Recently in Religion Category

I’ll get to stupid people in a minute.... but first a brief update....

We went to the Connecticut Opera Saturday night. We had a great time. We went to the pre-opera dinner, hosted by Max (a very nice, as in really nice, chain here in the Hartford area). Wine flowed freely, with a nice dinner, complete with the conductor visiting and giving a talk on the Hartford connection to the opera we were going to hear that night, Puccini’s Tosca. It turned out to be a very nice product.

For some reason, we were thought to be very high-standing patrons of the opera. At least, we sat at the table where the President of the Board of the Connecticut Opera sat. I actually had a great time. He asked how I got into opera, and I shared my childhood experiences of going to the “dam park” (yeah, just below a dam with a big water spill), putting out my blanket on a sunny Saturday afternoon, turning on my radio, and listening to Live From The Met, where I heard the really big voices of yesteryear, in real time no less!

Why did I do this? To escape my life at the time (and no, I didn’t share that with him). It was kind of like this for me...

I’m in a lot of trouble in the Evangelical community these days because there’s a group of oppressed people that I tend to love. And it’s a group of people that everybody’s upset with these days... But let me just say this. I was in high school. And there was a boy in high school who everybody picked on because we found out he was gay. We mocked him, we ridiculed him—you know what high school kids can do when they find out that somebody’s gay. We humiliated him in every way we could think of. On Fridays when the other boys went into the showers following gym, he would never go in—he was afraid. And when we came out with our wet towels, we whipped them at him and stung his little body.

I wasn’t there the day they took Roger and pushed him into the corner of that tile shower, and as he wrapped himself up like a fetus, five guys urinated all over him. He went home, and that night, went to bed, got up at two o’clock in the morning, went down to the garage, and he hung himself. And I knew I wasn’t a Christian. (source)

Except, of course, I didn’t kill myself over it. It was all timing really. Given six more months, since my terrible secret of me being gay was getting out to the good citizens of Emmett, and starting to circulate through the high school, I suppose I wouldn’t be here writing this today. The timing was that I was a graduating senior. I received my diploma and went off to college to escape my fate at their hands, unlike the boy described above. But I have to tell you, the last two weeks of my school year were a bit scary... watching where I was at... staying in a public place... leaving school late after I was sure everyone had left. You know, today, I don’t really feel anything at all about that. Don’t get me wrong. I do everything I can for gay teens in distress, but I’m finding that there are less and less of them all the time.

As gays meld into the broader population, places like West Hollywood and the Castro district in San Francisco will inevitably lose some of their appeal. As more gays come out in more places, the diversity of homosexual politics and lifestyles will come out with them, and the tolerant will multiply.

For some of the pioneers from the edgy, embattled, ecstatic “good old days,” this may be bittersweet. “But isn’t that what everyone wanted 20 years ago?” Gates asks. “Just to be treated like everyone else?” (source)

I think that’s a good thing. I know some people feel that we are losing our identity, and perhaps we are a bit. I don’t know if you’ve visited The Castro lately, but it’s certainly not what it was 25 years ago. But in the greater scheme of things, what is really happening is that we are finally able to become whole people with out “the gay thing” defining us. For me, that has meant that I’ve become less directly involved with “gay rights”, although I still support many gay rights causes and organizations. It has also made me more interested in all the other things that are waiting out there for me, such as hiking, photography, music, and art. I know they were always there for me, but when you are defined by society by your sexuality alone, that becomes your definition, and your worst fear. Today, in America at least, sexual orientation is becoming more and more a non-issue. Indeed, many of the people who in 2004 were so against gay marriage, are now changing their views, largely because people feel they can be themselves and are coming out more.

So.... back to stupid people. This morning I’m on my way to work. I stop at a stop light just before turning off on the road that eventually leads me to the freeway. At the corner are about six people holding signs that read, “I want lower taxes. I’M VOTING REPUBLICAN!”

I wanted to take a photo, but the light was pour, it was raining like hell (so I kind of felt sorry for them), so I just continued on. But on my way to work, I started thinking about the irony of it all. These people want lower taxes so they are voting Republican?

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could cost as much as $2.4 trillion through the next decade, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. The White House brushed off the analysis as “speculation.”

The estimate was the most comprehensive and far-reaching one to date. It factored in costs previously not counted and assumed that large number of forces would remain in the regions. (source)

I guess I’d like to know just who they feel will pay for the $2.4 trillion? We will, through taxes because that’s the only way the federal government has to raise money. So maybe they should have voted Democrat in 2004? Just a thought.

And I also wish the Democrats would “grow some” and, as Nancy Reagan once said, “JUST SAY NO!” to the current administration on spending.

After seven days, Maryland jurors smote the Westboro Baptist Church and its leaders Wednesday, awarding a grieving father nearly $11 million after anti-gay protests disturbed his Marine son’s funeral.

The father, Albert Snyder of York, Pa., sobbed when the verdict was read in U.S. District Court. Members of the Topeka church listened with tight-lipped smiles to the findings that they had invaded Snyder’s privacy with intent to inflict emotional distress.

The federal jury first awarded $2.9 million in compensatory damages. It returned in the afternoon with its decision to award $6 million in punitive damages for privacy loss and $2 million for distress. (source)

I grew up in a time when you did things for people. Instead of going to the mall (actually, we didn’t have malls in those days, we simply had little stores that specialized in clothing or whatever), we helped people out. If a neighbor was in trouble, we would offer our support, and our support was more than just words. Our support came in the form of helping that neighbor through deeds. If a funeral procession went by, you stopped and put your right hand over your heart and faced the funeral procession as they passed, out of respect for the family and the deceased. It was the proper and decent thing to do. And today, I still do that.

Today, our culture has changed a great deal, and not all in a good way. Yes, there have been some positive changes, such as more tolerance for despised minority groups. Somewhere in our fight for free speech, which we’ve had for a very long time, some of us it would seem have lost sight that there are times when it’s simply better to keep your mouth shut. Being able to say something does not mean that you should say it. But now days, more often than not it seems, people don’t give two cents about the other individuals feelings. Feelings are so politically correct after all, and politically correct seems to be going out of fashion.

I understand all of that, but whatever happened to just simple, every day, common decency? I’m glad that Fred Phelps disgusting group of thugs got hit big time with this settlement. He boasted afterwards, “Oh, it will take about five minutes to get that thing reversed.” Perhaps, but I would hope that Phelps, and a lot of the rest of us, would come away with two points from all of this...

1) Just because you can say something doesn’t mean that you should say it, out of consideration for others.
2) You do have free speech. But, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t consequences to that free speech.

Nothing is free. If you want to say certain things, there could be actions taken against you. This is what has happened to the Westboro Baptist Church. Their actions caught up with them. So, my hope is that the appeal will fail, and they will be liable to pay these costs, which they are financially unable to do. I’m told that their combined net worth is around one million dollars. I don’t return their hate by saying this. I simply hope it will stick because without money, there’s not a hell of a lot they can do.

And while I’m on the subject of decency, I suppose it’s worth a mention that this group has done the same thing for many years at the funerals of gay men who died of AIDS, and of course, they picketed the funeral of Matthew Shepard. America never cared about this activity until the group started targeting something more near and dear to the hearts of America; their straight sons who died in war were now being picketed at their funerals. How dare they? Pick on the gays, but not us. My un-Christian attitude on this is, “What goes around comes around”, but that’s not me. I’m more along the lines of, “Now you know how we felt.”

This is worth mention because this is precisely why the Phelps clan decided to stop picketing the funerals of gay men, and started targeting a larger and more sensational audience, dead soldiers. And it’s interesting to note the change that has taken place in the verbiage of the signs of this church.

From this....

To this....

They want the press coverage, and this is one way to get that. They have a right to their opinions and they have a right to express those opinions, but in my opinion, we have to find a way for them to have their freedom of speech, however vile we may think their message is, without them inflicting emotional damage on others. Picketing funerals crosses the line of decency. The emotional toll these people inflicted upon these families is what this settlement was about. The only difference is, they used words instead of a hammer. Had they used a hammer to do the same damage, they would have been prosecuted

Do we want any and all free speech at the expense of decency and a respect for what families are going through when they are simply trying to get through the hell of laying their son to rest? Somewhere, something went terribly wrong.

We are finally home and it’s nice to be home. We enjoyed our vacation to Washington State a great deal and saw some beautiful scenery along the way. I’m putting something together on it along with many photos. We took over 2,500 photos in all! Don’t worry, not nearly that many will be published. Maybe we are a bit addicted to photography? You think?

I noted on the news that the Supreme Court has made what I would consider to be major decisions on a few very big issues: our environment, freedom of speech, and finance reform, and grants to religious organizations.

Oh.... and what do all of these rulings have in common? They were all decided on a 5-4 vote - all of which would most likely have been decided the other way in the court of Sandra Day O’Connor. This is just one more thing President Bush has done for our country. America is not America anymore. It’s been sold out and we are losing more and more with each ruling. And this is just the beginning. Here’s a bit of news to look forward to:

If a U.S. Supreme Court justice steps down in the coming months, the Bush administration may have an easier time filling the seat with a conservative nominee than is generally expected, some political analysts argue.

The first full term in which Chief Justice John Roberts, Jr., and Associate Justice Samuel Alito have served together is drawing to a close, and the country is again bracing for the possibility of another justice retiring from the bench.

Retirement speculation focuses on Justices John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, both liberals. Stevens is 87 years old; and although Ginsburg is 13 years younger, her frail appearance has often prompted conjecture of poor health. (source)

So I would expect that the rulings on the court with new Bush appointees (which will most likely be confirmed with this gut-less Congress that we have today) to be much more lopsided.

And now, the rulings...

Endangered Species Act

The Supreme Court sided with developers and the Bush administration Monday in a dispute with environmentalists over protecting endangered species. The court ruled 5-4 for home builders and the Environmental Protection Agency in a case that involved the intersection of two environmental laws, the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act....

A federal appeals court had said that EPA did not do enough to ensure that endangered species would not be harmed if the state took over the permitting.

Environmental groups, backed by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal, said the administration position would in essence gut a key provision of the endangered species law. (source)

“A federal appeals court had said that EPA did not do enough to ensure that endangered species would not be harmed if the state took over the permitting.”

I had to read that twice and really think about it. The entire purpose of the Endangered Species Act was to prohibit any federal agency from taking action that would put an endangered species in further jeopardy. Now, the states can determine for themselves what they will or will not do for the protection of endangered species. Do I have that right?

Free Speech

In a majority decision written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., and joined in full by Justices Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito, the Supreme Court ruled that students don’t have the right to promote pro-drug messages at school-sponsored and faculty-supervised events. Justice Breyer concurred in the judgment in part. The Court also unanimously rejected Frederick’s damages claim against Principal Morse.....

The case arises from an event that occurred in Juneau on Jan. 24, 2002. During the 2002 Winter Olympics Torch Relay, the Juneau School District participated in the event by allowing students to view the relay under the supervision of teachers and school administrators as it passed through the street in front of the high school. As the torch and television cameras approached the school, JDHS high school student Joseph Frederick and several of his friends displayed a large banner that read “BONG HITS 4 JESUS.” Principal Morse asked the students to drop the banner because it violated the school district’s policy prohibiting the display of messages promoting illegal substances. When Frederick refused, Principal Morse confiscated the banner. She subsequently suspended Frederick for displaying the banner and several related offenses. (source)

BONG HITS 4 JESUS huh... Well, a bit tacky I will admit. I’m sure it’s very offensive to many groups. But here’s the thing with free speech; it is only free speech if you can defend anyone who says the most offensive things. The only issue I would have is if that speech is inciting others to violence against someone else or a group of people. “BONG HITS 4 JESUS” doesn’t fall into that category as far as I’m concerned. As an example, I find the signs held up by Fred Phelps pathetic church (we all know what the signs say... I’m not going to give him more air time) to be extremely offensive. Does his group have a free speech right to display those signs and speak their mind? Yes they do, and I would defend their right to that speech. Free speech isn’t easy.

Also on this topic I found an interesting article entitled "Did student-speech rights go up in smoke?" Here's an excerpt.

With a stroke of the powerful pen of Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., the U.S. Supreme Court limited student-speech rights this week, creating another exception to Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, its landmark 1969 First Amendment decision in which it declared that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

As a result of a colorful case colloquially known as “Bong Hits 4 Jesus,” the Court ruled June 25 that students just outside the schoolhouse gate lose their First Amendment rights if they speak even ambiguously about drugs. Though many associate the “war on drugs” with a loss of Fourth Amendment freedoms, the First Amendment also fell victim in the Court’s decision in Morse v. Frederick.

Federal Campaign Finance

The U.S. Supreme Court gave companies, labor unions and interest groups more power to run broadcast ads before elections, limiting the reach of a federal campaign-finance law.

The 5-4 ruling today marks a shift for the court, which in 2003 upheld the law, including a provision that restricts pre-election ads. The court today said that provision couldn’t be constitutionally applied to three 2004 ads, aired by a Wisconsin anti-abortion group, that called on the U.S. Senate to hold votes on President George W. Bush’s judicial nominees. (source)

We will never know if they ruled this way because they are against pro-choice. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote, “Discussion of issues cannot be suppressed simply because the issues may also be pertinent in an election. Where the First Amendment is implicated, the tie goes to the speaker, not the censor.” Would they have ruled this way if it were for gay rights? My gut feeling is, probably not. We know the First Amendment doesn’t apply to “BONG HITS 4 JESUS”.

Grants to Religious Charities

In a 5 to 4 decision, the Supreme Court has sided with the Bush administration, ruling that average citizens and watchdog groups do not have the legal right to challenge the federal program that awards grants to religious charities....

The ruling means that lawsuits challenging the White House office must be pursued by a person or group directly injured by a government action, as opposed to an average citizen.

Religious, civil-liberties, atheist, and other groups had been closely watching the case because of the precedent it will set about who can sue the federal government when concerns arise in cases that involve government grants to religious organizations. (source)

The federal government has ABSOLUTELY NO BUSINESS WHAT SO EVER giving money to “faith-based initiatives.” The line that separates church and state just keeps getting thinner and thinner and thinner. And yet, no one notices, just like Germany in the last century.

I suppose President Bush got just exactly what he wanted, a Supreme Court that would side with the administration on very key issues facing our country. It honestly would not surprise me if somehow this Supreme Court found a way to issue a ruling that Dick Cheney really wasn’t part of the Executive Branch.

If Cheney’s a member of the legislative branch, the Democratic Caucus chair suggests, the vice president won’t need all the money that currently goes to pay for his executive office, extensive staff and that secure undisclosed location that is so often his haunt. So Emanuel plans this week to offer an amendment to a spending bill that would defund the Office of the Vice President.

Well, I guess that pretty much says it all doesn’t it? He was about hate and made a lot of people sad and miserable. I suppose my final thoughts on Jerry Falwell would be the same sort of sentiment that he had towards gays and other minorities.

For every gay person who is beaten and killed in this country stemming from hatred, I would point the finger in your face and say, ‘You helped this happen’.

Kent sent me this funny video about Ted Haggard. You know, I don't wish bad things to happen to the guy, but if he's going to be in the closet about being gay, then turn around and bash people, well, I guess anything is fair game, isn't it?

Enjoy the video.

A couple of weeks ago, I heard about the death of one of my high school teachers. He taught foreign languages and was also a coach for various sports. I won’t use his name to protect and honor his memory. He was praised for being a good teacher and being a person that you could always talk to. In my experience, I learned very little from his Spanish course. I also found him to be someone that I would not talk to about what was going on in my life. But that probably has more to say about me, instead of him. I was a messed up kid in messed up circumstances. I wasn’t sharing much with anyone, other than a bottle of booze. It was my best friend because it dulled the pain I was going through as a teenager. You see, I’m one of those gay teenagers who commits suicide, and it’s all over. But in my case, I lived. And not by my own choosing, I might add.

I didn’t know this teacher to be very religious. Perhaps he found religion later in life. But, I assume from what he said in his obituary, that he had become a very religious man.

I did not lose a battle with cancer; Christ has won the victory over death. Where I have been, and what I have done is not important. What is important is Who I know, Who knows me, and what He did on the cross. Jesus saved a sinner by grace.

I’m happy for anyone in that situation to find reconciliation and peace. I’m happy that he had a support system of family and friends to help him through that experience.

But for me, it has opened up other issues -- bigger issues of the human experience. Does religion change how people feel about each other? It’s a rhetorical question. If you want an answer to that, you need only look at what is happening in Iraq. But in this country, in this society, the lines between being “religious”, and having that effect your every day experiences are somewhat more blurred.

Years ago, I was riding to New Haven, Connecticut with a colleague from work. It was a thirty minute drive for us. This person is Catholic, a devout Catholic. She saw my wedding ring and asked, “What does your wife do?” Now, I suppose I should also say that this was said before any of the current day marriage debate for gay couples had taken place, so the idea of two gay men getting married wasn’t even in the mind set of anyone, including gay couples.

Well, I lied to her. I made up a “wife”. I made up a career that my wife had. And I did this all in the period of 30 seconds. Poof! A real life person with hopes and dreams like anyone else, who just happen to have ovaries, and was married to none other than me! What ever I said, my colleague responded with, “Well, that’s wonderful!”

There is no doubt in my mind that if this person had known the truth about me, she would have had a very difficult time working with me. In fact, she probably would stop talking to me altogether. I said nothing to people at work about this exchange. But she started telling people about what a wonderful wife I had. It wasn’t long before two straight male friends approached me, along with smiles from ear to ear, asking me to tell them about my “wife”. Try explaining this issue to a straight man who has never once had to lie in his entire life about his sexuality. It’s a difficult task. But it came down to my statement of, “I have to work with people to do my job. If I can’t do that because they won’t work with me, one of us will have to leave.”

And to end this story, yes, she did find out, and yes, it did effect our working relationship. She stopped talking to me as though I had leprosy.

This brings me back to my high school teacher. How would he have felt about me, knowing that I’m gay? Not too good, I would suppose. Would it matter to him that I’m still the same person that he knew so many years ago? In my experience, probably not. I’d like to give people the benefit of a doubt and look at the world through rosy colored glasses, but acceptance from people of this nature has not been my experience.

I’ve mellowed and relaxed a great deal in the last six months. You’ve probably noticed that I write less and less now. It’s not that I’ve stopped caring about issues. But, I have weighted those issues. Is marriage equality still important to me? It sure is. But, unlike a year ago, I’m so much more than that issue -- or any one issue for that matter. I’m simply not willing to invest the emotional weight on issues that our society, and our community, feel are unimportant. It’s like the ant pushing and pushing against a house to move it. It’s just not going to happen.

So, while I’m willing to take insults from people who post to this site for the decisions that I make, I think I’ve come to a place that I can choose not to give a damn anymore. And that is OK.

I’m fine with that. The result: my blood pressure is 116 / 80, as opposed to 167 / 95 a year ago. I’ve lost some weight because I’m more conscious of what I eat and my cholesterol levels are good. I’m happy with life. So what’s changed in the last few months? I’ve stopped letting society define me and I’ve stopped asking for it’s approval.

This is in response to yesterday’s post entitled Morning Thought. I was going to respond to a comment left on the item, but then realized that it was turning into a full entry in itself.

On the comment left by Dave (and thank you Dave for the comment! :) ), he said, “Until God is taken out of the argument about basic human rights, there will always be a place for hatred and irrational persecution in the name of God.”

Dave, you are absolutely right. I was only trying to address the issue of “tolerance” versus “acceptance”. I’m tired of being “tolerated”, and I really don’t have time of day for people who “tolerate” me. If they see me on an absolutely equal footing with them, then they have “accepted” me.

On the religion issue, there will always be people around who use religion and God as an excuse to hate certain minorities. There’s really nothing I or anyone else can do about that. 9/11 was carried out, after all, for religious reasons.

I’ve come to a place in my life where I no longer care what people like this think. I do care about the actions that come out of the message that they send espousing hate in the name of God (gay bashings). But I see these crimes being prosecuted more and more with more appropriate sentences.

I realize that so many issues facing our community are driven by religion...

...we are denied equality in the name of religion
...people commit horrible crimes against us in the name of religion. In some places in the world, that means DEATH.

Yet, I try to believe in a right (in this country at least) for people to practice their religion. Some of us believe in God, and some do not. And what so many Americans still fail to understand is the fact that just because they have a right to believe in their God, does not give them the right to make the lives of people like me more difficult because of those laws.

This is extremely clear to me when I go to a hearing at the Legislative Office Building in Hartford. This year, we are, for the first time since civil unions were passed in Connecticut two years ago, trying to pass a bill that would allow gay couples to get married. And all through the hearings were speeches about God, religion, and the Bible. People were even quoting scripture at the hearings.

Now, I understand that these were open and public hearings, but one fact seems to elude people. We are talking about civil marriage here - NOT religious marriage. It is even part of the civil union bill that no religion would be required to perform a “gay wedding”. Therefore, all this religious talk in a civil discourse over equality under the law is absolute nonsense. It has no place in the argument. This application of religion when weighing the merits of a public bill violates the very nature and spirit of the separation of church and state.

Yet, no one sees that. It’s not as if people talking at the hearings are ignorant to this fact. They are after all, speaking directly to the legislators that we elect to represent us. And yet, my legislator would not even meet with me. He’s not interested in a) hearing what a gay man has to say and b) not interested in meeting a gay man.

So, I suppose, using his terminology, he can “go to Hell.”

As long as we allow religion into state and federal politics, these things will happen. And they’ve been happening for many years from the time that we introduced “under God” into the Pledge of Allegiance to placing monuments of the Ten Commandments into public parks. In a public school, speaking to school children, “under God” has no place being in the Pledge of Allegiance. The same goes for all the Ten Commandment monuments adorning our public parks. Take them out!

Keep your God and your religion where it belongs: IN A CHURCH!