

Got in this:

Hi, John, I got a Kindle for Christmas and the first book I loaded on it and read was UNFAIR. [Here.] It is a refreshing comfort to read about other Christians, gay and straight, who don’t think gay people are condemned to hell. I got so much @#&% for agreeing with that that my husband finally resigned his pastorate of 12 years because of the crap people at his church were giving him. It was a dark valley that he and I walked through after that split—but always I remembered it’s a fraction of the grief, rejection and heartbreak that gay people face every day from some people and groups. I had the clobber verses thrown in my face. Several people accused my husband of being a universalist, of preaching a “social gospel,” of coming to that church under false pretenses, of not having control of his wife, etc. This was a congregation that had always affirmed and shown love and respect for my husband prior to this. About half the congregation left from this smaller-sized Southern Baptist church when my husband resigned, pretty much everyone under 50 years old. My husband is now working at a funeral home as a family service counselor, and he does like it and is doing well. It is kinda sad that he is not pursing ministry in another denomination, though, as he is a gifted minister. However he just hasn’t been ready to consider going back. It has a been an ongoing journey to heal from the hurt caused by these people who I thought loved us like family. I know that God loves everyone, and that everyone includes gay people. Thank you for using your gifts to shine the light. I appreciate you and your ministry.

Key phrase in this good woman’s letter?

“… pretty much everyone under 50 years old.”

That being, of course, the people who left her husband’s Southern Baptist church when they discovered they were worshipping with Christians who were willing to extend the love of Jesus Christ to straight people, and no further.

These days of course everyone’s up in arms about the gay issue; I get hate mail about it every day from “Christians” whose raging apoplexy is matched only by their shocking illiteracy.

The whole gay-Christian “debate” is like watching a great ocean wave rising and cresting. Soon enough it crashes onto the shore, all thunderous fury and spray.

And then it is no more.

The anti-gay Christian bigots will grow old and die,* and a fresher, truer, more gracious, more enlightened Christianity will take its place. This will happen—this is happening—because God is good, God is fair, and above all God is love. And finally, ultimately, inevitably, love conquers all.

Farewell, anti-gay Christians. For as surely as one day follows the next, your time is coming to an end. May God show you more mercy in the next life than you showed gay people in this one.

* A couple of commenters below made the point that it is not, by a long shot, only young people who are choosing to leave denominations and churches that refuse to refute the toxic lie that God condemns homosexuality. That’s a good strong point I wanted to make sure to … well, jam in right here. Heck, I was 44 when this happened.