I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.
— John 13:34-35
(Not to mention a hymn I grew up with.)
Two stories I ran across today. First:
Authorities ‘looking into’ pastor’s church sermon calling for execution of LGBTQ people | TheHill
Here’s Pastor Grayson Fritts, preaching at All Scripture Baptist Church:
“Here’s how it should work. It shouldn’t work when we go out and we enforce the laws, because the Bible says the powers that be are ordained of God and God has instilled the power of civil government to send the police in 2019 out to these LGBT freaks and arrest them,” Fritts said in his June 2 sermon.
“Have a trial for them, and if they are convicted then they are to be put to death … do you understand that? It’s a capital crime to be carried out by our government.”
Do we feel more comfortable that Pastor Fritts is a detective in the Knox County Sheriff’s Office?
The next headline is relatively innocuous in its text …
… until you start reading about these preachers who, remarkably, don’t include Pastor Fritts, above.
There’s Steven Anderson, who celebrated the [Pulse Nightclub] massacre as soon as it happened because there were “50 less pedophiles in this world.” He added that he’s “not gonna sit here and cry about it and say it’s a tragedy, because it’s not.” He’s also said if he could push a button and kill every homosexual, he would “push it until it breaks.”
There’s Roger Jimenez, who said the worst thing about the massacre was that the shooter “didn’t finish the job.” He also longed for the government to round up all the gay people, “put them up against a firing wall, put a firing squad in front of them, and blow their brains out.”
There’s Tommy McMurtry, who wishes we could go back to the time when society put gay people in their place: “six feet under.”
[…] The man hosting the conference is Patrick Boyle of Revival Baptist Church in Orlando, so it’s presumably at his church or somewhere close by. Boyle, by the way, insists he’s just echoing the Bible when he says gay people “are worthy of death.”
Those folk are preachers at Faithful Word Baptist, Verity Baptist, and Liberty Baptist Church, and Revival Baptist Church.
Three points.
First, I am not suggesting this is the “Christian,” or even “Baptist” attitude toward LGBTQ folk. I know too many Christians, and read too many more, to make such an assertion.
Second, I am always seriously reluctant to brand people as not being “Christian.” That’s a tactic that’s been used by tyrants and theocrats down the centuries to discredit and persecute folk of all stripes.
But I find it impossible to reconcile the gleeful homophobic bloodthirstiness of these self-identifying Christian preachers with anything in the Biblical teachings of Christ, let alone the beliefs of many Christians I know.
Third, whenever there is a terroristic crime, or even violent sentiment of precisely this sort, by self-identifying Muslims, there is a public demand that other Muslims pointedly condemn such things, so as to demonstrate that they don’t support such sentiments (and, even then, law enforcement is encouraged and follows through on efforts to monitor Muslim organizations and gathering places to ensure we’re not seeing a terror attack in the making).
It would not be inappropriate, given these particular individuals, to similarly insist that Christians condemn their sentiments, lest people draw the conclusion that this is how all Christians feel (and, presumably, want to act upon), or even use as a justification to put Baptist congregations under police and FBI observation.
Consider this my own condemnation of same. This is, as I said, antithetical to my own religious beliefs, and my understanding of Christianity, not to mention my beliefs as to how a civil society operates in general, and how America operates specifically.
I would say more about the individuals involved … but it would involve language that doesn’t seem particularly loving. Because some folk make it very difficult to love them, Jesus’ dictates or not.
You don’t understand. John is talking about loving one another. The gays are not True Christians and are not included.
Of course! And if we keep Them out the neighborhood, then they won’t be our neighbors, either, and that gets off of the hook with Mark 12:31, too! Genius!