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~aroll

a new civil rights movement…part 2

so i know that i said in my next post in this series that i would discuss the separation of church & state...it's coming, but something has been pressing my heart more lately. we as a church, and me as an individual, have talked about the need to put a face to this fight/movement/"issue." this movement is about human beings - not religion, not faith, not legislation. it is about people made in the image of God, children of God equal and loved in His eyes...just not apparently in the eyes of a majority of His followers.

john smulo posted about our billboard and emailed me a note of encouragement. this led to him asking if i would do an interview. the entire interview can be viewed here, but i wanted to post a relevant part of it:

John: In one of our emails you said something that you wished people would stop talking about this as an “issue”, and instead see that they are actual people that are impacted here. Can you expand what you mean by this?

Alex: There was a very real sense for me, and several members of our community, that the Prop 8 campaign was very “us vs. them.” The gay agenda is out to corrupt children, destroy the church, break up families....which is all false. When we first got a postcard at our offices about The Call at Qualcomm, our volunteer coordinator (straight, 19 yo female) immediately wanted to be there with a group of people wearing shirts that said, “I am the face of those you hate.” She felt the need to put a face to this fight. If they say we are out to destroy families and corrupt children, what about the countless straight families who brought their kids to the candlelight vigil? What about the young girl standing on the sidewalk during an equal rights march with a sign that says, “I love my two mommies”? This “issue” within the church does have scholarship and texts to understand...but it is also real human beings made in the image of God earnestly seeking to live a life more like Christ. And outside of the church it is real human beings with the created need for companionship who are wanting to COMMIT to one another in devoted love, and that is something that should be celebrated. Beyond that, I could spend a few pages talking about the need for the separation of church and state and legislating morality (see my blog for more thoughts on that).

From my experience, many conservative Christians do not have relationships with gay & lesbian men and women, or they do and don’t know that their friends are gay. When someone close to them comes out, they are forced to deal with real life, not just words and arguments. Look at the story in Acts of the Church in Antioch...the Gentiles who were choosing to follow Jesus were being asked to subscribe to Jewish laws and customs, but Paul presented the fact that without living under that law they were still showing signs and fruit of the Spirit. The Council of Jerusalem could not argue with the living proof of God’s presence in their lives. When you begin to deal with people instead of an “issue” it does get messy, but you have the opportunity to learn from their experience and witness the presence of God in their lives...or in the context outside of the church you see couples that have been together 20+ years who simply want to have their commitment recognized and be afforded the same rights as straight couples, rights as basic as hospital visitation. Throughout Scripture we see how God constantly sought to redeem people not an institution. Jesus was about people not about religion.

i challenge all of us to remember that we, on both sides of this "issue," are dealing with real live human beings - with brains, lives, emotions, experiences...if you are reading this and don't know someone directly affected by this movement (which i would honestly find hard to believe), then check out this link and see the faces of many - gay and straight - who are simply asking to be treated as an equal...as a human being. ~aroll

germany in the movies...

something random occurred to me as i was watching previews before a movie the other night...there are currently 3 movies out or soon released dealing with various aspects of nazi germany in and after world war two. "the boy in the striped pajamas," "the reader" (releasing jan. 9), and "valkyrie" (releasing Christmas day). i have only seen the first movie i listed and thought it was very well done. i was not prepared for the ending at all, but the story of the film was beautiful. it shows in great detail the affect on families that the war had as a young german boy befriends a jewish boy being held in a concentration camp his own father oversees. "the reader" appears to do something similar as it chronicles the life and relationship of a woman who became a soldier and a young man who read to her as part of a secretive affair. he re-encounters her 8 years later as a law student observing her as a defendant in a war crimes trial. finally, "valkyrie" portrays one of a dozen or so attempts to assassinate hitler.

as someone who studied history in college, i have always been leery of people taking movies of historical events as solid true history. some films have done a great job at documenting the events that took place, others take considerable artistic license. at any rate, it seems lately that hollywood has taken an interest in telling stories that before have possibly gone unnoticed. hollywood is in the business of entertaining and telling stories. but what prompts three different studios to make these films at the same time? maybe i'm just searching for significance where there isn't any, but is there something to this? are we as human beings no longer content settling for one version of a story? maybe our culture as a whole is realizing the true value in exploring all peoples stories, for when we learn the story of the other the distance between us diminishes.

hmmm, should i link this to my civil rights posts? ~aroll

a new civil rights movement…part 1

in june of 1969, people began to stand up for the rights of gay and lesbian men and women following the raid on the bar at the stonewall inn in new york city. ever since, baby steps have been taken to recognize members of the lgbt community for exactly what they are – human beings no different than any other person on this planet. it’s interesting to me that in the same time period when tens of thousands of people fought for equality for people of color – a battle that was long overdue and vital to the continuation of society – another group of people fighting for equality battled in silence without gaining much ground. please do not hear this as comparing the plight of the african-american community to that of the lgbt community. that will always be The civil rights movement (capital “T”), but nonetheless this is “A” civil rights movement. but 40 years later, people are still fighting to be considered equal. this is not an “issue” but is about human beings.

many people, especially in the conservative church world, have to continued to advocate exclusion, judgment, and condemnation of the lgbt community. in spite of their efforts, progress has been made. one of the most significant steps forward came when the state of massachusetts legalized gay marriage. several years later, may of 2008 to be exact, the california supreme court overturned prop 22 (a ban on gay marriage) as unconstitutional which then launched the creation of proposition 8. in the midst of the battle over prop 8, connecticut even legalized gay marriage. then on november 4, 2008 the fight for equal rights for the lgbt community suffered an emotional blow: not only did prop 8 pass in california, but arizona and florida both passed constitutional amendments further defined the right of marriage away from the lgbt community, and arkansas passed a ban on adoption by gay couples. in one day, rights were taken away from a group of people who had been given rights, and rights were distanced from others even further.

throughout history, the church has been a voice of fighting for the rights of others: john wesley & william wilberforce in the fight to end slavery; William booth and the salvation army fighting poor working conditions for women & children in match factories; dr. martin luther king, jr. and the battle to end segregation. and now the church is leading the charge to deny a group of human beings equal rights under the law…the law. in the justification of “loving the sinner and hating the sin,” many within the conservative church compare homosexuality to rape, murder, adultery, etc. those “sins” are acted on other people against their will...people are entitled to their convictions, but voting yes on prop 8 acted those convictions on a group of people against their will. the right to live as the men and women God created them to be is not acting on anyone against his or her will. government’s role is not to legislate morality; it is to protect the rights and well-being of its citizens – all citizens, especially the rights of the minority.

my next post in this thread will be on the separation of church and state…

journeying in life, love, and the pursuit of Jesus…~aroll

NO on Prop 8...part 2

i fully intended on writing more posts on this topic, weighing in on more of the arguments, but frankly i've grown weary. i see the ads, i read the articles, i get the emails sent to pastors from "yes on 8," and while this is a very emotional issue for me and my community i'm tired of dealing with it. no matter what happens on tuesday, this is not over. if prop 8 passes, there will be many hurting people to help make sense of it all. if prop 8 fails, then the conservative evangelical church will only be that much more riled up to "fight the darkness that is advancing."

really? darkness? evil? marriage is a civil institution. yes it has existed in virtually every religion that has affected humans on this planet, but "marriage" as we know it is an institution regulated by the state governments that acknowledges a commitment between two individuals and guarantees those individuals certain rights. would granting that same acknowledgment to same-sex couples really bring the demise of this country, the church and humanity? oh wait...the world has not come to an end, heterosexual marriages still function (well, 48% of them anyway), and the church is still marching - and same sex marriages have been legal now for several months in california and even longer in massachusetts. the language of the current law on the books specifically says that churches retain autonomy in choosing for whom they will perform weddings. some churches now refuse to marry heterosexual couples who are living together...what do many of those couples do? they go down to the court house and have a judge marry them. do i want my wedding to be performed by a judge? no, i would rather a minister perform my ceremony because i want my marriage to be a covenant between me, my future partner, and God because my faith is important to me...always has been and always will be.

proposition 8 isn't protecting marriage...it is stealing it from a group of people. proposition 8 would write discrimination into the constitution of california. it is the church seeking to exclude people in the name of the same Jesus that i love and worship...and it's making me sick. it makes me horribly sad to see what this issue is doing to the Church. it has caused division among the body of Christ, and i hate to think about what this campaign has said to the thousands of people around the country who are outside of a faith community and may never engage in a conversation about faith because of the hate they have seen. as a result, a group of my friends and i are drafting a "manifesto" of sorts to say that we are Christ-followers not defined by tolerance, but by acceptance. we are Christ-followers who believe in the transforming power of God, not the conforming nature of religion.

i think about all the millions of dollars that have been raised in the name of discrimination and hate. yes, millions of dollars have been raised by "no on 8" as well, but that money wouldn't have been needed if proposition 8 didn't exist. how many homeless could have been fed with that money? how many sick people could have been given medical treatment with that money? at my small group last night, a friend put it this way, "one dollar gives one person in africa clean water for one year." think about that. how much further could this money have gone in helping humanity? i am ready for this to be over so that whatever process of healing and reconciliation that is needed can begin.

if you are a praying person, please pray that God's love, grace, and truth will prevail and that hate perpetrated in the name of God will not win out. if you are in san diego, please join thousands of people in a candlelight vigil at 9:00p on university ave. in hillcrest to show unity against hate and discrimination. vote NO on prop 8. ~aroll

NO on Prop 8...part 1

so here is part 1 in my effort to get the word out about how inaccurate, inflammatory, and inhumane prop 8 and its propaganda is. the new "NO on 8" television ads are starting to directly refute the "yes on 8" tv ads that use outright lies and misinformation such as churches losing their tax exempt status, citing a single incident in massachusetts to incite parents of school children, etc. this is a paragraph from the decision handed down by the California Supreme Court overturning Prop 22 (paragraph breaks are mine for easier reading):

A number of factors lead us to this conclusion. First, the exclusion of same-sex couples from the designation of marriage clearly is not necessary in order to afford full protection to all of the rights and benefits that currently are enjoyed by married opposite-sex couples; permitting same-sex couples access to the designation of marriage will not deprive opposite-sex couples of any rights and will not alter the legal framework of the institution of marriage, because same-sex couples who choose to marry will be subject to the same obligations and duties that currently are imposed on married opposite-sex couples.

Second, retaining the traditional definition of marriage and affording same-sex couples only a separate and differently named family relationship will, as a realistic matter, impose appreciable harm on same-sex couples and their children, because denying such couples access to the familiar and highly favored designation of marriage is likely to cast doubt on whether the official family relationship of same-sex couples enjoys dignity equal to that of opposite-sex couples.

Third, because of the widespread disparagement that gay individuals historically have faced, it is all the more probable that excluding same-sex couples from the legal institution of marriage is likely to be viewed as reflecting an official view that their committed relationships are of lesser stature than the comparable relationships of opposite-sex couples.

Finally, retaining the designation of marriage exclusively for opposite- sex couples and providing only a separate and distinct designation for same-sex couples may well have the effect of perpetuating a more general premise — now emphatically rejected by this state — that gay individuals and same-sex couples are in some respects “second-class citizens” who may, under the law, be treated differently from, and less favorably than, heterosexual individuals or opposite-sex couples. Under these circumstances, we cannot find that retention of the traditional definition of marriage constitutes a compelling state interest. Accordingly, we conclude that to the extent the current California statutory provisions limit marriage to opposite-sex couples, these statutes are unconstitutional.

even if you may not agree with my stance on this issue, if you are a california voter, please at least do your own thinking and own research and don't just buy the propaganda that would deny basic human rights to a group of human beings. i will be continuing the dialogue here as we get closer to the election. ~aroll