...so please, don't let me be the only one trying.
I know really good Christians. And I try to remember them when others make it difficult. Unfortunately, so often, it's the assholes who are loudest. What am I talking about? I'm talking about the other day. I was looking for a book. The only bookstore here in town is a Christian bookstore, but, since the book I am looking for is a Christmas book, I thought I might get lucky. And yes, I will cop to thinking very hard about if I wanted to give my money to a Christian bookstore, but then decided I needed to not pre-judge. Maybe this bookstore was run by good Christians.
Lithus and I walked in. The bell over the door rang. A woman came around the corner, walked up to us, looked me in the eye ~ and kept walking. Past me to the woman behind me. And asked her, "may I help you find anything?" And this is only the most recent example; it is far from the only one.
Good Christians, indeed.
However, instead of being angry, hurt, and slinking away, I am going to tell you about an organization I know of. I first heard about it from Mike, over at My Point Being. It's NALT ~ Not All Like That. It's Christians who are coming together to publicly, loudly, support the LGBTQ communities. Now, while this particular organization is LGBTQ-centric, I find that Christians who support this community tend to support other communities ~ you know, the ones made up of people who don't necessarily look like them, or dress like them, or dare to walk into your bookstore wearing a leopard print coat and a streak in their hair.
So, good Christians, check out NALT. Find a way to be vocal about your acceptance of people who are being attacked, in large and small ways. Reject, loudly and vociferously, what hateful Christians are doing to your faith, your religion, and your God's teachings. Now, in this holy time, speak up. Do not let their voices be the only ones we hear. Please.
Those are Pobble Thoughts. That and a buck fifty will get you coffee.
2 comments:
Thank you for getting the word out on NALT. It is delivering an important message. The backstory on NALT is that it was started by Dan Savage, the sex-advice columnist in Seattle who is a gay man in a committed relationship, and an avowed atheist who was raised Catholic. He was well known for bashing Christians for their views on sexuality. But when Christians went back to him and said, "We're not all like that," he listened! He deserves a lot of credit for undertaking the project, especially since he's gotten a lot of flack from the atheist community for it.
Mike ~ I'm not a huge Savage fan, but I do appreciate him taking this on. I also would say that a lot of Christians say "we're not all like that" but few actually back that up with action. Us listening isn't the problem. The problem has been the Christians (and straight people and white people and, and, and...) who want the credit for being not all like that, but who don't want to actually have to do the work to not be like that. Believe me, more of us would listen if more people like Savage ~ and yes, like you, who live solidly on my "good Christian" list ~ would actually back up their words.
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