It still shocks me we are still talking about legislating love. I wonder why divorce hasn't been banned to protect the sanctity of marriage... oh, that's right... most lawmakers would have to vote to put themselves in legal jeopardy.
Recently, the whole country watched the California Supreme Court render their disappointing Proposition 8 decision banning gay marriage. Alaska takes longer to thaw out. Today, June 9th, the Anchorage Assembly will vote on a municipal ordinance to ban discrimination against gays and lesbians in hiring, housing and education.
Jobs, homes and education? Yes. It's vulgar. I'm sick of the debate. I'm sick of Bible-waving fear mongers. I'm sick of people using Jesus as an excuse to hate.
Local super-sized Church leader, Dr. Jerry Prevo, of The Anchorage Baptist Temple, is the "not-so-Christ-like" voice of hate. His eight-page press release included bullet points explaining why he is against the ordinance. The last few pages read like a porn pamphlet. His website reads like a parody. His letter to the Anchorage Daily News warned:
It would allow any man to dress like a woman and use any public women's restroom. Ladies, do you want that to happen? If not then you should contact the Anchorage Assembly and show up at the June 9 public hearing. A man in a highly visible sales job could come to work dressed like a woman. A person of either sex who indulges a taste for extreme sexual promiscuity and pornography during working hours could not be stopped or fired even though it damages the company's image. Maybe, worst of all, this ordinance would allow a man who teaches a second grade class or any grade to show up as a woman in the classroom and the School District could do nothing because of this ordinance.
Thou doth protest too much. How many times must we hear about closeted anti-gay preachers and politicians before we completely disregard their spiteful venom and recognize their pathology? They can't come to terms with their secret desires so they lash out at innocent citizens with anti-gay sermons and legislation.
The list of infamy is long; there's Ted Haggard, the mega church pastor and advisor to President Bush. He was head of the National Association of Evangelicals and was a well-known anti-gay moral crusader. Ted got caught doing meth and hiring a male prostitute. Jesus salesman, Paul Crouch, president of the Trinity Broadcasting Network, paid Enoch Lonnie Ford $425,000 in 1998 in exchange for his silence about an alleged homosexual affair they'd had in 1996.
Then there are the closeted anti-gay legislators. During his two-decade-plus legislative tenure, former Republican Mayor of Spokane and Washington Legislator, Jim West, was quite focused. He initiated legislation to prohibit sexual contact between consenting teenagers; advocated a bill that would have banned gays and lesbians from working for schools, day cares and state agencies; voted to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman; and, when he was Senate Majority Leader, let a bill banning discrimination against gays and lesbians die in committee. When he was mayor, West promised to veto a proposition that would extend benefits to same sex domestic partners of city employees. West admitted to using a gay website and soliciting men online after being outed; he was stripped of his duties of mayor ten days later.
Homophobic Republican Senator Larry Craig voted for the anti-gay 1996 Defense of Marriage Act. That same year, he also voted against a bill outlawing employment discrimination based on sexual orientation. That bill failed by ONE VOTE! In 2007, Senator Craig was famously arrested for allegedly soliciting gay sex in a Minneapolis airport bathroom stall. Congressman Ed Schrock, a Christian Virginia Republican who regularly voted against gay rights, quit his seat when recordings began to circulate of the congressman using a telephone service to arrange gay sex. Anti-gay Arizona Republican Jim Kolbe voted for the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996. That vote inspired gay rights activists to out him. Other outed anti-gay hypocrites include Republican Congressman David Dreier-CA, and former Republican Congressmen James McCrery-LA and Mark Foley-FL. There are many others.
Thou doth protest too much, indeed.
I guess the recession is now hitting churches; hate drums up business. Prevo has worked hard to secure a tax free status for his church, his home and the homes of his employees, yet he wants to take rights away from citizens who actually pay taxes! The pastor's fascination of men wearing womens clothing is pure fetish. Historically, Jesus wore a "dress" to work. But Prevo doesn't base his teachings on the tolerance of Christ. He prefers cherry picking Bible 1.0, the old laws, abolished by the crucifixion.
Christianity was born out of Bible 2.0, the one about feeding the poor, healing the sick, freeing those wrongfully imprisoned and loving your neighbor as yourself. None of the miracles reported in the Bible were to make a GAY MAN STRAIGHT. None of the hungry were asked their "sexual orientation" before they were fed. Feeding the masses with 5 loaves and 2 fishes was socialism. Jesus wasn't run over by a runaway donkey cart. He was an innocent man TORTURED AND PUT TO DEATH by the STATE at the insistence of the CHURCH! The only reported anger from Jesus was directed at a corrupt church that had turned his Father's house into a "den of thieves." How annoying for Jesus; He takes time out to come to Earth and save souls, and in His name, we hate one another.
Jerry Prevo told the ADN, "If I were a veteran, I'd be upset that they are linking the two together." What the hell did our veterans fight for if it wasn't our rights of equality? Has anyone told the preacher about "Don't Ask, Don't Tell?" What about the men and women of other "sexual orientation" who have (and will) fight and die to protect his right to worship any way he sees fit?
The Independent Baptist Church of Wasilla's pastor, Ron Hamman, is fixated with the anti-Christ being a homosexual. His "warning" was published in The Frontiersman last week:
But will the Antichrist be a homosexual? Having seen what the Bible says of sodomy, it says, "Neither shall he [Antichrist] regard... the desire of women...." As I said at the onset, I am not the first to draw attention to this, but the verbiage is clear.
From a lost perspective, the reason sex sells, pornography is profitable, and prostitution is "the world's oldest profession" is mankind's desire of women. But homosexuality does not regard this -- in their unbridled lusts they burn for their own gender. And at what other time have we seen such perversion come out of the closets onto our streets, threatening violence if we do not accept their ways? And will it be just a coincidence that the Antichrist will be the very first occupant of the lake of fire, tasting eternal death 1,000 years before even the devil himself?
You be the judge.
NO, Pastor Ron Hamman, not "you be the judge." That's the point...you are supposed to trust your Maker to be the judge. Something about "judge not, lest ye be judged" comes to mind.
So the characteristics of the anti-Christ include a lack of desire for women? Well, according to them, the real Christ didn't desire women either. He wore a "dress" and sandals, quite possibly open toed. He hung out with a bunch of men and a former prostitute. I'm not saying Jesus was gay. I'm just saying it wouldn't matter to me if he was; I read the red letters in the Bible. I'm quite sure, Prevo and Hamman would have denied the real Jesus rent, education, employment and basic rights. They are so focused on the Anti, they forgot the Christ.
The "unbridled lusts" Pastors Prevo and Hamman explain in such great detail scream, "I hate myself!" Their Ted Haggard-like zeal is telling.
Pastor Prevo was wrong on apartheid in the 1980's. Was that Old Testament teaching? As much time as he spends on television, most people don't know he starred in the reality show "Repo Man." What would Jesus repo, Jerry?
My intolerance for the intolerant makes me one of them. I'm trying to understand how tiny their God must be to live in such fear.
The separation of church and state has fallen, a casualty on the culture war battlefield. The McChurches have frauded their tax exempt status. Political engagement, complete with voting instructions and the overt financing of political campaigns is normal practice. The Jesus Corporations are franchising fear. They preach the opposite of love; making them anti-Christ.
I grew up in the First Organic Free Range Christian Church of Homer, Alaska. I know people who walk their talk; they operate from their heart out of a place of love. The X-ians, (Christians minus Christ; think X-mas) fear all but themselves and do not understand the separation of church and state. They believe we are a Christian nation, and the pledge of allegiance is in the Old Testament somewhere. They ignore the Arlington National Cemetery gravestones marked with 38 different religious symbols; including Muslim, Hindu, Wicca, Atheist, Agnostic, or other varied faiths. All have died protecting the right to freedoms these hate filled speakers exploit. To use their vernacular-their elitist hate is un-American.
Don't confuse my criticism against the Christian fatwa of religious organizations with my respect for many churches or Christian people. The dangers of funding a jihadist movement against the legal reproductive choices of women or the civil rights of the GLBT community are real. People of faith can denounce the terrorist activities of such hate mongers without agreeing with the actions of their targets.
The real Anti-Christ shows up every day. It shows up in the fear, racism, homophobia, and hatred in the very people who claim they work for Christ.
Yes, Pastor Prevo. Yes, Pastor Hamman. Your actions are those of the Anti-Christ. Thou doth protest WAY TOO MUCH!