Special Sin Status

Matthew 22:34-40

              I get a special joy out of what I call Bible thumpers getting slam dunked.  In this passage, Jesus does it gently but I could see Jesus going for a slam dunk too. There are people out there that call themselves Christian and place all manner of restrictions on God's abundant love. Not only that, they cherry pick scripture, misquote, mistranslate and misinterpret whole sections, lines and parables.  It is to these people I am imagine Jesus might love nothing more than to slam dunk himself.

               Vicky Beeching, a huge star on the American evangelical Christian scene, came out gay recently. She said she knew it since she was 13 years old. Praise God! I'm not looking for converts, I am seeking honesty and dignity. That this young women stood up to acknowledge that you can indeed be gay and Christian is wonderful. I applaud her roundly. 

                Linda Harvey, the media ministry mogul, a conservative right wingnut of the highest order, gave 'special sin status' to Vicky Beeching. Let us forget for the moment that Jesus never, ever, said one thing about homosexuality one way or the other. Of course he implicitly approved it but let me not get off on a tangent. 

               For every passage of scripture that allegedly condemns same sex relationships, there is reasonable, religious and scholarly reasons to deny the use of said passages to condemn gays. Still, I can see Jesus responding to a question about gays in the same way he did to the Pharisees.  Jesus sidesteps the particulars of the law and goes for the jugular. What of love?  Of course this maddens Bible thumpers to no end. If they can't have a defined set of rules, what are we to go on??  Jesus is quite clear and is that is  the two great commandments.

        So when Linda Harvey gives 'Special Sin Status' to Vicky or anyone, know that Ms. Harvey negates scripture in doing so. You won't find that 'status' anywhere except in her feeble mind.  Just as religious right wingnuts create their own translations for their own impotent purposes, there are many more of us who choose to read and understand scripture, those of us who happen to be gay and Christian.

       Kudos to Vicky Beeching.

         

When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. ‘Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?’ He said to him, ‘ “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.’