LGBT community.

We are systematically taught that we are evil, that we choose to be homosexual and that we are depraved.

In our deepest being we wonder: “Am I going to hell?” “Could this love I feel for my partner not be of God”? So we fear by being different from the majority we will go to hell. So we do everything we can to say we are not different.

We buy the slogan, “The one who dies with the most toys wins.” We let affirmative action go by the wayside because it is race discrimination rather then equal opportunity. We tell people in our own community what is morally correct because it is so by interpretation of the scripture by the Church. The same Church, by the way, that says we are an abomination in the sight of God.

The same Church that says women must submit to men.

The same Church that says they are pro life and than willingly support the snuffing out the life of another human being by lethal injection. This is nothing more then late term abortion, but then what do I know.

The same Church that says women do not have a place in the pulpit.

The same Church that if their “cash-cow” pastor gets a divorce will change the rules so the cash keeps coming in.

The same Church that will punish a “progressive” congregation in the inner city by sending it a pastor from the suburbs who will then destroy all evidence of progressive thought in less then a year.

We in the GLBT community must stop deceiving ourselves. This is not political or about an institution. This is about our soul.

We must begin to speak the truth of God’s love for all people. We must speak this truth as a whole creation of God, rather then some freaky “love that dare not speak its name”. We must make this claim with the full knowledge that we are uniquely and wonderfully made in the image of God.

We must begin celebrating our gifts because we are gay, lesbian, bi or transgendered and God has something for us to do, something to give back to this world.

We can no longer be content not to be fired from our jobs, get insurance benefits or live quietly in the suburbs.

We must talk about our history, our heroes. We must act rather the react. We must point out that some of the best; the brightest and most articulate people of the world have come from the LGBT community. One of God’s gifts to the world.

We must point out that in blighted urban areas, it is our talented and creative community who rebuilds and puts life back into the area.

We must talk about how in the midst of our young dying that we have taught the world how to die with dignity and to live life to the fullest.

We must confront and refute the blatant lies and fear mongering of the religious bigots. Now is not the time to sit quietly in the comfort of our homes while the LGBT youth of the world continue to die, get beat to the point of death or drown out who they are in alcohol and drugs.

I ponder the same question that Jesus asked so long ago when he asked: “What does one profit if they gain the whole world but sacrifice their soul?” My fear is if we continue on our current path, we might gain the world but we will have lost our souls.

I would rather travel the path that shouts loudly and clearly,

“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

(Romans 8:38-39 New International Version)