{"id":1205,"date":"2014-03-17T12:19:45","date_gmt":"2014-03-17T17:19:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/?p=1205"},"modified":"2014-03-17T12:56:18","modified_gmt":"2014-03-17T17:56:18","slug":"dont-believe-everything-you-hear-about-troublesome-lesbians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/2014\/03\/dont-believe-everything-you-hear-about-troublesome-lesbians.html","title":{"rendered":"Don’t Believe Everything You Hear About “Troublesome Lesbians”"},"content":{"rendered":"

There is an article Here<\/a> (I hesitate to link it lest I help propagate the popularity of the article) it is titled \u201cWhen Two Lesbians Walk Into a Church Seeking Trouble\u201d and features the story of a wonderfully loving and accepting church and how their Christian nonjudgementalism softened the heart of Amy the lesbian. <\/p>\n

\"178932_10200091980326672_1937373783_n\"<\/a>To hear their Pastor tell it, This church is called Gateway in Austin TX, and their motto is \u201cCome as you are\u201d and they mean it! they even let lesbians come even though they admit they were trying to be shocking on purpose! <\/p>\n

I\u2019ll bet you would like a church like that. Maybe if you were in Austin you would like to visit. <\/p>\n

Well I am, and before their article went viral I did\u2026 Or at least I tried to. I was not allowed. <\/p>\n

I guess I\u2019m not troublesome enough. I\u2019m just a heterosexual white pastor\u2019s kid, but at Gateway, you are not permitted to join a Bible Study until you have joined their church, and that is no easy task. I\u2019ve spoken to others who have been asked to leave the Gateway community because they \u201cdidn\u2019t fit in\u201d or they \u201cmade people uncomfortable\u201d both descriptions that sound very much like Jesus to me. I was only turned away at the door, where I didn\u2019t give it another thought. I\u2019m thankful I\u2019m not like those who were invited in to the toxic community to be chewed up and spit out. <\/p>\n

And I\u2019m thankful that the pastor apparently sees the value in things like love and acceptance, and that the people who have taken this article viral, apparently do so for the same reasons\u2026 But while the pastor toots his own horn, he seems to fail to realize that his church has massive problems with acceptance, and they are visible even in his own article if you read carefully. <\/p>\n

Guess what: If the fullness of our love is the capacity to not be shocked by girls who like girls, then our love is not full enough. GLBT people have hopes and dreams and personalities. They need much more than for you to be unaffected by what you perceive to be their troublesome antics. <\/p>\n

And as we in the church pat our own backs by spreading this article. saying \u201cYes, I am a champion of allowing lesbians to come to church where they will learn to stop being lesbians, look how accepting I am\u201d we need to turn out gaze back on ourselves. I\u2019m not <\/p>\n

Not \u201cLook how loving I am\u201d. <\/p>\n

Not \u201clet me teach you how to be an accepting Christian\u201d <\/p>\n

Not \u201ceven people who are muddy are allowed near me\u201d <\/p>\n

But \u201cLord have mercy\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLord, teach me to love more, to accept more\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201dLord thank you for allowing muddy people like me near you\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There is an article Here (I hesitate to link it lest I help propagate the popularity of the article) it is titled \u201cWhen Two Lesbians Walk Into a Church Seeking Trouble\u201d and features the story of a wonderfully loving and accepting church and how their Christian nonjudgementalism softened the heart of Amy the lesbian. To…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":391,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nDon’t Believe Everything You Hear About “Troublesome Lesbians” - A Fear of Whales<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/2014\/03\/dont-believe-everything-you-hear-about-troublesome-lesbians.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Don’t Believe Everything You Hear About “Troublesome Lesbians” - A Fear of Whales\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There is an article Here (I hesitate to link it lest I help propagate the popularity of the article) it is titled \u201cWhen Two Lesbians Walk Into a Church Seeking Trouble\u201d and features the story of a wonderfully loving and accepting church and how their Christian nonjudgementalism softened the heart of Amy the lesbian. 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