Bible Predicts Gays and Lesbians Will Take Over the Church

“Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”  That is the big fear of many fundamentalist christians, isn’t it?  This scripture verse from Matthew 18:18 teaches them that whatever they permit to happen here on earth, God will permit to happen in heaven.  All I can say is “Praise God!”  I was afraid there’d be no internet, no Starbucks, and no cell phones in heaven. 

 

But Donny wasn’t talking about those things; he was talking about the biggest threat the church faces today: gay people.  Donny came to Soulforce, where I am a moderator, and joined in the discussions on our forums in a polite enough manner.  He made it clear that he thinks homosexuality is a sin.  We heard the same platitudes that we hear from others who wish to rationalize their hatred:  “hate the sin, love the sinner” and “I am a sinner too.”  I always brace myself when I hear certain phrases coming out of christians‘ mouths.  “Now don’t be offended, I’m just speaking the truth in love”  is usually the preface for a big insult or condemnation.  Donny’s “hate the sin, love the sinner” entrance line was the prelude to 37 public posts and a number of private messages to me, that can best be described as crazy-making. 

 

 I sat down with some of those posts and private messages that I had printed up and tried to make some sense of them, find a recurring theme, anything that gave me a clearer idea of what Donny was saying and why.  I found that Donny, and others like him, have a lot of fear going on in their heads.  The fear causes them to engage in inappropriate behaviors to justify their behaviors and rationalize their poor treatment of people who differ from themselves. 

 

One of the big fears appears to be change.  Donny often referred to the neologism being promoted by Soulforce.  I had to look it up.  Neologism often refers to newly coined words or phrases, but can mean new doctrine or new interpretation of sacred writings.  With this neologism that Soulforce is promoting, Donny sensed an attack.  He believes that Soulforce and other gay organizations are attempting to force the church to change the faith that was “delivered only once to the saints.” 

 

Gay christians, their organizations including Soulforce, do believe that recent theological study reveals a neologism:  Homosexuality as we understand it today based on scientific, medical, psychological, biological research, is not condemned by the Bible.  New interpretations of doctrine do not immediately indicate heresy, as many fundamentalists would have us think.  Consider that at some point doctrines concerning abolition of slavery, the sinfulness of racism, equality for women, and approval of divorce were all neologisms.  In our history, christians have supported slavery, racism, subjugation of women, prohibition of divorce by quoting the Bible and proclaiming all of these things to be God’s will.  In short, we like to think God is on our side so we use the Bible to support our prejudices. 

 

An early private message from Donny, in response to my request for him to adhere to our guidelines, revealed that he wanted to use proof-texting to denounce our stand about homosexuality.  Proof-texting involves using a verse or two as stand alone proof that the Bible supports or doesn’t support an issue.  It is always taken out of context, and therefor may or may not be referring to the issue being debated.  Later, when I bring up the issue of proof-texting on the public board, Donny claims that context is everything!  The contradictions began flowing after that.

 

Another tactic that is often used by the religious right is the “slippery slope” argument.  Slippery slope is a logical fallacy.  It is not a valid technique for proving a point.  Slippery slope says if A happens then B, or C, or D will happen, very often skipping over any of those intermediate steps, the debater will simply jump from A to D.  Donny’s favorite slippery slope was stating that if gays are allowed to marry, people will marry their pets.  Proof of this, for Donny, came in a claim that animal brothels exist in Europe.  He even defended his use of the slippery slope argument, apologized for comparing homosexuality to bestiality, then stated that ‘slippery slope’ is still a reality, which reasserted his original insult. 

 

Other logical fallacies committed by Donny in this exchange included ad ignorantiam, spotlight fallacy, begging the question, and burden of proof.  Donny claimed that because the Bible does not speak of loving homosexual relationships, nor does it mention same-sex marriage, that it must then condemn all such things.  That is ad ignorantiam.  A good example is the fact that the Bible also does not mention cats.  Following Donny’s logic, it is important to rid the world of all cats.  Donny offers up Pride parades and the outrageous behavior displayed at such events, generalizing that all gays and lesbians must behave this way (Spotlight fallacy.) 

When Donny appeals to scripture, his reasoning is somewhat circular, thus begging the question.  He even offered several purposes for the existence of the New Testament:  to define the Christian life and to defend against false teachings about it that entered into the Gospel and Apostolic community of believers; to combat false teachings creeping into the Church; in fact ALL of the New Testament was written to explain the way the believers in Christ should behave;  the New Testament was literally written to define what is and what isn’t Christian culture and community.  There is a sense of circular arguing in which we ask why we should base our societal standards on a first century writing and the answer seems to be because the Bible says we should. 

 

In all of this discussion, Donny made accusatory statements and wild exaggerations and failed to offer proof for any of them, thus committing the “burden of proof” fallacy. 

•  I’ll take this experience as great enlightenment and validation about the Gay Agenda and its relentless attack on the Church and its people.
• There have already been Churches burned to the ground for their “holding fast to that which is true.”
• Anything goes is a reality for many people in the sexual abandon realm.
• A billion-plus[sic] Christians have problems with supporting homosexuality and all that comes with it.
• Christians are being outlawed and hated for their Biblically[sic] accurate stand in opposition to approving homosexuality. It is the Christians being threatened.

 

 As I write this entry, I’m overwhelmed with the amount of rhetoric that Donny was able to spew forth on our Soulforce forums.  The accusations, the innuendo, the contradictions, the projection, and the hysteria is appalling.  Donny doesn’t believe christians should accept as valid principles that all the major medical, scientific and psychological organizations that proclaim homosexual orientation as normal as heterosexual orientation, and that orientation is unchangeable.  He believes that gay and lesbian people wish to destroy the christian church.  He even believes that the Bible predicts gays and lesbians will overrun the churches.  Donny does not believe that gays and lesbians can be christians. He has implied that all homosexuals are promiscuous.  He claims that he does not care what secularists do, and even states “I do not care about legalized gay marriage as it is not a Christian concept and does not concern the Church at all, except for things to avoid doing”  but later says “Marriage is a man and a woman. And in Christian truth, that is immutable. It is through gay activism of gay rights that you find this gay cause of gay marriage. Marriage shouldn’t be redefined as same-gender. Call it something else but “marriage” is not available.”  His arguments against gay and lesbian people included discussions of anti-discrimination laws, and hate crime bills. All of which seems to boil down to one thing:  fear, which is where we started this entry.

 

Well, I have a fear.  I am afraid that Donny’s most hateful opinions are exactly what religious right leaders are thinking but won’t say publicly. I am afraid that their projection of violence won’t be seen by our society.  Remember that religious leaders blamed 9-11 and Hurricane Katrina on LGBT people.  Donny claimed that LGBT people are burning christian churches to the ground, but the only news stories I found about burned out churches were attributed to racism and bigotry. Many churches have experienced vandalism caused by their support of LGBT people and issues.  I fear that Pastors will continue to speak lies about homosexuals, granting their congregants tacit approval to commit physical violence against gays and lesbians. 

 

Most of all, I fear calling myself a Christian.  That title is now so corrupt that I can not use it to describe my relationship with God.  And I wouldn’t want anyone to think that I belong to the same club as Donny.