That Big Ol' Table with All the Homeless and the Homosexuals

Stuff Christian Culture Likes’ Stephanie Drury argued, “You’d never see this many Christians lined up to help at a homeless shelter or food bank. And that’s something Jesus actually said to do.” And then it was added to a meme and went viral. It was a good question – and perhaps fair, though limited. In my experience, Christians tend to line up to do some work of charity – on occasion. Still, every Thanksgiving is more often than once, I guess.  That doesn’t mean that the entire enterprise is not above questioning. But we’ll get to that shortly.

The other night, my friend and fellow progressive Christian blogger Marching On and On turned those “God” quotes on their ear a bit. I reproduced on my Facebook page as a status update.

Dear Christian Right, while you were showing America how much you "love" me by stuffing your fat faces with chicken-fried-hate, half the world was dying of starvation.
- Jesus

There were other imaginary comments (‘cuz you know Jesus didn’t really say that, right?). Others that targeted NASA and self-reflection.

‎”Dear Science, while you spent $2.5 Billion on sending a camera to Mars, we were dying of starvation.
 - Half the World

"Dear Heath, while you are using your fat fingers to type out smart-Alec 'hard stances' on your extravagant smart phone, half the world is dying of starvation.
 – Jesus

If you’re like me, you’re tired of the CfA kerfuffle. But I think there are a lot of applicable points to make from the controversy – from this one-sided culture war*

I’ve got three critical points I’ll raise here, though. Well, two for today; the final point is gonna be stretched out for a moment or two later.

First, oftentimes conservative Christians and other members of the Religious Right -wait for it - are among the first responders in times of crises. They also tend to be generous in terms of giving. We can and probably should ask what they’re giving to, whether it’s effective or not, for what purpose, etc. But I think liberals and lefties tend to downplay this fact. We shouldn’t, because it needs to be acknowledged and taken into account for what it is. In a sense, it should also be commended; in other senses, not so much. But this fact is hardly to be condemned or mocked. They may not line around the block every single day to feed the poor, but they do line up to, for instance, serve soup kitchens or help stock the food pantry or help build houses. In my own experience at least, they do this often.

But that brings us to the second point: Often, Christians – whether conservative or liberal – tend to do things for the poor, rather than with. A soup kitchen is valuable for satiating the physically hungry on that day - at that moment. And serving at a soup kitchen also serves to satiate consciences of the spiritually hungry - those who are performing the service feel better about ourselves for a moment. Those of us who realize that there is something drastically wrong with the world, that somebody should do something about that, we want to and desire to find a release for that tension. We eat - they don't. There's a widening and friction-filled tension there and doing an act of service for those we deem the less fortunate helps to alleviate that tension.

This is an approach that effectively says that the better-off are actually better than those they serve. Can the homeless not share in the giving as well? Or are they not good enough?

Rather this: Can we all be welcome and eat at the same table, everybody bringing and giving and sharing and taking and creating and taking pleasure at what we have brought together? Can we accept the gifts of the homeless and the queer and the middle class and the single mother?

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*I say it’s a one-sided Cultural War because when one party is being attacked by another, that’s what it is – a one-sided war. Conservative Evangelicals and their Religious Right co-horts tend to buy into the concept of culture wars. The way it is framed, it looks like a two sided issue and that “both sides” (whatever that means) are equally invested in that. 

Galileo: King of Insight

The following beautiful response was written by a friend, artist Cameron Webb, to another friend. It was inspired in part by the Chick-Fil-A controversy, but it's much more than that. It is a conversation about the wonder and vastness of God's nature, about varied sexuality, about learning of the grandness of nature and the power that that distributes and the fear that that power grants to us all without discrimination. 
Importantly, this text is rooted in love and compassion and deep friendship. It is quoted with permission. Please feel free to share

All of the things that create a marriage, that sustain it, that make it holy - loving, caring, sacrificial giving on both sides as Christ loved and died for us - egalitarianism, nurturing, honoring, cherishing - all these things are what God ordained.

None of those things have anything to do with the race, gender, sexual orientation, able-ism (and handicapped people have been denied marriage rights in the past, and discriminated against in this same way, and in areas, still are today). God created this world with infinite variations. Male penguins and sea horses that care for the young, creatures that procreate in ways that blend gender and sex roles. There are animals that will literally change sex in certain instances. There are instances of homosexual couples in thousands of animals - a natural variation of the infinite incredible world that God has created.

Humans are no exception.

We are created just as varied. An infinite, complex diverse God created and ordained uniqueness that is so complex that each individual's combination of gender identity, orientation and sexual formation is unique to each and every one of us.

Heterosexuality is by far and away the dominant variation, just as many other variations are dominant throughout creation. But given all the variations of all the infinite creation, we have enshrined heterosexuality, paired it with a narrow definition of what gender traits must go with what, and we have made it an idol to be worshiped, to the exclusion of and condemning all of the rest of God's creation.

Remember, there was a firm belief in the Middle Ages that the earth was center of the universe, and the sun revolved around it - a belief held based on Biblical language. We know today that the poetic Spirit-breathed words of scripture of the universe do not, on the surface reading, explain the fact that the sun is in the center and the planets orbit it, as God ordained.

The upheaval of that realization left ruined lives due to the church's violent opposition. It was not until the 16th century that a fully predictive mathematical model of a heliocentric system was presented, by the Renaissance mathematician, astronomer, and Catholic cleric Nicolaus Copernicus of Poland, leading to the Copernican Revolution. In the following century, Johannes Kepler elaborated upon and expanded this model to include elliptical orbits, and supporting observations made using a telescope were presented by Galileo Galilei.

Galileo's Observatory: A. D. White Architectural Photographs, Cornell University Library 

All three men faced disdain, persecution by the church.

Copernicus waited until his death bed to publish his scientific findings for fear of the church; Galileo was threatened with torture and exiled to permanent house arrest for the remainder of his life for advocating the beautiful heliocentric solar system that today we praise God for.

Today, science is turning up more and more and more evidence faster and faster that substantiates the infinite and beautiful variations of human sex, orientation, and gender created so complexly by our Incredible creator.

The Bible is misquoted, mistranslated and out-right ignored and used, as it was used on Copernicus and Galileo, to support HUMAN prejudices and idolatry, all the while ignoring not only his infinite complex creation, but the true heart of marriage - to love, honor, cherish, and love as Christ loved us. Our marriages fail, because we do not nurture, cherish, honor and love one another as Christ loved us and died for us, as He loves and nurtures us still.

And as long as we focus on human prejudice - hatred and destruction of relationships - and refuse to honor God and all his stunning creation, we will live with this idea that marriage has to do with anything, but what God intended: to love and honor one another.

Knocking It Out

Trigger warning: Homophobia, parental abuse, spiritual abuse

Much negative publicity has formulated around the Beat the Gay out of Your Kids pastor (all types of triggers). As well it should. This pastor, who is incidentally in the same state as the Amendment One anti-equality bill, gave his congregants a special leniency to crack and punch (to applause and laughter) their four year old sons if they started acting “limp-wristed” in order to knock that problematic homosexuality out of them. He then went on to say that "butch" girls need to "dress themselves up" to be "beautiful" and "attractive". Because we all know that lesbians are ugly, right? And that, in order to become straight, all they need is to look purty.

My fear, though, is that in pointing to him as an example of extreme homophobia, we may be doing normal homophobia a bit of a solid. Opponents of equal rights use that example as they use the example of the God Hates Fags church. “At least we’re not like those guys. Those guys are sick, amirite?”

They continue:

BtGooYK Pastor is a bad man for even joking about violently disposing children of their homosexual behavior. At least we’re not like that. At least we don't purposefully beat them. Though we don't frown on bullying by their peers. If a kid wants to beat the gay out of another kid, who are we to stand in their way? We only seek to ex- their gayness by using shoddy psychiatry and shaming. We only seek to keep them from children because their gayness may catch on them – or they may practice their gayness on the kids, because that’s what the gays do. They do the gay with little kids. We only want to keep them from exercising the same rights straight folks have in openly declaring their love for another.

At least we’re not like those other guys, the say.

Soft-peddled homophobia is still homophobia. And just by getting caught, the hard-peddlers make it easier for the soft-peddlers to enforce their religious views on others. They can claim that they aren’t bigoted (and they may honestly believe that) in the same way that a racist can claim to not be racist because he’s not burning crosses or lynching, even as he’s writing newspaper articles about how Jay-Z’s basketball team should be called the Brooklyn N*****s.

What is up with the Amendment One thing, anyway? Is this the first amendment given in a state constitution that moves AWAY from and even contradicts the Bill of Rights? Can a state constitution be ruled unconstitutional on the basis that it clearly establishes a religious practice over civil practices? Because it does. Not even a good one.

So, congratulations, North Carolina! A small minority just decided that a smaller minority of you are sub-human. Like the chattel slaves of old, homosexuals are not even worthy of the dignity of getting married. And voters did this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

I suppose they’re coming for adulterers next. I’m sure the amendment will be amended to exclude fornicators from marrying. And divorcees, definitely, will also be excluded from that right – unless their previous spouses cheated on them, or they remarried their original partners. I mean, it’s not that we hate these sinners. Just their sins, right?

No? Nobody ever is going to suggest these laws? Just for teh gheys and the lesbos? Oh. I see…

Because we all need something to meditate on

Rush to Judgment

I can see why this guy is big stuff on the religious right's calendar. Why they listen to his unsubstantiated bigoted rants against The Gays, the Intilekts, Women, and that Magic Negro.

Rush Limbaugh is going to enter into his FOURTH marriage! Isn't that Teh Awesome??

This guy loves heterosexual marriage so much that he's doing it again and again. That's three more times than the man we all want to fail, right, Rushie? You're four times as dedicated to straight marriage than that ManChild in Chief, as you like to call him.

In addition - and this is what makes him such a Great AMERICAN - Rush is also a lover of freedom, which is why he doesn't stay with those marriages. Can't keep him cooped up; ya can't keep a good man down.

So I ask, what's wrong with the rest of us? We should be on HIS level!

Why do we hate hetero marriage and freedom so much?

Rednecks and Redstone, Unite

OK.

A couple bits in the free daily yesterday caught my eye. One is that the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said that homosexuality is immoral - akin to heterosexual adultery - and, therefore, homosexuals shouldn't be allowed in the U.S. military. This was in response to questions about the "Don't Ask / Don't Tell" policy.

A few questions: Is that to imply that anyone who has ever committed adultery should not be allowed in the U.S. military? Or would that be more of a 'grey area' (i.e., if the adulterous affair had stopped within a period of time, or was committed outside of the jurisdiction of the United States, or was done before the parties joined the Forces)? Or, rather, would the implication of adultery ("lust of the eyes") be enough to injunct the wrath of the U.S. Air Force?

But, better question (IMHO): Is the Head of the U.S. Armed Forces - which, in effect, teaches grown men to kill other grown men (and women, and children) - saying that gay people need not show up for the party? That those with a preference for their own gender (or a shared preference) should rightfully be ostracized?

I'm all for morals. But I kinda doubt that the morals of making a living by killing somehow trumps the rights of those who are identified by their sexuality.

The second article that made my eyes bug had to do with Viacom suing YouTube and parent megaCorporation Googe (caveat: Google runs Blogger and Blogspot, as well as my all-time favorite, gmail. So, I don't wanna say anything bad about sweet, sweet Google. Ha ha, Googe!) for running clips from its various networks including, most infamously - at least for me - Stephen Colbert. But this includes stuff from MTV, VH1, Comedy Central, BET, and CBS. I'm sure there's more, but who cares? (They also own Blockbuster, which shows you how generally clueless they are.) And they're suing them for 1,000,000,000 dollars!



But why, o Why, would you want to tear down free publicity?

I'm all against piracy. I'm sorry. I think it's stealing. So, unless the artist comes out and says, 'Get this however you get it' or whatever, I'd rather go through the proper channels and try to pay those who put in the work. But YouTube isn't piracy. It doesn't work (generally speaking) as blanket bootlegging. I could see if they posted entire hour-and-a-half long movies. Maybe. But the sound and visual quality's so bad that, if I could, I would prefer to get them through other, higher-def, channels. But Colbert/The Daily Show, etc., generally isn't available through those channels. And Colbert's earned his name and fame in a way unprecedented 10 years ago.

Through YouTube.