I found
this article "His God Doesn't Hate Fags" in the Chicago Reader curious. I think Kate Hawley did a good job wallowing into this territory, which she has done before
here on Colorado Senator Salazar's comments on James Dobson's media empire. Perhaps introducing this new, and conflicted figure, to the fore.
Hawley's article does a good job at directing us toward what could possibly be this bridge between evangelical Christianity and GLBT individuals. Here though Hawley illuminates an appropriate amount of skepticism and amongst the participants in the article an appropriate amount of apprehension when dealing with the person of Andrew Marin.
For example amongst those in the story are Human Rights Campaign's Harry Knox:
...HRC's Harry Knox, doled out thanks and praise to many in the crowd. He singled out a young man with cherubic features and fashionably mussed blond hair. "Andrew Marin of the Marin Foundation," he said. "That's another voice you're going to be hearing from." Marin stood and gave a slight nod to the crowd as it politely applauded. It isn't often that someone like Marin--a self-described straight, white, evangelical conservative--goes into the heart of a liberal enclave and receives a benediction from the nation's largest gay rights organization. But reaching out to the opposition is Marin's modus operandi. His three-year-old Chicago nonprofit, the Marin Foundation, is devoted to fostering dialogue between gay activists and conservative Christians. Through classes, speaking engagements, media outreach, and scientific research, the 25-year-old hopes to diffuse the fear and suspicion on both sides.
Yet later Knox backtracks in discussing how Marin contacted him with:
"I don't want to oversell my endorsement of Andrew, but the dialogue is so important," he says. "We are grateful to him to want to be in dialogue."
I think Knox was correct in his lack of zeal for Marin who in the interview did say about homosexuality when asked by Hawley:
"It's theologically sloppy to say it's not a sin," he replies. But he quickly adds that all Christians are sinners, according to Romans 3:23. "We're all dealing with something."
Even if one views homosexuality as sinful why ignore the crucial and practical meaning of Jesus' message: "Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgement you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in yoru own?" (Matthew 7:1-5)
Let the novelty wear off. I think the more dubious quality of this story is that Marin has found his niche. While claiming "education not condemnation" he can further the advancement of focus groups for churches with his
foundation as well as potential converts in the growing boom of ex-gay ministries to which Hawley perceptively pries:
There are other questions Marin simply avoids altogether, such as whether homosexuality is a choice. "In order to not put off half my foundation, I will never say an opinion on that," he says. He also refuses to say if he believes gays can go straight. "I'm not going to pick a side," he says. "That said--have I seen people change? Yes, I have. Have I seen people not change? Yes, I have. Do I think that people who do change just drop all thoughts of homosexuality? No. I think that will be with them for their entire life."
I think if we turn to an earlier part of the article where Marin "self-describes" himself as straight, white, etc. and view his conflicted, though...uh...convicted, back story and then realize perhaps it isn't about those around this person but, if you read this
bio it is about himself. Perhaps.
What I could have used some more of is a direct address of where scripturally these people get off thinking that there is at all a possibility of homosexuality not being compatible with Christianity? When the actual word ' homosexual' never appears in the 66 books of the Christian Bible. Jesus never mentions it, though he has a lot to say about divorce (Matt. 19:1-12). I think the demographic of the GLBT community needs to be intensely wary of individuals like Marin who are a slighter shade different than the
Culture Campaign and who associate so closely with people like Pastor Erwin Lutzer of the Moody Church (affiliated with the Bible Institute) who claimed in his book "The Truth About Same-Sex Marriage" that gay marriage is:
"the most damaging social experiment to ever be attempted in this country... If God's people do not act now, it might be too late."
Not being gay myself, but a supporter of GLBT rights, and a (reluctant) somewhat-Christian of the (obviously) liberal persuasion I am concerned about these issues and the movement of evangelical groups toward this percieved middle. Which is a position of less verbal judgement and misty equivocations - strange for such a successfully polarizing issue in the past for Conservatives. I would hope reports like Hawley's can lay bare these movements, and their shady operators for we certainly won't forget their polarizing effect on these issues. Especially when they don't want to put off half their foundation. Heaven forbid you have to clarify.