Andrew Sullivan weighs in on the anti-gay legislation nearing passage at the Arizona Legislature:
I know the danger to gay people remains great, and I don’t want to minimize the impact of living in a state where businesses of all kinds are empowered by law to put “No Gays Allowed” or “No Gays Served” in their best practices. But in America in the 21st Century, the movement that seeks to legislate outright discrimination against a tiny minority is doomed to bitter failure. It’s doomed because the principle of non-discrimination is now endemic in American culture — and among the younger generation the first article of their civil religion. Such a principle became embedded in the national identity in the Civil Rights era, where the evil of Jim Crow laws was exposed with fatal finality.
Now, the Christianist right is putting its full weight behind legal discrimination against any groups or individuals who might offend someone’s sincerely held religious conscience. Arizona’s Senate just passed a new bill expanding the concept of religious freedom from being the province of “religious assemblies and institutions” to a much broader category that includes “any individual, association, partnership, corporation, church, religious assembly or institution, estate, trust, foundation or other legal entity.” So rights once accorded to purely religious institutions are now for anyone — any business, any teacher, any pharmacist, any florist, any hotel-owner and on and on.
I’ve had my say on this, but it’s worth reiterating that this bill has absolutely nothing to do with Christianity. It is, rather, is an attack on Christian principles and a betrayal of the Gospels.
If there was one aspect of organized religion that Jesus opposed, it was its attempt to draw lines around the unclean, the marginalized and the sinners. Among his radical acts was immersing himself with sinners of all sorts — prostitutes, lepers, and collaborators with an occupying power. Segregation — the placing of a group of unholy people outside of mainstream interaction — was anathema to Jesus and should be to all Christians. To construct a legal regime in which those people are fair game for outright ostracism and segregation is a disgusting inversion of both democratic and Christian values.
This article appears in Feb 20-26, 2014.
You’re fist mistake is to justify any religion of any sort. There is allegedly a separation of church and state in this country. To justify social equality based on the belief that “Jesus loved sinners” is to put lesbians and gays into some inferior class. The discussion should begin by acknowledging that the bible is just another mythology and not “gospel” truth. You should be ashamed of yourself. Oh wait…clearly you are.
Sully is a professional “gay catholic”, sort of a variant of “gay republican” where he spends all of his punditry arguing with himself.
Conservatives will use any excuse to discriminate against anyone. They are full of hatred as are Christians. Arizona continues down the path of radical and extremist views and bills. It is a state full of hate, hate created by many who move to this state because they have the freedom of the Republicans to do what they want.
When will the voters of Arizona wake up and elect true, honest law makers. Those that want to make a real difference in the state. Conservatives just continue to tear apart the state. Let us vote wise and elect those that want a state that is productive, can get new companies to move into the state. Currently it is a state where people don’t even want to visit. It is not a state that welcomes.
Before equating Christianity with the rabidly reactionary Republicans who abound in this state and its legislature, as evidenced most recently by the 50 votes in favor of the so-called religious liberty bill [HB 2153/SB 1062], I’d suggest to commenters above that they drag themselves away from their copies of The Weekly and pick up and actually read Pope Francis’ Joy of the Gospel. There’s real Christianity to be found in it. And if you don’t have the time or inclination to do that, please at least consider that the so-called Christians advocating irrational and unconstitutional discrimination are perhaps not walking with Jesus in doing so. And I’ll offer a loud “Amen!” to Andrew Sullivan’s remarks.
When Jesus fed the 5,000, He didn’t ask the gays to leave.
Why do His selective ‘followers’ choose to do so now?
@ franklymydears,
Re: “Before equating Christianity with the rabidly reactionary Republicans who abound in this state and its legislature, as evidenced most recently by the 50 votes in favor of the so-called religious liberty bill”
Um, this is a ‘Christian’ sponsored bill, claiming ‘religious liberties’ to discriminate and passed by the clearly equally religionistic legislators (having read their comments in the debate).
Those ‘Christians’ should grow a pair and OWN the prejudice they spread. And, the Pope has nothing to do with this article OR this bill.
Jesus isn’t involved with this bill.
This is a nasty piece of legislation that is destroying both the separation of church and state and the religion used as the butcher knife.
I believe in a God who hears and answers prayers, including the prayers of LGBTQIA people. I believe in a God who brings new mercies every single day–morning by morning. I believe in a living God who does new things. I believe in a God that has heard the prayers of the LGBTQIA community and is bringing them justice. If Arizona allows this law to go forward, it will be worshiping a dead idol of prejudice rather than the living God of justice.
See: http://www.theafricanamericanlectionary.org/pdf/dialogue/WhyIBelieveHomosexualityIsNotASin_ValerieDixon.pdf
And the chapter of LGBTQIA rights in the book: Just Peace Theory Book One: Spiritual Morality, Radical Love, and the Public Conversation. (http://bookstore.iuniverse.com/Products/SKU-000187064/Just-Peace-Theory-Book-One.aspx)