Facing outrageousness

June 14, 2022

Beloved,  

      How grateful am I for our life together with our gay, lesbian and transgender brothers, sisters and friends in the faith.  They are so much a part of our regular cycle of worship, service and fellowship and, because they never, ever complain, I am prone to forget about the daily mistreatment they experience in the world.  The slights, the comments, the hatefulness and the outright threats against their existence, like I read about yesterday.  A preacher whose name does not bear repeating has gained some social media traction for saying the worst possible things and suggesting his comments only repeat the words of Jesus.  An easily provable lie.  If his words weren’t so dangerous, I’d ignore him altogether.  But he is getting a hearing online, and the LGBTQIA community must not be the only ones standing up to him.  His ministry colleagues and fellow believers must be at the front, defending them against such threat and terror.  To that end, here is the letter I have written and will send. 

Dear Pastor ~, 
          Your church website speaks plainly of your desire to share the gospel with the world.  That you present it there in so many languages is a ministry unto itself.  I am so grateful for it, trusting that we are one church with one mission:  to share the love of God with our neighbors, knowing — as Jesus teaches in Luke 10 — all the world is our neighborhood.  This is why I am writing to you now.  Having just watched the section of the June 5th sermon by Preacher ~ in which he claimed that Jesus blessed the trial and execution of gay and lesbian people for what he labeled “the sin of abomination,” I cannot keep from sharing my concerns regarding both the errancy of such biblical interpretation and the danger of such preaching.  
          While I am by no means the final authority on all biblical matters, I am beyond certain that the Gospels contain no such words from the mouth of Jesus.  Other biblical references to pederasty (translated homosexuality after 1946) may or may not be debatable, depending on one’s biblical perspective; but whether Jesus ever spoke of it is not.  He simply didn’t, and to claim otherwise is, simply, a lie.  
          It occurs to me that your preacher might be young in the work and prone to the excite-ment of the pulpit.  If so, he might never imagine someone taking his words literally, and yet such things happen all the time. Like it or not, the preacher’s voice speaks for God to many a hearer.  People could be hurt or worse, should someone take his voice as Divine permission to kill someone.  What a tragedy it would be for a preacher’s call and enthusiasm to drown in the blood spilled on account of his words.   
          While the temptation to argue the scriptures or theology is strong, my soul’s desire in writing is to speak up on behalf of the gay and transgender human beings who are dear to me and those around the world who feel genuinely terrorized by Christian preachers calling for their cold-blooded, state-sponsored execution.  Such preaching is neither biblical nor Christian.  Such preaching drives people further from the gospel, not closer, and the great shame of it all is that Jesus never, ever said anything of the sort.  I pray you might take my letter in the Spirit with which I have composed it.  May we all be firm in the truth of His great sacrifice on our behalf.
peace & prayers, 
pastor annette

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