It is 12:36 and counting.  With each key stroke my alarm grows one second closer to sounding and my week will then; at 6:42 begin again; as it did last week and as it will the week that follows this one.  Adulthood has its blessings and its curses.  I just can't sleep.  I'm listening to a song that I used as the piece for my very first solo in fourth grade.  This blog is not political.  Its probably not going to be spiritual; although I know myself and in a few short paragraphs something about faith will find its way to this page.  God has a way of doing that with me.

This song; its on repeat.  I have it in several versions.  Its called Rainbow Connection and was made famous by Kermit as he floated in a dingy boat dreaming about Miss Piggy.  I fell in love with its melody in elementary school and although for a while I was ashamed to admit it; I've always loved this song.  Its slow, lullingly melodious.  This song has grown up with me.  At every turn in life I've listened to it again and again only to realize the often profound philosophical meaning behind the voice of a beloved childhood icon.  I have taken it along; or just maybe it  has taken me.

Little did I know, this song would fifteen years later be able to characterize many parts of my life between that point and this.  How many children's games become maps to our adult lives.  How many innocent songs have taught us almost as much as life itself?  God has a way of working things out.  It is often small moments like these that prove it to me when my adult mind forgets.  A good friend often reminds me to never loose the magic of childhood.  She is right.  The lesson in Adam and Eve is just that; the value of innocence, the preciousness of God given magic to his children.

If someone does not believe in a higher power that is quite alright with me; I am not you and your life is your life.   However, I can not fathom not believing in God.  In a greater good.  I could not live if I thought God no longer existed.  For me, Jesus and the faith I place in him is the difference in existing in my life and living it.  I am not perfect; but I am justified.  I do wrong; but who doesn't?  And God already knows anyway.  The love I have in my life is often misunderstood but that is quite alright with me, I never asked anyone else's opinion.

I am a child of God; this song so sweetly reminds me.  It reminds me of magic and rainbows and dreams and wishes and children's things that I perhaps should pack away.  Why don't I?  If I'd have known then as a forth grader what I know now.  One wonders what I would have done differently but then again all in all, I love my life and can see God in every turn so maybe I'll just keep on wishing on rainbows and buying into childish dreams, as the song says, "Look what its done so far..."

http://search.playlist.com/tracks/rainbow%20connection%20dixie%20chicks

One year ago today I bought a plane ticket to Athens, Greece which I never used.  Slightly under $900 that went to waste.  That $900 was the best money I've ever wasted.  It proved to me and to the world that I can do whatever I want.  That I don't require the falsehood of friendship, but rather cherish those rare individuals who are friendship's very definition.  It taught me that no one is allowed to tell me what I can and can not do, including those who love me and who I love in return.  Rather, Christ is all I need to see the light at the end of a dark path.  Those $900 I'll never get back.  As of today I have donated to the cause of a multimillion dollar internet travel company.  However, I do so with a smile on my face.

Without that once choice to go when I wanted to go, to do what I wanted to do and to pay for the journey my self I would have never been brave enough to truly admit who I was, who I am, to myself.  I would have never been brave enough to leave a town that -except for a rare few- had forgotten I existed.  I would have never found Chicago, and the Art Institute, or Holy Covenant United Methodist Church, or God forbid, I might have never found Jonas.  My greatest fiscal mistake became the catalyst to my greatest life lesson.  Money well spent I'd say!

I am living proof, follow your heart.  Do not be afraid to jump because some day you won't be able to.  This lesson is textbook example that the voice within us is God's own whisper.  Listen.  I did, and it brought my wildest dreams into reality.

When one realizes that they are in fact, queer, gay, homosexual or, whatever term is popular in today's world to use, they often find themselves amidst fear, anger, loneliness, self-hatred, doubt and most of all, in what can only be described as the pit of misunderstanding.  For those who ascribe to a faith the situation is only intensified exponentially by the amount of adherence one has followed in their faith.  This writer can only address such an oxymoronic situation from a Christian perspective, given that he has never been Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Wicca or even New Age.  Christianity has been, as Marx would say, this writer's form of opium.  A choice, he will unquestionably admit is not regretted on any level.

To come of age, and thus sexual maturity, in full view of the Church is, in and of itself, awkward.  To come to that already taboo subject with the internal understanding that the sexuality one is part of is even more unspeakable must be, and often is, torturous to all who find themselves there.  According to modern statistics, this fear is forty-six percent of the time, deadly for those young faithful individuals.   Modern science reports that one in seven is homosexual.  That number is true within the folds of the faithful as well.

Amidst the mix of Baptist and Pentecostal upbringing that this poet was a part of, sex, in a corporate religious setting was virtually never discussed.  Homosexual orientation was almost never mentioned, if it was, it was unquestionably a joke tucked neatly away as giggly bigotry in a sermon given by men who claimed to have unyielding, Christ like love for all people to parishioners who seemed to find such hate-laden speech as humorous as their pastors .  Looking back, their motives have understandably become highly suspect.

The scripture condemns this scarcely understood form of what many call, sexual deviance a total of nine times.  Genesis nineteen ,  twice in Leviticus,  once in  Judges,  Romans chapter one, once in Second Corinthians, once in Paul's letters to Timothy and lastly, vaguely in Jude.  To a young Christian with the faith of a mustard seed and the libido of a lion, this list is daunting.  Daunting to the point of sleepless nights, fear of Church, fear of friendship and emotional intimacy, more than all, fear of God.  One can never become close to a God due to his condemnation, yet can never leave his throne due to the constant need to be forgiven.  It often builds a rock solid faith that more often than not encloses a deep seated fear.  This wall of faith is both a blessing and a curse.  No structure is more comforting, no contents are more horrific.  Faith becomes the definition of a catch 22; believing literally damned if one does, damned if one does not.

However, this essayist refused to surrender, to live their life in faith expecting Hell's flames to greet them upon completion of the race St. Paul refers to.  Upon the death of a dear friend; the search for truth began.  The cornerstone of such theological investigation became the biblical fact that Truth shall indeed set one free.  First came prayer, near suicide, twice, followed by ten University hours (half the academic year) of Attic and Ionic Greek.  This investigative theologian needed to hear condemnation or emancipation from Paul himself, not from what he was told Paul said.  Next came exhaustive collegiate level studies of History, Anthropology, and Politics interwoven with ancient language as well as religious studies.  Dozens, if not scores of sleepless nights and classroom sessions were spent devouring, digesting and understanding scripture in a light that had until then, been hidden.  If truth had the power to set the faithful free, if God was indeed love, and one truly sought for the glorification of God in the attaining of knowledge, then in fact, truth, God, would become a Savior yet again, in the midst of a dark, albeit, academically terrific night lodged deep in the soul.

The knowledge that was learned was then used to re investigate the nine passages that seemed to have been screaming into the ears of millions for years, "No matter how much you love God and follow his precepts, you will burn in Hell."  What was discovered was indeed worth sharing.

Genesis nineteen speaks to the condemnation of Sodom and Gomorrah due to their lack of hospitality, not  homosexuality.  This interpretation is backed by the later writings of the prophets, specifically Isiah and Ezekel who do not mention homosexual intentions in their reasons for the destruction of the cities.

The two Levitical verses are placed among the sections of the law dealing with ritual cleanliness, not holiness code.  Furthermore, of their respective chapters (18 & 22) they are the only laws that still remain in accordance.  It is now common, acceptable and not at all sinful to wear clothes woven from two fabrics, eat shrimp, admire owls, or plant two crops in the same field.  Lastly, as Christians, Levitical law has been done away with or else Christ's death was in vain.  One wonders, which is it?

Judges speaks again, to the law, explained above.

Romans condemns pedophilia and temple prostitution, not what modern Fundamentalist movements have termed homosexuality.  Paul coins the term which has been translated homosexual since 1955 (never before).  The two words he employs are arseno and koitai.  Arseno a loose term for male prostitute and koitai the Greek equivalent of Fucker.  It is admitantly not admirable that such a saint would use such coarse language, nonetheless it is true.  He condemns, when the context is taken into account loose sexual practices that unquestionably violate individuals.  He speeks nothing of loving, monogamous same gender sexual relationships; which were, unequivocally common, acceptable and admired in Paul's time. 

Second Corinthians condemns similar practices, as does Second Timothy, both using similar phrasing.  Again, loving relationships of the same gender were never, to my exhaustive knowledge on the subject addressed by St. Paul.  It is noteworthy to mention that dozens of Church Fathers, from Orgin to Aquinas comment on homosexuality (not all of them condemning such things, in fact some go so far as to admire such 'noble aspirations of friendship') none of them use Paul's writing as condemnation.  It is never mentioned.  Their arguments against homosexuality deal mostly with its lack of evidence in the animal population (which has long sense been proven false) as well as suggesting that such practice (only the submissive partner mind you) loose their identity as a man, thus invoking sexism as a defense.  Not until the sixth century was Paul's argument used to condemn anything remotely homosexual and even then the word was not used, rather, sexual perversion or the like.

Lastly, Jude's reference is so vague that even modern scholarship can not determine if the inference should even be implied.


What is more important are the findings of the numerous tellings, blessings, and reverences of eunuchs in scripture.  Not all were homosexual but the social stigma was without a doubt attached to such people.  Isiah says in the 56th chapter:
     ³Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the LORD say,
         "The LORD will surely separate me from His people "
         Nor let the eunuch say, "Behold, I am a dry tree."    ⁴For thus says the LORD,
         "To the eunuchs who keep My sabbaths,
         And choose what pleases Me,
         And hold fast My covenant,
      ⁵To them I will give in My house and within My walls a memorial,
         And a name better than that of sons and daughters;
         I will give them an everlasting name which will not be cut off.

The Ethiopian Eunuch is to this day traditionally seen as the reason Ethiopia is Africa's only governmental Christian nation.

Lastly, Christ himself has this to say on the subject:
    ¹²"For there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother's womb; and there are eunuchs who were     made eunuchs by men; and there are also eunuchs who made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom     of heaven. He who is able to accept this, let him accept it."

Least we read scripture to say what we want it to say.  How many times does scripture, Christ himself, condemn hypocrites, liars, those who he calls white washed tombs.  How many of todays Christians are all too similar to the Pharisees of Christ's day?  Jesus came to preach a radical message of love, inclusion, acceptance and grace.  Somewhere along the path the Church as forgotten just who Jesus was, and what he stood for.  Shame on us all; gay and straight alike.

Homosexuality has been condemned because it has been misunderstood, not because God hates homosexuals or sees their love as less than their heterosexual counterparts.  People hate gays, God genuinely loves them.  For what parent hates their child?  What parent wants their child to live in fear and misery.

This command I give unto you, Love one Another.  If any man hates his brother and does not love him, the truth is not in him.

And we all know what the truth does... It sets us Free.

This academic poet is for the first time in his life, Free, having been released from the chains which so easily have entangled him.  Grace has found him waiting, Christ has found him wanting and he alone has filled him so that his cup, indeed, runs over.  If Christians are known by their fruits I dare say, taste those of this freed poet; For Christ has given him increase.