Epiphany

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Today I read the story about Megan Phelps-Roper. For those not in the know, not long ago she was considered one of the future leaders of the Westboro Baptist Church. A while ago a blog comment by a Jewish man (another of their hated groups) about Jesus started her thinking. It was one of those life changing moments an epiphany a small thing that snowballed.  She has left Westboro and was seen attending a church that bills itself as accepting of all lifestyles.

My epiphany moment came, at all places, at a church holiness seminar. I have grown up in an evangelical/fundamentalist church. Once a year for many decades they have held a holiness seminar for a few select individuals from across the nation. As a young person it was always somewhat of a dream but one I always knew was unobtainable. I could never rise to the point where I would be asked to attend this event. Yet as fate would have it in the summer of 2011 I was asked to attend.

Ten days in Chicago not far from lakeshore drive learning about the holiness of God, what it means for us, how to make it personal and playing tourist. It was great for a few days, I knew a couple of the instructors, a few of the participants and got to know others. I enjoyed the free time to get around the city. I've always enjoyed exploring new places and new cities. The only real task I had was to run the sound system and power point projector for the meetings held in the chapel. Which was OK with me I also enjoy running sound systems.

Every year it seems the weekend of the seminar is the same weekend of the Chicago Pride Parade which also happens to go past the two sides of facility where it is held. The city actually closes about five blocks for the weekend. The parade itself takes about three hours to pass by, of course this is followed by a big festival. I found it to be an exciting time. Unfortunately I was there with an evangelical/fundamentalist church at one of their facilities. One that has made public statements about homosexuality being a sin. They are not open and affirming.

Of course there was a prayer meeting the night before the parade. Now it wasn't supposed to be all about the pride event but it does seem kind of convenient. Anyway as you might already guess many maybe most of the prayers had to do with the parade. Now maybe it was because I was already dealing (or not dealing as the case was) with being trans but I found most of the prayers to be very offensive to me. There was not the love or compassion that Jesus showed to others. You can talk about hate the sin, love the sinner but I didn't hear much evidence of love in many of those prayers. For the first time in my life I was ashamed to be a part of the ministry. I nearly walked out of this required meeting but I let the fact that I was running the sound system keep me there, a decision I regret today. I guess that was the first epiphany moment for me. That night started a chain of events that leads me to where I am today.

During the time of the parade they of course scheduled meditation time for the same time that the parade was going by. They told us to use our i-pod, or headphones anything so that we could ignore the parade. Something seemed fundamentally wrong to me. Here we were a group of Christian pastors, at a seminar to learn to be filled with the spirit of God; A large crowd just outside the walls that we are supposed to consider sinners and the best that our leaders had to offer us was to ignore them. The whole thing bothered me so much that that evening after classes were done I HAD to go out into the fenced off streets and walk around with the festival goers. My first experience with the LBGT community, I didn't interact with anyone but something had changed in me. That night on those streets I prayed how can I deal with this, how can I deal with them, where do I go from here. I knew I would never see this community as the horrible condemned sinners that I had always heard they were.

The whole time I was walking about the festival area I kept thinking about how Jesus was constantly hanging out with those that the church of his day had considered unredeemable sinners. Not only did he go to their homes he ate meals there and went to some of their parties. In fact he was so well known for hanging out with prostitutes and corrupt tax collectors that church leaders considered him the chief of sinners, Satan himself. I had a picture in my mind of Jesus at the pride parade, perhaps marching in it, hugging people and telling them they were special to him and loved by him.

Jesus always had love for the people outside of the church, dealt with them gently and with forgiveness. It was the church that received harsh criticism and was the recipient of his anger several times. Could it be that the evangelical/fundamentalist churches of today are our modern scribe's and Pharisee's. We've become so concerned about what is sin and living a sin free life that we have forgotten to show Christlike love. We've written people off for living in sin and attempted to ignore them the best we can or we shout at them through bull-horns while holding signs decrying their life-style. The God we claim to serve went into their homes, ate meals with them, attended their parties. We were there to learn to become more like God yet the best we had to offer was to ignore them. It was all so upside down, so ridiculous. I think I told my therapist later that the whole scene was ludicrous to me.

(Rom 14:13 KJV) Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumblingblock or an occasion to fall in his brother's way.

Ultimately it's not about what's right or wrong, what's a sin or not. I cannot judge another person on that basis, that's God's domain. I can only be responsible for my own life and my own choices and do my best to be a positive influence in the world. My faith in God must lead me to love and acceptance of all persons and to appreciate the great diversity in people. When we in the church judge another's life-style, in our arrogance we are taking upon ourselves a power that is reserved for God alone.

In August of 2012 I participated in my first ever pride parade event, and I expect the first of many. Prior to the event I had spent much time in soul searching and prayer but I came to the conclusion that for the sake of my spiritual journey and to demonstrate Christlikeness I had to do it. It was kind of a symbol of my new outlook, a symbol of non-judgment and acceptance that I owed to my God. I was with a trans-gender group of course; And while most of the group rode on the float I wanted to walk, to experience it in a little more personal manner. It was an enjoyable day and yes I did see those “Christians” shouting into bull-horns as I passed, I just smiled and waved to them. Maybe next time I'll walk up to them and talk to them about the love of Jesus Christ their God.

God Bless

Anita