By Louis R. Carlozo, Theolog (the 'blog of The Christian Century)
May 30, 2007
Not long before his death, Jerry Falwell, the Religious Right’s resident lightning rod and 800 lb. theological/political gorilla, crowed that the concern over the environment was a demonic distraction from the “real” issues of the day, including gay marriage. It’s not my job to dissect the moral “right versus wrong” of homosexuality. But many homosexuals are Christians. Therefore, it doesn’t matter whether you embrace the concept of the “more light” church or try to call a technical foul by waving the Book of Romans around like a Pharisee dressed in a referee’s outfit—no Christian should be claiming the moral authority to take away a person’s proclaimed faith in Jesus.
Christ has accounted for each one of us by heaping more grace into our lives than any of us deserves. The only appropriate response is to keep our wretchedness, our falling short, our deceptions and our misdeeds in mind as we celebrate our forgiveness daily, and with humility. In imitation of Christ, we should extend that same grace to others. We all belong to the community of the brutally broken made whole by a force of love we cannot understand.
The instant we try to set limits or definitions on that love, we are sinning again. I would rather proclaim my foolishness in Christ—and my ignorance—than profess to know answers about things I can’t see through this dark glass of mortality.
What I do know is that people need love. Healing. Peace. Shelter. Nurture. Living water. For me to get involved, I’m going to need every ounce of energy I have, and supernatural energy that I don’t.
Jerry Falwell’s myopic obsession with gay marriage was a demonic distraction from these and other life-and-death struggles: poverty, AIDS, a war without end in Iraq, and the unnecessary destruction of our planet by greenhouse gasses.
Louis R. Carlozo, a Chicago Tribune editor and DVD columnist, teaches reporting and writing at Loyola University in Chicago.
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