Our Jesus is gay. Theirs is not. Really he's the same man, woman or transgender (that might make the most sense) but always the same God. We all must clasp hands and venerate the cross he carried (Protestant) or carries (Catholic) for all our salvation.
This post was published on the now-closed HuffPost Contributor platform. Contributors control their own work and posted freely to our site. If you need to flag this entry as abusive, send us an email.

Jesus is gay. I use the present tense because as a gay Christian, he is with me now and throughout the eternal life of my soul.

How did I come to take gay Jesus as my savior? As the world has grown more embracing of the GLBT community so have many people of faith...but not all.

I was drawn back to my church, as are many, at a vulnerable and lonely time. I found a wonderful parish where not only were GLBT people welcome, we had our own ministry. Our pastor never re-visited homophobic dogma as we served Christ via bake sales, potlucks and retreats. The velvet-gloved bitch slap came as a pamphlet, sent on behalf of our scowling former pope in his Prada slippers and hat Donatella Versace might wear to Fashion Week Luncheon. Homosexuals are welcome but "disordered," and we must repudiate what our bathing suits cover. As you can imagine, after that, our numbers dwindled at least for a time.

Had the pope been right? Were Adam and Steve as much a crime against nature as Liza Minelli and David Gest?

Jesus is gay. I know because I am gay and he loves me. This deceptively simple concept at last silenced the ecclesiastical white noise and ended the debate in my soul. How could I not have seen it? His metrosexual beauty, artistic temperament, (carpentry can be art), gentle nature, excellent listening skills (ever meet a straight man as hot as him who could claim that one?), and it became self-evident. In his taut arms and manicured hands, I found my response to anyone who says unless I reject my innate nature, I can't be saved. Jesus is gay!

Gay Christian youth, some already struggling, are regularly drawn into churches with Up with God messages and Jesus rocks music. Only later to discover, after letting down their guard, that the other intolerant shoe drops. "Well, yes Jesus loves you," they say. "But he hates your sins." When the now even more vulnerable kid pleads an infallible God made them this way, it's back to the old "Knock it off or there's the door" routine. The results are often as tragic as they are avoidable. Rachel Maddow, some righteously indignant pencil waving please.

Unto these traumatized outcasts and refugees of homophobes in the lamb's clothing, I say dry your eyes and take gay Christ into your heart. The day of reckoning has arrived! And I don't mean the Barney's warehouse sale. When our Father Abraham, Justice Anthony Kennedy, delivered us to the promised land of marital equality, he did more than codify our right to stroll zombie-like through Home Depot in search of the perfect door knocker; or endure our child's teacher doing her best Church Lady impression and saying "Isn't that special," through a thin-lipped smile of acknowledgement little Mason has to Mommies. At least Modern Family has eased that crossing, along with Rosie's cruises, and that Neil Patrick Harris because he's such a stitch. And he sings too!

Now Catholicism has a doctrinal Gordian knot to untie before the disordered nonsense can be banished into the trashcan of prejudice, but evangelical churches, which can apple pick from the tree of knowledge, bible verses as articles of faith, have a choice to make, and it is in their response that the lavender light of a righteous Messiah will at last shine upon them.

Two thirds of millennial evangelicals support GLBT marital rights. If their leaders refuse gay and lesbian married couples, aren't they showing their intolerant hand to the pro-gay majority of the youth they crave? For each rejected GLBT couple, how many other non-GLBT congregants will bail too? If the marketing of these churches is Jesus rocks the love, it must be getting harder to later instill any Debbie, the homophobic downer, sermonizing especially when it comes to two people living as Jesus commands: monogamous and faithful to both their marriage and their Christ. Evangelical churches have begun to feel literally damned if we do embrace GBLT marriage, out of business if we don't, and this idea is getting a lot of serious chat, print, and prayer in many communities of faith.

My solution: accept the fabulous news that Jesus is gay. We, righteous GLBT Christians, won't hold theological grudges. We will welcome everyone, without precondition, no matter their lack of knowledge of grooming products or Sondheim. We'll never profess our love and acceptance, only to qualify it later, and let the other Gucci loafer or Doc Marten drop. We will update their music so not all Christian rock sounds like bad eighties cover bands, and return Jesus to just a two syllable name. Most importantly, my GLBT brothers and sisters will demonstrate to these -poly-cotton blend wearing- wretches, that we love Christ as much as anyone else. If not more so, because we have to risk rejection, even when we least expect it, every time we sit in a pew, and still we keep coming back. Ellen, let's dance to our song of praise. A-ay-men, A-ay-men, A-ay-men, Amen Amen!

While the unrepentant remain lost in their wilderness of ignorance, and blaspheme by hating in his name, Sunday mornings, before brunch, we will make welcome our non GLBT Christian brothers and sisters, and teach them our triumphant, harmonized hymns of joy to our gay Christ.

And then we will sing theirs too.

Our Jesus is gay. Theirs is not. Really he's the same man, woman, or transgender (that might make the most sense) but always the same God. We all must clasp hands and venerate the cross he carried (Protestant) or carries (Catholic) for all our salvation. Millions died in unholy wars over that inconsistency until both sides let their love of Christ usurp their differences. Christ now calls us to do the same. "I'm here, I'm queer, trans, bi, straight, or all of the above," he cries. "And I'm going to save your souls!"

Popular in the Community

Close

What's Hot