Love thy neighbor? and other thoughts..

It's an interesting, delicate line.

Upon first reading this, my heart is saddened by the image the "preacher protestors" are portraying of Christianity. And truly, I am saddened by how gays are marginalized and isolated by society -- but especially by Christians -- as a people group to be ridiculed and looked down upon as "less than us." (For the record, this was my belief long before I started working with the AAS-C). If you believe like I do that the Scripture says homosexuality is wrong, I still don't think that means queers are any worse than the rest of us. I've have several conversations lately in which it was wondered why homosexuality has been elevated to the position of the ultimate socially unacceptable sin -- can you think of something else as controversial? That's a simplistic statement I know, but that's a whole other conversation, really.

But it's just hard for me to agree that they should be treated differently (and definitely not worse) than straight people. Which is why I really wrestle with the ban on same-sex marriages, although I suspect that comes more from my long-standing support of separation of church and state than anything else. (And that is certainly another conversation, as well.)

One interviewee from the article said, "The Bible says to love your neighbor as thyself. It doesn't tell you who to love and not to love." If he was talking in reference to the the anti-gay protesters who definitely were not showing love to Pride attendees, he got it about half right-- as far as I know, the Bible does tell you who to love: everyone, including your enemies, regardless of who you perceive that to be. I just think it's a little sad that "the gay" was the one who got that, but not the Christians.

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Getting back to my original opening line, though, I have to think about how all that is different from me attending an abortion protest, which is something I would certainly do. Maybe it's hypocritical of me to be much more passionate about that and to be willing to go to a Planned Parenthood clinic to protest. I don't know. I do know that there is something of a more personal nature with homosexuality protests, as in, typically speaking, they protest people in general (i.e. the "God hates faggots" idiots). Whereas abortion protests are promoting life, period.

Scratch what I just said...I would not be interested in a Planned Parenthood protest, actually. I would go to a prayer rally, yes, particularly on legislative grounds. God responds to prayer; that's a hard and fast fact. Planned Parenthood is not likely to respond to protests with anything other than disdain, and that gets you nowhere.