More Fodder

There is a commonly held belief and physiologically proven theory that we create our God. We form god in our image. When you read the pages of the Koran, the Torah, the Bible, you do what you would do with any work of literature, you find common threads between yourself and the protagonist. I realize that to most these are much more than works of literature, but that doesn’t change how we perceive what we read.

In any situation we relate what we see to our lives and act accordingly. So it is no surprise that when people describe God, God tends to have the same morals and ideology as themselves. This is how faith speaks to us, this is WHY faith speaks to us. This is why the metaphor alone is so transformative. This is also why the church can’t get there act together.

Elton John recently made a statement "I think Jesus was a compassionate, super-intelligent gay man who understood human problems.” He wrapped his quote up with an insightful statement about God’s compassionate nature. "On the cross, he forgave the people who crucified him. Jesus wanted us to be loving and forgiving. I don't know what makes people so cruel. Try being a gay woman in the Middle East - you're as good as dead."

No body is listening to that second half Elton. You just called the son of God gay, and the audience that this message is getting to, as Elton well knows, is less than compassionate to the plight of the gay man. And because of that first statement he has muted the much more prevalent point, that God is loving.

I am not personally offended by Elton’s assumption. I mean I get it, Jesus spent most of his time hanging around twelve dudes in the middle of the desert, washing there feet, expressing “he-motions” over some fish and a roaring fire. And this view of Jesus probably helped Elton relate the story of Christ to his life which allowed that story to become a transformative force in his life.

My problem here is this. Elton John is a public figure, A literal walking legend who is listened to by a very large audience. When he invokes the name of Jesus he perks the churches ears, he has to, because the church, in order to stay relevant, has to care about relevant people.

Would it matter if Jesus where in fact gay? Not to me, but it does to the millions of Bible believing Catholics and Protestants who have spent there entire lives relating to Jesus in an entirely different way. Now Elton has re-enflamed the Us V. Them mentality of the church and guess who pays the price for that? Those who find peace in the walls of the church, because situations like this are the catalyst for disenchantment. I know people who stopped going to church over the Da Vinci code.

Now some may say (and rightly so) that this is just a symptom of a larger problem that is not Elton’s problem. Here is the thing, it is Elton’s problem. If he is a church going Christian who cares about the faith of his brothers and sisters than it became his problem the moment he donned the yoke. Should the church stop being so petty? Should the church work on getting stronger so things like this don’t shake it up? Absolutely, but how is that going to happen when instead of lightly easing the mindset of tolerance and acceptance into the congregations consciousness we stand up and chuck a rock into the church’s window? The gay community is in the birthing stages of acceptance in the church and now Elton John has just given the opposing side a soap box. “they want to be ordained because they think that Jesus was a queer, if we allow that then we are agreeing with them!” And actual clergy or would be clergy are going to be lost in the noise when they try and bring up the logical point that “there is no biblical suggestions that implies that Jesus was gay, but that isn’t the point, we are God loving Christians who have been called to serve our lord.” And worse than that gay clergy are going to be forced into the awkward position of trying to defend this statement.

Because if they say “Jesus wasn’t gay” than the world hears a confirmation to all the reasons THEY say he wasn’t gay such as “gay is a sin and Jesus wasn’t sinful.” Instead of what that statement really means “he wasn’t gay because well…he wasn’t gay.” And if they say “he was gay.” Well you can put the rest of that together.

Elton John did his own message a disservice by prefacing that message with a shocking statement he knew would rock the boat. You need to rock the boat to invite the waters of change…but there is a way, there is a time, there is an effective method.