I'm talking about practicing Christians, not nominal ones. I'm talking about the majority of practicing Christians who go to Evangelical Protestant churches, to Mormon churches, etc. These are some of the most horrible homophobic bigots in the world. What's preached in those churches about me and the people I love is disgusting and terrible.
As disgusting and terrible as about 1/3 of United Methodists who are such homophobic monsters that they're actually leaving the denomination because other United Methodists aren't as evil and disgusting as they are.
That really drives the point rather home, doesn't it? They're making headlines of their homophobia. They're making a huge hairy deal of how much they hate people like me and the people I love. They're organizing around how much they hate us.
I grew up in the Evangelical Protestant Christian world. I have close-up experience with how rotten the religion is, how bullying the people are. How cruel they are to people who don't meet their judgmental moral standards — like me and the people I love.
Yes, Christians are awful people, as a rule, with notable minority exceptions.
It's not much better in the Catholic world, although lay Catholics are not particularly likely to be personally homophobic the way Evangelical Christians are, going by data.
But here's the rub: Catholic nuns and priests practically universally affirm doctrines that people like me are depraved and disordered. They can't become nuns and priests unless they are vile homophobes who can affirm those twisted, condemnatory, evil doctrines — which qualify in any objective sense as hate speech against minorities.
They act on the evil too. For example, in just the latest bit of monstrosity, the Catholic diocese in Cleveland issued policies that the children of LGBTQ people (and of course LGBTQ children) may not attend their school system. LGBTQ people may not staff their school system. The same applies to Catholic charitable organizations and other Catholic employers in the diocese.
You don't get more evil than that. More cruel. More twisted.
But are Catholic lay people in Cleveland standing up and protesting? Are they withholding their donations? Are they telling their cruel, demonic archbishop that if he doesn't stop attacking people like me and those I love that he won't have a diocese to lead anymore?
No. Not in the least. They just acquiesce.
They just go along with the cruelty, reinforcing it by their lack of action.
That's not isolated. That's happening all over the United States. In a Catholic diocese near me, the archbishop ruled that people like me may not partake in any church sacrament. Queer people have effectively been thrown out of the Church. In another diocese near me, the archbishop ejected a queer Catholic support group, ruled that they may no longer after decades use any diocese property. Some of the language in the ruling was just shockingly twisted and homo/transphobic.
None of this surprises me about the bishops. Members of the Catholic clergy are presumptively terrible people because they have to affirm revolting things about people like me and the people I love — just to obtain their positions. I'm not shocked that members of the clergy are disgusting. They have to be disgusting.
But I'm a little bit shocked that these horrifying rulings seem to have had no effect on Catholic lay people near me. They just keep going to church, they just keep giving money. They don't seem to give a flip about the cruelty and the naked hatred of their Christian leaders.
And that's what's so weird about Christianity. Christianity was founded around principles of love and neighborliness, but Christians are usually just hateful monsters to people like me and the people I love — either actively or passively.
Speaking of which, you should google statements made by United Methodist bishops regarding the congregations that are leaving because they despise people like me.
Those bishops invariably talk about how they love and respect the departing congregations. Seriously? Well, that sure puts me in my place, doesn't it?
Guess how often in their statements they talk about how much they love and respect LGBTQ people and urge the homophobic bigots in the departing congregations to do the same, to become better, more moral people, more loving people?
You can look, but you'll look in vain in UMC press releases.
The members of those departing congregations are leaving because of plain hatred, because they hate people like me and those I love.
But to go over press releases and news stories, you would barely know that, at least not from the words that remaining United Methodists are uttering.
Something about their religion has turned them at least partly evil too. Evil enough to slience them, to stop them from affirming basic love and decency they claim in principle to stand for.
So excuse me if I take an extraordinarily dim view of practicing Christians, who are usually in my extensive experience, just absolutely horrible people.
Maybe you really don't care that much about homo/transphobia, maybe to you it's just a secondary issue that you care about it principle but not very much in practice.
But I don't roll like that. I don't just accept this vicious Christian hatred that's focused on queer people so constantly, and so increasingly these days.
Christian scare me, and I have every reason to be scared. They're powerful, and they're increasingly harnessing political power to fuel their hate campaigns.
The Christians who aren't consumed by hatred are silent and acquiescent.
As a queer person, I have a target on my back, and it's because of Christians, who are terrible, awful people, as a rule — either actively or passively.
I know this much. If I want to find a loving, decent, thoroughly moral person, the very last place I would ever look would be in a Christian church.
