A progressive Christian friend of mine, Brian Bowen (who devotes his life to the message that both Jesus and Paul endorsed same-sex marriage in the Bible, with very interesting points), recently related on a Facebook post this little interesting exchange:
"Pastor: Are you a practicing homosexual?
Me: No, I'm a perfected one!"
I also remember reading an earlier book in the Left Behind series, in which the GIRAT (Greatest Investigative Reporter of All Time), Buck Williams, has an exchange with a lesbian coworker in which he says that, "While the bible does call practicing homosexuals sinners, it also says that premarital straight sex is a sin."
(As if that's equal at all!)
But I really haven't seen any references to "practicing homosexuals" as much as I used to. Gone are the days when gays could talk about how God had called them to celibacy, and Christians would eat that shit up. Now it's been replaced by, "There's no such thing as a gay Christian, just like there's no such as a pedophile Christian."
(As if the bible condemned pedophilia at all, and as if all LGBTQ people were rapists.)
A few years ago, I had a rather interesting exchange with a relative. My Uncle 'Phobe had just said something disparaging about gays and then walked out of the room, conveniently enough.
"There's nothing sinful about being gay," I muttered. "That's not even biblical."
One of my conservative relatives (well, they're all conservative, on my mother's side, pretty much) said, "Oh, yes, it is!"
"BEING gay?!" I repeated.
"Well...not being gay, but practicing it," she admitted. (I believe this relative is pro-gay now.)
People seem to be more bigoted now. Nowadays people are sins, not sex acts. I ask about Side B (completely chaste) gay Christians, in arguments online, all the time, and most people don't even understand what I'm talking about. They think you have to fuck your way into the gay club.
I would blame the rise of LGBT activism and equal rights in recent years, but there's really no excuse in not knowing the difference between "gay" and "gay fucker." If they want to talk about homosexuality, they should at least know what Side A and Side B mean.
I recently got into an argument in which I asked about Side B gay Christians (after explaining what they were, of course). My opponent said that they were still sinning by lusting after their own sex. I knew he had good intentions, from our conversation, but that made me mad, that he would assume that.
I asked him, "How do you know that they choose to lust in their hearts? Surely you've had the experience of seeing an attractive woman, and choosing not to lust after her? Why can't they choose not to lust after their own sex? You have a huge double standard here. You are assuming that gay people automatically sin, while you are not assuming the same for straight people. Don't do that crap. You're better than that."
I didn't get any reply to that. I think he got distracted by other people.
I remember when salvation narratives included people who had "fallen away" and who now "rededicated their lives to Christ." Heck, I lived it, once, when I believed. But now almost everyone is of the "once saved, always saved" persuasion. I am twenty-four and I already feel old, because I see these disturbing Christian trends that were nothing like what I was taught to believe. I find it interesting that Christians are quick to say that people who are now atheists were never saved, rather than that they are just wandering away from God. The greater condemnation seems to win, every time.
And that's exactly what seems to be happening with LGBTQ issues. For some people, the greater condemnation wins, every time.
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