LGBT

xchrom

(108,903 posts) Sat Oct 18, 2014, 05:43 AM Oct 2014

Distorted Love: The Toll of Our Christian Theology on the LGBT Community

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-pavlovitz/distorted-love-the-toll-of-our-christian-theology-on-the-lgbt-community_b_5988938.html

Love doesn't always look like love.

When I published this blog post two weeks ago, I was prepared for some people to applaud it, and for others to condemn it. That's what happens whenever you put an opinion out there.

I was fully prepared for the waves of both support and hostility that accompany any vantage point on anything, especially a controversial topic like sexuality.

What I was not prepared for in any way were the literally hundreds and hundreds of people who have reached out to me personally to thank me for bringing some healing and hope to their families. Parents, children, siblings, and adults have confided in me (some for the first time anywhere), telling of the pain, and bullying, and shunning they're received from churches, pastors, and church members -- from professed followers of Jesus.

Scores of people from all over the world have shared with me their devastating stories of exclusion and isolation, of unanswered prayers to change, of destructive conversion therapies, of repeated suicide attempts, and of being actively and passively driven from faith by people of faith.

4 replies

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Distorted Love: The Toll of Our Christian Theology on the LGBT Community (Original Post) xchrom Oct 2014 OP

Christianity destroys all people, telling them they are worthless filthy sinners. Manifestor_of_Light Oct 2014 #1

And yet Prophet 451 Oct 2014 #4

Thank you for posting this. theHandpuppet Oct 2014 #2

... xchrom Oct 2014 #3

Manifestor_of_Light

(21,046 posts)

1. Christianity destroys all people, telling them they are worthless filthy sinners.

Reply to xchrom (Original post)

Sat Oct 18, 2014, 05:54 AM

Oct 2014

straight or gay, although they have particular emphasis on their rejection of the LGBT community.

I don't see how anyone can accept Christian theology and be psychologically healthy. It causes toxic shame and unearned guilt, and drives people to desperation.

It takes courage to get the inner strength to walk away and not take the nonsensical theology seriously.

I've always hated the song Amazing Grace, because I am not a "wretch" and I don't think ANY human being is a wretch. I think we all have a spark of goodness, somewhere, even if we can't see it easily.

Prophet 451

(9,796 posts)

4. And yet

Reply to Manifestor_of_Light (Reply #1)

Sat Oct 18, 2014, 08:14 AM

Oct 2014

My Grimmer (grandmother) was devoutly, if quietly, Christian. And, besides raising me, she devoted her entire life to caring for disabled and disturbed kids. And I know, from conversations we had toward the end of her life, that she drew a great deal of strength and inspiration from her faith. If it matters, she was also a liberal kind of Christian, being pro-choice and pro-gay, and believed in universal reconciliation (i.e. the idea that Jesus's death paid the price for all humans, both living and dead, believer and non-believer).

Now, personally, I'm a Luciferian Satanist. I see Christianity to be a form of propaganda for a tyrannical god who must be opposed. But what I'm saying is that someone can wholeheartedly believe in Christianity and be, not just psychologically healthy, but a sterling example of humanity.

theHandpuppet

(19,964 posts)

2. Thank you for posting this.

Reply to xchrom (Original post)

Sat Oct 18, 2014, 06:30 AM

Oct 2014

This message needs to be read far and wide. Hope you will consider cross posting to some other DU fora.

xchrom

(108,903 posts)

3. ...

Reply to theHandpuppet (Reply #2)

Sat Oct 18, 2014, 06:47 AM

Oct 2014

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