In God We Trust: Can you be gay if you’re religious?

I always find it a bit baffling when I meet gays and lesbians who are religious.  I for one do not want to have any part in a club that doesn’t want me as a member.  However, the fact remains that many gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgenders do go to church or temple.  How is this possible?

If God loves everyone, then God loves gays. Religions, specifically christianity, always tell you that God loves you.  If there is a God, I find it hard to imagine that he or she would create homosexuals just so that annoying conservatives could point at them and scream about how we are an abomination.  Just like I don’t believe that God put dinosaur bones in the ground just to test our faith in the story of Creation.  If you are a good person, you are a good person.  It doesn’t matter who you choose to love, just that you are able to love other human beings and show kindness to your fellow man.

Almost everything is a sin. If you were to look at modern life in comparison to what the bible preaches, you’d see that it is damned near impossible to live a life free of sin.  The world is filled with jealousy and coveting and adultery.  Ever steal a pen or a notepad from the office?  Well maybe you’re going to hell.   In reality, no one is perfect.  No one is free from any sin.  There’s only a throw-away line in the bible that could be interpreted as saying that homosexuality is a sin.  But it’s a book that was written thousands of years ago and has been translated into hundreds of different languages.  So who’s to say exactly what each line means.  Just live your life and try to be a good person.

Not all religious institutions preach hate. The media is filled with images of religious zealots shouting to the heavens that “God hates fags” and that “all homos are going to hell.”  Well, that may be a commonly held belief in some religions, but it is not necessarily a belief that is held by all religious people.  For every religion there is, there are congregations that are liberal and accepting.  If you want to go to a gay-friendly church or temple they can be found with a little bit of research.  For example, Unitarian churches are notoriously liberal, as are many “Jewbu” synagogues.  If you want to be a member of a religious organization, but without all the judgement and talk of hellfire, there are groups out there for you.