An Open Letter to Faith: There is no divine right to bigotry

BY: LISA CUMMING

On June 26th the United States Supreme Court ushered the nation towards a more promising future by legalizing same-sex marriage everywhere. The Due Process and Equal Protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment were finally recognized and applied to their most full potential.

Rainbow flags were superimposed on 26 million Facebook profile pictures, and corporations took it upon themselves to rebrand in the famous Pride colours.

While many Americans rejoiced because of the landmark decision, unfortunately some were not so inclined to celebrate.

Images of beautiful same-sex marriage ceremonies and nationwide celebrations were starkly contrasted with ugly posters reading “God Hates You” and “God defined marriage NOT the Supreme Court.”

Let me be the one to break the ice and just come right out and say it: opposition to gay marriage comes wholly from bigots. Using the umbrella of religion to excuse abhorrent behavior has gone on for far too long. Being religious does not allow you the “excuse” to be homophobic, and being bigoted is not an excuse at all. While some Churches and denominations across the U.S. have been allies of the equal rights movement all along, or have recently come to their senses, some religious institutions though, have taken to fight against the Supreme Court decision. I pity them. I pity them because they fail to grasp that homosexuality is not a “new” thing.

Religion is not built on foundations that inherently hate and discriminate against love. Religion offers love, preaches love in fact. So ditch the distorted notion that faith gives anyone the right to deprive people of who they are.

While some Churches and denominations across the U.S. have been allies of the equal rights movement all along, or have recently come to their senses, some religious institutions though, have taken to fight against the Supreme Court decision

As long as men and women have been having sex, so have men with men, and women with women. Humans are inherently curious by nature so it only makes sense that we, as a modern formed human species, would not just have gone for 200,000 years as heterosexual. While actual labels did not come into existence until more recently there should be absolutely no doubt that the entire world was not in fact perfectly straight.

Homosexuality did not “start” in the ‘60s and it will not “end” with a “God Hates Fags” poster.

4_gay rights — A man gives a “thumbs down” in front of anti gay protesters at the U.S. Supreme Court on March 27, 2013 in Washington, DC. The Supreme Court, for the first time, takes up the delicate and divisive issue of gay marriage when the nine justices consider the legality of a California ballot initiative that limits marriage to opposite-sex couples. Wednesday, the court will consider the 1996 federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which limits the definition of marriage to opposite-sex couples. AFP PHOTO/Karen BLEIERKAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty Images ORG XMIT: 164256121

This applies to everyone in the LGBTQ+ community.

A transgendered person will never feel comfortable with the biological sex that they were assigned at birth, and a bisexual person is not just “going through a phase.”

Throwing bible verses around in an effort to support the “God hates Homos” agenda will only be counteracted with passages like “She lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses,” (Ezekiel 23:20) and “Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material,” (Leviticus 19:19). Just two examples of exactly how nonsensical single passages of the bible can be.

Bart D. Ehrman, a distinguished professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina wrote:

“Good Christian scholars of the Bible, including the top Protestant and Catholic scholars of America, will tell you that the Bible is full of lies, even if they refuse to use the term.”

The Bible is Holy Scripture, but it is illogical to think that every single word written should be taken as law. The law is the law, and the law, at long last, acknowledged equality by making same-sex marriage legal. No stack of vile posters or loaded vernacular of obnoxious remarks in the world could change this.

In 2013 it was reported that 59 per cent of people who are gay, lesbian or bisexual identify with both Christian and non-Christian faiths. 48 per cent of that group recognized themselves as Christians.

The claim that religion is why you think heterosexuality is the only natural human orientation is fruitless. In 2013 it was reported that 59 per cent of people who are gay, lesbian or bisexual identify with both Christian and non-Christian faiths. 48 per cent of that group recognized themselves as Christians.

Religion is not the reason why you are so eager to despise a group of people. There is no reason grounded in rationality. Hate is not blind faith. Hate is just blindness.

If you are to oppose gay-marriage and hate all who are different than yourself, do not falsely hate in the name of religion. Please, those of us who have faith are getting a bad rap because of you. Ask instead: if I am so ready and willing to hate, and refuse to understand what I do not, do I really understand the meaning of religion at all?