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Some of the most outspoken personalities of the religious right are women. Sharon Engel, Sarah Palin, Anne Coulter – the list continues. They claim to believe in the bible and to live by its rules, but do they really adhere to strict biblical canon? After all, it is immoral and sinful to pick and choose the parts of the bible that you like. Lets see what the New Testament has to say about the role of women in society…

This from 1 Corinthians 11:

11:3 But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.
11:4 Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head.
11:5 But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven.
11:6 For if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered.
11:7 For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.
11:8 For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man.
11:9 Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.
11:10 For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels.
11:11 Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.

Further, from 1 Corinthians 14:

14:34 Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law.
14:35 And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.

Rather than being so outspoken about political issues, campaigning to deny civil rights to minority groups, and having tea parties – perhaps these outspoken women should follow the teachings of the Apostle Paul in their Providence-inspired holy book: shut up, cover your head and if you must speak, filter it through your husband. Don’t have a husband? I’m sorry. Marriage is sacred, you should go find one.

Until next time…

This video really creeped me out…but it’s true of religious dogma.

Today I was reading an article on Change.org about a church in Michigan who outed one of their gay parishioners and socially isolated him. Having been through similar treatment at a church I went to in high school, I found this article infuriating. Like a lot of Christians, I was very unhappy being gay. In fact, I was self-hating from about 13 years old until late high school. It took me until I was 20 to come out. When I went to this church, I got very involved and became a youth leader. I spent most of my summer volunteering at the church and working hard for – not what I believed in – but for a feeling of belonging, a purpose.

I don’t know that I ever actually drank the Judeo-Christian kool aid. I think it was more of a socio-cultural thing for me. I was born and raised as a Christian and went to church a lot, so I thought that’s just what you do. I never much cared for the church I grew up in, but was very enthusiastic about a church I found in high school. As I said above, I got involved quickly. Like most Christians, I had perpetual feelings of guilt. I never felt like I was good enough for God (read: conservative Christian far right culture) so I was went up for alter calls almost every week at church, trying to make myself worthy in the eyes of God. Talking to friends and family, I’m not the only one who felt like this. But it made me feel very guilty to be gay; I wanted to be cured. So I talked to my “mentors” at church about praying with me, etc.

Like most Christians, they subscribed to the belief that homosexuality is a “choice” and that the “gay lifestyle” is a very negative thing. They prayed with me for some kind of divine intervention to cure me. When no divine intervention came from their fictitious God, they removed me from every program I was involved in and socially isolated me to the point of excommunication. Since it is a big church in a big town, they couldn’t go as far as publicly excommunicating me but they made it uncomfortable to the point of forcing me to (voluntarily?) leave.

In the end I’m just thankful I live in California or I may have been sent to one of those horrible deprogramming camps that permanently damage people for the rest of their lives.

Here is the article in question, entitled: Michigan Church Outs, Then Expels Gay Man:

A man from Williamston Michigan is battling her church over his sexuality.

The man, who wishes not to have his name used, says that by discussing her sexuality with the pastor of Lighthouse Community Church in Williamston, a small bedroom community east of Lansing, he has been targeted for excommunication from the church.

In a June 28 email to the man, Pastor Thurm Payton wrote, “I want to make one more appeal to you to turn from the lifestyle you’ve chosen to deal with the feelings you have wrestled with for many years. I can’t escape the truth that you’ve taken a severe detour in God’s plan for how your life is to be lived.”

He further states,”I would deeply regret it if the effect of my trusting friendship with you was to slowly enable you to accept a lifestyle that is against God’s Word.”

But the man was not interested in denouncing his homosexuality, as Payton plead with him to do.

So when the man declined, Payton, evidently worried with accidentally “enabling” his homosexuality, decided in conjunction with pastoral leaders Jimmy Gretzinger, John Newman, Mark Harbison and Tom Blaylock that it was necessary to excommunicate the man.

Sounds like a story that happens to hundreds of thousands of LGBT people everyday. Except the “leadership team” decided that excommunication was not enough. The sent a four page letter to the congregation announcing the man, as well as a person accused of adultery, would be subjected to a public excommunication.

The letter outed the man to the church.

“This is literally a scarlet letter, designed to isolate and humiliate the members accused of impropriety,” said Truth Wins Out’s Executive Director Wayne Besen. “It is absurd that the church claims that its intent is not to injure the alleged sinners. They are clearly engaging in a vindictive game of mean-spirited psychological attacks causing grave harm to the individuals singled out and targeted.”

“This church has the right to hold self-righteous and backwards ideas on sexuality,” said Besen. “However, what they are doing is immoral and their actions should be brought to light. With such a medieval mindset, it should be no surprise that many Americans are turning away from such barbaric churches in droves.”

And the kicker to all this? The Williamston Public Schools are renting the middle school cafeteria to the church, thus supporting the group with tax payer funded locations.

Editor’s note: The gender of the person involved in this case was accidentally identified as female, when in fact the victim of the church’s excommunication is a male. We apologize for this error.

This is truly sad, that in this day and time, middle Americans are still so ignorant about LGBTQ issues. The worst part is that they don’t care about LGBTQ issues; most of them do not WANT to become educated on LGBTQ issues. In general, Christians pick and choose the parts of the bible that they want and ignore the parts that inconvenience them. I still fail to understand why Christians make such a big deal out of homosexuality but eat unclean meat, wear clothes of mixed fabric, work on Sundays, tolerate divorce and allow their wives to leave the house. If you read Leviticus all of these things are mentioned, but on these issues they take a liberal approach to Leviticus and decide that the things they dislike are no longer relevant. Maybe homosexuality is irrelevant today too?

Jesus was a loving man who never mentioned homosexuality once, on the contrary he blessed and loved Mary Magdalene – a prostitute. So why the witch hunt on “fags”? Shouldn’t Christians be focused on preserving marriage within their own church and preventing divorce? If marriage is such a sacred institution that they want to deny it to homosexual couples, then why not focus on making marriage more successful?

Here are some comments that were follow ups to this article, these two I found especially profound

The first one is by Dave Hershey:

Dear Pastor Thurm Payton,

I just read on a website about a gay man that you and your church excommunicated. I understand that you wish for him to change his sexual orientation. However, according to the American Psychological Association, the American Medical Association, and nearly all other various medical, psychological and psychiatric organizations have stated that it is dangerous to alienate people based on their sexual orientation.

There are two things that your treatment of this man leads me to believe, you are not only going against what Jesus taught, which is love and acceptance (remember the prostitute Jesus saved from stoning?) and that by outing him to the entire congregation you are also a very vindictive person and untrustworthy person. (The shame should be ALL on you!)

I’m sure you have wondered why so many LGBT citizens have turned away from the church, it is this VERY reason! Because of the hatred shown toward them, and the lack of love and acceptance.

You and the pastoral leaders of your business (I refuse to refer to your business as a church because it is far from being a place of solace and peace as it should be) ought to be ashamed of your actions, but somehow I know you are likely not.

I would like to recommend a piece I read months ago that I think explains why so many LGBT citizens have left the church. And I also think it may help you understand more about the LGBT community as a whole and why we have rejected your “hate the sin, love the sinner” meme that you like to use. It can be found here: http://www.boxturtlebulletin.com/2010/04/02/21575

It is my hope that you will read this piece and open your eyes to the truth, and that is we are very loving and caring people. That we come from all walks of life. And no matter how much you want us to conform to YOUR worldview, that will never happen until you start accepting us for who and what we are, your fellow human beings, your neighbors, and members of your earthly family.

By the way, I would like one question answered for me, when did you make a conscious decision to be heterosexual? My guess is that you never had to make a conscious decision to be heterosexual, just as we never made a conscious decision to be LGBT.

Best Regards and may YOUR God have mercy on your soul!

The second one is by William Stoddart:

Right on, Dave.!!  I am in total agreement with your post comments.  There is absolutely no such thing as a, ‘GAY LIFESTYLE” anymore than there is a. “STRAIGHT LIFESTYLE.”   Homophobes delight in constantly using the word “lifestyle” as a part of their demagoguery.  To them “lifestyle” revolves entirely around whom a person is sexually attracted to.  I am positive that if you were to ask any straight male, “What kind of a lifestyle do you lead?”–that their solitaryanswer would not be, “I like to have sex with women.”  Any person’s sexual orientation is just one very small part of the tapestry which defines their life.  The homophobic use of the word “lifestyle” when referencing gays and lesbians is offensive and demeaning.  In a way it conveys the warped idea that all we think about, or do, 24 hours a day is to have sex.

Then, the equally offensive word constantly used by these homophobic evangelists is, “CHOICE..”   Scientific, medical, and biological studies have consistently concluded that being gay or lesbian is not a ‘CHOICE”—no more being born black, or being born with blue eyes is a ‘CHOICE”   Unfortunately, hard core homophobes, will never have the capacity to understand that sexual orientation IS NOT A CHOICE! It is the way are born.  Note that I did not use the phrase sexual ‘PREFERENCE”.   By sometimes using the word PREFERENCE instead of ORIENTATION, they intentionally confer the idea that we CHOSE to be the way we are.   When a homophobe engages me in their demented “choice” philosophy, I always ask them how they went about “choosing” to be straight?  I ask if they perhaps “flipped a coin.”   Or I may ask if they tried both types, and then decided that being intimate with a female felt the best. (kind of like trying on a pair of shoes)  Invariably, they are not able to explain why they are either going with, or married to a person of the opposite sex.  They will usually simply end the discussion with, “That’s just the way I am.”   So, if it’s so very easy for them to understand that “it’s just the way they are” why then is it so difficult for them to understand that our sexual orientation is, “just the way we are.”   If being gay or lesbian was truly a choice–there most likely would be none.   If it was simply a matter of choice, who would consciously choose to be gay—knowing in advance that they would face a life of constant ridicule and rejection?

Hopefully these articles are eye opening to you. Hopefully it helps you to see that homosexuality is something, although maybe not natural, isn’t a choice. Where do people get off thinking they can tell us to reject our innate urges and live a lie?

As an atheist raised in a Judeo-Christian household, I find this topic to be particularly interesting. As someone who watched all of the Dr. Dino videos in church as a kid, I am very familiar with a lot of the far-right “intelligent” design arguments (see http://www.drdino.com/). Without getting too political, I was horrified that so many schools in the bible belt (Southern US) were trying to get “intelligent” design put into schools, presenting religious dogma as science, especially during the presidency of George W. Bush. Creationism is NOT science and has no place in a science classroom; if presented in public schools, it should only be presented in a comparative religions class giving other religions equal emphasis. Creationism and Intelligent Design are not scientific theories because they do not follow the scientific method. They do not analyze data proving or disproving a hypothesis and they are not open to peer review. They must either be accepted or rejected. Intelligent Design is figuratively black or white whereas science has a lot of grey area and is constantly changing and correcting itself. To be objective, Intelligent Design in its most recent manifestation is finally at least making an effort to be loosely scientific. Creationists are now trying to disprove science, citing religious dogma as evidence, instead of using a completely faith-based approach. For instance at http://www.intelligentdesign.org/ they actually say that Intelligent Design has nothing to do with the bible and is common sense regardless of what one’s religious beliefs are. When asked if creationist theory is the same as intelligent design, they reply “No. Intelligent design theory is simply an effort to empirically detect whether the “apparent design” in nature acknowledged by virtually all biologists is genuine design (the product of an intelligent cause) or is simply the product of an undirected process such as natural selection acting on random variations. Creationism is focused on defending a literal reading of the Genesis account, usually including the creation of the earth by the Biblical God a few thousand years ago. Unlike creationism, the scientific theory of intelligent design is agnostic regarding the source of design and has no commitment to defending Genesis, the Bible or any other sacred text. (http://www.intelligentdesign.org/faq.php)” One would have to question the truthfulness of this statement however, noting that “god”, “bible” and various pronouns for “god” are capitalized, implying that his site has a Judeo-Christian affiliation. Regardless, it is downright untrue for this website to call Intelligent Design a scientific theory.

A very interesting article validating my opinions is http://is.gd/2pBMP (link has been shortened), which was written by Glenn Branch, the deputy director of the National Center for Science Education. His ultimate conclusion is “Creationism is not just a legal failure. It is a scientific failure as well. Scan the scientific research literature: There are no signs that anyone is using creationism, whether as creation science or its newfangled form of intelligent design, to explain the natural world. In contrast, not a year passes without the appearance of thousands of scientific publications that apply, refine, and extend evolution (http://is.gd/2pBMP). “ Ultimately, thank your deity of choice that we have a supreme court that enforces the separation of church and state clause in our constitution. Otherwise the American education system would be even more flawed. Hopefully during his presidency, President Obama will make a difference in the science education throughout the US, especially in the Southern states, enforcing our laws requiring educators to acknowledge only evolution in the classroom.

It is a shame, in this day and time, especially in a place as liberal as California that Proposition 8 was upheld in court. I would think that everyone, even super conservative christian bigots would want others to be happy. Equality should be for everyone, unconditionally, not just for people who support the conservative agenda.

One World, Under God – The Atlantic (April 2009)

This is a fascinating new perspective on Jesus, Paul and Christianity from a Social Science and Evolutionary Psychology point of view.

I’m still a bit baffled by it, but it shines a whole new light on the evolution of Judeo-Islam-Christian religions and their rapid expansion.

Let me know what you think!