In my election post, I talked about how I think people are tired of the culture wars. It’s time to move past the polarization, time to stop flinging flaming arrows at each other and time to stop beating people over the head with the Bible simply because we may disagree on something. In short, it’s time for sanity.
As a Christian and someone who is part of the LGBT community, the polarization over LGBT issues in this country and the way it’s framed as Christians on one side and gays on the other is particularly troublesome to me. It sets up a false dichotomy and creates division that doesn’t need to exist. The Gospel is about God’s overwhelming love and grace and that’s something that people are losing sight of amid the culture war skirmishes.
The reality is that no matter how many culture war battles are fought, LGBT people aren’t going to go away. Speaking to straight Christians, please, step back for a minute and try and understand that while this is academic for you, for us this is our lives that you’re talking about and debating. The only question is whether the reaction of the Church is going to bring people closer to God or drive them away altogether. Up to this point, much of evangelical Christendom has done a great job of driving gay people away from the Church, away from the message of the Gospel, and that’s something that not only doesn’t need to be the case, it shouldn’t be the case.
Anyway, I’ve got too much work still to do on my copyright paper, so to draw this to a close, I have a book recommendation. The book, Torn: Rescuing the Gospel from the Gays-vs-Christians Debate by Justin Lee is new today, and while I haven’t had time to read more than the first chapter (blasted law school), it comes highly recommended by people whose opinions I trust. I recommend checking it out either in dead tree form or kindle, and since I’ve provided all these handy dandy links, it’s pretty darn easy to go buy it now.
Bottom line is it’s time to add some sanity to this whole debate.