But before I deal with this first one, I need to give it some context.
Earlier in the book when I referred to the "Adam and Steve" comment, I mentioned another often-said phrase that I find equally offensive:
"Love the sinner, hate the sin"
Truth be told, I actually think that this is the most offensive one...in fact, it's the deadliest...because it sounds so nice and fair and progressive and "Christian"...but at the heart of it is a cynical, condescending and smugly self-righteous sentiment that literally sends shivers up my spine.
It's the poisoned apple of homophobic slurs
More than anything else, it's a lie.
I've seen from my own experience that, typically, the "Christians" who say "Love the sinner, hate the sin" in an attempt to sound benevolent, yet uncompromisingly moral, not only hate the "sin" as they judge it, they actually loathe the "sinner"...and making this smarmy, phony statement is an unctuous way for them to camouflage their true feelings about it.
Their attempt at reconciling the Christ-delivered mandate to love everyone unconditionally with their actual contempt for homosexuals exhibits the very kind of hypocrisy that Jesus continually attacked with a vengeance.
The absurdity of "Love the sinner, hate the sin" reminds me of the scores and scores of letters I've received from those fluent in Christian-ese who begin their pompous missives with the statement "It's not my place to judge you", and then set out to write 3 to 5 pages of nothing but judgment on me!
It's as if saying "It's not my place to judge you" is the disclaimer that gives them carte-blanche to tear into you and say anything they want to say...like when someone begins a conversation by saying, "Now, I'm just saying this in love..."...
You know full well, if you've ever been on the receiving end of that opening line, that the words you hear spoken after that are generally anything but loving!
Here's a thought...if it's not your place to judge, then don't even write the letter!
And if you're saying something in love, you don't even have to qualify that it's said in love...love bears fruit of itself! Margaret Thatcher said, "Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't"...in the same way, if you have to tell someone that love is your motivation for doing or saying something, it's the clearest indication that nothing could be further from the truth.
Some of those same people have written in those same letters, "Your personal life is between you and God", to which I also say...EXACTLY! Then why not just let God and me deal with it?
Anyway, this brings me to the question I get asked all the time:
Question #7: Is homosexuality a sin?
Answer #7: No way to answer that because it's not a valid question.
Sexual orientation is not what you do, it's who you are!
To be continued...
1 comment:
Bravo! Bishop.
In reverse order, who We Each are is who We are, not what we do. That applies across the board. In my own life, Holy Spirit has often reminded me of that, in conjunction with I Am who God has created Me. I Am different, and have embraced it, and questioned it. I Am and have throughout my life been a friend to those isolated or eschewed by the mainstream, while me being accepted in the mainstream.
That has often been a bit of self-conundrum for me. The ethereal ‘they’ accept me, but ‘they’ have not accepted many that are part of me. At times in my life I flaunted that to challenge ‘them’, saying ‘How can you accept Me, and not those With me?’ Other times I simply accepted the situation and went on.
I have often heard from my ‘righteous’ friends of how they love the sinner and hate the sin. I would mess with them and say the ‘sinner’ and ‘sin’ are inexorably connected. One does not exist without the other, and that includes each of ‘them’. Do ‘they’ love and hate themselves simultaneously? Generally that does not get a response. Approaching 50, I find I have fewer friends in the ‘mainstream’, and many more on the ‘edges’.
It is interesting, as I age; I see that many will not relinquish their fear and angst. More surprisingly, I find that that is OK. God loves each of Us as We are. I see that We are All together, while different. I prefer my perception and experience, and those that are accepting, those that are not ‘mainstream’, in part because there is less fronting of who They are. After a while, Each of Us is comfortable naked or comfortable covered. I like naked better. To Me, naked is the sinner and the sin entwined. To Me, covered is the sinner and the sin separated like in a petri dish, unnatural. That is My view though, and others have equally valid different views.
Since ‘sin’ has been conquered from the foundation of the Earth, or this reality, it is a non-issue spiritually. All ‘sin’ however one defines it and it ‘sin’ is now only defined laterally, among each other, is irrelevant. The only relevance is with God, and that has been resolved retroactively to the beginning. In the Big Picture, in God’s Tapestry, ‘sin’ as is commonly thought of by 21st Century humans barely exists. It is in Spirit, lack of Peace and Trust in G-D that is somewhat related to ‘sin’ in general perception, and even that is accounted for in Grace.
It has long been finished. Being mean, horrid, dismissive of Each person God continually creates is a ‘sin’ as far as God is concerned, -- and yes, I can speak with authority on that. And even that is removed from Us retroactively. Everything else is not even considered – True.
It is True, the question you end this installment with is irrelevant, meaningless, All ‘sin’ however conceived by whomever, is Not on God’s radar.
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