TO FUNDAMENTALIST CHRISTIANS, LOVE EQUALS HATE

From the AP via the Huffington Post courtesy of AlterNet:

Church Cancels Memorial for Gay Navy Vet

The church's pastor, the Rev. Gary Simons, said no one knew Sinclair, who was not a church member, was gay until the day before the Thursday service, when staff members putting together his video tribute saw pictures of men "engaging in clear affection, kissing and embracing."

Simons said the church believes homosexuality is a sin, and it would have appeared to endorse that lifestyle if the service had been held there.

"We did decline to host the service _ not based on hatred, not based on discrimination, but based on principle," Simons told The Associated Press. "Had we known it on the day they first spoke about it _ yes, we would have declined then. It's not that we didn't love the family."

And

Wright called the church's claim about the pictures "a bold-faced lie." She said she provided numerous family pictures of Sinclair, including some with his partner, but said none showed men kissing or hugging.

More here.

Full disclosure: I met Simmons' wife, April, who is Joel Osteen's younger sister, years ago when I was a Southern Baptist youth; some church friends brought her to visit a Bible study group I attended. The Osteen family lived in Kingwood, but she didn't go to school with me because her devout parents had her in a private Christian academy. And that's about it. I noted that she was very sweet and utterly beautiful, and never saw her again.

Now I know she's married to a total asshole.

What ever happened to loving the sinner? This really blows my mind. Jesus, supposedly these people's LORD, consistently associated with the dregs of society, tax collectors, prostitutes, thieves, lepers, Democrats, you name it. Shunning this guy because he was gay is decidedly not what "Jesus would do." The hugging and kissing pictures just don't cut it as an excuse: they could have easily cut the offending images and continued with the service as planned. Clearly, they freaked because he was gay.

So they're liars, too. Fucking bastards.

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

2 arrested in alleged dragging of girl behind van at boot camp

The director of a Christian boot camp and an employee were arrested Friday for allegedly dragging a 15-year-old girl behind a van after she fell behind the group during a morning run, authorities said.

And

A call to Love Demonstrated Ministries was not immediately returned Friday. No listing was found for Bassitt. An answering machine at a listing for Flowers cut off during an attempt to leave a message Friday.

Flowers, the camp's director, allegedly ordered Bassitt to run alongside the girl after she fell behind, the affidavit said. When the girl stopped running, Bassitt allegedly yelled at her and pinned her to the ground while Flowers tied the rope to her, according to the affidavit.

Click here for the rest.

I love how the organization running this outfit is called "Love Demonstrated Ministries." Yet another off the scale right-wing irony in this age of countless right-wing ironies. Obviously, love is not demonstrated by dragging a fifteen year old girl down the road from a van. For that matter, teen boot camps in general, which are brutal, fucked-up institutions of humiliation, violence, and mind-control, aren't a good way of demonstrating love, either. What the fuck kind of people show their love in this way?

Bottom line: fundamentalist Christians are psychotic, violence-loving monsters. Just like the genocidal god-the-father they prefer over the peace-loving god-the-son to whom they only pay lip service. If one of these sociopaths ever tells you that he loves you, run for the fucking hills.

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