by: Mark Currey
 
I pastor a small community in the heart of the Bible-Belt. The following email conversation occurred a couple of weeks ago.  Given the conversation and the much deserved push-back from my friend, I read the following to the community I pastor a few Sundays ago…

Friend:
Mark,
I got this e-mail from a friend that I work with today. I know the friend that she is talking about. Read this and let
me know what you think. I'd like to give her your e-mail address if you say it is okay. Peace!

Me:
sure... have her contact me.
our "church position" is somewhat nuanced - will explain when i have a little more time but, bottom line, everyone is welcome.

by Rev. Mark Sandlin

Yes sir, we grow 'em on trees in these parts. Yet another NC minister has gone all “king of crazy town” when it comes to talking about homosexuality and the Bible. The idea that two people of the same sex could actually be in love seems to be some powerful mojo when it comes to NC ministers. It is like it sends them into a testosterone induced fervor that completely blinds them to the greatest hits of the Bible like, “thou shall not kill,” and “love thy neighbor.”

Oddly, there was a time when the same kind of fervor blinded the same kind of preachers here in the South and, because of it, a lot of people who were different from them ended up hanging from trees. Maybe it's not so odd. Maybe it's completely to be expected.

Yep, in certain Southern churches, gay is the new black. Realistically, it's not just Southern churches, but with North Carolina's recent passage of Amendment One and the viral YouTube video of the knock-the-gay-out-of-your-kid pastor, it wouldn't be surprising to find a few arborists diligently searching the hillsides of the gorgeous North Carolina foothills for the mythical Tree of Homophobia (which, ironically, I hear has leaves the colors of the rainbow). Just looking at the news over the last several months, while it would seem that all states have ministers that preach exclusion (and even violence) toward our LGBT brothers and sisters, North Carolina does simply seem to be better at it. “We're #1! We're #1! We're #1!”

So, the latest in the parade of “a-minister-REALLY-said-THAT?” circus here in N.C. is Pastor Charles L. Worley (please note my restraint in guessing what the “L” is for... clearly not “love” - okay, my near restraint). He believes, one assumes biblically, that “lesbians and queers” should be locked up inside an electrified fence until they die out. As I understand his argument, up until this point LGBT folk have been reproducing and creating little baby homosexuals and if all the “lesbians” are inside one fence and all the “queers” are inside another, well, they could no longer reproduce and hence - no more homosexual babies.

by Brad Duncan

Dear Pastor,

Please invite the gay crowd to our church.  Please invite the LGBT
people.  Please do it soon, and with no reservation. Please love the gay crowd and welcome them.  Don't make their sexuality an issue at all, or withhold acceptance from them, don't criticize or hold back your friendship.  Don't talk to them about sin instead of grace.  Just invite them.

 Please don't delay or discuss it in committee.  Time is running out.

Dear Pastor, do it for us, before our hearts grow cold and hard.  Do it so that we can remember the dank stink that grows in our hearts from the seed of hate.  Do it before we can't love anymore.

Do it before we start to think that sitting in judgment makes us good, makes us better, makes us receive salvation.  Do it before we forget about grace altogether.

As long as we can love to hate a class of people for their lifestyle, we can believe that we are somehow saved by ours.  Maybe we think we are saved by our straightness, our lack of accepting the gay crowd?  Did we already
forget about the blood of Christ and about grace?  Have we already turned stale?  Do we think we're actually ON God's side by not inviting them?  Or are we against him?

Dear Pastor, the gay crowd is not going to corrupt our children, or convince us to be promiscuous or unfaithful.  The gay crowd is not going to make us love sin or the devil.  The gay crowd is not going to make us love God
less.  The gay crowd will not diminish our worship, or reduce ourappreciation for the Bible.  The gay crowd is not contagious or repellent.