LOVE THE SIN, NOT THE SINNER

Has anyone figured out yet that I detest organized religion? You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.

Love the sinner, not the sin. How many times have we heard that? What does it mean?

Here's another variation. Recently Newsweek ran an article about the Episcopal Church and the fallout over the consecration of Gene Robinson as Bishop. Apparently the magazine printed a photo of people holding vulgar signs in protest of the consecration. Jill Kinsella, Dir. of Communications for Christ Church-Episcopal in Plano,TX, wrote in to decry that "both legitimate camps in this debate agree that the group in that photo (known to many) is so outlandish and hateful as to be irrelevant to anyone except police departments. We are saddened...that all orthodox Episcopalians might be painted with the broad antigay brush that this photo depicts. The orthodox believers in our church have been very outspoken against the new bishop...[but] we have been careful to express our dissatisfaction in a respectful pastoral manner that is aimed at the behavior, not the person." (Emphasis supplied.)

At the behavior, not the person. Love the sinner, not the sin.

How boorish. What a terrific example of willful self-deception, self-congratulatory blather, and an attempt by the real sinners to expiate their own sins.

But it doesn't hold an ounce of water, because the obvious, intrinsic and inalienable fact is that for LGBT people there is no distinction between the person and the behavior. The person is the behavior. The behavior is as intrinsic to the individual as air is to the human body. This is not rocket science.

But it may as well be to the ignorant hypocrites who have convinced themselves that this is a legitimate distinction, and spout it with such offensive and self-righteous piety. They are good people, we are supposed to conclude, because they love us in spite of our sins or behavior.

This specious distinction becomes just another example of the bankruptcy of any true moral code in these people and institutions.

Rather than buy them the respect and legitimacy that they crave from us, it reveals the cravenness in their hearts and their bastard illegitimacy.

So screw you, Kinsella, and all your weasel-mates in all the other churches that try this same gambit. You are exposed, you have no clothes, and you are fooling only yourselves. Please go directly to hell, do not pass god, do not collect 200 mea culpas.