Last week, I was meeting a friend of mine for coffee at a local restaurant. I’ve been going there for quite some time and it is a gathering place for many of the local retired individuals to meet and visit and laugh. I was early and took a booth, waiting for her to arrive. Near me, were two occupied tables – the adjoining booth containing four ladies that I did not know and a table with two men that I do know. All of the individuals were roughly the age of my parents…around 70. The ladies were carrying on a quiet conversation and generally having a good time. The two gentlemen (and you will never again hear me refer to them as such) were also carrying on a conversation, albeit much louder than the ladies, and much more boisterous.
As I sat waiting for my friend to arrive, I couldn’t help but hear the conversation that was going on between these two men. It was difficult for the entire restaurant not to hear it. I know both of these men; I know that they are fine, up-standing, God-fearing, church going men. However, the afternoon that I am speaking of really made me sit up and take notice of them…and change my opinion of them drastically.
I listened, as they first started in on politics. This didn’t surprise me, as that is general fodder in a coffee shop. Then I listened in horror as these two men started telling demeaning, vulgar and very graphic, gut wrenching jokes about women. I glanced up from the newspaper that I was reading to see the horror-stricken faces of two of the ladies in the adjoining booth. They were obviously offended – I was offended. But it did not stop. It continued to get worse and the men got louder and more graphic with their jokes – trying to ‘one-up’ each other in their vulgarity, lewdness and increase the shock value of what they were saying. The ladies became visibly more uncomfortable, stopped eating and signaled for the waitress to bring their checks. They left – leaving half-eatenmeals, paying and vacating the restaurant so quickly that you would have thought that it was on fire.
I was horrified. I couldn’t believe that I had just witnessed this.
But it wasn’t over.
The next thing I knew, the jokes about gay people started. I am not easily offended and often can laugh off a lot of what’s being said – even when it hurts. However, this was just as offensive and tasteless, lewd and vulgar, horrifying and gut wrenching as the jokes they had told about women. I sat quietly, reading (or pretending to read) my newspaper as the jokes turned to hate-filled rhetoric based on Biblical passages and Christianity. I was stunned. These men I know, whom I have seen attending church (and don’t worry, I’m not naming a church and you will have a hard time figuring out which one as I have played in several churches in this town), began spouting off about (expletive) gay people (not the term they used) and what should be done to them. That they should be put to death, like all the (expletive) persons of color (again, not the term they used). That they should all (expletive) die of AIDS. I listened as the old, tried-and-true, Bible verses were trotted out, defending their stance.
I didn’t move. I was too stunned. Frankly, I was somewhat frightened.
I didn’t realize that I had been holding my breath in an effort to keep from shaking. I didn’t know it until the waitress approached me, nervously eyeing the men over her shoulder, to see if I needed more coffee. I nodded, releasing my breath, and she poured the coffee and quickly retreated to the kitchen. The men continued.
Thankfully, before my friend arrived, they left. A flood of emotions hit me in a matter of seconds: relief, anger, shock, pain, horror…you name it - I felt it. I felt every emotion but one: hatred.
You see, in Leviticus (that lovely book that many Christians trot out to justify their hatred and judgment of so many), also contains on every crucial verse. “Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against a fellow Israelite, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.” – Leviticus 19:18. While I may not have liked what they were saying, while it made me uncomfortable…I could not stoop to their level of hatred. I, too, am a Christian and was taught to“love others as yourself”.
In this town, the town that I have grown to love and call home, a town that according to the Internet, has 40 plus churches - this is was the second time that I have experienced hatred this year. And I could not believe that this was coming from, fine Christian persons. The other time I experienced hatred for who I am, is when I found out that a ‘friend’, also a Christian and very active in their church, a ‘friend’ that I’ve had in my own home on many occasions – HATES people that are gay. I view that ‘friend’ in a much different light now, but I do not HATE them.
We go to church because we are ALL sinners, not saints. Just because there is something about me that is ‘different’ from you makes me no less a human being. My sin is my sin…and your sin is your sin. Jesus himself said, when speaking of the woman caught in the act of adultery: “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” – John 8:7b.
What’s the bottom line here? What’s my point? I guess there are two points to this. One – as hatred is spewed in the name of God it should be remembered that God doesn’t condone hatred of anyone; and, Two – we are ALL sinners. Jesus died and rose again that we may be forgiven of our sins – those we have committed and those that we have YET to commit and that we might have everlasting life.
And the bottom line? – It doesn’t matter who you are: we are ALL God’s children and deserving of love and compassion just as the Bible instructs. And we should remember that HATRED is ALSO a sin.
Like the old Sunday school song says:
“Oh, be careful little mouth what you say.
Oh, be careful little mouth what you say.
For the Father up above is looking down in LOVE,
So, be careful little mouth what you say."
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